LXXIX. Michael Cosowarth

SENCE thou has not, O Lord, left me to lye

A scorn to foes in my o’rwhelmed right,

But hast exalted up my head on hye,

Of thee my songe shal be, and of thy might.

When I cryd for thy all-relevinge ayde,

Thou didst restore to ioye my sade distresse:

When at the grave my soule for entrance stayd,

From grave thou didst returne my heavinesse.

O singe, therefore, due praises to the Lord;

You blessed saints, do you his praises singe:

Do you the holynesse with thankes record,

Which doth belong to this our heavenly Kinge.

For he no long tyme doth his ire prolonge,

His frowninge wrath within a while is dead,

When then, as if he’d done me wretch a wronge,

In’s smilinge brow glad life is pictured.

This did my whyninge life endure awhile,

Whilst th’ earth was buried with an evening’s shade;

But when the morning’s light began to smile,

My ioy did come, and all my woe did fade.

And when things flowed to my full content,

And blind prosperitye on me attended,

Now shall these ioyes, quoth I, which God hath sent,

Now shall these lastinge ioyes be never ended.

For thou, deere Lord, ev’n thou of tender love,

And of that goodnesse which doth dwell in thee,

As with a mountaine which can never move,

Stand fast about the moovinge state of mee.

Therewith he turned his milder face aside,

And all with turned thoughts besteed was I;

And every thought a world of woes implyed,

Which strayned forth from me this dolefull crye:

Ah, Lord! if to the ground downe sunck I were,

What price is in my bloud to proffett thee?

If thou disrobe me of th’ earthe’s tyre I weare,

Can thy great praises then be songue by mee?

O can the mute and the untounged dust,

Which in th’ eternall house of death doth dwell,

Consum’d with wormes and ever-eatinge rust,—

O can the dust of thy great gloryes tell?

O heare me then, O Lord! O Lord, me heare,

And send some mercyes, Lord, some mercyes send;

O let thy saving health betymes appeare,

And give my woes unto an happy end.

But thou has turnd about my murninge songe;

New tuns of ioye have drowned up my sadness,

And for the sacke which shrouded me so longe,

Thou hast clothed my soule with never-weering gladnes.

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