LAMENTATION OF MARY AT THE FOOT OF THE CROSS, WITH HER DEAD SON IN HER ARMS
I.
Whilst Mary’s arms her lifeless Son
Close to her bosom press’d,
Deep drawn and bitter sighs broke out
From her maternal breast ;
Long did she view with tearful eyes
His bleeding corpse, and then
In broken accents thus bewail’d
The cruelty of men.
II.
“Ah, me!” she said, “and can it be,
I’ll never more rejoice
To gaze upon thy beauteous smiles,
Or hear thy tender voice;
Alas! how throbs my sinking breast
To see Thee thus, my Son;
My heart must break, as thine has broke,
For both hearts make but one.
III.
“Gone from thy lips are those sweet
smiles
That played around them once,
Gone from thy eyes that look of love
That graced thy countenance;
I see thy face all bath’d in blood,
That face whose looks could win
The hearts of all, and even hearts
Long steep’d in loathsome sin.
IV.
“Those eyes once, like the stars of night, Shed lustre all around,
And even shone upon all those
In sin’s dark prison bound;
But now extinguished is their light,
And with thy blood suffused,
Distorted by insulting blows, And, oh! so cruelly bruised.
V.
“Oh cruel lance! Oh scourges cruel!
Oh torturing thorny crown! Why thus combine my Son’s fair form
In his own Blood to drown?
He is the King of Heaven, yet
His flesh you have ill-used,
Ah, see! His clotted Blood lies thick!
See! all his limbs are bruised.
VI.
” And Thou art dead ! Thou, whom I’ve
nursed
And kissed so many times;
Man! thou hast conquered, sinful man!
And conquered by thy crimes;
Ah! ne’er shall I rejoice again,
Nor seek to get relief, My joy shall be in weeping, My only comfort grief.
VII.
“But say, my martyred Jesus, say
Whose sin has thus deserved
For Thee such cruel and bitter pangs;
For Thee! th’ Eternal Word.
Ah! I know well, my Jesus, yes
And all earth’s creatures know,
It was the sins of guilty men That clothed Thee here below.
VIII.
“How strange to see the God of Love
So spotless and so pure,
All these sad pains for others’ sins
Thus suffer and endure;
Oh power of hell! Oh power of sin!
It seems that at thy nod,
The great and the immortal has
Become a mortal God.
“O Father! look from heaven, look
Upon thy murdered Child;
Cruel men his limbs have torn and cut;
Yet He-so meek, so mild
So like a bruised rose he lies
All crushed beneath their feet!
Yet mercy for all sinners
Through the Sinless I entreat.”
X.
Do thou, sweet Mother Mary,
Trace thy Dolours on my heart,
And make me feel most keenly Compassion’s piercing dart;
In thinking on thy sorrows,
Let me pine away in grief, Permit me not in creatures
To seek to find relief. Amen.
