1. Attend, my people, to my law;thereto give thou an ear;The words that from my mouth proceedattentively do hear.
2. My mouth shall speak a parable,and sayings dark of old;
3. The same which we have heard and known,and us our fathers told.
4. We also will them not concealfrom their posterity;Them to the generationto come declare will we:The praises of the Lord our God,and his almighty strength,The wondrous works that he hath done,we will shew forth at length.
5. His testimony and his lawin Isr'el he did place,And charg'd our fathers it to showto their succeeding race;
6. That so the race which was to comemight well them learn and know;And sons unborn, who should arise,might to their sons them show:
7. That they might set their hope in God,and suffer not to fallHis mighty works out of their mind,but keep his precepts all:
8. And might not, like their fathers, bea stiff rebellious race;A race not right in heart; with Godwhose sp'rit not stedfast was.
9. The sons of Ephraim, who nor bowsnor other arms did lack,When as the day of battle was,they faintly turned back.
10. They brake God's cov'nant,and refus'd in his commands to go;
11. His works and wonders they forgot,which he to them did show.