Where are thy palms, thy branches, and thy verse? Hosanna! heark! why doest thou stay?

Arise ! arise ! And with his healing bloud anoint thine eyes,

Thy inward eyes ; His bloud will cure thy mind, Whose spittle only could restore the blind.

EASTER HYMN.

DEATH and darkness, get you packing!
Nothing nov to man is lacking;
All your triumphs now are ended,
And what Adam marr'd is mended;
Graves are beds now for the weary,
Death a nap, to wake more merry;
Youth now, full of pious duty,
Seeks in thee for perfect beauty;
The weak and aged, tir'd with length
Of daies, from thee look for new strength;
And infants with thy pangs contest
As pleasant as if with the brest.

Then unto Him who thus hath thrown,
Even to contempt, thy kingdome down,
And by his blood did us advance
Unto his own inheritance,
To Him be glory, power, praise,
From this unto the last of daies !

THE HOLY COMMUNION.

WELCOME sweet, sacred feast ! O welcome life!

Dead I was, and deep in trouble ;
But

grace and blessings came with thee so rife,
That they have quicken'd even drie stubble.
Thus soules their bodies animate,
And thus at first when things were rude,

Dark, void, and crude,
They by thy word their beauty had and date

All were by thee,

And still must be ;
Nothing that is or lives
But hath his quicknings and reprieves,
As thy hand opes or shuts ;

Healings and cuts,
Darkness and daylight, life and death,
Are but meer leaves turn'd by thy breath

Spirits without thee die,

And blackness sits

On the divinest wits,
As on the sun ecclipses lie.
But that great darkness at thy death,
When the veyl broke with thy last breath,

Did make us see
The way to thee;

And now by these sure, sacred ties,

After thy blood
Our sov'rain good,
Had clear'd our eies,

And given us sight;
Thou dost unto thyself betroth

Our souls and bodies both
In everlasting light.

Was't not enough that thou hadst payd the price,

And given us eies
When we had none, but thou must also take

Us by the hand,
And keep us still awake,

When we would sleep,

Or from thee creep,
Who without thee cannot stand ?

Was't not enough to lose thy breath
And blood by an accursed death,

But thou must also leave

To us, that did bereave
Thee of them both, these seals, the means

That should both cleanse
And keep us so,

Who wrought thy wo?
O rose of Sharon ! O the lilly

Of the valley !
How art thou now, thy flock to keep,
Become both food, and Shepheard to thy sheep!

PSALM CXXI.

UP to those bright and gladsome hills, Whence flowes

my

weal and mirth, I look, and sigh for Him who fills

Unseen both heaven and earth.

He is alone my help and hope,

That I shall not be moved ; His watchful eye

is ever ope, And guardeth his beloved.

The glorious God is my sole stay,

He is my sun and shade :
The cold by night, the heat by day,

Neither shall me invade.

He keeps me from the spite of foes ;

Doth all their plots controul ; And is a shield, not reckoning those,

Unto my very soul.

Whether abroad amidst the crowd,

Or else within my door,
He is my pillar and my cloud,

Now and for evermore.

AFFLICTION.

PEACE, peace: it is not so. Thou dost miscall

Thy physick; pills that change

Thy sick accessions into setled health ;
This is the great elixir that turns gall
To wine and sweetness, poverty to wealth,

And brings man home when he doth range.
Did not He who ordain’d the day,

Ordain night too ?
And in the greater world display

What in the lesser he would do ?
All flesh is clay, thou know'st; and but that God

Doth use his rod,
And by a fruitfull change of frosts and showres

Cherish and bind thy pow'rs,
Thou wouldst to weeds and thistles quite disperse,

And be more wild than is thy verse.
Sickness is wholsome, crosses are but curbs

To check the mule, unruly man ;
They are heaven's husbandry, the famous fan,

Purging the floor which chaff disturbs.
Were all the year one constant sun-shine, wee

Should have no flowres ;
All would be drought and leanness; not a tree

Would make us bowres.
Beauty consists in colours ; and that's best

Which is not fixt, but flies and flowes.
The settled red is dull, and whites that rest

Something of sickness would disclose.

L