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Old Satan foams and yells aloud, [the wheels. And gnaws th' eternal brafs that binds him to The opening gates of blifs receive their king, The Father God fmiles on his Son, Pays him the honours he has won,

The lofty thrones adore, and little cherubs fing. Behold him on his native throne,

Glory fits faft upon his head;

Drefs'd in new light, and beamy robes,

His hand rolls on the feafons, and the fhining
globes,
[dead.
And fways the living worlds, and regions of the
Gouge was his envoy to the realms below,
Vait was his truft, and great his skill,
Bright the credentials he could show,
And thousands own'd the feal,
His hallow'd lips could well impart
The grace, the promise, and command:
e knew the pity of Immanuel's heart,
And terrors of Jehovah's hand.
How did our fouls ftart out, to hear
The embaffies of love he bare,

While every ear in rapture hung. Upon the charming wonders of his tongue! Life's bufy cares a facred filence bound, Attention ftood with all her powers, With fixed eyes and awe profound, Chain'd to the pleasure of the found, Nor knew the flying hours.

But O my everlasting grief!

Heaven has recall'd his envoy from our eyes,
Hence deluges of forrow rise,
Nor hope th' impoffible relief.

Ye remnants of the facred tribe
Who feel the lofs, come share the smart,
And mix your groans with mine:
Where is the tongue that can describe
Infinite things with equal art,

Or language fo divine?

Our paflions want the heavenly flame,
Almighty Love breathes faintly in our fongs,
And awful threatenings languifh on our tongues;
Howe is a great but fingle name :
Amidst the crowd he ftands alone:

Stands yet, but with his ftarry pinions on,
Dreft for the flight, and ready to be gone.

Eternal God, command his ftay,

Stretch the dear months of his delay; O we could with his age were one immortal day! But when the flaming chariot's come, And fhining guards, t' attend thy prophet home, Amidft a thoufand weeping eyes,

Send an Elitha down, a foul of equal fize, Or burn this worthless globe, and take us to the fkies.

DIVINE SONGS FOR CHILDREN.

PREFACE.

TO ALL TAAT ARE CONCERNED IN THE EDUCATION OF CHILDREN,

MY FRIENDS, It is an awful and important charge that is committed to you. The wisdom and welfare of the fucceeding generation are intrusted with you beforehand, and depend much on your conduct. The feeds of mifery or happiness in this world, and that to come, are oftentimes fown very early? and therefore, whatever may conduce to give the minds of children a relish for virtue and religion, ught, in the first place, to be proposed to you. Verfe was at firft defigned for the fervice of God, though it hath been wretchedly abused fince. The ancients, among the Jews and the Heathens, taught their children and difciples the precepts of morality and worship in verfe. The children of Ifrael were

fes, Deut. xxxi. 19, 30, and we are directed in the New Testament, not only to fing" with grace "in the heart, but to teach and admonish one an"other by hymns and fongs," Ephef. v. 19. And there are thefe four advantages in it.

I. There is a great delight in the very learning of truths and duties this way. There is fome thing fo amufing and entertaining in rhymes and metre, that will incline children to make this part of their business a diverfion. And you may turn their very duty into a reward, by giving them the privilege of learning one of these fongs every week, if they fulfil the bufinefs of the week well, have learnt ten or twenty fongs out of it. and promifing them the book itself, when they

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The glories of his power, and glories of his grace:
There he beheld the wondrous fprings

Of those celeftial facred things,
The peaceful gofpel, and the fiery law

In that majestic face.

That face did all his gazing powers employ,
With most profound abafement and exalted joy,
The rolls of fate were half unfeal'd,

He ftood adoring by;
The volume open'd to his eye,
And fweet intelligence he held

With all his fhining kindred of the sky.

Ye feraphs that furround the throne,

Tell how his name was through the palace known, How warm his zeal was, and how like your own: Speak it aloud, let half the nation hear,

And bold blafphemers fhrink and fear † : Impudent tongues! to blaft a prophet's name! The poifon fure was fetch'd from hell,

Where the old blafphemers dwell, To taint the pureft duft, and blot the whiteft fame' [through,

Impudent tongues! You should be darted Nail'd to your own black mouths, and lie Ufelefs and dead till flander die,

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Till flander die with you.

"We faw him, faid th' ethereal throng,

"We faw his warm devotions rife,

"We heard the fervour of his cries,
"And mix'd his praises with our fong:

We knew the fecret flights of his retiring hours,

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Nightly he wak'd his inward powers,

Young Ifrael rofe to wrestle with his God, "And with unconquer'd force fcal'd the celestial

66

towers,

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Draw the paft fcenes of thy delight,

My mufe, and bring the wondrous man to fight.

Place him furrounded as he flood

With pious crowds, while from his tongue
Aftream of harmony ran foft along,
And every ear drank in the flowing good:
Softly it ran its filver way,

Till warm devotion rais'd the current strong:
Then fervid zeal on the fweet deluge rode,
Life, love and glory, grace and joy,
Divinely roll'd promifcuous on the torrent-flood,
And bore our raptur'd fenfe away, and thoughts
and fouls to God.

O might we dwell for ever there!
No more return to breathe this groffer air,
This atmosphere of fin, calamity, and care.
But heavenly fcenes foon leave the fight
While we belong to clay,
Palions of terror and delight,
Demand alternate fway.

Though he was fo great and good a man, he did not escape cenfure.

Behold the man, whofe awful voice
Could well proclaim the fiery law,
Kindle the flames that Mofes faw,
And fwell the trumpet's warlike noise.
He ftands the herald of the threatening skies,
Lo, on his reverend brow the frowns divinely rife,
All Sinai's thunder on his tongue, and lightning
in his eyes.

Round the high roof the curfes flew
Diftinguishing each guilty head,
Far from th' unequal war the atheist fled,
His kindled arrows ftill purfue,

His arrows ftrike the atheist through, And o'er his inmoft powers a fhuddering horror fpread.

The marble heart groans with an inward wound;
Blafpheming fouls of harden'd steel

Shriek out amaz'd at the new pangs they feel,
And dread the echoes of the found.
The lofty wretch arm'd and array'd

In gaudy pride finks down his impious head,
Plunges in dark despair, and mingles with the dead,

Now, mufe, affume a fofter ftrain,
Now foothe the finner's raging smart,
Borrow of Gouge the wondrous art

To calm the farging confcience, and affwage the

He from a bleeding God derives

Life for the fouls that guilt had flain, And ftrait the dying rebel lives,

The dead arife again;

The opening fkies almoft obey
His powerful fong; a heavenly ray

[pain;

[day.

Awakes defpair to light, and sheds a cheerful His wondrous voice rolls back the spheres, Recalls the fcenes of ancient years,

To make the Saviour known; Sweetly the flying charmer roves Through all his labours and his loves,

The anguish of his crofs, and triumphs of his throne.

Come, he invites our feet to try
The steep afcent of Calvary,
And fets the fatal tree before our eye:
See here celeftial forrow reigns;
Rude nails and ragged thorns lay by,
Ting'd with the crimion of redeeming veins.
In wondrous words he fung the vital flood
Where all our fins were drown'd,
Words fit to heal and fit to wound,
Sharp as the fpear, and balmy as the blood.
In his difcourfe divine

Afresh the purple fountain flow'd;
Our falling tears kept sympathetic time,
And trickled to the ground,
While every accent gave a doleful found,
Sad as the breaking heart-ftrings of th' expiring

God.

Down to the manfions of the dead,
With trembling joy our fouls are led,
The captives of his tongue;

There the dear prince of light reclines his head
Darkness and fhades among.

With pleafing horror we furvey
The caverns of the tomb,

Where the belov'd Redeemer lay,
And fled a fweet perfume,

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While every ear in rapture hung Upon the charming wonders of his tongue! Life's bufy cares a facred filence bound, Attention ftood with all her powers, With fixed eyes and awe profound, Chain'd to the pleafure of the found, Nor knew the flying hours.

But O my everlasting grief!
Heaven has recall'd his envoy from our eyes,
Hence deluges of forrow rife,
Nor hope th' impoffible relief.

Ye remnants of the facred tribe
Who feel the lofs, come share the smart,
And mix your groans with mine:
Where is the tongue that can describe
Infinite things with equal art,

Or language fo divine?

Our paflions want the heavenly flame, Almighty Love breathes faintly in our fongs, And awful threatenings languish on our tongues; Howe is a great but fingle name: Amidft the crowd he stands alone : Stands yet, but with his ftarry pinions on, Dreft for the flight, and ready to be gone. Eternal God, command his stay, Stretch the dear months of his delay; O we could with his age were one immortal day! But when the flaming chariot's come, And fhining guards, t' attend thy prophet home, Amidst a thousand weeping eyes,

Send an Elitha down, a foul of equal fize, Or burn this worthless globe, and take us to the fkies.

DIVINE SONGS FOR CHILDREN.

PREFACE.

TO ALL TAAT ARE CONCERNED IN THE EDUCATION OF CHILDREN

MY FRIENDS, It is an awful and important charge that is committed to you. The wisdom and welfare of the fucceeding generation are intrufted with you beforehand, and depend much on your conduct. The feeds of mifery or happiness in this world, and that to come, are oftentimes fown very early? and therefore, whatever may conduce to give the minds of children a relish for virtue and religion, ought, in the first place, to be proposed to you. Verfe was at firft defigned for the fervice of God, though it hath been wretchedly abufed fince. The ancients, among the Jews and the Heathens, taught their children, and difciples the precepts of morality and worship in verfe. The children of Ifrael were

fes, Deut. xxxi. 19, 30, and we are directed in' the New Teftament, not only to fing" with grace "in the heart, but to teach and admonish one an"other by hymns and fongs," Ephef. v. 19. And there are thefe four advantages in it.

I. There is a great delight in the very learning of truths and duties this way. There is fomething fo amusing and entertaining in rhymes and metre, that will incline children to make this

part of their business a diverĥion. And you may turn their very duty into a reward, by giving them the privilege of learning one of these fongs every week, if they fulfil the bufinefs of the week well, have learnt ten or twenty fongs out of it. and promifing them the book itself, when they

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Hither our fouls their conftant offerings brought, The burthens of the breast, and labours of the thought;

Our opening bofoms on the confcious ground
Spread all the forrows and the joys we found,
And mingled every care; nor was it known
Which of the pains and pleasures were our own;
Then with an equal hand and honest foul
We share the heap, yet both poffefs the whole,
And all the paflions there through both our bc-
foms roll.

By turns we comfort, and by turns complain,
And bear and ease by turns the fympathy of pain.
Friendship mysterious thing, what magic

powers

Support thy fway, and charm these minds of ours?
Bound to thy foot we boaft our birth-right still,
And dream of freedom, when we've loft our will,
And chang'd away our fouls: At thy command,
We fnatch new miferies from a foreign hand,
To call them ours; and, thoughtlefs of our eafe,
Plague the dear felf that we were born to pleate.
Thou tyrannefs of minds, whofe cruel throne
Heap on poor mortals forrows not their own;
As though our mother nature could no more
Find woes fuficient for each fon the bore,
Friendship divides the fhares, and lengthens
out the store.

Yet we are fond of thine imperious reign,
Proud of thy ilavery, wanton in our pain,
And chide the courteous hand when death dif-
folves the chain.

Virtue, forgive the thought! the raving mufe
Wild and defpairing knows not what she does,
Grows mad in grief, and in her favage hours
Affronts the name the loves and the adores.
She is thy votarefs too; and at thy fhrine,
O facred friendship, offer'd fongs divine,
While Gunston liv'd, and both our fouls were

thine.

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The linnet and the lark their vefpers fung,
And clouds of crimfon o'er th' horizon hung;
The flow-declining fun with floping wheels
Sunk down the golden day behind the western hills

Mourn, ye gardens, ye unfinish'd gates,
Ye green enclosures, and ye growing fweets,
Lament; for ye our midnight hours have known,
And watch'd us walking by the filent moon
In conference divine, while heavenly fire
Kindling our breafts did all our thoughts infpire
With joys almoft immortal; then our zeal
Blaz'd and burnt high to reach th' ethereal hill,
And love refin'd, like that above the poles,
Threw both our arms round one another's fouls
In rapture, and embraces. Oh forbear,
Forbear my fong! this is too much to hear,
Too dreadful to repeat; fuch joys as thefe
Fled from the earth for ever!-

Oh for a general grief! let all things share Our woes, that knew our loves: The neigbouring air

Let it be laden with immortal fighs,

And tell the gales, that every breath that flies
Over these fields fhould murmur and complain,
And kifs the fading grafs, and propagate the pain.
Weep all ye buildings, and the groves around
For ever weep: this is an endless wound,
Vaft and incurable. Ye buildings knew
His ülver tongue, ye groves have heard it too:
At that dear found no more shall ye rejoice,
And I no more must hear the charming voice:'
That could fpeak life, lies now congeal'd in death;
Woe to my drooping foul! that heavenly breath,
While on his folded lips all cold and pale
Eternal chains and heavy filence dwell.

Yet my fond hope would hear him speak again,
Once more at least, once more, and then
Gunfton aloud I call: In vain I cry
Gunfton aloud; for he muft ne'er reply.
In vain I mourn, and drop thefe funeral tears,
Death and the grave have neither eyes nor ears:
Wandering I tune my forrows to the groves,
And vent my fwelling griefs, and tell the winds
our loves;
[not:
While the dear youth fleeps faft, and hears them
He hath forgot me: In the lonesome vault
Mindlefs of Watts and friendship, cold he lies
Deaf and unthinking clay.———

But whither am I led? This artless grief Hurries the mufe on, obftinate and deaf To all the nicer rules, and bears her down From the tall fabric to the neighbouring ground: The pleafing hours, the happy moments paft In thefe fweet fields reviving on my tafte Snatch me away refiftlefs with impetous hafte. Spread thy ftrong pinions once again, my fong, And reach the turret thou haft left fo long: O'er the wide roof its lofty head it rears, Long waiting our converie; but only hears The noify tumults of the realms on high; The winds falute it whistling as they fly, Or jarring round the windows; rattling fhowers Lath the fair fides; above, loud thunder roars; But ftill the matter fleeps; nor hears the voice Of facred friendship, nor the tempeit's noife: An iron flumber fits on every fente, In vain the heavenly thunders ftrive to rouse it thence.

One labour more, my mufe, the golden sphere
Seems to demand: See through the dusky air
Downward it shines upon the rifing moon;
And, as the labours up to reach her noon,
Pursues her orb with repercuffive light,
And streaming gold repays the paler beams of
night:

But not one ray can reach the darkfome grave,
Or pierce the folid gloom that fills the cave
Where Gunston dwells in death. Behold it flames
Like fome new meteor with diffufive beams
Through the mid-heaven, and overcomes the

ftars;

"Sofhines thy Gunston's foul above the spheres," Raphael replies, and wipes away my tears.

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AN ELEGY ON MR. THOMAS GOUGE.

TO MR. ARTHUR SHALLET, MERCHANT. Worthy Sir,

THE fubject of the following elegy was high in
your efteem, and enjoyed a large fhare of your
affections. Scarce doth his memory need the af-
fitance of the mufe to make it perpetual; but
when the can at once pay her honours to the ve-
nerable dead, and by this adorefs acknowledge
the favours the has received from the living, it is
A double pleasure to,
Sir,

Your obliged humble fervant,
I. WATTS.

TO THE MEMORY OF

THE REVEREND MR. THOMAS GOUGE,

Who died Jan. 8th. 1699-1700.

YE virgin fouls, whofe fweet complaint
Could teach Euphrates not to flow,
Could Sion's ruin fo divinely paint,
Array'd in beauty and in woe:
Awake, ye virgin fouls, to mourn,

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No vulgar mortal dy'd

When he refign'd his breath.
The mufe that mourns a nation's fall,
Should wait at Gouge's funeral,
Should mingle majeity and groans,
Such as the tings to finking thrones,
And in deep founding numbers tell,
How Sion trembled, when this pillar fell
Sion grows weak, and England poor,
Nature herself, with all her store,
Can furnish fuch a pomp for death no more,
The reverend man let all things mourn;
Sure he was fome ethereal mind,
Fated in fleth to be contin'd,

And order'd to be born.

His foul was of th' angelic frame,
The fame ingredients, and the mould the fame
When the Creator makes a minifter of flame,
He was all form'd of heavenly things,
Mortals, believe what my Urania fings,
For the has feen him rife upon his flamy wings

How would he mount, how would he fly
Up through the ocean of the fky,
Tow'rd the celeftial coaft!
With what amazing fwiftnefs foar
Till earth's dark ball was feen no more,
And all its mountains loft!

Scarce could the mufe purfue him with her fight
But, angels, you can tell,

For oft you meet his wonderous flight,

And knew the stranger well;

Say, how he past the radiant spheres.

And vifited your happy feats,

And trac'd the well-known turnings of the golden

And walk'd among the stars.

Tell how he climb'd the everlasting hills

Surveying all the realms above,

[treets

Borne on a strong-wing'd faith, and on the fiery

Of an immortal love.

'Twas there he took a glorious fight

And with your tuneful forrows drets a prophet's Of the inheritance of faints in light,

urn.

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And read their title in their Saviour's right.
How oft the humble fcholar came,
And to your fongs he rais'd his cars
To learn th' unutterable name,
To view th' eternal bafe that bears,
The new creation's frame.
The countenance of God he saw,
Full of mercy: full of awe,

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