The psalms :: :: University of Virginia Library

O Lord in me there lieth nought,
But to thy search revealed lies:
For when I sitt
Thou markest it:
No lesse thou notest when I rise:
Yea closest closett of my thought
Hath open windowes to thine eyes.

Thou walkest with me when I walk,
When to my bed for rest I go,
I find thee there,
And ev'ry where:
Not yongest thought in me doth grow,
No not one word I cast to talk,
But yet unutt'red thou dost know.

If forth I march, thou goest before,
If back I torne, thou com'st behind:
Soe foorth nor back
Thy guard I lack,
Nay on me too, thy hand I find.
Well I thy wisdom may adore,
But never reach with earthy mind.

To shunn thy notice, leave thine ey,
O whither might I take my way?
To starry spheare?
Thy throne is there.
To dead mens undelightsome stay?
There is thy walk, and there to ly
Unknown, in vain I should assay.

O Sun, whome light nor flight can match,
Suppose thy lightfull flightfull wings
Thou lend to me,
And I could flee
As farr as thee the ev'ning brings:
Ev'n ledd to West he would me catch,
Nor should I lurk with western things.

295

Doe thou thy best, O secret night,
In sable vaile to cover me:
Thy sable vaile
Shall vainly faile:
With day unmask'd my night shall be,
For night is day, and darkness light,
O father of all lights, to thee.

Each inmost peece in me is thine:
While yet I in my mother dwelt,
All that me cladd
From thee I hadd.
Thou in my frame hast strangly delt:
Needes in my praise thy workes must shine
So inly them my thoughts have felt.

Thou, how my back was beam-wise laid,
And raftring of my ribbs, dost know:
Know'st ev'ry point
Of bone and joynt,
How to this whole these partes did grow,
In brave embrod'ry faire araid,
Though wrought in shopp both dark and low.

Nay fashionles, ere forme I toke,
Thy all and more beholding ey
My shapelesse shape
Could not escape:
All these tyme fram'd successively
Ere one had beeing, in the booke
Of thy foresight, enrol'd did ly.

My God, how I these studies prize,
That doe thy hidden workings show!
Whose summ is such,
Noe suume soe much:
Nay summ'd as sand they summlesse grow.
I lye to sleepe, from sleepe I rise,
Yet still in thought with thee I goe.

My God if thou but one wouldst kill,
Then straight would leave my further chase
This cursed brood
Inur'd to blood:
Whose gracelesse tauntes at thy disgrace
Have aimed oft: and hating still
Would with proud lies thy truth outface.

296

Hate not I them, who thee doe hate?
Thyne, Lord, I will the censure be.
Detest I not
The canckred knot t,
Whom I against thee banded see?
O Lord, thou know'st in highest rate
I hate them all as foes to me.

Search me, my God, and prove my hart,
Examyne me, and try my thought:
And mark in me
If ought there be
That hath with cause their anger wrought.
If not (as not) my lives each part,
Lord safely guide from danger brought.