No thought can ease them but their sovereign's care, Whose praise the afflicted as their comfort sing; E'en those, whom want might drive to just despair, Think life a blessing under such a king. 261. Meantime he sadly suffers in their grief, Outweeps an hermit, and outprays a saint; All the long night he studies their relief, How they may be supplied, and he may want. 262. "O God," said he, "thou patron of my days, Guide of my youth in exile and distress! Who me, unfriended, brought'st by wond'rous ways, The kingdom of my fathers to possess: 263. "Be thou my judge, with what unwearied care I since have laboured for my people's good; To bind the bruises of a civil war, And stop the issues of their wasting blood. 264. "Thou, who hast taught me to forgive the ill, And recompense, as friends, the good misled; If mercy be a precept of thy will, Return that mercy on thy servant's head. 265. "Or if my heedless youth has stepped astray, Too soon forgetful of thy gracious hand, On me alone thy just displeasure lay, But take thy judgments from this mourning land. 266. "We all have sinned; and thou hast laid us low, As humble earth, from whence at first we came: Like flying shades before the clouds we show, And shrink like parchment in consuming flame. 267. "O let it be enough what thou hast done; When spotted deaths ran arm'd through every street, With poisoned darts, which not the good could shun, The speedy could out-fly, or valiant meet.[189] 268. "The living few, and frequent funerals then, Proclaimed thy wrath on this forsaken place; And now those few, who are returned again, Thy searching judgments to their dwellings trace. 269. "O pass not, Lord, an absolute decree, Or bind thy sentence unconditional; But in thy sentence our remorse foresee, And in that foresight this thy doom recal. 270. "Thy threatnings, Lord, as thine, thou may'st revoke; But, if immutable and fixed they stand, Continue still thyself to give the stroke, And let not foreign foes oppress thy land."[190] 271. The Eternal heard, and from the heavenly quire Chose out the cherub with the flaming sword; And bade him swiftly drive the approaching fire From where our naval magazines were stored. 272. The blessed minister his wings displayed, And like a shooting star he cleft the night: He charged the flames, and those that disobeyed, He lashed to duty with his sword of light. 273. The fugitive flames, chastised, went forth to prey On pious structures, by our fathers reared; By which to heaven they did affect the way, Ere faith in churchmen without works was heard. 274.