LOVE-SICK.
Jesus, my life! how shall I truly love thee!
Oh that thy Spirit would so strongly move me,
That thou wert pleased to shed thy grace so far
As to make man all pure love, flesh a star!
A star that would ne'er set, but ever rise,
So rise and run, as to outrun these skies,
These narrow skies (narrow to me) that bar,
So bar me in, that I am still at war,
At constant war with them. Oh, come, and rend
Or bow the heavens! Lord, bow them and descend,
And at thy presence make these mountains flow,
These mountains of cold ice in me! Thou art
Refining fire; oh, then, refine my heart,
My foul, foul heart! Thou art immortal heat;
Heat motion gives; then warm it, till it beat;
So beat for thee, till thou in mercy hear;
So hear, that thou must open; open to
A sinful wretch, a wretch that caused thy woe;
Thy woe, who caused his weal; so far his weal
That thou forgott'st thine own, for thou didst seal
Mine with thy blood, thy blood which makes thee mine,
Mine ever, ever; and me ever thine.
PSALM CIV.
1 Up, O my soul, and bless the Lord! O God,
My God, how great, how very great art thou!
Honour and majesty have their abode
With thee, and crown thy brow.
2 Thou cloth'st thyself with light as with a robe,
And the high, glorious heavens thy mighty hand
Doth spread like curtains round about this globe
Of air, and sea, and land.
3 The beams of thy bright chambers thou dost lay
In the deep waters, which no eye can find;
The clouds thy chariots are, and thy pathway
The wings of the swift wind.
4 In thy celestial, gladsome messages
Despatched to holy souls, sick with desire
And love of thee, each willing angel is
Thy minister in fire.
5 Thy arm unmoveable for ever laid
And founded the firm earth; then with the deep
As with a vail thou hidd'st it; thy floods played
Above the mountains steep.
6 At thy rebuke they fled, at the known voice
Of their Lord's thunder they retired apace:
Some up the mountains passed by secret ways,
Some downwards to their place.
7 For thou to them a bound hast set, a bound
Which, though but sand, keeps in and curbs whole seas:
There all their fury, foam, and hideous sound,
Must languish and decrease.