Note 58, Chapter 5 of the author's Christina Rossetti in Context which the University of North Carolina Press published in 1988. It appears in the Victorian web with the kind permission of the author, who of course retains copyright.
These biblical allusions are:
Line 3: Without Whose Will one lily doth not stand. Matt. 6:28-29 And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: and yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. Line 4: Nor sparrow fall at his appointed date; Matt. 10:29 Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing: and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. Line 5: Who numbereth the innumerable sand, Ps. 139:18 If I should count them, they are more in number than the sand; when I wake, I am still with thee. Line 6: Who weighs the wind and water with a weight. Job 28:25 To make the weight for the winds; and he weigheth the waters by measure.
Last modified 24 June 2007