Verse 1
Poor guilty worm, o’rewhelm’d with fear
Before an earthly judge t’ appear,
And meet thy lighter doom,
How wilt thou meet that fiery hour,
When arm’d with glorious, vengeful power
The Judge from heaven shall come?

Verse 2
Heir of that everlasting curse,
Canst thou depart without remorse
Or one relenting sigh,
So daunted at a moment’s pain,
So bold, and harden’d to sustain
The death that cannot die?

Verse 3
Tremendous God, in mercy frown,
Cast all his hellish courage down,
Which Satan’s breath inspires,
Make this incarnate fiend submit,
And shake him o’re the burning pit,
And scorch him with the fires.

Verse 4
Now, Father, now thy terrors dart,
And pierce, and fill his stubborn heart
With horrid pangs unknown:
Justice divine, thy prisoner seize,
Compel’d by torture to confess
The murther of thy Son.

Verse 5
Before he sinks among the dead,
O may he guilty, guilty plead,
And justify our God:
Then, Jesus, then step in between,
To part the punishment and sin,
To save him by thy blood.

Verse 6
Thy blood alone can purge his guilt,
Can expiate that his hands have spilt,
And all his crimes efface:
Get thyself honor on thy foe,
Wash the foul monster white as snow,
And show forth all thy grace.

Verse 7
Or if thy wise and righteous will
Its counsels deep from us conceal,
We bless th’ award divine,
We leave him in a state unknown,
And let him die to God alone,
And die—without a Sign!

Verse 8
But while he yields his parting breath,
And swim his closing eyes in death,
Before his closing eyes
Show Thyself bleeding on the tree—
Then let him gasp, Remember me—
And wake in paradise!