Israel, in an­cient days,
Not on­ly had a view
Of Si­nai in a blaze,
But learned the Gos­pel too:
The types and fig­ures were a glass,
In which they saw the Sav­ior’s face.

The pas­chal sac­ri­fice,
And blood-be­sprink­led door,
Seen with en­light­ened eyes,
And once ap­plied with pow­er,
Would teach the need of oth­er blood,
To re­con­cile an ang­ry God.

The lamb, the dove, set forth
His per­fect in­no­cence,
Whose blood of match­less worth
Should be the soul’s de­fense;
For He who can for sin atone,
Must have no fail­ings of His own.

The scape­goat on his head
The peo­ple’s tres­pass bore,
And, to the des­ert led,
Was to be seen no more;
In him our sure­ty seemed to say,
Behold I bear your sins away.

Dipped in his fel­low’s blood,
The liv­ing bird went free:
The type, well un­der­stood,
Expressed the sin­ner’s plea—
Described the guil­ty soul en­larged,
And by the Sav­ior’s death dis­charged.

Jesus, I love to trace
Throughout the sac­red page,
The foot­steps of Thy grace,
The same in ev­ery age!
O grant that I may faith­ful be
To clear­er light vouch­safed to me!