Oh, Lovely Appearance of Death

Oh, lovely appearance of death No sight upon earth is so fair Not all the gay pageants that breathe Can with a dead body compare In solemn delight I survey A corpse, when the spirit is fled In love with the beautiful clay And longing to lie in its stead How blest is our brother, bereft Of all that could burden his mind How easy the soul, that has left This wearisome body behind Of evil incapable, thou Whose relics with envy I see No longer in misery now No longer a sinner like me This earth is afflicted no more With sickness, or shaken with pain The war in the members is o'er And never shall vex him again No anger henceforward, or shame Shall redden his innocent clay Extinct is the animal flame And passion is vanished away To mourn and to suffer is mine While bound in a prison I breathe And still for deliverance pine And press to the issues of death What now with my tears I bedew Oh I might this moment become My spirit created anew My flesh be consigned to the tomb