My thoughts lie open to the Lord

Before they're formed within;

And ere my lips pronounce the word

He knows the sense I mean.

O wondrous knowledge, deep and high!

Where can a creature hide?

Within thy circling arms I lie,

Beset on every side.

So let thy grace surround me still,

And like a bulwark prove,

To guard my soul from every ill,

Secured by sovereign love.

PAUSE.

Lord, where shall guilty souls retire,

Forgotten and unknown?

In hell they meet thy dreadful fire,

In heav'n thy glorious throne.

Should I suppress my vital breath

To 'scape the wrath divine,

Thy voice would break the bars of death,

And make the grave resign.

If winged with beams of morning light

I fly beyond the west,

Thy hand, which must support my flight,

Would soon betray my rest.

If o'er my sins I think to draw

The curtains of the night,

Those flaming eyes that guard thy law

Would turn the shades to light.

The beams of noon, the midnight hour,

Are both alike to thee

O may I ne'er provoke that power

From which I cannot flee.