What I possess, or what I crave, Be not possest and blest in Thee; When winter-fortunes cloud the brows Of summer friends; when eyes grow strange; When plighted faith forgets its vows; When earth and all things in it change; O Lord, Thy mercies fail me never: Great God! whose kingdom hath no end, GEORGE HERBERT. Born, 1593; Died, 1632. THE GIFTS OF GOD. WHEN God at first made man, Having a glass of blessings standing by; So strength first made a way ; Then beauty flow'd, then wisdom, honour, pleasure: For if I should (said He) Bestow this jewel also on my creature, Yet let him keep the rest, But keep them with repining restlessness: CONSTANCY. WHO is the honest man? He that doth still and strongly good pursue, Whose honesty is not So loose or easy, that a ruffling wind While the world now rides by, now lags behind. Who when great trials come, Nor seeks, nor shuns them, but doth calmly stay, Till he the thing and the example weigh: All being brought into a sum, What place or person calls for, he doth pay. Whom none can work or woo To use in anything a trick or sleight ; Who never melts or thaws At close temptations: when the day is done, And is their virtue; virtue is his sun. Whom nothing can procure, When the wide world runs bias, from his will SIN. LORD, with what care hast Thou begirt us round! Parents first season us: then schoolmasters Deliver us to laws; they send us bound Pulpits and Sundays, sorrow dogging sin, Blessings beforehand, ties of gratefulness, Yet all these fences and their whole array JAMES SHIRLEY. DEATH'S FINAL CONQUEST. THE glories of our birth and state Must tumble down, And in the dust be equal made With the poor crooked scythe and spade. Some men with swords may reap the field, And plant fresh laurels where they kill ; But their strong nerves at last must yield, Early or late, They stoop to fate, And must give up their murmuring breath, The garlands wither on your brow; Then boast no more your mighty deeds; See where the victor victim bleeds: All heads must come To the cold tomb; Only the actions of the just Smell sweet, and blossom in their dust. ASCRIBED TO NICHOLAS BRETON. Age of Queen Elizabeth. I WOULD I were an excellent divine, This would I be, and would none other be But a religious servant of my God: And know there is no other God but He, And willingly to suffer Mercy's rod, Joy in His grace, and live but in His love, And I would frame a kind of faithful prayer Nor servile fear might faithful love deface; |