When I behold them prest with grief,
I'll cry to heav'n for their relief;
And by my warm petitions prove

How much I prize their faithful love.

WATTS.

PSALM CXLII.

WITH sobbing voice, with drowning eyes,
With joined hands, rais'd to the skies,
With humble soul, and bended knee,
I rise, O Lord, I pray to thee.
As my dim eyes a briny shower
Of tears into my bosoin pour:
So I into thy sacred ears

Pour out my heart, unload my fears.
Though dangers me besieging round
My mazed senses quite confound,
Thou canst give me a thread, whereby
I from this labyrinth may fly.
My harmless feet can walk no way
But privy snares my foes fore-lay,
And looking round about for aid,
My friends to know me are afraid.
No human succour now is left
To me, of help, and hope bereft :

My life is sought by many a one,
But ah! protected is by none.
To thee, O Lord, my cries I send,
My certain hope, my surest friend;
I have, in this false world's wide scope
None other help, none other hope.
O hear my cries, for faint I grow,
Opprest with endless weight of woe.
Me from my persecutors free,

Too great, too strong for poor weak me.
Bring me from out this hell-black cave,
My prison, nay my living grave;
Where fiends, and fiendly-hearted foes
My flight on every side enclose.
So shall my thankful mouth always
Pour forth a fountain of thy praise,
And this thine aid shall teach the just
On thee their Rock to build their trust.

FRANCIS DAVISON, MS.

PSALM CXLIV.

My soul, in raptures rise to bless the Lord,
Who taught my hands to draw the fatal sword;
Led by his arm, undaunted I

appear

In the first ranks of death, and front of war.

He taught me first the pointed spear to wield,
And mow the glorious harvest of the field:

By him inspir'd, from strength to strength I past,
Plung'd through the troops, and laid the battle waste.

In him my hopes I centre and repose,

He guards my life, and shields me from my foes,
He held his ample buckler o'er my head,

And screen'd me trembling in the mighty shade; Against all hostile violence and pow'r,

He was my sword, my bulwark, and

my

He o'er my people will maintain my sway,
And teach my willing subjects to obey.

tow'r :

Lord! what is man, of vile and humble birth, Sprung with his kindred reptiles from the earth," That he should thus thy secret counsels share, Or what his son, who challenges thy care? Why does thine eye regard this nothing, Man, His life a point, his measure but a span?

The fancy'd pageant of a moment made,
Swift as a dream, and fleeting as a shade.

Come, in thy pow'r, and leave th' ethereal plain, And to thy harness'd tempest give the rein; Yon starry arch shall bend beneath the load, So loud the chariot, and so great the God!

Soon as his rapid wheels Jehovah rolls,
The folding skies shall tremble to the poles,
Heav'n's gaudy axle with the world shall fall,
Leap from the centre, and unhinge the ball.

Touch'd by thy hands, the lab'ring hills expire Thick clouds of smoke, and deluges of fire; On the tall groves the red destroyer preys, And wraps th’eternal mountains in the blaze: Full on my foes may all thy lightnings fly On purple pinions through the gloomy sky.

Extend thy hand, thou kind all-gracious God, Down from the heav'n of heav'ns, thy bright abode, And shield me from my foes, whose tow'ring pride. Low'rs like a storm, and gathers like a tide: Against strange children vindicate my cause, Who curse thy name, and trample on thy laws; Who fear not vengeance which they never felt, Train'd to blaspheme, and eloquent in guilt: Their hands are impious, and their deeds profane, They plead their boasted innocence in vain.

Thy name shall dwell for ever on my tongue,
And guide the sacred numbers of my song;
To thee my muse shall consecrate her lays,
And every note shall labour in thy praise;

The hallow'd theme shall teach me how to sing, Swell on the lyre, and tremble on the string.

Oft has thy hand from fight the monarch led, When death flew raging, and the battle bled; And snatch'd thy servant, in the last despair, From all the rising tumult of the war.

Against strange children vindicate my cause, Who curse thy name, and trample on thy laws; That our fair sons may smile in early bloom, Our sons, the hopes of all our years to come, Like plants that nurs'd by fost'ring show'rs arise, And lift their spreading honours to the skies. That our chaste daughters may their charms display,

Like the bright pillars of our temple, gay, Polish'd, and tall, and smooth, and fair as they.

Pil'd up with plenty let our barns appear, And burst with all the seasons of the year; Let pregnant flocks in ev'ry quarter bleat, And drop their tender young in ev'ry street. Safe from their labours may our oxen come, Safe may they bring the gather'd summer home. Oh! may no sighs, no streams of sorrow flow, To stain our triumphs with the fears of woe.