The Complete Works of Richard Crashaw Volume I Part 15

2. Tast this, and as Thou lik'st this lesser flood Expect a sea; My heart shall make it good.

3. Thy wrath that wades here now, e're long shall swim, 5 The floodgate shall be set wide ope for Him.

4. Then let Him drinke, and drinke, and doe His worst To drowne the wantonnesse of His wild thirst.

5. Now's but the nonage of My paines, My feares Are yett but hopes, weake as my infant yeares. 10

6. The day of My darke woe is yet but morne, My teares but tender, and My death new-borne.

7. Yet may these unfledg'd griefes give fate some guesse, These cradle-torments have their towardnesse.

8. These purple buds of blooming death may bee, 15 Erst the full stature of a fatall tree.

9. And till My riper woes to age are come, This knife may be the speare's praeludium.

ON THE WOUNDS OF OUR CRUCIFIED LORD.[31]

O, these wakefull wounds of Thine! 1 Are they mouthes? or are they eyes?

Be they mouthes, or be they eyne, Each bleeding part some one supplies.

Lo! a mouth! whose full-bloom'd lips 5 At too dear a rate are roses: Lo! a blood-shot eye! that weeps, And many a cruell teare discloses.

O, thou that on this foot hast laid Many a kisse, and many a teare; 10 Now thou shalt have all repaid, What soe're thy charges were.

This foot hath got a mouth and lips To pay the sweet summe of thy kisses; To pay thy teares, an eye that weeps, 15 Instead of teares, such gems as this is.

The difference onely this appeares, (Nor can the change offend) The debt is paid in ruby-teares Which thou in pearles did'st lend. 20

VPON THE BLEEDING CRUCIFIX: A SONG.[32]

I.

IIESU, no more! It is full tide: From Thy head and from Thy feet, From Thy hands and from Thy side All the purple riuers meet.

II.

What need Thy fair head bear a part In showres, as if Thine eyes had none?

What need they help to drown Thy heart, That striues in torrents of it's own?

III.

Water'd by the showres they bring, The thornes that Thy blest browe encloses (A cruell and a costly spring) Conceiue proud hopes of proving roses.

IV.

Thy restlesse feet now cannot goe For vs and our eternall good, As they were euer wont. What though?

They swimme, alas! in their own floud.

V.

Thy hand to giue Thou canst not lift; Yet will Thy hand still giuing be.

It giues, but O itself's the gift: It giues though bound; though bound 'tis free.

VI.

But O Thy side, Thy deep-digg'd side!

That hath a double Nilus going: Nor euer was the Pharian tide Half so fruitfull, half so flowing.

VII.

No hair so small, but payes his riuer To this Red Sea of Thy blood; Their little channells can deliuer Somthing to the generall floud.

VIII.

But while I speak, whither are run All the riuers nam'd before?

I counted wrong: there is but one; But O that one is one all ore.

IX.

Rain-swoln riuers may rise proud, Bent all to drown and overflow; But when indeed all's ouerflow'd, They themselues are drowned too.

X.

This Thy blood's deluge (a dire chance, Dear Lord, to Thee) to vs is found A deluge of deliuerance; A deluge least we should be drown'd. _lest_ N'ere wast Thou in a sense so sadly true, The well of liuing waters, Lord, till now.

NOTES AND ILl.u.s.tRATIONS.

The t.i.tle in 1646 is 'On the bleeding wounds of our crucified Lord:' in 1648 has 'body' for 'wounds:' in 1670 as 1646. I record these variations, &c.:

St. i. lines 2 and 3, in 1646 and 1670 read