18. Affliction

MY heart did heave, and there came forth ‘O God!’

By that I knew that Thou wast in the grief,

To guide and govern it to my relief,

Making a scepter of the rod:

Hadst Thou not had Thy part,

Sure the unruly sigh had broke my heart.

But since Thy breath gave me both life and shape,

Thou know’st my tallies; and when there ’s assign’d

So much breath to a sigh, what’s then behinde?

Or if some yeares with it escape,

The sigh then onely is

A gale to bring me sooner to my blisse.

Thy life on earth was grief, and Thou art still

Constant unto it, making it to be

A point of honour now to grieve in me,

And in Thy members suffer ill.

They who lament one crosse,

Thou dying dayly, praise Thee to Thy losse.