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89

Christmas Carol.

[_]

TO THE TUNE OF “GOOD KING WENCESLAS.”

Young and old must raise the lay
That their heart engages:
For the Child is born to day
Who is King of ages:
For the God, by all adored,
Comes to His elected;
For the Babe that is the Lord,
Hastes to be rejected.
If the purple proves the King,
Where is goodly raiment?
If man needeth ransoming,
Who shall make the payment?
90

For the purple here is grass:
For the throne, the manger:
For the Courtiers, ox and ass
Kneel before the Stranger.
Joshua hastes to meet the foes,
Boastful and defiant;
David to his brethren goes,
And shall slay the giant:
Help is nigh to change our fate,
Help we may rely on:
Solomon, with royal state,
Shall be crowned in Gihon.
Through the desert as we go,
Sorrowful and fearing,
From the Rock the waters flow,
That shall work our cheering.
Manna, wherewith all are fed,
Comes for our salvation;
Born in Bethlehem, “House of Bread,”
By interpretation.
91

Young and old must raise the lay
That their heart engages:
For the Child is born to day
Who is King of ages:
Young and old their deeds so frame,
That, as He came hither,
They, when He their lives shall claim,
May to Him go thither.
[_]

[Imitated from the Spirituale Rosetum of John Mauburn circ. 1460.]

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