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| GIVE me my scallop-shell of quiet, | |
| My staff of faith to walk upon, | |
| My scrip of joy, immortal diet, | |
| My bottle of salvation, | |
| My gown of glory, hope’s true gauge; | 5 |
| And thus I ’ll take my pilgrimage! | |
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| Blood must be my body’s balmer, | |
| No other balm will there be given; | |
| Whilst my soul, like quiet palmer, | |
| Travelleth towards the land of Heaven, | 10 |
| Over the silver mountains | |
| Where spring the nectar fountains: | |
| There will I kiss | |
| The bowl of bliss, | |
| And drink mine everlasting fill | 15 |
| Upon every milken hill. | |
| My soul will be a-dry before, | |
| But after, it will thirst no more. | |
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| Then by that happy, blissful day, | |
| More peaceful pilgrims I shall see, | 20 |
| That have cast off their rags of clay, | |
| And walk apparelled fresh like me. | |
| I ’ll take them first | |
| To quench their thirst, | |
| And taste of nectar’s suckets | 25 |
| At those clear wells | |
| Where sweetness dwells | |
| Drawn up by saints in crystal buckets. | |
| |
| And when our bottles and all we | |
| Are filled with immortality, | 30 |
| Then the blest paths we ’ll travel, | |
| Strewed with rubies thick as gravel,— | |
| Ceilings of diamonds, sapphire floors, | |
| High walls of coral, and pearly bowers. | |
| From thence to Heaven’s bribeless hall, | 35 |
| Where no corrupted voices brawl; | |
| No conscience molten into gold, | |
| No forged accuser, bought or sold, | |
| No cause deferred, no vain-spent journey, | |
| For there Christ is the King’s Attorney; | 40 |
| Who pleads for all without degrees, | |
| And he hath angels, but no fees; | |
| And when the grand twelve-million jury | |
| Of our sins, with direful fury, | |
| ’Gainst our souls black verdicts give, | 45 |
| Christ pleads his death, and then we live. | |
| Be thou my speaker, taintless pleader, | |
| Unblotted lawyer, true proceeder! | |
| Thou giv’st salvation even for alms,— | |
| Not with a bribèd lawyer’s palms. | 50 |
| And this is mine eternal plea | |
| To Him that made heaven, earth, and sea, | |
| That, since my flesh must die so soon, | |
| And want a head to dine next noon, | |
| Just at the stroke when my veins start and spread, | 55 |
| Set on my soul an everlasting head: | |
| Then am I, like a palmer, fit | |
| To tread those blest paths which before I writ. | |
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| Of death and judgment, heaven and hell, | |
| Who oft doth think, must needs die well. | 60 |
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