HYMN OF THE WALDENSES

Hear, Father, hear thy faint afflicted flock

Cry to thee, from the desert and the rock;

While those, who seek to slay thy children, hold

Blasphemous worship under roofs of gold;

And the broad goodly lands, with pleasant airs

That nurse the grape and wave the grain, are theirs.

Yet better were this mountain wilderness,

And this wild life of danger and distress-

Watchings by night and perilous flight by day,

And meetings in the depths of earth to pray-

Better, far better, than to kneel with them,

And pay the impious rite thy laws condemn.

Thou, Lord, dost hold the thunder; the firm land

Tosses in billows when it feels thy hand;

Thou dashest nation against nation, then

Stillest the angry world to peace again.

Oh, touch their stony hearts who hunt thy sons-

The murderers of our wives and little ones.

Yet, mighty God, yet shall thy frown look forth

Unveiled, and terribly shall shake the earth.

Then the foul power of priestly sin and all

Its long-upheld idolatries shall fall.

Thou shalt raise up the trampled and oppressed,

And thy delivered saints shall dwell in rest.