When the wild turmoil of this wearisome life,

With its scenes of oppression, cor

ruption, and strife

The proud man's frown, and the base man's fear –

The scorner's laugh, and the sufferer's tear

And malice, and meanness, and falsehood and folly,

Dispose me to musing and dark melancholy;

When my bosom is full, and my thoughts are high,

And my soul is sick with the bondman's sigh

Oh! then there is freedom, and joy and pride,

Afar in the desert alone to ride! There is rapture to vault on the champing steed,

And the stars burn bright in the midnight sky,

As I sit apart by the desert stone, Like Elijah at Horeb's cave, alone, "A still small voice" comes through the wild

(Like a father consoling his fretful child),

Which banishes bitterness, wrath, and fear,

round me sigh,

near!