But now I die ; now all is finished.
My woe, man's weal: and now I bow my head :
Only let others say, when I am dead,

Never was grief like mine.

THE THANKSGIVING.

O King of grief! (a title strange, yet true,

To thee of all kings only due)
O King of wounds! how shall I grieve for thee,

Who in all grief preventest me?
Shall I weep blood ? why, thou hast wept such store,

That all thy body was one door. Shall I be scourged, flouted, boxed, sold ?

'Tis but to tell the tale is told.
My God, my God, why dost thou part from me ?

Was such a grief as cannot be.
Shall I then sing, skipping, thy doleful story,

And side with thy triumphant glory?
Shall thy strokes be my stroking ? thorns, my flower ?

Thy rod, my posie? cross, my bower? But how then shall I imitate thee, and

Copy thy fair, though bloody hand ? Surely I will revenge me on thy love,

And try who shall victorious prove. .
If thou dost give me wealth ; I will restore

All back unto thee by the poor.
If thou dost give me honour; men shall see,

The honour doth belong to thee.
I will not marry ; or, if she be mine,

She and her children shall be thine. My bosom-friend, if he blaspheme thy name,

I will tear thence his love and fame.

One half of me being gone, the rest I give

Unto some Chapel, die or live. As for thy passion—but of that anon,

When with the other I have done. For thy predestination, I'll contrive,

That three years hence, if I survive, I'll build a spital, or mend common ways,

But mend my own without delays. Then I will use the works of thy creation,

As if I used them but for fashion. The world and I will quarrel ; and the year

Shall not perceive, that I am here. My music shall find thee, and every string

Shall have his attribute to sing ; That altogether may accord in thee,

And prove one God, one harmony. If thou shalt give me wit, it shall appear,

If thou hast given it me, 'tis here. Nay, I will read thy book, and never move

Till I have found therein thy love;
Thy art of love, which I'll turn back on thee,

O my dear Saviour, Victory!
Then for thy passion-I will do for that,

Alas ! my God, I know not what.

TH TE

I HAVE consider'd it, and find
There is no dealing with thy mighty passion :
For though I die for thee, I am behind ;

My sins deserve the condemnation.

To

O make me innocent, that I
May give a disentangled state and free;
And yet thy wounds still my attempts defy,

For by thy death I die for thee.

Ah! was it not enough that thou
By thy eternal glory didst outgo me ?
Could'st thou not grief's sad conquests me allow,

But in all victories overthrow me?

Yet by confession will I come
Into the conquest. Though I can do nought
Against thee, in thee I will overcome

The man, who once against thee fought.

THE AGONY.

PHILOSOPHERS have measured mountains, Fathom'd the depths of seas, of states, and kings, Walk'd with a staff to heaven, and traced fountains :

a

But there are two vast, spacious things,
The which to measure it doth more behove :
Yet few there are that sound them; Sin and Love.

;

Who would know Sin, let him repair
Unto Mount Olivet; there shall he see
A man, so wrung with pains, that all his hair,

His skin, his garments, bloody be.
Sin is that Press and Vice, which forceth pain
To hunt his cruel food through every vein.

Who knows not Love, let him assay,
And taste that juice, which on the cross a pike
Did set again abroach ; then let him say

.
If ever he did taste the like.
Love is that liquor sweet and most divine,
Which my God feels as blood ; but I, as wine.

THE SINNER.

LORD, how I am all ague, when I seek

What I have treasured in my memory!

Since, if my soul make even with the week,
Each seventh note by right is due to thee.

3

I find there quarries of piled vanities,

But shreds of holiness, that dare not venture

To show their face, since cross to thy decrees :
There the circumference earth is, heaven the centre.

In so much dregs the quintessence is small :

The spirit and good extract of my heart
Comes to about the

many

hundredth part. Yet, Lord, restore thine image, hear my call :

And though my hard heart scarce to thee can groan,
Remember that thou once didst write in stone.

GOOD FRIDAY.

O my chief good,
How shall I measure out thy blood ?
How shall I count what thee befell,

And each grief tell?

Shall I thy woes Number according to thy foes? Or, since one star show'd thy first breath,

Shall all thy death ?

Or shall each leaf,
Which falls in Autumn, score a grief?
Or cannot leaves, but fruit, be sign,

Of the true vine?

Of my

Then let each hour

whole life one grief devour ; That thy distress through all may run,

And be my sun.

Or rather let
My several sins their sorrows get;
That, as each beast his cure doth know,

Each sin may so.

SINCE blood is fittest, Lord, to write
Thy sorrows in, and bloody fight;
My heart hath store ; write there, where in
One box doth lie both ink and sin:

C