Six centuries of select hymns and spiritual songs collected out of the Holy Bible together with a catechism, the canticles, and a catalogue of vertuous women / by William Barton.

The Seventh Song. (Book 7)

[Christ.]

O Princess, thou than life more dear, How beautifull thy feet appear When they with purple ribbands bound, In Golden Sandals print the Ground! Thy Joints like Jewels which impart To wondring eye the work-mans art. Thy Navel like a Mazer fill'd With juice from rarest fruits distill'd. Thy belly like an heap of wheat With never fading Lillies set; Thy breasts like two young Roes do show, Which fell at once from one fair Doe: Thy Neck's an Ivory Tower, thine Eyne Like those Fish-pools in Heshbon shine. Thy Nose presents that Tower upon The face of flowery Lebanon:

Which all the pleasant plains survays, Where Abana her streams displays. Thy head like Carmel cloath'd with shade, Whose Tresses Tyrrean fillets bray'd, Sweet fetters for the great Kings Eyes, Fast holden in those Galleries: How pleasant, Oh! how exquisite Thy beauty fram'd for sweet delight; Thy stature like an upright palm, Thy breasts like clusters dropping balm. I will ascend thy palms high crown, Whose boughs victorious hands renown: Thy Nose shall smell like apples fine, Thy breasts like clusters of the Vine: And from the spreading branches root Will gather her delicious fruit. Choice wine shall from thy palate spring, Most acceptable to the King; Which sweetly shall descend and make The dumb to speak, the dead to wake.

[The Church.]

I my belov'd am onely thine, And thou by just exchange art mine: Come, let us tread the pleasant fields, Tast we what fruits the Country yields▪ And in the Villages repose, When shades of night all forms enclose: Then with the early morn repair To our new Vine-yard, see if there The tender Vines disclose their gemms And Granets blossom on their stemms:

Amongst those fragrant trees my love There onely shalt thou freely prove, How sweet a smell our mandrakes yield, Our Gates with various fruits are fill'd; Fruits that are old, fruits from the tree, New gather'd, all preserv'd for thee.