The Temple: Sacred Poems and Private Ejaculations/The Banquet
¶ The Banquet.
Welcome sweet and sacred cheer,Welcome deare;With me, in me, live and dwell:For thy neatnesse passeth sight,Thy delightPasseth tongue to taste or tell.
O what sweetnesse from the bowlFills my soul,Such as is, and makes divine!Is some starre (fled from the sphere)Melted there,As we sugar melt in wine?
Or hath sweetnesse in the breadMade a headTo subdue the smell of sinne;Flowers, and gummes, and powders givingAll their living,Lest the enemie should winne?
Doubtlesse, neither starre nor flowerHath the powerSuch a sweetnesse to impart:Onely God, who gives perfumes,Flesh assumes,And with it perfumes my heart.
But as Pomanders and woodStill are good,Yet being bruis'd are better sented:God, to show how farre his loveCould improve,Here, as broken, is presented.
When I had forgot my birth,And on earthIn delights of earth was drown'd;God took bloud, and needs would beSpilt with me,And so found me on the ground.
Having rais'd me to look up,In a cupSweetly he doth meet my taste.But I still being low and short,Farre from court,Wine becomes a wing at last.
For with it alone I flieTo the skie:Where I wipe mine eyes, and seeWhat I seek, for what I sue;Him I view,Who hath done so much for me.
Let the wonder of this pitieBe my dittie,And take up my lines and life:Hearken under pain of death,Hands and breath;Strive in this, and love the strife.