Psalm 139 (Version 4, Part 1)

In all my vast concerns with thee

In vain my soul would try

To shun thy presence, Lord, or flee

The notice of thine eye.

Thy all-surrounding sight surveys

My rising and my rest,

My public walks, my private ways,

And secrets of my breast.

My thoughts lie open to the Lord

Before they're form'd within:

And ere my lips pronounce the word,

He knows the sense I mean.

O wondrous knowledge, deep and high!

Where can a creature hide?

Within thy circling arms I lie,

Beset on every side.

So let thy grace surround me still,

And like a bulwark prove,

To guard my soul from every ill,

Secur'd by sovereign love.

Lord, where shall guilty souls retire,

Forgotten and unknown?

In hell they meet thy dreadful fire,

In heaven thy glorious throne.

Should I suppress my vital breath

To 'scape the wrath divine,

Thy voice would break the bars of death,

And make the grave resign.

If wing'd with beams of morning light,

I fly beyond the west,

Thy hand, which must support my flight,

Would soon betray my rest.

If o'er my sins I think to draw

The curtains of the night,

Those flaming eyes that guard thy law

Would turn the shades to light.

The beams of noon, the midnight hour,

Are both alike to thee:

O may I ne'er provoke that power

From which I cannot flee!