THE LARK AND THE FOWLER.

THOU Simple Bird, what makes thee here to play?
Look, there's the Fowler! pr'ithee come away.
Dost not behold the net? Look there, 'tis spread,
Venture a little further, thou art dead.

Is there not room enough in all the field
For thee to play in, but thou needs must yield
To the deceitful glittering of a glass,

Between nets placed, to bring thy death to pass?

Bird, if thou art so much for dazzling light, Look, there's the sun above thee: dart upright: Thy nature is to soar up to the sky,

Why wilt thou come down to the net and die?

Heed not the Fowler's temping flattering call; This whistle he enchanteth Birds withal. What though thou seest a live Bird in his net, She's there because from thence she cannot get.

Look, how he tempeth thee with his decoy, That he may rob thee of thy life, thy joy. Come, prithee Bird, I pr'ithee come away; Why shouldst thou to this net become a prey?

Hadst thou not wings, or were thy feathers pull'd, Or wast thou blind, or fast asleep wert lull'd: The case would somewhat alter; but for theeThy eyes are ope, and thou hast wings to flee.

Remember, that thy song is in thy rise,

Not in thy fall, earth's not thy paradise:
Keep up aloft then, let thy circuits be
Above, where Birds from Fowlers' nets are free.

COMPARISON.

This Fowler is an emblem of the devil; His nets and whistle, figures of all evil. His glass an emblem is of sinful pleasure, Decoying such who reckon sin a treasure.

This simple Lark's a shadow of a saint,
Under allurings, ready now to faint.
What you have read, a needful warning is,
Design'd to shew the soul its snare and bliss;
And how it may this Fowler's net escape,
And not commit upon itself this rape.

THE VINE TREE.

WHAT is the Vine, more than another tree?
Nay most, than it, more tall more comely be.
What workman thence will take a beam or pin,
To make out what may be delighted in?
Its excellency in its fruit doth le:
A fruitless Vine, it is not worth a fly.

COMPARISON.

What are professors more that other men? Nothing at all. Nay, there's not one in ten, Either for wealth, or wit, that may compare, In many things, with some that carnal are. Good then are they, when mortify'd their sin, But without that they are not worth a pin.

MEDITATIONS UPON AN EGG.

THE Egg's no chick by falling from the hen;
Nor man a christian till he's born again.

The Egg's at first contained in the shell; Men, afore grace, in sins and darkness dwell. The Egg, when laid, by warmth is made a chicken: And Christ, by grace, the dead in sin doth quicken. The chick at first is in the cell confined; So heaven-born souls are in the flesh detain'd. The shell doth crack, the chick doth chirp and peep; The flesh decays, and men then pray and weep.

The shell doth break, the chick's at liberty;
The flesh falls off, the soul mounts up on high.
But both do not enjoy the self-same plight:
The soul is safe, the chick now fears the kite.

But chicks from rotten Eggs do not proceed: Nor is an hypocrite a saint indeed.

The rotten Egg, though underneath the hen,

If crack'd, stinks, and is loathsome unto men.
Nor doth her warmth make what is rotten sound;
What's rotten, rotten will at last be found.
The hypocrite, sin has him in possession,
He is a rotten Egg under profession.

Some Eggs bring cockatrices; and some men
Seem hatch'd and brooded in the viper's den.
Some Eggs bring wild fowls; and some men there be
As wild as are the wildest fowls that flee.

Some Fggs bring spiders; and some men appear
More venom'd than the worst of spiders are.
Some Eggs bring pismires; and some seem to be
As much for trifles as the pismires be.

And thus to diverse eggs from diff'rent shapes,
As like some men as monkeys are like apes.
But this is but an Egg, were it a chick,

Here had been legs, and wings, and bones to pick.

FOWLS FLYING IN THE AIR.

METHINKS I see a sight most excellent,
All sorts of Birds fly in the firmament:
Some great, some small, all of a diverse kind,
Mine eye affecting, pleasant to my mind.
Look how they wing along the wholesome air,
Above the world of worldlings, and their care.
And as they diverse are in bulk and hue,
So are they in their way of flying too.
So many birds, so many various things
Swim in the element upon their wings.

COMPARISON.

These Birds are emblems of those Men, that shall
E'er long possess the heavens, their all in all.
They each are of a different shape and kind;
To teach, we of all nations there shall find.
They are some great, some little, as we see,
To shew some great, some small in glory be.
Their flying diversely, as we behold,

Do shew saint's joys will there be manifold,
Some glide, some mount, some flutter, and some do,
In a mix'd way of flying, glory too,

To shew that each shall to his full content,

Be happy in that heavenly firmament.

THE LORD'S PRAYER.

OUR Father which in heaven art,
Thy name be always hallowed:
Thy kingdom come, thy will be done;
Thy heavenly path be followed:
By us on earth, as 'tis with thee,
We humbly pray:

And let our bread to us be given
From day to day.

Forgive our debts, as we forgive
Those that to us indebted are.
Into temptation lead us not;

But save us from the wicked snare.
The Kingdom's thine, the power too,

We thee adore;

The glory also shall be thine

For evermore.

MEDITATIONS UPON THE PEEP OF

DAY.

Ат

peep

of day, 1 often cannot know

Whether 'tis night, whether 'tis day or no,
I fancy that I see a little light,

But cannot yet distinguish day from night:
I hope, 1 doubt, but certain yet I be not,
I am not at a point, the sun 1 see not.

Thus such, who are but just of grace possest,
They know not yet if they be curst or blest.

THE FLINT IN THE WATER.

THIS Flint, time out of mind has there abode,
Where crystal streams make their continual road,
Yet it abides a Flint as much as 'twere
Before it touch'd the water or came there.

Its hardness is not in the least abated,
"Tis not at all by water penetrated.
Though water hath a soft'ning virtue in't,
It can't dissolve the stone, for 'tis a Flint.

Yea, though in water it doth still remain,
Its fiery nature still it doth retain.
If you oppose it with its opposite,
Then in your very face its fire will spit.

COMPARISON.

This flint an emblem is of those that lie, Under the word, like stones, until they die. Its crystal streams have not their natures changed, They are not from their lusts by grace estranged,

THE FISH IN THE WATER.

THE water is the Fish's element;

Take her from thence, none can her death prevent; And some have said, who have transgressors been, As good not be, as to be kept from sin,