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Dear Lord! restore thy ancient peace,

Thy quikning friendship, man's bright wealth! And, if thou wilt not give me ease

From sicknesse, give my spirit health!

PALM-SUNDAY.

COME, drop your branches, strow the way,

Plants of the day!

Whom sufferings make most green

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The King of grief, the Man of sorrow,

Weeping still like the wet morrow,

Your shades and freshness comes to borrow.

Put on, put on your best array;
Let the joy'd road make holy-day,
And flowers, that into fields do stray

Or secret groves, keep the high-way.

Trees, flowers, and herbs; birds, beasts, and stones, That since man fell expect with groans

To see the Lamb, come all at once,

Lift up your heads and leave your moans!
For here comes He

Whose death will be

Man's life, and your full liberty.

Hark! how the children, shrill and high,

Hosanna cry;

Their joys provoke the distant skie,
Where thrones and seraphins reply;
And their own angels shine and sing
In a bright ring:

Such yong, sweet mirth
Makes heaven and earth

Joyn in a joyful symphony.

The harmless, yong, and happy ass,
Seen long before* this came to pass,
Is in these joys an high partaker,
Ordain'd and made to bear his Maker.

Dear feast of palms, of flowers and dew! Whose fruitful dawn sheds hopes and lights; Thy bright solemnities did shew,

The third glad day through two sad nights.

I'll get me up before the sun,

I'll cut me boughs off many a tree,

And all alone full early run

To gather flowers to wellcome thee.

Then, like the palm, though wronged I'll bear; I will be still a childe, still meek

As the poor ass, which the proud jear,

And onely my dear Jesus seek.

Zech. ix. 9.

If I lose all, and must endure

The proverb'd griefs of holy Job,

I care not, so I may secure

But one green branch and a white robe.

JESUS WEEPING.

St. Luke, xix. 41.

BLESSED, unhappy city! dearly lov'd,

But still unkinde! Art this day nothing mov'd?
Art senseless still? O can'st thou sleep
When God himself for thee doth weep?
Stiff-necked Jews! your father's breed
That serv'd the calf, not Abr'am's seed,
Had not the babes hosanna cryed,
The stones had spoke what you denyed.

Dear Jesus, weep on! pour this latter
Soul-quickning rain, this living water,
On their dead hearts; but (O my fears!)
They will drink blood that despise tears.
My dear, bright Lord! my Morning-star!
Shed this live-dew on fields which far
From hence long for it! shed it there,
Where the starv'd earth groans for one tear!

This land, tho' with thy heart's blest extract fed, Will nothing yield but thorns to wound thy head.

THE DAUGHTER OF HERODIAS.

St. Matthew, xiv. 6, &c.

VAIN, sinful art! who first did fit
Thy lewd, loath'd motions unto sounds,
And made grave musique, like wilde wit,
Erre in loose airs beyond her bounds,

What fires hath he heap'd on his head!
Since to his sins, as needs it must,
His art adds still, though he be dead,
New fresh accounts of blood and lust.

Leave, then,* yong sorceress; the ice
Will those coy spirits cast asleep,
Which teach thee now to pleaset his eyes
Who doth thy lothsome mother keep.

But thou hast pleas'd so well, he swears,
And gratifies thy sin with vows;
His shameless lust in publick wears,
And to thy soft arts strongly bows.

Skilful inchantress! and true bred!
Who out of evil can bring forth good!
Thy mother's nets in thee were spred:
She tempts to incest, thou to blood.

* Her name was Salome. In passing over a frozen river, the ice broke under her, and chopt off her head.

† Herod Antipas.

JESUS WEEPING.

St. John, xi. 35.

My dear, Almighty Lord! why dost thou weep?
Why dost thou groan and groan again?
And with such deep,

Repeated sighs thy kinde heart pain?
Since the same sacred breath, which thus
Doth mourn for us,

Can make man's dead and scatter'd bones
Unite, and raise up all that dyed at once?

O holy groans! groans of the Dove!
O healing tears! the tears of love!

Dew of the dead! which makes dust move
And spring, how is't that you so sadly grieve,
Who can relieve?

Should not thy sighs refrain thy store
Of tears, and not provoke to more?
Since two afflictions may not raign

In one at one time, as some feign.
Those blasts, which o'er our heads here stray,
If showers then fall, will showers allay;
As those poor pilgrims oft have tryed,
Who in this windy world abide.

Dear Lord! thou art all grief and love;

But which thou art most, none can prove.

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