With trembling; kiss the Son lest he appear anger, and ye perish in the way,

In

If once his wrath take fire like fuel sere. Happy all those who have in them their stay.

PSALM III.

AUG. 9, 1653.

WHEN HE FLED FROM ABSALOM.

OORD, how many are my foes!
How many those

That in arms against me rise!
Many are they

That of my life distrustfully thus say
No help for him in God there lies.
But thou, Lord, art my shield, my glory,
Thee through my story

Th' exalter of my head I count;

Aloud I cried

Unto Jehovah, he full soon replied And heard me from his holy mount.

I lay and slept, I wak'd again,

For my sustain

Was the Lord. Of many

The populous rout

millions

I fear not, though encamping round about
They pitch against me their pavilions.
Rise, Lord, save me my God, for thou
Hast smote ere now

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On the cheek-bone all my foes,

Of men abhorr'd

Hast broke the teeth. This help was from the

Lord;

Thy blessing on thy people flows.

PSALM IV.

AUG. 10, 1653.

NSWER me when I call,
God of my righteousness,

In straits and in distress

Thou didst me disenthrall

And set at large; now spare,

Now pity me, and hear my earnest pray'r.

Great ones, how long will ye

My glory have in scorn,

How long be thus forborne

Still to love vanity,

To love, to seek, to prize

Things false and vain, and nothing else but lies?

Yet know the Lord hath chose,

Their Hydra heads, and the false North displays Her broken league to imp their serpent wings. O yet a nobler task awaits thy hand,

(For what can war, but endless war still breed?) Till truth and right from violence be freed, And public faith clear'd from the shameful brand Of public fraud. In vain doth valour bleed, While avarice and rapine share the land.

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XVI. TO THE LORD GENERAL

CROMWELL.

ROMWELL, our chief of men, who through a cloud

Not of war only, but detractions rude,

Guided by faith and matchless fortitude,

To peace and truth thy glorious way hast plough'd, And on the neck of crowned fortune proud

Hast rear'd God's trophies, and his work pursued, While Darwen stream with blood of Scots imbrued, And Dunbar field resounds thy praises loud, And Worcester's laureat wreath. Yet much remains To conquer still; peace hath her victories.

No less renown'd than war: new foes arise Threatening to bind our souls with secular chains: Help us to save free conscience from the paw Of hireling wolves, whose gospel is their maw.

ΙΟ

XVII. TO SIR HENRY VANE THE

YOUNGER,

ANE, young in years,

but in sage counsel old,

Than whom a better senator ne'er held

The helm of Rome, when gowns not arms repell'd The fierce Epirot and the African bold, Whether to settle peace, or to unfold

The drift of hollow states hard to be spell'd, Then to advise how war may best upheld Move by her two main nerves, iron and gold In all her equipage: besides to know

Both spiritual pow'r and civil, what each means, What severs each, thou hast learn'd, which few have

done:

The bounds of either sword to thee we owe:

Therefore on thy firm hand Religion leans
In peace, and reckons thee her eldest son.

II

XVIII. ON THE LATE MASSACRE IN
PIEMONT.

VENGE, O Lord, thy slaughter'd saints, whose
bones

Lie scatter'd on the Alpine mountains cold; Ev'n them who kept thy truth so pure of old, When all our fathers worshipp'd stocks and stones, Forget not: in thy book record their groans Who were thy sheep, and in their ancient fold Slain by the bloody Piemontese that roll'd

Mother with infant down the rocks.

Their moans

The vales redoubled to the hills, and they

To Heav'n. Their martyr'd blood and ashes sow O'er all th' Italian fields, where still doth sway The triple tyrant; that from these may grow A hundred fold, who having learn'd thy way Early may fly the Babylonian woe.

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XIX. ON HIS BLINDNESS.

HEN I consider how my light is spent VAV Ere half my days, in this dark world and wide,

And that one talent which is death to hide, Lodg'd with me useless, though my soul more bent To serve therewith my Maker, and present My true account, lest he returning chide; "Doth God exact day-labour, light denied," I fondly ask: But Patience, to prevent That murmur, soon replies, " God doth not need Either man's work, or his own gifts; who best Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best: his state

Is kingly; thousands at his bidding speed,

And post o'er land and ocean without rest;
They also serve who only stand and wait."

ΙΟ

XX. TO MR. LAWRENCE.

AWRENCE, of virtuous father virtuous son,
Now that the fields are dank, and ways are

mire,

Where shall we sometimes meet, and by the fire