My mother's maids, when they did sew and spin,
They sang sometime a song of the field mouse,
That, for because her livelood was but thin,

Would needs go seek her townish sister's house.
She thought herself endurèd too much pain;
The stormy blasts her cave so sore did souse

That when the furrows swimmèd with the rain,
She must lie cold and wet in sorry plight;
And worse than that, bare meat there did remain

To comfort her when she her house had dight;
Sometime a barley corn; sometime a bean;

Behold, how eager this our little boy
Is for a butterfly, as if all joy,
All profits, honours, yea, and lasting pleasures,
Were wrapped up in her, or the richest treasures
Found in her would be bundled up together,
When all her all is lighter than a feather.

He halloos, runs, and cries out, 'Here, boys, here!'
Nor doth he brambles or the nettles fear:
He stumbles at the molehills, up he gets,
And runs again, as one bereft of wits;
And all his labour and his large outcry
Is only for a silly butterfly.

Comparison

When I do this begin to apprehend,
My heart, my soul, and mind, begins to bend

To God-ward, and sincerely for to love
His son, his ways, his people, and to move

With brokenness of spirit after him
Who broken was, and killed for my sin.

Now is mine heart grown holy, now it cleaves
To Jesus Christ my Lord, and now it leaves

Those ways that wicked be; it mourns because
It can conform no more unto the laws

Of God, who loved me when I was vile,
And of sweet Jesus, who did reconcile

As 'tis appointed men should die,
So judgment is the next
That meets them most assuredly;
For so saith holy text.

Wherefore of judgment I shall now
Inform you what I may,
That you may see what 'tis, and how
'Twill be with men that day.

This world it hath a time to stand,
Which time when ended, then
Will issue judgment out of hand
Upon all sorts of men.

The Judge we find, in God's record,
The Son of man, for he
By God's appointment is made Lord
And Judge of all that be.

Heaven is a place, also a state,
It doth all things excel,
No man can fully it relate,
Nor of its glory tell.

God made it for his residence,
To sit on as a throne,
Which shows to us the excellence
Whereby it may be known.

Doubtless the fabric that was built
For this so great a king,
Must needs surprise thee, if thou wilt
But duly mind the thing.

If all that build do build to suit
The glory of their state,
What orator, though most acute,
Can fully heaven relate?

If palaces that princes build,

Us godly fear delightful unto thee,
That fear that God himself delights to see

Bear sway in them that love him? then he will
Thy godly mind in this request fulfil.

By giving thee a fear that tremble shall,
At every trip thou takest, lest thou fall,

And him offend, or hurt thyself by sin,
Or cause poor souls that always blind have been

To stumble at thy falls, and harder be
Against their own salvation and thee.

That fear that of itself would rather choose
The rod, than to offend or to abuse

Death, as a king rampant and stout
The world he dare engage;
He conquers all, yea, and doth rout
The great, strong, wise, and sage.

No king so great, nor prince so strong,
But death can make to yield,
Yea, bind and lay them all along,
And make them quit the field.

Where are the victors of the world,
With all their men of might?
Those that together kingdoms hurl'd,
By death are put to flight.

How feeble is the strongest hand,
When death begins to gripe!
The giant now leaves off to stand,

Through horrors of land and horrors of sea
Bereft and wandering, Odysseus,
God-fearing wretch, sought Ithaca;
Unfaltering, he plunged into the gloom of Hades;
The roar of fierce Charybdis and underwater Scylla's groans
Shook not his noble soul.
His patience vanquished cruel fate, it seemed,
And to the dregs he'd drunk the bitter cup.
It seemed the heav'ns were done with testing him
And drove him softly, slumbering,
To homeland's longed-for cliffs.
He waked: what then? He did not know his home.

I

O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being,
Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead
Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing,

Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red,
Pestilence-stricken multitudes: O thou,
Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed

The winged seeds, where they lie cold and low,
Each like a corpse within its grave, until
Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow

Her clarion o'er the dreaming earth, and fill
(Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air)

THOU youngest virgin-daughter of the skies,
   Made in the last promotion of the blest;
   Whose palms, new pluck'd from Paradise,
   In spreading branches more sublimely rise,
   Rich with immortal green above the rest:
   Whether, adopted to some neighbouring star,
   Thou roll'st above us, in thy wandering race,
   Or, in procession fixt and regular,
   Mov'd with the heaven's majestic pace;