A Christians nightly
Care.
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WHen thou hast spent the longsom day,
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in pleasure and delight,
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And after toile, and wearie way,
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doee seek thy rest at night,
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Into thy pain and pleasure past,
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eke this in labour yet:
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Ere sleep close up thine eyes too fast,
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do not thy God forget.
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But search within thy secret thoghts,
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what deeds did thee befall:
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And if thou find a misse in ought,
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to God for mercie call,
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But if thou find nothing amisse,
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that thou canst call to minde:
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Yet evermore remember this,
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there is the more behinde:
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And look how well soever it be,
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that thou hast spent this day:
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It came of God, and not of [t]hee,
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so to direct thy way.
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Thus if thou try thy daily deeds,
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and pleasure in this pain:
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Thy life shall cleanse thy corn from weeds
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and thine shall be the gain.
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But if thy sleepy sinfull eye,
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will venter for to wink,
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Before thy wilfull will may try,
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how far thy soul may sink:
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Beware and walk, or else thy bed
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which soft and smooth is made:
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Shall heap more evil upon thy head,
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then stroak of enemies blade.
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But if thy pain procure thine ease,
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in bed as thou dost ly,
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Im sure it will not God displease,
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to sing this soberly.
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I see that sleep is lent me here,
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to ease my wearie bones,
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As death at length will once appear,
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to ease my grievous groanes.
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My daily sports with bellie fed,
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would cause my sleepy eye,
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To sleep so sound in quiet bed,
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whereby my soul might die:
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The stretching arms, the ganting breath,
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that in my bed I use:
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Are portraicts of the pangs of death,
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when life shall me refuse:
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And as my bed each sundry part,
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in shadows doth resemble:
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Then sundry shapes of death, whose dart
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will make my heart to tremble:
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My bed it selfe is like the grave,
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my sheets, the winding sheet:
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My cloathes, the moulds which I must have
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to cover me most meet.
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The hungry flaes, that lowp most fresh
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to worms I can compare,
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Which greedily will eat my flesh,
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and leave my bones right bare:
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The waking Cock that airly crowes,
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to put the night away,
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Puts me in minde the Trump that blowes
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before the latter day.
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Then as I rise up lustily,
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when sluggish sleep is past,
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So hope I to rise joyfullie,
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to judgement at the last.
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Thus will I wake, thus will I sleep,
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thus will I hope to rise.
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Thus will I neither wail nor weep,
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but sing in holy guise.
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My bones shall in this bed remain,
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my soul in God shall trust:
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By whom I hope to rise again
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from death and earthly dust,
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All laud and praise be to the Lord,
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and also to his Sonne
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And likewise to the holy Ghost.
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and so my song is done.
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