SONG XV Againft Lying.
O'Tis a lovely thing for youth
To walk betimes in wifdom's way,
To fear a lie, to fpeak the truth,
That we may truft to all they fay.
But lyars we can never truft,
Tho they fhould fpeak the thing that's true
And he who does one fault at firft
And lies to hide it, makes it two.
Have we not known, nor heard, nor read,
How God abhors deceit and wrong?
How Annanias was ftruck dead,
Catch'd with lie upon his tongue?
So did his wife Sapphire die,
When the came in, and grew fo bold
As to confirm that wicked lye
Which juft before her hufband told.
The Lord delights in them who fpeak
The words of truth; but every liar
Muft have his portions in the lake
Which burns with brimilone and with fire.
Then let me always watch my lips,
Left I be ftruck to death and hell;
since God a book of reck'ning keeps
for ev'ry lie which children tell.
The aforementioned is in a book I found in my attic in Mendham, New Jersey when be moved out of the house in 1982. The book belonged to a Maltby Honell and was purchased in Brunswick on February 11, 1791. He also signed the back of the book on June 5, 1792.
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