In heaven soaring up, I dropt an ear
On earth, and oh! sweet melody!
And listening, found it was the saints who were
Encoached for heaven that sang for joy.
For in Christ’s coach they sweetly sing,
As they to glory ride therein.
Oh! joyous hearts! Enfired with holy flame!
Is speech thus tasseled with praise?
Will not your inward fire of joy contain
That it in open flames doth blaze?
For in Christ’s coach saints sweetly sing,
As they to glory ride therein.
And if a string do slip, by chance, they soon
Do screw it up again: whereby
They set it in a more melodious tune
And a diviner harmony.
For in Christ’s coach they sweetly sing,
As they to glory ride therein.
In all their acts, public and private, nay,
And secret too, they praise impart.
But in their acts divine and worship, they
With hymns do offer up their heart.
Thus in Christ’s coach they sweetly sing,
As they to glory ride therein.
Some few not in, and some whose time and place
Block up this coach’s way, do go
As travelers afoot: and so do trace
The road that gives them right thereto;
While in this coach these sweetly sing,
As they to glory ride therein.
Next, Taylor’s great love of God is expressed in a beautiful figure of
speech in which the poet wants God to use him as a housewife uses wool
to make yarn and yarn to make cloth. In the first stanza, he asks God to
make him into a spinning wheel, of which the flyers, distaff, spool, and
reel all are parts. In the second stanza, Taylor wants to be a loom on
which God can weave holy robes. A fulling mill is a place where cloth is
dyed. Finally, the poet wants God to clothe him in the holy robes made
on this imaginary loom. This poem is a highly original way to ask God to
give one faith, love, and understanding. You should consider it a
prayer.