This meditation has as it motto:

²¹ His lord said unto him, Well done, thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord. 

Matthew 25:21 (KJV) 

It is a telling line of a parable by Jesus given shortly before he is arrested and killed:

¹⁴ “For it will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted to them his property. ¹⁵ To one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability. Then he went away. ¹⁶ He who had received the five talents went at once and traded with them, and he made five talents more. ¹⁷ So also he who had the two talents made two talents more. 

¹⁸ But he who had received the one talent went and dug in the ground and hid his master’s money. 

¹⁹ Now after a long time the master of those servants came and settled accounts with them. ²⁰ And he who had received the five talents came forward, bringing five talents more, saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me five talents; here, I have made five talents more.’ ²¹ His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’ 

²² And he also who had the two talents came forward, saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me two talents; here, I have made two talents more.’ ²³ His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’ 

²⁴ He also who had received the one talent came forward, saying, ‘Master, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you scattered no seed, ²⁵ so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here, you have what is yours.’ ²⁶ But his master answered him, ‘You wicked and slothful servant! You knew that I reap where I have not sown and gather where I scattered no seed? ²⁷ Then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers, and at my coming I should have received what was my own with interest. ²⁸ So take the talent from him and give it to him who has the ten talents. ²⁹ For to everyone who has will more be given, and he will have an abundance. But from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away. ³⁰ And cast the worthless servant into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ 

Matthew 25:14–30 (ESV) 

The “talents” refers to a measure of weight not a skill. The Master is without question the Lord. God has appointed different gifts (hence the English language pun on “talent”) to different persons.  Leon Morris explains the verse in question as follows:

His master commended this servant. First he says simply, “Well,” which we normally put into English with “Well done,” but which could be taken in some such sense as “It is well.” Or we could understand it as an interjection, “Bravo!” (BDF 102[3]). However we take it, it is a mark of approval. This is something the master understands and approves. He goes on to salute the servant as good and faithful, an expression that approves both his character and his diligence; he had been all that the master expected (Cassirer translates, “excellent and trustworthy servant”). The master goes on to develop the thought of faithfulness. The servant, he says, has been faithful over a few things. Clearly Jesus wants his hearers to understand that the master was a very rich man. While we do not know exactly how much five talents were worth in our money, it seems clear that it was a considerable sum. But the master can speak of it as no more than a few things. Now that the servant has proved himself in what the master regards as a comparatively lowly piece of service, further doors of opportunity will be opened to him. “I will appoint you over many things” indicates that the faithful servant will be rewarded with a position that will give him more scope for the use of the abilities that he has shown he possesses. Once again Jesus is teaching that the reward for good work is the opportunity of doing further work. “Enter the joy of your master” may be understood in the sense of REB, “share your master’s joy.” Whether that is the way to take it or not, it clearly means that the servant has received the warm approval of his master and that his future is one in which joy will be prominent.

Leon Morris, The Gospel according to Matthew, The Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI; Leicester, England: W.B. Eerdmans; Inter-Varsity Press, 1992), 629.

This poem can be read as a warning or an invitation.  The invitation is apparent, We are offered joy, the joy of the Lord himself. Such an offer should inflame our love and hope. What could be greater than the joy of God. If we truly loved ourselves and loved the effulgence of joy, this offer would overwhelm us and direct our hearts:

By dying to ourselves is not to be understood a choosing that which is to our own hurt, as it were not to love ourselves. The true Christian is furthest of all from that, for none consults his own happiness so much as he that lives to Christ. ’Tis the wicked man that loves his own death and chooses it before life, and runs himself like a fool into his own destruction and ruin, into his own eternal misery.

Jonathan Edwards, “Living to Christ and Dying to Gain,” in Sermons and Discourses, 1720–1723, ed. Wilson H. Kimnach and Harry S. Stout, vol. 10, The Works of Jonathan Edwards (New Haven; London: Yale University Press, 1992), 569.

Taylor weighs his love and the joy set before him, and it makes no sense:

When I Lord eye thy joy and my love, small

My heart gives in.

The desire for this joy, this offer of joy should pull me along! But I look at my love of Christ and I do not find a desire which matches the offer.  We would wonder at a child being offered a party or a prize or a day at the beach who is unconcerned. The joy which we are offered is far greater than anything offered to a child, but when the best of us looks at his own heart does he see a desire which matches the offer?

my love, small

How discouraging. There is implicit fear here also. If his love is so small, is he the third servant who simply buries the talent?

The sounds First, the “I”, “my,” “eye” (look at) “thy.” Second, the L’s of Lord/love/small. The second line ends with a closed sound of an “n” and the pause of a period. 

The jagged pauses which make one move slowly through the first line

When I ** Lord   ** eye*  thy joy ** and my love, ** small which collapses with greater speed when contrasted with the stops of the first line:

My heart gives in.

Where then can the poem go? We pause with far or despair—there is nothing in this line and a half to encourage a march on to the end. He has seemingly given up.

But he does not give up completely, though he does wonder at himself:

What now? Strange! Sure I love thee!

This makes no sense, I must love you. The perplexity here is interesting. He does not directly address his emotions, because then the line would be something along the line, I do in fact love you.  Rather this is the perplexity of reasoning, this makes no sense. I should love you. I have every reason to love you. I hope that I love you. But do not actually find love here. This is strange. Let me look around. I am certain I will find love in her somewhere.

And so he searches. But he finds nothing of love. He finds weeds. Weeds, of course, being the natural produce of the ground after the Fall. No one must work to grow weeds, they grow of themselves. It is flowers and food which takes work. But all things left to themselves will naturally decay and brambles naturally grow:

And finding brambles ‘bout my heart to crawl

So he looks back to his heart. At first it gave in. Then he searched again for love and found only brambles:

My heart misgives me.

What confidence can he have in such a heart. It is offered the greatest joy and does not produce the greatest love. He searches around in his heart, looking for love and finds it misplaced. It clings onto lesser things but has nothing which is fit for the one who should be loved:

Such great love hugging them, such small love, thee.

His love clings onto trifles and so little left for Christ. What a self-indictment. He is testifying against himself. I have sought my heart for love and found love clinging to that which is not you. You have offered me joy unspeakable and what do I have for you?

Whether thou hast my love, I scare can see.

I can barely see any evidence of love for you. Things which I have in sensible present possession I cling to. I hug them without effort. But that which is far greater, that which is of infinite value and should cause infinite joy. I cannot find it. It is so faint, I scare can see any.

This has within it, as is seen from the parable, a veiled warning. Infinite joy is there for the asking. But I refuse to receive it, it will be an infinite woe. Consider then the final line of this stanza

Whether thou hast my love, I scare can see.