If poisonous minerals, and if that tree, Whose fruit threw death on else immortal us, If lecherous goats, if serpents envious Cannot be damned; alas, why should I be? Why should intent or reason, born in me, Make sins, else equal, in me more heinous? And mercy being easy, and glorious To God, in his stern wrath, why threatens he? But who am I, that dare dispute with thee O God? Oh! of thine only worthy blood, And my tears, make a heavenly lethean flood, And drown in it my sin's black memory; That thou remember them, some claim as debt, I think it mercy, if thou wilt forget. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...HIGH PLAINS RAG by JAMES GALVIN PINE-TREES AND THE SKY: EVENING by RUPERT BROOKE MARRIAGE by MARY ELIZABETH COLERIDGE A BROADWAY PAGEANT by WALT WHITMAN AN ARMOURY by ALCAEUS OF MYTILENE |