A good Exhortation to every
man what he should doo when he goeth to bed and when
he riseth. To a new Northen tune.
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AT night lye down prepare to have:
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thy sleep, thy death, thy bed, thy grave.
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A rise a wake think that thou hast:
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thy life but lent, thy breth a blast.
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Let not the sluggish sleep,
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close up thy waking eye:
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Until with judgement deep,
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thy dayly deeds thou trye.
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He which one sinne in conscience keeps,
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when he to quiet goes:
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More ventrous is then he which sleepes,
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with twentie mortall foes.
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Therfore at night call unto minde,
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[?] the day hast spent:
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[?] if nought amis thou finde,
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if ought betime repent.
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And since thy bed a pattern is,
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of death and fatall hearse:
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Bedward it shall not be amis,,
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thus to record in verse.
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The stretching armes, the yawning breath,
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that I to bedward use:
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Are patterns of the panges of death,
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when life must me refuse.
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The nightly Bell which I heare sound,
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as I am laid in bed:
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Foreshowes the Bell which me to ground,
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shall ring when I am dead,
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My bed is like the grave so colde,
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and sleep which shuts myne eye,
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Resembleth death: Clothes which me folde,
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declare the moules so drye.
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The frisking fleas resemble wel,
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the wringling worme to me:
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Which with me in the grave shall dwel,
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where I no light shall see.
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The waking Cock that early crowes,
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to weare the night away:
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Puts me in minde the trump that blowes
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before the later day.
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The splendent Sun whose golden ray,
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no eye can dure to see:
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Declares how in that dreadful day,
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God shall appeer to me.
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The rising in the morn likewise,
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When sleepy night is past:
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Puts me in minde how I shall rise
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to judgement at the last.
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I go to bed as to my grave,
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God knoweth when I shall wake:
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But Lord I trust thou wilt me save,
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and me to mercy take.
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Thus wil I wake, thus wil I sleep,
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thus wil I hope to rise:
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Thus wil I neither waile nor weep,
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but sing in godly wise.
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Repent, repent you sinners all,
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and call to God for grace:
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That he may graunt unto us all,
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in heaven a dwelling place.
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