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And by thir vices brought to servitude,
Then to love Bondage more then Liberty, 270
Bondage with ease then strenuous liberty;
And to despise, or envy, or suspect
Whom God hath of his special favour rais'd
As thir Deliverer; if he aught begin,
How frequent to desert him, and at last
To heap ingratitude on worthiest deeds?
Chor: Thy words to my remembrance bring
How Succoth and the Fort of Penuel
Thir great Deliverer contemn'd,
The matchless Gideon in pursuit 280
Of Madian and her vanquisht Kings;
And how ingrateful Ephraim
Not worse then by his shield and spear
Had dealt with Jephtha, who by argument,
Defended Israel from the Ammonite,
Had not his prowess quell'd thir pride
In that sore battel when so many dy'd
Without Reprieve adjudg'd to death,
For want of well pronouncing Shibboleth.
Sam: Of such examples adde mee to the roul, 290
Mee easily indeed mine may neglect,
But Gods propos'd deliverance not so.
Chor: Just are the ways of God,
And justifiable to Men;
Unless there be who think not God at all,
If any be, they walk obscure;
For of such Doctrine never was there School,
But the heart of the Fool,
And no man therein Doctor but himself.
Yet more there be who doubt his ways not just, 300
As to his own edicts, found contradicting,
Then give the rains to wandring thought,
Regardless of his glories diminution;
Till by thir own perplexities involv'd
They ravel more, still less resolv'd,
But never find self-satisfying solution.
As if they would confine th' interminable,
And tie him to his own prescript,
Who made our Laws to bind us, not himself,
And hath full right to exempt 310
Whom so it pleases him by choice