Help Us, O Lord, the Good Decay

Help us

O Lord

the good de­cay;

The faith­ful from the world de­part;

The li­ar rules with sub­tle sway

The false smooth lip

the dou­ble heart.

The flat­ter­er’s guile the Lord shall quell

The mouth that speaks with boast­ful glee—

Our tongues in match­less pow­er ex­cel

Our lips are strong; what lord have we?

He hears the poor man’s deep-drawn sighs

He sees the hearts that in­ly mourn

And Lo

I come

He saith

I rise

To save thee from the ty­rant’s scorn.

Thy Word is pure and per­fect

Lord

As sil­ver in the fur­nace tried:

Seven times as­sayed

that ho­ly Word

Seven times hath come forth pu­ri­fied.

The souls

O Lord

that with Thee walk

Thy love will shield in ev­il hour

On ev­ery side

though sin­ners stalk

And base­ness climbs to lof­ty pow­er.