This poem appears in our free booklet, Sacred Verse and Hymns: George Herbert’s Works of Love and Praise.
Welcome, dear feast of Lent! Who loves not thee,
He loves not temperance, or authority,
But is composed of passion.
The Scriptures bid us fast; the church says now,
Give to thy mother, what thou wouldst allow
To every corporation.
The humble soul, composed of love and fear,
Begins at home, and lays the burden there,
When doctrines disagree.
He says, in things which use hath justly got,
“I am a scandal to the church;” and not,
“The church is so to me.”
True Christians should be glad of an occasion
To use their temperance, seeking no evasion,
When good is seasonable:—
Unless authority, which should increase
The obligation in us, make it less;
And power itself disable.
Besides the cleanness of sweet abstinence;
Quick thoughts and motions, at a small expense;
A face not fearing light.
Whereas in fulness there are sluttish fumes,
Sour exhalations, and dishonest rheums,
Revenging the delight.
Then, those same pendent profits, which the spring
And Easter intimate, enlarge the thing,
And goodness of the deed.
Neither ought other men’s abuse of Lent
Spoil the good use; lest, by that argument,
We forfeit all our creed.
It’s true, we cannot reach Christ’s fortieth day;
Yet, to go part of that religious way,
Is better than to rest.
We cannot reach our Saviour’s purity;
Yet are we bid, be holy even as he.
In both let’s do our best.
Who goeth in the way which Christ hath gone,
Is much more sure to meet with him, than one
That travelleth by-ways.
Perhaps my God, though he be far before,
May turn, and take me by the hand; and more,
May strengthen my decays,
Yet, Lord, instruct us to improve our fast
By starving sin; and taking such repast,
As may our faults control:
That every man may revel at his door,
Not in his parlor; banqueting the poor,
And, among those, his soul.
Image: An engraving of George Herbert (Source).
