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The purles of youthfull bloud and bowles,

Lust in the robes of love,

The idle task of feav'rish souls
Sick with a scarf or glove;

Let it suffice my warmer days
Simper'd and shin'd on you;
Twist not my cypresse with your bays,
Or roses with my yewgh.

Go, go, seek out some greener thing;
It snows and freezeth here;
Let nightingales attend the spring;
Winter is all my year.

SON-DAYES.

BRIGHT shadows of true rest! some shoots of blisse;
Heaven once a week;

The next world's gladnesse prepossest in this;
A day to seek ;

Eternity in time; the steps by which

We climb above all ages; lamps that light

Man through his heap of dark days; and the rich And full redemption of the whole week's flight!

II.

The pulleys unto headlong map;, time's bower;
The narrow way;

Transplanted paradise; God's walking houre;
The cool o'th' day!

The creature's jubile; God's parle with dust; Heaven here; man on those hills of myrrh and flowres ;

Angels descending; the returns of trust;
A gleam of glory after six-days-showres!

III.

The churche's love-feasts; time's prerogative,
And interest

Deducted from the whole; the combs and hive,
And home of rest.

The milky way chalkt out with suns; a clue,
That guides through erring hours; and in full story
A taste of heav'n on earth; the pledge and cue
Of a full feast; and the out-courts of glory.

REPENTANCE.

LORD, since thou didst in this vile clay
That sacred ray,

Thy Spirit, plant, quickning the whole
With that one grain's infused wealth,
My forward flesh crept on; and subtly stole
Both growth and power; checking the health

And heat of thine: that little gate

And narrow way, by which to thee

The passage is, he term'd a grate

And entrance to captivitie;

Thy laws but nets, where some small birds,
And those but seldome too, were caught;
Thy promises but empty words,

Which none but children heard or taught.
This I believed; and, though a friend
Came oft from far, and whisper'd, No;
Yet, that not sorting to my end,

I wholy listen'd to my foe.
Wherefore, pierc'd through with grief, my sad
Seduced soul sighs up to thee;

To thee, who with true light art clad,
And seest all things just as they be.
Look from thy throne upon this roll
Of heavy sins, my high transgressions,
Which I confesse with all my soul;
My God, accept of my confession!

It was last day,

Touch'd with the guilt of my own way,
I sate alone; and taking up

The bitter cup,

Through all thy fair and various store,
Sought out what might outvie my score.

The blades of grasse thy creatures feeding;
The trees, their leafs; the flowres, their seeding;

The dust, of which I am a part;

The stones much softer than my heart;

The drops of rain, the sighs of wind,

The stars to which I am stark blind;

The dew thy herbs drink up by night,

The beams they warm them at i'th' light:
All that have signature or life

I summon'd to decide this strife;
And lest I should lack for arrears,
A spring ran by, I told her tears;
But when these came unto the scale,
My sins alone outweigh'd them all.

O my dear God! my life, my love!
Most blessed Lamb! and mildest Dove!
Forgive your penitent offender,
And no more his sins remember;
Scatter these shades of death, and give
Light to my soul, that it may live;
Cut me not off for my transgressions,
Wilful rebellions, and suppressions;
But give them in those streams a part
Whose spring is in my Saviour's heart.
Lord, I confesse the heynous score,
And pray I may do so no more;
Though then all sinners I exceed;
O think on this,―thy Son did bleed !
O call to mind his wounds, his woes,
His agony, and bloudie throes;
Then look on all that thou hast made,
And mark how they do fail and fade;
The heavens themselves, though fair and bright,
Are dark and unclean in thy sight;

K

How then, with thee, can man be holy,
Who doest thine angels charge with folly?
O what am I, that I should breed
Figs on a thorne, flowres on a weed?
I am the gourd of sin and sorrow,
Growing o'er night, and gone to-morrow.
In all this round of life and death,
Nothing's more vile than is my breath;
Profanenes on my tongue doth rest,
Defects and darkness in my brest;
Pollutions all my body wed,

And even my soul to thee is dead;
Only in Him on whom I feast,
Both soul and body are well drest;
His pure perfection quits all score;
And fills the boxes of his poor;
He is the center of long life and light;
I am but finite, He is infinite.

O let thy justice then in him confine;
And through his merits make thy mercy mine!

THE BURIAL OF AN INFANT.

BLEST infant-bud, whose blossome-life
Did only look about, and fall,
Wearyed out in a harmless strife
Of tears, and milk, the food of all!

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