Be therefore wise, ye kings, instructed be, Ye rulers of the earth, and henceforth see Ye serve the Lord in fear, and stand in awe Of sinning any more against His law, His royal law of liberty: to do To others as you’d have them do to you. Oh stoop, ye mighty monarchs, and let none Reject His government, but kiss the Son While’s wrath is but a little kindled, lest His anger burn, and you that have transgressed His law so oft, and would not Him obey, Eternally should perish from the way— The way of God’s salvation, where the just Are blessed who in the Lord do put their trust. _Felix quem faciunt aliena pericula cautum_. Happy’s he Whom others’ harms do wary make to be. As the unreasonable rage and furious violence of the persecutors had drawn the former expostulation from me, so in a while after, my heart being deeply affected with a sense of the great loving-kindness and tender goodness of the Lord to his people, in bearing up their spirits in their greatest exercises, and preserving them through the sharpest trials in a faithful testimony to his blessed truth, and opening in due time a door of deliverance to them, I could not forbear to celebrate His praises in the following lines, under the title of— A SONG OF THE MERCIES AND DELIVERANCES OF THE LORD. Had not the Lord been on our side, May Israel now say, We were not able to abide The trials of that day When men did up against us rise, With fury, rage, and spite, Hoping to catch us by surprise, Or run us down by might. Then had not God for us arose, And shown His mighty power, We had been swallowed by our foes, Who waited to devour. When the joint powers of death and hell Against us did combine, And with united forces fell Upon us, with design To root us out, then had not God Appeared to take our part, And them chastized with His rod, And made them feel the smart, We then had overwhelmed been And trodden in the mire; Our enemies on us had seen Their cruel hearts’ desire. When stoned, when stocked, when rudely stripped, Some to the waist have been (Without regard of sex), and whipped, Until the blood did spin; Yea, when their skins with stripes looked black, Their flesh to jelly beat, Enough to make their sinews crack, The lashes were so great; Then had not God been with them to Support them, they had died, His power it was that bore them through, Nothing could do’t beside. When into prisons we were thronged (Where pestilence was rife) By bloody-minded men that longed To take away our life; Then had not God been with us, we Had perished there no doubt ’Twas He preserved us there, and He It was that brought us out. When sentenced to banishment Inhumanly we were, To be from native country sent,