Reverence
by Venerable John Henry Newman

I bow at Jesu's name, for 'tis the Sign
Of awful mercy towards a guilty line.
Of shameful ancestry, in birth defiled,
And upwards from a child
Full of unlovely thoughts and rebel aims
And scorn of judgment-flames,
How without fear can I behold my Life,
The Just assailing sin, and death-stain'd in the
strife?

And so, albeit His woe is our release,
Thought of that woe aye dims our earthly peace;
The Life is hidden in a Fount of Blood!
And this is tidings good
For souls, who, pierced that they have caused
that woe,
Are fain to share it too:
But for the many, clinging to their lot
Of worldly ease and sloth, 'tis written "Touch Me
not."

Off Monte Pelegrino.
June 14, 1833