12 The true, elect, and ryghteous man,
Shall florishe lyke the palme;
As Ceder tree in Lybanus
Hymselfe shall sprede wyth balme.
13 Depe planted, they, in rootes alway
In God's swete house to bide,
Shall florish lyke, in both the courtes
Of this our God and guyde.
14 In age most sure, they shall encrease
Theyr fruit abundantly;
Well likying they, and fat shall be,
To bear most fruitfully.
15 That is to say, they out shall preach
This Lord's true faithfulness,
Who is my strength and mighty rocke;
Who hateth unryghteousness.
Almighty God, which art the contynuall ioye and perpetuall felicitye of all thy sayntes, whom thou doost inwardly water with the dew of thy heauenly grace, whereby thou makest them to floryshe like the palme tree in the celestiall courts of thy Church: we besech thee that thou would so discusse from vs the burdenous weight of sinne, that we may enioye their felowship. Christ etc.
Though David's raigne be somewhat ment,
Yet Christ is chiefe here prophecied,
Who was both kyng in regiment,
And priest in death; then after stied
To heaven to sit as priest and king,
His frendes to saue, his foes to wring,
Wyth death the sting.
Dixit Dominus Domino.
1 THE Lord most hye, the Father, thus
Dyd say to Christ, my Lord, his Sonne,-
Set thou in power most glorious
On my right hand aboue the sunne;
Until I make thy foes euen all
Thy low footstoole to thee to fall
2 The Lord shall send from Zion place
Of thy great power, imperiall,
The royall rod, and princely mace,
Whence grace shall spring originall:
Yea, God shall say,-Thou God vprise,
To raigne amids thyne enemies,
3 The people, glad, in hartes delight,
Shall offer giftes, in worship free,
As conquest day of thy great might
In shining shew of sanctitie :
For why? the dew of thy swete birth,
As morne new sprong, dropth ioyfull mirth,
So seene on earth.
4 The Lord did sweare, and fast decreed;
He will hys worde no tyme repent,
Which sayd thou art a priest indeed,
A kyngly priest, aye permamant;
Of order namde Melchisedeck,
Whom peace and right doth ioyntly decke
As God's elect.
5 The Lord, as shield, kepth right thy hand
To make thy raigne inuincible:
He shall subdue by sea and land
All power aduerse most forcible:
He shall great kyngs and Cæsars wound;
In day of wrath, all them confound
By fearefull sound.
6 He iudgment true shall exercise,
As iudge among the Gentile sect;
All places he shall full surprise,
Wyth bodies dead, on earth proiect.
Abrode he shall in sunder smyte
The heds of realmes that him will spyte,
Or scorne hys myght.
7 Though here exilde, he strayth as bond,
And shall in way but water drynke
Of homely brooke as comth to hand,
Pursued to death, and wysht to sinke:
Yet he for thys humilitie
Shall lift hys head in dignitie
O Lord, the eternall Sonne of the Father, which wast begotten before the world was made, and art the first of all creatures, we lowly beseche thee that where, by the session of the ryhte hande of thy Father, thou subduest thy enemies, so make vs to subdue all the dominion of sinne rising against vs, to be made meete to serue thee in all godliness: who liuest and raignest one God wyth the Father, and the Holy Ghost. Amen.
AN HYMNE OF HEAVENLY LOVE.
LOVE, lift me up upon thy golden wings
From this base world unto thy heaven's hight
Where I may see those admirable things
Which there thou workest by thy soveraine might
Farre above feeble reach of earthly sight,
That I thereof an heavenly hymne may sing
Unto the God of Love, high heaven's King.
Many lewd layes (ah! woe is me the more!)
In praise of that mad fit which fooles call Love
I have in th' heate of youth made heretofore,
That in light wits did loose affection move:
But all these follies now I do reprove,
And turned have the tenor of my string,
The heavenly prayses of true Love to sing.
And ye, that wont with greedy vaine desire
To reade my fault, and, wondring at my flame
To warme yourselves at my wide sparckling fire,
Sith now that heat is quenched, quench my blame
And in her ashes shrowd my dying shame;
For who my passed follies now pursewes,
Beginnes his owne, and my old fault renewes
BEFORE THIS WORLD'S GREAT FRAME, in which
al things
Are now contained, found any being-place,
Ere flitting Time could wag his eyas wings
About that mightie bound which doth embrace
The rolling spheres, and parts their houres by space
That High Eternall Powre, which now doth move
In all these things, mov'd in its selfe by love.
It lov'd it selfe, because it selfe was faire ;
(For fair is lov'd;) and of it self begot
Like to it selfe his eldest Sonne and Heire,
Eternall, pure, and voide of sinfull blot,
The firstling of His ioy, in whom no iot
Of love's dislike or pride was to be found,
Whom He therefore with equall honour crown'd.
With Him he raign'd, before all time prescribed,
In endlesse glorie and immortall might,
Together with that Third from them derived,
Most wise, most holy, most almightie Spright!
Whose kingdome's throne no thoughts of earthly
wight
Can comprehend, much lesse my trembling verse
With equall words can hope it to reherse.
Yet, O most blessed Spright! pure lampe of light,
Eternall spring of grace and wisedom trew,
Vouchsafe to shed into my barren spright
Some little drop of thy celestiall dew,
That may my rymes with sweet infuse embrew,
And give me words equall unto my thought,
To tell the marveiles by thy mercie wrought.
Yet being pregnant still with powrefull grace,
And full of fruitfull Love, that loves to get
Things like himselfe, and to enlarge his race,
His second brood, though not of powre so great,
Yet full of beautie, next He did beget
An infinite increase of angels bright,
All glistring glorious in their Maker's light.
To them the heaven's illimitable hight
(Not this round heaven, which we from hence be-
hold,
|