3 City of God, most glorious things

Of thee abroad are spoke.

I mention Egypt, where proud kings
Did our forefathers yoke;

4 I mention Babel to my friends,
Philistia full of scorn,

And Tyre, with Ethiop's utmost ends:
Lo this man there was born.

5 But twice that praise shall in our ear
Be said of Sion last:

This and this man was born in her;

High God shall fix her fast.

6 The Lord shall write it in a scroll,
That ne'er shall be out-worn,
When he the nations doth enroll,
That this man there was born.

7 Both they who sing and they who dance
With sacred songs are there;

In thee fresh brooks and soft streams glance,
And all my fountains clear.

PSALM LXXXVIII.

I LORD GOD, that dost me save and keep,
All day to thee I cry,

And all night long before thee weep,
Before thee prostrate lie.

2 Into thy presence let my prayer,
With sighs devout, ascend;

And to my cries, that ceaseless are,

Thine ear with favour bend.

3 For, cloyed with woes and trouble store,
Surcharged my soul doth lie;

My life, at death's uncheerful door,
Unto the grave draws nigh.

4 Reckoned I am with them that pass

Down to the dismal pit;

I am a 1 man but weak, alas!

And for that name unfit,

1 Heb.: A

man without manly

5 From life discharged and parted quite strength.

Among the dead to sleep,

And like the slain in bloody fight.
That in the grave lie deep;
Whom thou rememberest no more,
Dost never more regard :

Them, from thy hand delivered o’er,
Death's hideous house hath barred.
6 Thou, in the lowest pit profound,
Hast set me all forlorn,

Where thickest darkness hovers round,
In horrid deeps to mourn.

7 Thy wrath, from which no shelter saves,
Full sore doth press on me;

2 Thou break'st upon me all thy waves,
2 And all thy waves break me.

8 Thou dost my friends from me estrange,
And mak'st me odious,

Me to them odious, for they change,
And I here pent up thus.

9 Through sorrow and affliction great
Mine eye grows dim and dead ;
Lord, all the day I thee entreat,
My hands to thee I spread.

Io Wilt thou do wonders on the dead?

Shall the deceased arise

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30

2 The Hebrew bears both.

And praise thee from their loathsome bed

With pale and hollow eyes?

II Shall they thy loving-kindness tell

On whom the grave hath hold?
Or they who in perdition dwell
Thy faithfulness unfold?

12 In darkness can thy mighty hand

40

Or wondrous acts be known?
Thy justice in the gloomy land
Of dark oblivion ?

13 But I to thee, O Lord, do cry
Ere yet my life be spent;

And up to thee my prayer doth hie
Each morn, and thee prevent.

14 Why wilt thou, Lord, my soul forsake
And hide thy face from me,

15 That am already bruised, and shake
With terror sent from thee;
Bruised and afflicted, and so low
As ready to expire,

While I thy terrors undergo,

Astonished with thine ire?

16 Thy fierce wrath over me doth flow; Thy threatenings cut me through: 17 All day they round about me go; Like waves they me pursue.

18 Lover and friend thou hast removed,
And severed from me far:

They fly me now whom I have loved,
And as in darkness are.

PSALM I.

Done into verse 1653.

BLEST is the man who hath not walked astray
In counsel of the wicked, and i' the way
Of sinners hath not stood, and in the seat
Of scorners hath not sat; but in the great
Jehovah's Law is ever his delight,
And in his Law he studies day and night.

He shall be as a tree which planted grows
By watery streams, and in his season knows
To yield his fruit; and his leaf shall not fall,
And what he takes in hand shall prosper all.
Not so the wicked; but, as chaff which fanned
The wind drives, so the wicked shall not stand
In judgment, or abide their trial then,
Nor sinners in the assembly of just men.
For the Lord knows the upright way of the just,
And the way of bad men to ruin must.

PSALM II.

Done August 8, 1653.—Terzetti.

IO

WHY do the Gentiles tumult, and the nations
Muse a vain thing, the kings of the earth upstand
With power, and princes in their congregations
Lay deep their plots together through each land
Against the Lord and his Messiah dear?

"Let us break off," say they, "by strength of hand, Their bonds, and cast from us, no more to wear,

Their twisted cords." He who in heaven doth dwell Shall laugh; the Lord shall scoff them, then severe Speak to them in his wrath, and in his fell

And fierce ire trouble them. "But I," saith he, “Anointed have my King (though ye rebel)

On Sion my holy hill." A firm decree

I will declare: the Lord to me hath said,
"Thou art my Son; I have begotten thee
This day; ask of me, and the grant is made:
As thy possession I on thee bestow

ΙΟ

The Heathen, and, as thy conquest to be swayed, Earth's utmost bounds: them shalt thou bring full low With iron sceptre bruised, and them disperse

Like to a potter's vessel shivered so."
And now be wise at length, ye kings averse;

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Be taught, ye judges of the earth; with fear Jehovah serve, and let your joy converse With trembling; kiss the Son, lest he appear In anger, and ye perish in the way,

If once his wrath take fire, like fuel sere. Happy all those who have in him their stay.

PSALM III.

August 9, 1653.

When he fled from Absalom.

LORD, how many are my foes!

How many those

That in arms against me rise!

Many are they

That of my life distrustfully thus say,
“No help for him in God there lies.”
But thou, Lord, art my shield, my glory;
Thee, through my story,

The exalter of my head I count :
Aloud I cried

Unto Jehovah; he full soon replied,
And heard me from his holy mount.
I lay and slept; I waked again :
For my sustain

Was the Lord. Of many millions

The populous rout

I fear not, though, encamping round about, They pitch against me their pavilions.

Rise, Lord; save me, my God! for thou

Hast smote ere now

On the cheek-bone all my foes,

Of men abhorred

ΙΟ

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Hast broke the teeth. This help was from the Lord; Thy blessing on thy people flows.