Hymns of the Eastern Church: Theodore of the Studium: Canon for Apocreos. Ode IX
Hymns of the Eastern Church, by J.M. Neale, [1884]
Canon for Apocreos
by Theodore of the Studium
Ὁ Κύριος ἔρχεται.
The Lord draws nigh, the righteous Throne's Assessor,
The just to save, to punish the transgressor:
Weep we, and mourn, and pray,
Regardful of that day;
When all the secrets of all hearts shall be
Lit with the blaze of full eternity.
Clouds and thick darkness o’er the Mount assembling,
Moses beheld the Eternal's glory, trembling:
And yet he might but see
God's feebler Majesty. p. 182
And I—I needs must view His fullest Face:
O spare me, Lord! O take me to Thy grace!
David of old beheld, in speechless terror,
The session of the Judge—the doom of error:
And what have I to plead
For mercy in my need?
Nothing save this: O grant me yet to be,
Ere that day come, renewed and true to Thee!
Here, fires of deep damnation roar and glitter:
The worm is deathless, and the cup is bitter:
There, day that hath no morrow,
And joy that hath no sorrow:
And who so blest that he shall fly the abyss,
Rais’d up to God'S Right Hand, and speechless bliss!
My soul with many an act of sin is wounded:
With mortal weakness is my frame surrounded: p. 183
My life is well nigh o’er:
The Judge is at the door
How wilt thou, miserable spirit, fare,
What time He sends His summons through the air?