How great, how terrible that God,
Who shakes creation with His nod!
He frown, and earth’s foundations quake,
And all the wheels of nature break!
Crushed under guilt’s oppressive weight,
This globe now totters to its fate:
Trembles beneath her guilty sons,
And for deliverance heaves and groans!
And see! The glorious dreadful day,
That takes the enormous load away!
See skies, and stars and earth, and seas,
Sink in one universal blaze!
Where, now-ah! Where shall sinners seek
For shelter in the general wreck?
Can falling rocks conceal them now,
When rocks dissolve like melting snow?
In vain for pity now the cry:
In lakes of liquid fire they lie:
There on the burning billows tossed,
For ever, ever, ever lost!
But saints undaunted and serene,
Your eyes shall view the dreadful scene!
Your Saviour lives, though worlds expire,
And earth and skies dissolve in fire!
JESUS! The helpless creature’s friend!
To thee my all I dare commend:
Thou canst preserve my feeble soul,
When lightning blaze from pole to pole!
-Samuel Davies
