Poetry Monday - John Donne



Wilt thou love God as He thee? then digest,

My soul, this wholesome meditation,

How God the Spirit, by angels waited on,

In heaven, doth make His temple in thy breast.


The Father, having begot a Son most blest,

And still begetting, (for He ne'r be gone)

Hath deigned to choose thee by adoption,

Coheir to His glory, and sabbath's endless rest.


And as a robbed man, which by search doth find,

His stolen stuff sold, must lose or buy it again:

The Son of glory came down, and was slain,

Us whom He had made, and Satan stole, to unbind.


T'was much, that man was made like God before,

But that God should be made like man, much more!


Father, part of His double interest

Unto Thy kingdom, Thy Son gives to me,

His joinure in the knotty Trinity

He keeps, and gives to me His death's conquest.


This lamb, whose death, with life the world has blessed,

Was from the world's beginning slain, and He

Hath made two Wills, which with the Legacy

of His and Thy kingdom, do Thy sons invest.


Yet such are Thy laws, that men argue yet

Whether a man those statutes can fulfill;

None doth; but all-healing grace and spirit

Revive again what law and letter kill.


Thy law's abridgement, and Thy last command

Is all love; Oh let this last will stand!


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