A tree is now the instrument of life,
Though ill that trunk, and Christ’s fair body suit;
Ah, cursed tree! and yet, oh, blessed fruit!
That death to Him, this life to us doth give:
Strange is the cure when things past cure revive,
And the physician dies to make his patient live.
Giles Fletcher.
Like crowded forest trees we stand,
And some are marked to fall:
The axe shall smite, at God’s command,