What have I brought Thee home

For this Thy love? Have I discharged the debt, Which this day's favor did beget?

I ran; but all I brought was foam.

Thy diet, care, and cost

Do end in bubbles, balls of wind;
Of wind to Thee whom I have crost,
But balls of wild-fire to my troubled mind.

Yet still Thou goest on,

And now with darkness closest weary eyes,
Saying to man, "It doth suffice:
Henceforth repose; your work is done."

Thus in Thy ebony box

Thou dost inclose us, till the day

Put our amendment in our way,
And give new wheels to our disorder'd clocks.

I muse, which shows more love,

The day or night: that is the gale, this the harbor; That is the walk, and this the arbor;

Or that the garden, this the grove.

My God, Thou art all love.

Not one poor minute 'scapes thy breast,
But brings a favor from above;

And in this love, more than in bed, I rest.

CHURCH MONUMENTS.

WHILE that my soul repairs to her devotion,
Here I intomb my flesh, that it betimes
May take acquaintance of this heap of dust;
To which the blast of death's incessant motion,
Fed with the exhalation of our crimes,

Drives all at last.

Therefore I gladly trust

My body to this school, that it may learn
To spell his elements, and find his birth
Written in dusty heraldry and lines;
Which dissolution sure doth best discern,
Comparing dust with dust, and earth with earth.
These laugh at jet, and marble put for signs,

To sever the good-fellowship of dust,
And spoil the meeting. What shall point out them,
When they shall bow, and kneel, and fall down flat
To kiss those heaps, which now they have in trust?
Dear flesh, while I do pray, learn here thy stem
And true descent; that, when thou shalt grow fat,

And wanton in thy cravings, thou may'st know,
That flesh is but the glass, which holds the dust
That measures all our time; which also shall
Be crumbled into dust. Mark, here below,
How tame these ashes are, how free from lust,
That thou may'st fit thyself against thy fall.

CHURCH MUSIC.

SWEETEST of sweets, I thank you: when displeas

ure

Did through my body wound my mind,

You took me thence; and in your house of pleas

ure.

A dainty lodging me assign'd.

Now I in you without a body move,
Rising and falling with your wings :

We both together sweetly live and love,

Yet say sometimes, " God help poor kings!"

Comfort, I'll die; for if you post from me,

Sure I shall do so, and much more:

But if I travel in your company,

You know the way to heaven's door.

CHURCH LOCK AND KEY.

I KNOW it is my sin, which locks Thine ears,
And binds Thy hands!

Out-crying my requests, drowning my tears;
Or else the chillness of my faint demands.

But as cold hands are angry with the fire,
And mend it still,

So I do lay the want of my desire,
Not on my sins, or coldness, but Thy will.

Yet hear, O God, only for His blood's sake,
Which pleads for me:

For though sins plead too, yet like stones they

make

His blood's sweet current much more loud to be.

THE CHURCH-FLOOR.

MARK you the floor? That square and speckled stone,

Which looks so firm and strong,

Is Patience:

And the other black and grave, wherewith each

one

Is checker'd all along,

Humility:

The gentle rising, which on either hand

Leads to the choir above,

Is Confidence:

But the sweet cement, which in one sure band

Ties the whole frame, is Love

And Charity.

Hither sometimes Sin steals, and stains The marble's neat and curious veins : But all is cleansed when the marble weeps. Sometimes Death, puffing at the door, Blows all the dust about the floor:

But while he thinks to spoil the room, he sweeps.
Blest be the Architect, whose art
Could build so strong in a weak heart.

THE WINDOWS.

LORD, how can man preach Thy eternal word? He is a brittle, crazy glass:

Yet in Thy temple Thou dost him afford

This glorious and transcendent place,
To be a window, through Thy grace.

But when Thou dost anneal in glass Thy story, Making Thy life to shine within

The holy preachers, then the light and glory More reverend grows, and more doth win; Which else shows waterish, bleak, and thin.

Doctrine and life, colors and light, in one

When they combine and mingle, bring A strong regard and awe: but speech alone Doth vanish like a flaring thing,

And in the ear, not conscience ring.