VVho Thee adore: that I may give a voice
To thy great Acts, and in their joy rejoyce.
We as our Fathers, have thy Grace exil'd;
Revolted, and our Souls with Sin defil'd.
They, of thy Miracles in Egypt wrought,
So full of Feare and Wonder, never thought;
Thy Mercies, then their haires in number, more:
But murmur'd on the Erythraean Shore.
Yet for his Honour sav'd them from the Foe,
That all the VVorld his wondrous Power might know.
There the commanded Sea asunder rent,
VVhile Israel through his dusty Chanel went:
VVhom He from Pharaoh and his Army saves;
The swift-returning Flouds their fatall Graves.
[Part. 2] Then they his VVord believ'd, and sung his Praise;
Yet soone forgot: and wandred from his VVaies.
VVho long for flesh to pamper their excesse;
And tempt him in the barren Wildernesse.
He grants their wish, and with a Flight of Fowles
Sent meager Death into their hungry Soules.
They, Moses gentle Government, oppose;
And envy Aaron, whom the Lord had chose.
The yawning Earth then in her silent womb
Did Dathan and Abirams Troups intomb.
A swiftly-spreading Fire among them burnes,
And those Conspirators to Ashes turnes.
Yet they, the slaves of Sin in Horeb made
A Calfe of Gold, and to an Idol prai'd.
The Lord, their Glory, thus exchanged they
For th'Image of a Beast that feeds on Hay:
Forgot their Saviour, all his Wonders shown
In Zoan, and the Plains by Nile o'reflown;
The VVonders acted by his pow'rfull Hand;
VVhere the Red-Sea obey'd his stern Command.
God had pronounc'd their ruine: Moses then,
His Servant Moses, and the best of Men,
Stood in the Breach, which their Rebellion made;
And by his Prayer the hand of Vengeance staid.
[Part. 3] Yea they this fruitfull Paradise despis'd,
Nor his so-oft-confirmed Promise priz'd:
But mutined against their faithfull Guide,
And basely wisht they had in Egypt dy'd.
For this, the Lord advanc'd his dreadfull Hand,
To overthrow them on th'Arabian Sand;
To scatter their rebellious Seed among
Their Foes; expos'd to Poverty and Wrong.