The Poetry Corner

Ecclesiastical Sonnets - Part III. - XX - Baptism

By William Wordsworth

Dear be the Church, that, watching o'er the needs Of Infancy, provides a timely shower Whose virtue changes to a Christian Flower A Growth from sinful Nature's bed of weeds! Fitliest beneath the sacred roof proceeds The ministration; while parental Love Looks on, and Grace descendeth from above As the high service pledges now, now pleads. There, should vain thoughts outspread their wings and fly To meet the coming hours of festal mirth, The tombs which hear and answer that brief cry, The Infant's notice of his second birth Recall the wandering Soul to sympathy With what man hopes from Heaven, yet fears from Earth.