O God, to whom I make my suit,
Let not thine oracles be mute,
For vice, yea violence and fraud
Have spread their specious lies abroad.

And from their tongues with falshood fraught
They have their accusation brought,
And come about me with abuse,
Without a motive to induce.

But for the very love I bore,
Behold, they are my friends no more;
Mean while I practise to forbear,
Resign'd to patience and to pray'r.

Thus in my progress have they stood,
And thus rewarded bad for good,
Devising and committing ill
For turns of kindness and good-will.

Set thou a man of virtuous fame
My foe to rule and to reclaim,
And let thy holy angel stand
To guide the motions of his hand.

Whene'er his cause is heard and try'd,
Give thou the sentence on his side,
And let his pray'r thy favour win,
Refin'd from gross conceits and sin.

As he repents his former ways,
Add length unto his better days,
And grant him thine especial grace
To keep and to adorn his place.

To many children let him be
A sire, and live their sons to see,
And let him cherish in his wife
A help-meet to a godly life.

And let his rising race be fed
With freedom's best ingenuous bread;
To their own garners let them go,
Nor dearth nor desolation know.

Let God's good blessing of increase
Be on his cattle and his fleece,
Nor let the foreigner approach
Upon his labours to incroach.

Let him be register'd and clast
'Mongst neighbours of the Christian cast,
And for his heirs lay up the fort
And treasure of a good report.

Let his posterities extend
The honours that from him descend,
And when his years he has fulfil'd,
His name to greater credit build.

Let what his fathers did amiss
Be sunk in such a change as this,
And let him, as his praise exalts,
Atone for all his mother's faults.

And let the total sum of all,
His race recover'd from their fall,
Be shewn for mercy to behold,
And be by Christ himself enroll'd.

And this the more, as at the first
His mind was fashion'd for the worst,
And in vexatious actions dealt,
With soul unsympathiz'd to melt.

In unbelief he took delight,
In deeds of obloquy and spite;
But now he shall his tongue employ
In benediction, love, and joy.

From habits of invet'rate root
He had no grace, and bore no fruit;
But now through Christ his heart is new,
He shall another course pursue.

Let him by faith his sins uncloke,
And God through penitence invoke,
And let the Lord's most holy word
His loins with purity begird.

Let such returns as these dispose
To quick conversion all my foes,
And thus in love may I controul
The persecutors of my soul.

But thou, O Lord, benignly deal
With me, who thus for sinners feel,
According to thy name intreat
Thy servant, for thy love is sweet.

O let my charity procure
Thy speedy help, for I am poor,
And as mine enemies afflict,
My heart within my breast is prickt.

I haste this fleshly veil to quit,
Reduc'd like shadowy forms that flit,
And hurry'd from my vernal day,
Am driv'n like grashoppers away.

As with such rigour I abstain,
My knees are feeble and in pain;
For want of their nutricious sap
My lips and all my body chap.

Moreover I became the jest
Of those that knew me at the best,
And as they saw my alter'd look,
Their heads with shrewd remarks they shook.

O Lord, my Saviour, whom I serve,
From these calamities preserve,
And as with meekness I behave,
According to thy mercy save.

And they shall know that this degree
Of goodness is alone from thee,
That thou thyself to pray'r reveal'd,
All my infirmities hast heal'd.

Though they with ceaseless wrath malign,
Be thou the more and more benign,
And baffle those that bear me down,
With joys my fervent vows to crown.

Let all my foes to grace be sped,
By shame to true contrition led,
And find in a propitious hour
The Lord's regenerating pow'r.

To God I will my duty shew
With all that gratitude can do,
And where the multitude resort
By songs to lively praise exhort.

For Jesus shall the poor assist
The flesh and mammon to resist,
Who saves the soul from Satan's sieve,
And judges not but to forgive.