Hearken! under pain of death, Strive in this; and love the strife. THE ELIXIR. TEACH me, my God and King, Not rudely, as a beast, To run into an action; A man that looks on glass, All may of thee partake: Nothing can be so mean, Which with his tincture, for thy sake, Will not grow bright and clean. A servant with this clause Who sweeps a room, as for thy laws, This is the famous stone, That turneth all to gold: For that, which God doth touch and own, A WREATH. A WREATHED garland of deserved praise, So live and like, that I may know thy ways; DEATH. DEATH, thou wast once an uncouth hideous thing, Nothing but bones, The sad effect of sadder groans: Thy mouth was open, but thou couldst not sing. For we consider'd thee, as at some six After the loss of life and sense, Flesh being turn'd to dust, and bones to sticks. We looked on this side of thee, shooting short; Where we did find The shells of fledge souls left behind; Dry dust, which sheds no tears—but may extort. But since our Saviour's death did put some blood Into thy face, Thou art grown fair and full of grace, Much in request, much sought for as a good. For we do now behold thee gay and glad, When souls shall wear their new array, Therefore we can go die, as sleep; and trust Unto an honest, faithful grave; JUDGMENT. ALMIGHTY Judge! how shall poor wretches brook Thy dreadful look, Able an heart of iron to appal, When thou shalt call For every man's peculiar book? What others mean to do, I know not well; That some will turn thee to some leaves therein That they in merit shall excel. But I resolve, when thou shalt call for mine, And thrust a Testament into thy hand. There thou shalt find my faults are thine. ANONYMOUS. THE four poems which follow, were put into the Editor's hands, with a view to publication in the present volume, by his highly esteemed friend Mr. James Montgomery. He gladly makes this acknowledgment; both because it is pleasant to acknowledge a favour of this kind from such a quarter, and because he is thus enabled to bring them before his readers with the recommendation .of a higher judgment than his own. "It is not known," Mr. M. observes, upon these pieces, " that they have before been printed. They are copied from a manuscript of the early part of the seventeenth century, containing miscellaneous poems on sacred subjects; some of which, notwithstanding occasional harsh and quaint phrases, and the conceits which are characteristic of the age, are "beautiful exceedingly." X |