{
 "id": "george-macdonald/going-to-sleep",
 "title": "Going to Sleep",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "George MacDonald",
 "poet_slug": "george-macdonald",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "The Poetical Works of George MacDonald, Volume I",
 "book_slug": "poetical-works-vol-1",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 56,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1893,
  "venue": "The Poetical Works of George MacDonald, Volume I (1893)",
  "note": "Taken from the 1893 collected Poetical Works, which is the printing this text is and not the poem's first appearance. MacDonald gathered and revised for it work published from 1855 onward, and it arranges the poems by its own editorial grouping rather than by the volumes they came from, so which earlier book or magazine printed this poem first has not been established here.",
  "uncertain": true,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/poeticalworks01macduoft",
   "https://archive.org/metadata/poeticalworks01macduoft",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9543"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/george-macdonald_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1953",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/8949",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9543",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9984",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/10578",
   "https://archive.org/details/bookofstrifeinfo00macd",
   "https://archive.org/details/discipleandothe02macdgoog",
   "https://archive.org/details/hiddenlifeandoth00macduoft",
   "https://archive.org/details/discipleandothe02macdgoog",
   "https://archive.org/details/rampolli00macd",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/102955776",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/011821572"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 20,
  "n_stanzas": 4,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 33,
  "max_indent": 2
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Little one, you must not fret",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That I take your clothes away;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Better sleep you so will get,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And at morning wake more gay⁠—",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Saith the children’s mother.",
    "indent": 2
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "You I must unclothe again,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For you need a better dress;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Too much worn are body and brain;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "You need everlastingness⁠—",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Saith the heavenly father.",
    "indent": 2
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "I went down death’s lonely stair;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Laid my garments in the tomb;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Dressed again one morning fair;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Hastened up, and hied me home⁠—",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Saith the elder brother.",
    "indent": 2
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Then I will not be afraid",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Any ill can come to me;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "When ’tis time to go to bed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I will rise and go with thee⁠—",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Saith the little brother.",
    "indent": 2
   }
  ]
 ]
}