ON A PRAYER-BOOK SENT TO MRS. M. R

LO, here a little volume, but great book!

A nest of new-born sweets,

Whose native pages, 'sdaining

To be thus folded, and complaining

Of these ignoble sheets,

Affect more comely bands,

Fair one, from thy kind hands,

And confidently look

To find the rest

Of a rich binding in your breast!

It is in one choice handful, heaven; and all
Heaven's royal hosts encamped, thus small
To prove that true schools use to tell,
A thousand angels in one point can dwell.

It is love's great artillery,
Which here contracts itself, and comes to lie
Close couched in your white bosom; and from thence,
As from a snowy fortress of defence,
Against your ghostly foe to take your part,
And fortify the hold of your chaste heart.

It is an armoury of light;
Let constant use but keep it bright,
You'll find it yields
To holy hands and humble hearts
More swords and shields
Than sin hath snares, or hell hath darts.

Only be sure
The hands be pure
That hold these weapons, and the eyes
Those of turtles, chaste, and true,
Wakeful, and wise.

Here's a friend shall fight for you;
Hold but this book before your heart,
Let prayer alone to play his part.

But, O! the heart
That studies this high art
Must be a sure housekeeper,
And yet no sleeper.

Dear soul, be strong;
Mercy will come ere long,
And bring her bosom full of blessings,
Flowers of never-fading graces,
To make immortal dressings
For worthy souls, whose wise embraces
Store up themselves for Him who is alone
The Spouse of virgins, and the Virgin's Son.

But if the noble Bridegroom when He comes
Shall find the wandering heart from home,
Leaving her chaste abode
To gad abroad,
Amongst the gay mates of the god of flies
To take her pleasure, and to play
And keep the Devil's holy day;
To dance in the sunshine of some smiling,
But beguiling
Spheres of sweet and sugared lies,
Some slippery pair
Of false, perhaps, as fair,
Flattering, but forswearing, eyes;

Doubtless some other heart
Will get the start
Meanwhile, and, stepping in before,
Will take possession of that sacred store
Of hidden sweets, and holy joys,
Words which are not heard with ears-
These tumultuous shops of noise-
Effectual whispers, whose still voice
The soul itself more feels than hears;

Amorous languishments, luminous trances,
Sights which are not seen with eyes,
Spiritual and soul-piercing glances
Whose pure and subtle lightning flies
Home to the heart, and sets the house on fire
And melts it down in sweet desire,
Yet does not stay
To ask the window's leave to pass that way;

Delicious deaths, soft exhalations
Of soul; dear and divine annihilations;
A thousand unknown rites
Of joys, and rarefied delights;

A hundred thousand goods, glories, and graces,
And many a mystic thing,
Which the divine embraces
Of the dear Spouse of spirits with them will bring
For which it is no shame
That dull mortality must not know a name.

Of all this store
Of blessings, and ten thousand more,
If when He come
He find the heart from home,
Doubtless He will unload
Himself some otherwhere,
And pour abroad
His precious sweets,
On the fair soul whom first He meets.

O fair! O fortunate! O rich! O dear!
O happy, and thrice happy she,
Dear silver-breasted dove,
Whoe'er she be,
Whose early love
With winged vows
Makes haste to meet her morning Spouse,
And close with His immortal kisses!
Happy, indeed, who never misses
To improve that precious hour,
And every day
Seize her sweet prey,
All fresh and fragrant as He rises,
Dropping, with a balmy shower,
A delicious dew of spices.

O, let the blessful heart hold fast
Her heavenly armful, she shall taste
At once ten thousand paradises!
She shall have power
To rifle and deflower
The rich and roseal spring of those rare sweets,
Which with a swelling bosom there she meets;
Boundless and infinite, bottomless treasures
Of pure inebriating pleasures;
Happy proof she shall discover,
What joy, what bliss,
How many heavens at once it is,
To have a God become her lover!

End of title