#25Armageddon

HOSANNAH! Hark, the melody, Strikes sweetly on my ravish'd ear; The constellations make reply In echoes from each distant sphere, Till all the wide expansion rings With "live for ever, King of kings."

He comes! Ho comes! The heavens rend! Floods clap your hands! Ye mountains joy! Forests in glad obeisance bend! Earth, raise your hallelujahs high; Let Zion wake the lofty strain– "Live, King of kings! For ever reign!"

Ripe is the vintage of the earth; Its clustering grapes are round and full; And vengeance, vengeance bursts to birth, Sudden and irresistible! Messiah comes to tread the plain, The wine-press of the battle-plain.

The cry is up, the strife begun, The struggle of the mighty ones; And Armageddon's day comes on, The carnival of slaughter's sons; War lifts his helmet to his brow: O God, protect thy people now!

Assemble quickly fowls of air! Come to the supper of the Lord: The great ones of the earth prepare To reap the harvest of the sword; And captains' flesh shall be your food, And ye shall drink of heroes' blood.

Yea, come, O king, and take the spoil; With thy confederates share the prey: Ha! Ha! Death grins a ghastly smile; The morning dawns–and where are they? The flames, the flames, great Autocrat, Spread o'er thee in Jehoshaphat.

The graves are cleav'd! the saints arise! The resurrection of the just! And now, unto their kindred skies, Up leap the tenants of the dust! They rise to meet their Lord in air, And tune their hallelujahs there.