On the Death of an Infant

Dirk Smits (1702–1752)

From the Dutch by H. S. Van Dyk

A HOST of angels flying,

Through cloudless skies impelled,

Upon the earth beheld

A pearl of beauty lying,

Worthy to glitter bright

In heaven’s vast hall of light.

They saw, with glances tender,

An infant newly born,

O’er whom life’s earliest morn

Just cast its opening splendor;

Virtue it could not know,

Nor vice, nor joy, nor woe.

The blest angelic legion,

Greeted its birth above,

And came, with looks of love,

From heaven’s enchanting region;

Bending their wingèd way

To where the infant lay.

They spread their pinions o’er it,—

That little pearl which shone

With lustre all its own,—

And then on high they bore it,

Where glory has its birth;—

But left the shell on earth.