Page [unnumbered]
Gods Ship, Gods Church, with many a tempest tost,
With waues of woe, and furious billowes beaten,
Oft seemes to man to be euen fully lost,
Quight swallowed vp, and of those surges eaten:
When straight at hand Gods succour doth appeare,
Who staies the stormes, and doth all troubles cleare▪
The worldlings proud, fierce foemen to this barke,
Do swim in wealth, and flote in honors hie:
So that they seeme deuoyd of any carke,
And beare their topsailes flanting in the skie:
When sodainly Gods vengeance doth appeare,
Which makes them buy their passed pleasure deare▪
By those same stormes God tries his chosen pheere,
His Church, his spouse, how constant she wil stand;
Corrects his children whom he holds most deare,
Lest that they perish with that wicked band.
Whom, when they haue those perils stoutly past,
He doth conduct to happie hauen at last.
By those faire calmes which wicked men enioy,
Without excuse Gods bountie doth them make:
And as the Oxe is fatted on with ioy,
Is brought at last vnto the dolefull stake:
The worldlings so doth time in pleasure spend,
But goes to paine, when Death his life doth end.