Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, ON THOSE THAT DESERVE IT, by FRANCIS QUARLES


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

ON THOSE THAT DESERVE IT, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: O when our clergy, at the dreadful day
Last Line: Durst ye not stoop to play the fools for him?
Subject(s): Clergy; Judgment Day; Priests; Rabbis; Ministers; Bishops; End Of The World; Doomsday; Fall Of Man


O when our clergy, at the dreadful Day
Shall make their audit, when the Judge shall say
"Give your accounts. What, have my lambs been fed?
Say, do they all stand sound? Is there none dead
By you defaults? Come shepherds, bring them forth
That I may crown your labours in their worth',
O, what an answer will be given by some!
"We have been silenced; Canons struck us dumb;
The great ones would not let us feed thy flock,
Unless we played the fools and wore a frock;
We were forbid unless we'd yield to sign
And cross their brows -- they say, a mark of thine.
To say the truth, great Judge, they were not fed.
Lord, here they be; but Lord, they be all dead.'
Ah, cruel shepherds! Could your conscience serve
Not to be fools, and yet to let them starve?
What if your fiery spirits had been bound
To antic habits, or your heads been crowned
With peacock's plumes, had ye been forced to feed
Your Saviour's dear-brought flock in a fool's weed,
He that was scorned, reviled, endured the curse
Of a base death in your behalf -- nay worse,
Swallowed the cup of wrath charged up to the brim --
Durst ye not stoop to play the fools for him?






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