1 From my youth up, may Israel say

they oft have me assailed;

2 Reduced me oft to heavy straits,

but never quite prevailed.

3 They oft have plowed my patient back

with furrows deep and long;

4 But our just God has broke their chains,

and rescued us from wrong.

5 Defeat, confusion, shameful rout

be still the doom of those,

Their righteous doom, who Zion hate

and Zion's God oppose.

6 Like corn upon our houses' tops,

untimely let them fade,

Which too much heat, and want of root,

has blasted in the blade.

7 Which in his arms no reaper takes,

but unregarded leaves;

No binder thinks it worth his pains

to fold it into sheaves.

8 No traveler that passes by

vouchsafes a minute's stop,

To give it one kind look, or crave

Heav'n's blessing on the crop.