Thee, Thee alone, O God, I fear, In Thee do I confide; Thy presence is to me more dear Than all things else beside. Thy virtue, power, life, and light, Which in my heart do shine, Above all things are my delight: O make them always mine! Thy matchless love constrains my life, Thy life constrains my love, To be to Thee as chaste a wife As is the turtle-dove To her elect, espoused mate, Whom she will not forsake, Nor can be brought to violate The bond she once did make; Just so my soul doth cleave to Thee, As to her only head, With whom she longs conjoin’d to be In bond of marriage-bed. But, ah, alas! her little fort Is compassed about; Her foes about her thick resort, Within and eke without. How numerous are they now grown! How wicked their intent! O let thy mighty power be shown, Their mischief to prevent. They make assaults on every side, But Thou stand’st in the gap; Their batt’ring-rams make breaches wide, But still Thou mak’st them up. Sometimes they use alluring wiles To draw into their power; And sometimes weep like crocodiles; But all is to devour. Thus they beset my feeble heart With fraud, deceit, and guile, Alluring her from Thee to start, And Thy pure rest defile. But, oh! the breathing and the moan, The sighings of the seed, The groanings of the grieved one, Do sorrows in me breed. And that immortal, holy birth, The offspring of Thy breath (To whom Thy love brings life and mirth, As doth thy absence, death); That babe, that seed, that panting child, Which cannot Thee forsake, In fear to be again beguiled, Doth supplication make: O suffer not Thy chosen one, Who puts her trust in Thee, And hath made Thee her choice alone, Ensnared again to be. _Bridewell_, _London_, 1662. In this sort did I spend some leisure hours during my confinement in Bridewell, especially after our return from Newgate thither, when we had more liberty, and more opportunity and room for retirement and thought: for, as the poet said, _Carmina scribentes secessum et otia quærunt_. They who would write in measure, Retire where they may, stillness have and pleasure. And this privilege we enjoyed by the indulgence of our keeper, whose heart God disposed to favour us. So that both the master and his porter were very civil and kind to us, and had been so indeed all along. For when we were shut up before, the porter would readily let some of us go home in an evening, and stay at home till next morning; which was a great conveniency to men of trade and business, which I being free from, forbore asking for myself, that I might not hinder others.