Classic Poem

PSALM X .

Ut quid, Domine?

1.

Why standest Thou so farr,
O God, our only starr,
In time most fitt for Thee
To help who vexed be?
For lo, with pride the wicked man
Still plagues the poore the most he can;
O, let proud him be throughly caught
In craft of his own crafty thought.

2.

For he himself doth prayse,
When he his lust doth raise;
Extolling ravenous gain,
But doth God self disdain.
Nay, so proud is his puffed thought,
That after God he never sought,
But rather much he fancys this, —
That name of God a fable is.

3.

For while his wayes do proue
On them he sets his loue,
Thy judgments are too high,
He cannot them espy.
Therfore he doth defy all those
That dare themselues to him oppose,
And sayeth in his bragging heart,
This gotten blisse shall ne're depart.

4.

Nor he removed be,
Nor danger ever see;
Yet from his mouth doth spring
Cursing and cosening;
Vnder his tongue do harbour'd ly
Both mischief and iniquity
For proof, oft lain in wait he is,
In secret by-way villages,

5.

In such a place vnknown
To slay the hurtless one:
With winking eyes aye bent
Against the innocent,
Like lurking lion in his denn,
He waites to spoyle the simple men:
Whom to their losse he still dos get,
When once he draw'th his wily nett.

6.

O, with how simple look
He oft layeth out his hook!
And with how humble showes
To trapp poore soules he goes!
Then freely, saith he in his sprite,
God sleeps, or hath forgotten quite;
His farr off sight now hood winkt is,
He leasure wants to mark all this.

7.

Then rise, and come abroad,
O Lord, our only God;
Lift up Thy heavnly hand,
And by the sylly stand.
Why should the evill so evill despise
The power of Thy through-seeing eyes?
And why should he in heart so hard
Say Thou dost not Thyn own regard?

8.

But naked, before Thine eyes,
All wrong and mischeife lyes,
For of them in Thy hands
The ballance evnly stands.
But who aright poor-minded be,
Commit their cause, themselues to Thee,
The succour of the succourless,
The Father of the fatherlesse.

9.

Breake Thou that wyked arm,
Whose fury bends to harme;
Search him, and wyked he
Will straight-way nothing be.
So, Lord, we shall Thy title sing,
Ever and ever to be King,
Who hast the heath'ney folk destroy'd
From out Thy land, by them anoy'd.

10.

Thou openest heavnly doore
To prayers of the poore;
Thou first preparedst their mind,
Then eare to them enclin'd:
O, be Thou still the orphan's aide,
That poore from ruine may be stayd,
Least we should ever feare the lust
Of earthly man, a lord of dust.