The bells themselves are the best of preachers,
Their brazen lips are learned teachers,
From their pulpits read more

The bells themselves are the best of preachers,
Their brazen lips are learned teachers,
From their pulpits of stone, in the upper air,
Sounding aloft, without crack or flaw,
Shriller than trumpets under the Law,
Now a sermon and now a prayer.

Hear the sledges with the bells,
Silver bells!
What a world of merriment their melody foretells!
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Hear the sledges with the bells,
Silver bells!
What a world of merriment their melody foretells!
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,
In the icy air of night,
While the stars that oversprinkle
All the Heavens seem to twinkle
With a crystalline delight:
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme
To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells
From the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells--
From the jingling and the tingling of the bells.

And this be the vocation fit,
For which the founder fashioned it;
High, high above earth's life, read more

And this be the vocation fit,
For which the founder fashioned it;
High, high above earth's life, earth's labor
E'en to the heaven's blue vault to soar.
To hover as the thunder's neighbor,
The very firmament explore.
To be a voice as from above
Like yonder stars so bright and clear,
That praise their Maker as they move,
And usher in the circling year.
Tun'd be its metal mouth alone
To things eternal and sublime.
And as the swift wing'd hours speed on
May it record the flight of time!

Around, around,
Companions all, take your ground,
And name the bell with joy profound!
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Around, around,
Companions all, take your ground,
And name the bell with joy profound!
Concordia is the world we've found
Most meet to express the harmonious sound,
That calls to those in friendship bound.

That all-softening, overpowering knell,
The tocsin of the soul--the dinner bell.

That all-softening, overpowering knell,
The tocsin of the soul--the dinner bell.

He heard the convent bell,
Suddenly in the silence ringing
For the service of noonday.

He heard the convent bell,
Suddenly in the silence ringing
For the service of noonday.

The old mayor climbed the belfry tower,
The ringers ran by two, by three;
"Pull, if ye read more

The old mayor climbed the belfry tower,
The ringers ran by two, by three;
"Pull, if ye never pulled before;
Good ringers, pull your best," quoth he.
"Play uppe, play uppe, O Boston bells!
Ply all your changes, all your swells,
Play uppe The Brides of Enderby."

Then get thee gone and dig my grave thyself,
And bid the merry bells ring to thine ear
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Then get thee gone and dig my grave thyself,
And bid the merry bells ring to thine ear
That thou are crowned, not that I am dead.

These bells have been anointed,
And baptized with holy water!

These bells have been anointed,
And baptized with holy water!