✚ A pleasant posie, or sweete Nosegay of fragrant smellyng Flowers: gathered in the Garden of heauenly pleasure, the holy and blessed Bible.
To the Tune of the black Almayne.
A Stock of flowers, bedewed with showers,
In a Garden now there springs:
With mirth and glee, vpon a Tree,
A Byrd there sits and sings,
So pleasant is her voyce,
It doth my hart reioyce:
She sets her tunes and noates so meete,
That vnto me it seemes so sweete:
That all the Flowers that euer could be,
Was neuer so swete as this to me,
The lyke before I dyd neuer se.
¶The Bible it is, that Garden iwys,
Which God preserue alwayes:
Lykewyse Gods worde it is that Byrde,
That now so much I prayse.
Also those goodly Flowers,
So well bedewed with showers:
I wyll now go about to gather,
And put them in a Posy together:
I wyll not put them in no Chest,
But bynd them vp as I thinke best,
And kepe them alway next my brest.
¶The fyrst I fynd, to please my mind,
A bell he had to name:
Enoch alwayes, is worthy of prayse,
Like wyse of worthy Fame.
Looke you what Moses wrytes,
And in Genesis there resites:
How God tooke hym the story sayth,
That he should neuer tast of death:
And also Noe that righteous man
A curious worke dyd take in hand,
To make the Arke we vnderstand.
¶Good Abraham, that faithfull man,
In God dyd trust alway:
He dyd not feare, nor once dispayre.
His onely son to slay.
Isacke was no weede,
Nor Iacob in very deede:
Ioseph was a Flower of price,
God dyd hym saue from cruell deuice
Also Moses eke we fynd,
And Aaron lyke wyse vp we bynd,
Iosua is not out of mynd.
¶The Iudges also, both lesse and mo,
They were of worthy Fame:
To speake of all, my tyme is smal,
To rehearce them all by name.
The Prophet Samuell,
Our God dyd loue him well:
Dauid was a Flower so sweete,
To make hym kyng God thought it meete
For great Golias he hath slayne.
And Sallomon after him dyd raygne
Which vnto wysedome dyd attayne.
When Achab dyd florysh, the Rauens did norish
Elia a man of God,
Kynge Iosias, and Esdras
We finde and pacient Iob.
They feared our God of might,
And serued him day and night:
No ioy nor payne could them procure,
But alwayes by hym to endure:
Esay lyke wyse and Ieremy,
They preached alway earnestly
and dyd their duty faithfully,
¶And Daniell destroyed Bell,
The Babilonians God:
The Dragon also, he brought to wo,
Without either sword or Rod.
To rehearce the prophets all,
By their names them for to call:
Although they be of worthy Fame,
It is to long them for to name:
We may not Toby as leaue behynd,
Yet was he almost out of mind,
But few such flowers now can we fynd.
¶Full wel we know, no flowers can blow,
But boysterous stormes must fynd:
For that is no Flower, that euery showre,
Doth driue away with wynd▪
For all these goodly Flowers,
Had many stormy showers:
Before that they could blow or bud,
Or bring forth seede to doe any good:
They dyd abyde both cold and blast,
Yet allwayes dyd they stand stedfast,
Tyll all the stormes were gone and past.
¶Now at this time, for our gracious queene,
Let vs geue harty prayes:
God may her defend, from enemies hand:
at this time and alwayes.
And send her prosperous raygne,
With vs for to remayne,
For to defend Gods word so pure,
And euer with it for to endure:
That she may be to vs a bower,
To kepe vs alway when it doth showre,
I pray God saue that Princly flower.
¶FINIS.
Iohn Symon.
¶Imprinted at London, by Richard Iohnes: dwellyng in the vpper end of Fleetlane. 1572.