"Oh, how they rent me with their revelry, The hideous tumult of their joy in sin! And me they mixed up with their obscene mirth, Till half I doubted it was I myself Foaming my own shame out from helpless lips That blasphemed God, then laughed with ribald glee. I was not mistress of my mind or heart; Reason in me was a distracted realm, And will and conscience seemed like ships at sea Driven with fierce winds and tossed toward hopeless wreck. "I wonder at myself that I do not Fight against God who strangely suffered it. But, never, never! He suffers many things Strangely, but I, this is His grace in me, Bow down at all of them, saying, 'Amen!' The crown of all my reasons for believing That God is gracious, is that I believe. For why do I believe, except that He Makes me believe, against so many signs Seen in the world abroad which swear in vain He is not good? O, ever-blessed God, Who let those demons seven take up in me Their lodgment, that they might be so dislodged! "On an accepted day for me the Lord Was passing through the city where I dwelt, And one that knew my miserable case Implored Him to have mercy upon me. He heard, He condescended, and He came. But how at His first footsteps of approach, How did those inmates evil within me rave! What riot, mixed of panic and despair And hatred! The whole land elect where Christ Upon this earth appeared, when He appeared Was rife with insurrection from the pit Mad in attempt against Him. So in souls Possessed by spirits from hell, if Christ drew nigh Outrageous spasms of futile fury raged. Those demons seven in me usurped me now With tenfold more abominable rape. They with my fingers clutched and tore my hair; Gnashed with my teeth, and flickered with my tongue; They frothed from forth the corners of my mouth With foul grimace and execrable grin; In random jaculation hither and thither Flung my arms wildly like a windmill wrought To ruin in a whirlwind's vortices; Writhed all my bodily members, till I thought, With what of power to think was left to me, That surely nothing of corporeal mould Had strength enough of life to suffer more."