To me 'tis equal whether love ordain
My life or death, appoint me pain or ease
My soul perceives no real ill in pain,
In ease or health no real good she sees.
One good she covets, and that good alone,
To choose thy will, from selfish bias free;
And to prefer a cottage to a throne,
And grief to comfort, if it pleases Thee.
That we should bear the cross is Thy command,
Die to the world and live to self no more;
Suffer unmoved beneath the rudest hand
When shipwrecked pleased as when upon the shore.
--Madame Guyon, tr. by William Cowper.
I preached as never sure to preach again,
And as a dying man to dying men.
--Richard Baxter.