The Preparative

My Body being Dead, my Limbs unknown;

Before I skilled [sic] to prize

Those living Stars mine Eyes,

Before my Tongue or Cheeks were to me shown,

Before I knew my Hands were mine,

Or that my Sinews did my Members join,

When neither Nostril, Foot, nor Ear,

As yet was seen, or felt, or did appear;

I was within

A House I knew not, newly clothed with Skin.

Then was my Soul my only All to me,

A Living Endless Eye,

Far wider than the Sky

Whose Power, whose Act, whose Essence was to see.

I was an Inward Sphere of Light,

Or an Interminable Orb of Sight,

An Endless and a Living Day,

A vital Sun that round about did ray

All Life and Sense,

A Naked Simple Pure Intelligence.

I then no Thirst nor Hunger did conceive,

No dull Necessity,

No Want was Known to me;

Without Disturbance then I did receive

The fair Ideas of all Things,

And had the Honey even without the Stings.

A Meditating Inward Eye

Gazing at Quiet did within me lie,

And every Thing

Delighted me that was their Heavenly King.