| Citation |
SCG-C.735.039
23-30 Aug 1735:12, 21 (82)
The 6 first verses of the 137th Psalm paraphras'd.
When on the banks of Babel's rolling flood
We sat and wept our country and our God,
From bursting hearts the heavy sorrows rise,
And vent the burthens at our swimming eyes.
Our harps (whose musick now was useless grown,
No help to real grief, no easement to our moan)
We careless hung, neglected, useless thing;
Sorrow has spoil'd the sound of every string!
No more gay airs, nor softest tunes shall breathe
By sad and silent, as the caves of death.
There they our conquerors, in insulting mood,
Would have profan'd our harps, our songs, our God,
To sooth their impious mirth. But sacred songs,
(Such as were sung in Zion, ) to our God belongs,
Nor shall be prostituted to the mirth,
Of the mad vulgar (sordid sons of Earth)
How shall we to such foes presume to sing?
Foes to our God, our country, & our King.
The song wou'd faint, upon the impious wire
Would lose it's self and all it's sacred fire
And be forever banish'd from the heavenly quire
No. No, dear Salem no, our zeal for thee
Shall lasting as ourselves & suffrings be.
. . . [7 lines]
Never attempt to sing another song.
|