2 Into thy presence let my pray'r

With sighs devout ascend,
And to my cries, that ceaseless are,

Thine ear with favour bend.
3 For cloy'd with woes and trouble store

Surcharg'd my soul doth lie,
My life at death's uncheerful door

Unto the grave draws nigh.
4 Reckon'd I am with them that pass

Down to the dismal pit,
I am a man, but weak alas,

And for that name unfit.
5 From life discharg'd and parted quite

Among the dead to sleep,
And like the slain in bloody fight
That in the

grave
Whom thou rememberest no more,

Dost never more regard,
Them from thy hand deliver'd o'er

Death's hideous house hath barr'd. 6 Thou in the lowest pit profound

Hast set me all forlorn,
Where thickest darkness hovers round,

In horrid deeps to mourn.
7 Thy wrath, from which no shelter saves,

Full sore doth press on me;
Thou break’st upon me all thy waves,

And all thy waves break me.
8 Thou dost my friends from me estrange,

And mak’st me odious,

lie deep.

Me to them odious, for they change,

And I here pent up thus. 9 Through sorrow and affliction great, Mine

eye grows dim and dead, Lord, all the day I thee intreat,

My hands to thee I spread.
10 Wilt thou do wonders on the dead?

Shall the deceas'd arise,
And praise thee from their loathsome bed

With pale and hollow eyes?
11 Shall they thy loving kindness tell

On whom the grave hath hold?
Or they who in perdition dwell,

Thy faithfulness unfold?
2 In darkness can thy mighty hand

Or wondrous acts be known?
Thy justice in the gloomy land

Of dark oblivion ?
13 But I to thee, O Lord, do cry,

Ere yet my life be spent,
And up to thee my pray’r doth hie,

Each morn, and thee prevent.
14 Why wilt thou, Lord, my soul forsake,

And hide thy face from me,
15 That am already bruis'd, and shake

With terror sent from thee?
Bruis'd and afflicted, and so low

As ready to expire,
While I thy terrors undergo

Astonish'd with thine ire.

05

16 Thy fierce wrath over me doth flow,

Thy threat’nings cut me through: 17 All day they round about me go,

Like waves they me pursue.
18 Lover and friend thou hast remov'd,

And sever'd from me far:
They fly me now whom I have lov'd,

And as in darkness are.

70

A PARAPHRASE ON PSALM CXIV.*

5

When the blest seed of Terah's faithful son,
After long toil their liberty had won,
And past from Pharian fields to Canaan land,
Led by the strength of the Almighty's hand,
Jehovah's wonders were in Israel shown,
His praise and glory was in Israel known.
That saw the troubled sea, and shivering fled,
And sought to hide his froth-becurled head
Low in the earth; Jordan's clear streams recoil,
As a faint host that hath receiv'd the foil.
The high, huge-bellied mountains skip like rams
Amongst their ewes, the little hills like lambs.
Why fled the ocean? And why skipt the mountains ?
Why turned Jordan toward his crystal fountains ?

* This and the following Psalm are Milton's earliest performances. Warton.

O recoil] The rhymes probably from Sylvester's Du Bartas

10 15

Shake, Earth, and at the presence be aghast
Of him that ever was, and aye shall last,
That glassy floods from rugged rocks can crush,
And make soft rills from fiery flint-stones gush.

PSALM CXXXVI.

aye endure,

Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord, for he is kind,

For his mercies

Ever faithful, ever sure.
Let us blaze his name abroad,
For of Gods he is the God :

For his, &c.
O let us his praises tell,
Who doth the wrathful tyrants quell:

For his, &c.
Who with his miracles doth make
Amazed heaven and earth to shake :

For his, &c.
Who by his wisdom did create
The painted heavens so full of state :

For his, &c.
Who did the solid earth ordain
To rise above the watery plain :

15

20

17 crush] The rhymes from Sylvester's Du Bartas,

p.

30. And so one humour doth another crush, Till to the ground their liquid pearls do gush.' Dunster. watery plain] P.L. i. 396.

• Rabba, and her watery plain ! Todd.

29

95

30

35

C

For his, &c.
Who by his all-commanding might
Did fill the new-made world with light:

For his, &c.
And caus'd the golden-tressed sun
All the day long his course to run:

For his, &c.
The horned moon to shine by night,
Amongst her spangled sisters bright:

For his, &c.
He with his thunder-clasping hand
Smote the first-born of Egypt land :

For his, &c.
And in despite of Pharaoh fell,
He brought from thence his Israel :

For his, &c.
The ruddy waves he cleft in twain,
Of the Erythræan main :

For his, &c.
22 golden-tressed] Buchanan's trans. of this psalm.

* Qui solem auricomum jussit dare jura diei.' Todd. • The golden-tressed sun.' Benlowes's Theophila, p. 42. 34 spangled] See notes on P. L. vii. 384, 581.

36 thunder] “Whose thunder-clasping hand.' Benlowes's Theophila, p. 88.

"I fell] Mr. Dunster refers to Sylvester's Du Bartas, for these rhymes, pp. 357, 377, 438, 478. At p. 361 'Pharaoh' is called ' fell.' 45 cleft) Sylvester's Du Bartas, p. 48.

• His dreadful voice to save his antient sheep,

Did cleave the bottom of th’ Erythréan deep.' And p. 967. “The Erythrean ruddy billows roar.' Dunster.