At thy approach the conscious trees
Bend humbly to the tepid breeze,

And every flower a fresher brightness wears;
Labour to the field repairs,

Where buxom Ceres waits him with a smile:
Whistling he crosses every stile,

Or chants some love-lorn ditty's air,

With which he means to charm, and win his favourite

fair.

O sovereign of the spicy gale,

Of odours pure, and salutary dews,
Oft as thy star its beam renews,
Thy violet breath entranc'd let me inhale:
Give me to range thy wholesome hills,

Thy valleys, wash'd with crystal rills,

And verdant lawns, where many a wild-flower grows;

There, while zephyr softly blows,

Let me indulge the heaven-devoted thought,

And render praises as I ought

To Him whose power and love divine

Call'd thee from total void, and bade thy beauty shine.

William Woty.

MATINS.

I cannot ope mine eyes,

But thou art ready there to catch

My morning-soul and sacrifice!

Then we must needs for that day make a match.

My God, what is a heart?
Silver or gold, or precious stone,
Or star, or rainbow, or a part

Of all these things, or all of them in one?

My God, what is a heart,

That thou should'st it so eye and woo,
Pouring upon it all thy art,

As if that thou hadst nothing else to do?

Indeed, man's whole estate Amounts (and richly) to serve thee: He did not heav'n and earth create, Yet studies them, not Him by whom they be.

Teach me thy love to know;

That this new light, which now I see, May both the work and workman show: Then by a sunbeam I will climb to thee.

Herbert.

EVEN-SONG.

Blest be the God of love,

Who gave me eyes, and light, and power this day,

Both to be busy and to play,

But much more blest be God above,

Who gave me sight alone,

Which to himself he did deny!

For when he sees my ways, I die!

But I have got his Son, and he hath none.

What have I brought thee home
For this thy love? have I discharg'd the debt,
Which this day's favour did beget?

I ran, but all I brought was some.

My diet, care, and cost,

Do end in bubbles, balls of wind;

Of wind to thee whom I have cross'd, But balls of wild-fire to my troubled mind.

Yet still thou goest on,

And now with darkness closest weary eyes,
Saying to man, it doth suffice:
Henceforth repose, your work is done.

Thus in thy ebony box

Thou dost enclose us, till the day
Put our amendment in our way,

And give new wheels to our disorder'd clocks.

I muse, which shows more love

The day or night: that is the gale, this th' harbour;
That is the walk, and this the arbour;
Or that the garden, this the grove.

My God thou art all love,

Not one poor minute 'scapes thy breast,
But brings a favour from above:

And in this love, more than in bed, I rest.

Herbert.

AN AUTUMN MORNING.

Go! let the diving Negro seek

For gems hid in some forlorn creek;

We all pearls scorn,

Save what the dewy morn

Congeals upon each little spire of grass,

Which careless shepherds beat down as they pass; And gold ne'er here appears,

Save what the yellow Ceres bears?

Sir W. Raleigh.

FAIR DAYS; OR, DAWN'S DECEITFUL.

Fair was the dawn; and but e'en now the skies
Show'd like to cream, inspir'd with strawberries:
But in a sudden all was chang'd and gone,
That smil'd in that first sweet complexion;
Then thunder-claps and lightning did conspire
To tear the world, or set it all on fire.
What! trust to things below, when as we see,
As men, the heavens have their hypocrisy.

Herrick.

SUNDAY.

O day most calm, most bright,
The fruit of this, the next world's bud,
The indorsement of supreme delight,
Writ by a Friend, and with his blood;
The couch of time, care's balm and bay:
The week were dark, but for thy light;
Thy torch doth show the way.

The other days and thou

Make up one man; whose face thou art,
Knocking at heaven with thy brow:
The worky days are the back-part;
The burden of the week lies there,
Making the whole to stoop and bow,
Till thy release appear.

Man had straight forward gone
To endless death: but thou dost pull
And turn us round, to look on one,
Whom, if we were not very dull,

We could not choose but look on still;
Since there is no place, so alone,

The which he doth not fill.

Sundays the pillars are,

On which heaven's palace archéd lies!
The other days fill up the spare
And hollow room with vanities;

They are the fruitful beds and borders
In God's rich garden! that is bare,
Which parts their ranks and orders.

The Sundays of man's life,
Threaded together on Time's string,
Make bracelets to adorn the wife
Of the eternal glorious King.

On Sunday heaven's gate stands ope;
Blessings are plentiful and rife-
More plentiful than hope.