CI. Anonymous

O LORD, turne not away thy face

From him that lyeth prostrate,

Lamenting sore his sinfull life

Before thy mercy-gate:

Which gate thou openest wide to those

That doe lament their sinne:

Shut not that gate against me, Lord,

But let me enter in.

And call me not to mine accounts,

How I haue liued here;

For then I know right well, O Lord,

How vile I shall appeare.

I need not to confesse my life,

I am sure thou canst tell:

What I haue beene and what I am,

I know thou knowest it well.

O Lord, thou knowest what things be past,

And eke the things that bee;

Thou knowest also what is to come:

Nothing is hid from thee.

Before the heauens and earth were made,

Thou knowest what things were then,

As all things else that haue been since

Among the sonnes of men.

And can the things that I haue done

Be hidden from thee then?

Nay, nay, thou knowest them all, O Lord,

Where they were done, and when.

Wherefore with teares I come to thee,

To beg and to intreate;

Euen as the child that hath done euill,

And feareth to be beate.

So come I to thy mercy-gate,

Where mercy doth abound;

Requiring mercy for my sinne,

To heale my deadly wound.

O Lord, I need not to repeate

What I doe beg or craue;

Thou knowest, O Lord, before I aske,

The thing that I would haue.

Mercy, good Lord, mercie I aske,

This is the totall summe:

For mercy, Lord, is all my sute;

Lord, let thy mercy come.