You Sinners Are

Michael Wigglesworth (1631—1705)
The free gift.

CLXXVII.

“I may deny you once to try,
or Grace to you to tender.
Though he finds Grace before my face
who was the chief offender;
Else should my Grace cease to be Grace,
for it would not be free,
If to release whom I should please
I have no liberty.

CLXXVIII.

“If upon one what’s due to none.
I frankly shall bestow,
And on the rest shall not think best
compassion’s skirt to throw,
Whom injure I? will you envy
and grudge at others’ weal?
Or me accuse, who do refuse
yourselves to help and heal ?

CLXXIX.

“Am I alone of what’s my own,
no Master or no Lord?
And if I am, how can you claim
what I to some afford?
Will you demand Grace at my hand,
and challenge what is mine?
Will you teach me whom to set free,
and thus my Grace confine?

CLXXX.

“You sinners are, and such a share
as sinners, may expect;
Such you shall have, for I do save
none but mine own Elect.
Yet to compare your sin with their
who liv’d a longer time,
I do confess yours is much less,
though every sin’s a crime.

On a Chinese Roll

Up on the hill / People never stare
They just don’t care
Chinese music under banyan trees
Here at the dude ranch above the sea
Aja / When all my dime dancin’ is through
I run to you

Up on the hill / They’ve got time to burn
There’s no return
Double helix in the sky tonight
Throw out the hardware / Let’s do it right
Aja
When all my dime dancin’ is through
I run to you

Up on the hill / They think I’m okay
Or so they say
Chinese music always sets me free
Angular banjoes / Sound good to me
Aja
When all my dime dancin’ is through
I run to you

Aja Lyrics: Walter Carl Becker Donald Jay Fagen
Lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group

P.F. Chang ?

Chinese Verse in Floyd Lyrics

It’s not that widely known that Pink Floyd quoted lines from classical Chinese poetry in a couple of their early songs. (Not widely known, but known nevertheless – see Note at bottom of page).

The first was the song ‘Chapter 24’ on Piper at the Gates of Dawn, released in 1967. This song by Syd Barrett quotes the Chinese Book of Changes (Yi Jing), a very trendy thing to do at the time and still apparently quite trendy, judging by the number of hits for this term on the Internet. But this is pretty boring stuff. Anyone with a passing interest in Oriental mysticism is apt to quote the Yi Jing as proof of his/her hipness. It’s on a par with attributing anything vaguely Oriental to ‘Zen influences’.

http://www.cjvlang.com/Pfloyd/index.html

Allusions to Classical Chinese Poetry in Pink Floyd