William Cowper

When we don't pray, we quit the fight. Prayer keeps the Christian's armor bright. And Satan trembles when he sees. The weakest saint upon his knees.

How sweet, how passing sweet, is solitude!
But grant me still a friend in my retreat,
Whom I may whisper, Solitude is sweet.

I am monarch of all I survey,
My right there is none to dispute,
From the centre all round to the sea,
I am lord of the fowl and the brute.
O solitude! Where are the charms
That sages have seen in thy face?
Better dwell in the midst of alarms,
Than reign in this horrible place.

Sends Nature forth the daughter of the skies... To dance on earth, and charm all human eyes.

I, fed with judgment, in a fleshy tomb, am
Buried above ground.

Be trusted with the Lord.
Wait for His seasonable aid,
And though it tarry, wait:
The promise may be long delay'd,
But cannot come too late.

Man disavows, and Deity disowns me;
Hell might afford my miseries a shelter;
Therefore Hell keeps her ever-hungry mouths all
Bolted against me.

Hard lot! encompassed with a thousand dangers,
Weary, faint, trembling with a thousand terrors,
I'm called, if vanquished, to receive a sentence
Worse than Abiram's.

Him the vindictive rod of angry Justice
Sent quick and howling to the centre headlong;
I, fed with judgement, in a fleshy tomb, am
Buried above ground.

Judge not the Lord by feeble sense, but trust him for his grace, behind a frowning providence He hides a smiling face.

Still ending, and beginning still!

Grief is itself a medicine.

So Fancy dreams - Disprove it, if ye can,
Ye reas'ners broad awake, whose busy search
Of argument, employ'd too oft amiss,
Sifts half the pleasures of short life away.

He “loved the world that hated him: the tear
That dropped upon his Bible was sincere;
Assailed by scandal and the tongue of strife,
His only answer was a blameless life

Blind unbelief is sure to err
And scan His work in vain;
God is His own interpreter,
And He will make it plain.

O solitude, where are the charms That sages have seen in thy face? Better dwell in the midst of alarms, Than reign in this horrible place.

Their tameness is shocking to me.