Fraud and Deceit love only night,
  Their wiles they practise out of sight;
  Curtained by dark, Adultery too
  Doth his foul treachery pursue,

  But slinks abashed and shamed away
  Soon as the sun rekindles day,
  For none can damning light resist
  And ’neath its rays in sin persist.

  Who doth not blush o’ertook by morn
  And his long night’s carousal scorn? 
  For day subdues the lustful soul,
  And doth all foul desires control.

  Now each to earnest life awakes,
  Now each his wanton sport forsakes;
  Now foolish things are put away
  And gravity resumes her sway.

  It is the hour for duty’s deeds,
  The path to which our labour leads,
  Be it the forum, army, sea,
  The mart or field or factory.

  One seeks the plaudits of the bar,
  One the stern trumpet calls to war: 
  Those bent on trade and husbandry
  At greed’s behest for lucre sigh.

  Mine is no rhetorician’s fame,
  No petty usury I claim;
  Nor am I skilled to face the foe: 
  ’Tis Thou, O Christ, alone I know.

  Yea, I have learnt to wait on Thee
  With heart and lips of purity,
  Humbly my knees in prayer to bend,
  And tears with songs of praise to blend.

  These are the gains I hold in view
  And these the arts that I pursue: 
  These are the offices I ply
  When the bright sun mounts up the sky.

  Prove Thou my heart, my every thought,
  Search into all that I have wrought: 
  Though I be stained with blots within,
  Thy quickening rays shall purge my sin.

  O may I ever spotless be
  As when my stains were cleansed by Thee,
  Who bad’st me ’neath the Jordan’s wave
  Of yore my soiled spirit lave.

  If e’er since then the world’s gross night
  Hath cast its curtain o’er my sight,
  Dispel the cloud, O King of grace,
  Star of the East! with thy pure face.

  Since Thou canst change, O holy Light,
  The blackest hue to milky white,
  Ebon to clearness crystalline,
  Wash my foul stains and make me clean.

  ’Twas ’neath the lonely star-blue night
  That Jacob waged the unequal fight,
  Stoutly he wrestled with the Man
  In darkness, till the day began.

  And when the sun rose in the sky
  He halted on his shrivelled thigh: 
  His natural might had ebbed away,
  Vanquished in that tremendous fray.

  Not wounded he in nobler part
  Nor smitten in life’s fount, the heart: 
  But lust was shaken from his throne
  And his foul empire overthrown.

  Whereby we clearly learn aright
  That man is whelmed by deadly night,
  Unless he own God conqueror
  And strive against His will no more.

  Yet happier he whom rising morn
  Shall find of nature’s strength forlorn,
  Whose warring flesh hath shrunk away,
  Palsied by virtue’s puissant sway.