Classic Poem

Welcome sweet, and sacred feast; welcome life!
Dead I was, and deep in trouble;
But grace, and blessings came with thee so rife,
That they have quicken'd even drie stubble;
Thus soules their bodies animate,
And thus, at first, when things were rude,
Dark, void, and Crude
They, by thy Word, their beauty had, and date;
All were by thee,
And stil must be,
Nothing that is, or lives,
But hath his Quicknings, and reprieves
As thy hand opes, or shuts;
Healings, and Cuts,
Darkness, and day-light, life, and death
Are but meer leaves turn'd by thy breath
Spirits without thee die,
And blackness sits
On the divinest wits,
As on the Sun Ecclipses lie.

But that great darkness at thy death
When the veyl broke with thy last breath,
Did make us see
The way to thee;
And now by these sure, sacred ties,
After thy blood
(Our sov'rain good,)
Had clear'd our eies,
And given us sight;
Thou dost unto thy self betroth
Our souls, and bodies both
In everlasting light.

Was't not enough that thou hadst payd the price
And given us eies
When we had none, but thou must also take
Us by the hand
And keep us still awake,
When we would sleep,
Or from thee creep,
Who without thee cannot stand?

Was't not enough to lose thy breath
And blood by an accursed death,
But thou must also leave
To us that did bereave
Thee of them both, these seals the means
That should both cleanse
And keep us so,
Who wrought thy wo?
O rose of Sharon ! O the Lilly
Of the valley!
How art thou now, thy flock to keep,
Become both food , and Shepheard to thy sheep.