MATERIAL
I run eight hundred hens to the acre
They die by dozens mysteriously. . . .
I am more than doubtful concerning my Maker.
Why has the Lord afflicted me?
What a return for all my endeavour
Not to mention the L. S. D!
I am an atheist now and for ever,
Because this God has afflicted me!
PROGRESSIVE
Money spent on an Army or Fleet
Is homicidal lunacy. . . .
My son has been killed in the Mons retreat,
Why is the Lord afflicting me?
Why are murder, pillage and arson
And rape allowed by the Deity?
I will write to the Times, deriding our parson
Because my God has afflicted me.
CHORUS
We had a kettle: we let it leak:
Our not repairing it made it worse.
We haven't had any tea for a week.
The bottom is out of the Universe!
CONCLUSION
This was none of the good Lord's pleasure,
For the Spirit He breathed in Man is free;
But what comes after is measure for measure,
And not a God that afflicteth thee.
