{
 "id": "john-newton/vanity-of-the-creature-sanctified",
 "title": "Vanity of the Creature Sanctified",
 "ordinal": "56",
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "John Newton",
 "poet_slug": "john-newton",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Olney Hymns",
 "book_slug": "olney-hymns",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 56,
 "container": "Book I On Select Texts of Scripture",
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1779,
  "venue": "Olney Hymns (1779)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/bim_eighteenth-century_olney-hymns-in-three-bo_newton-john_1779",
   "https://cowperandnewtonmuseum.org.uk/bulletin/computerised-index-to-the-olney-hymns/",
   "https://archive.org/details/olneyhymnsinthre00cowpuoft"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/john-newton_william-cowper_olney-hymns",
  "file": "book-1.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Olney_Hymns_%281840%29",
   "https://archive.org/details/olneyhymnsinthre00cowpuoft"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-15"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 32,
  "n_stanzas": 8,
  "n_parts": 8,
  "longest_line_chars": 36,
  "max_indent": 0
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [
  {
   "ordinal": "I",
   "title": null,
   "stanza_range": [
    0,
    1
   ]
  },
  {
   "ordinal": "II",
   "title": null,
   "stanza_range": [
    1,
    2
   ]
  },
  {
   "ordinal": "III",
   "title": null,
   "stanza_range": [
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   ]
  },
  {
   "ordinal": "IV",
   "title": null,
   "stanza_range": [
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   ]
  },
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   "ordinal": "V",
   "title": null,
   "stanza_range": [
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   ]
  },
  {
   "ordinal": "VI",
   "title": null,
   "stanza_range": [
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   ]
  },
  {
   "ordinal": "VII",
   "title": null,
   "stanza_range": [
    6,
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   ]
  },
  {
   "ordinal": "VIII",
   "title": null,
   "stanza_range": [
    7,
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   ]
  }
 ],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Honey though the bee prepares,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "An envenom’d sting he wears;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Piercing thorns a guard compose",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Round the fragrant blooming rose.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Where we think to find a sweet,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Oft a painful sting we meet;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "When the rose invites our eye,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We forget the thorn is nigh.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Why are thus our hopes beguiled?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Why are all our pleasures spoil’d?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Why do agony and woe",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From our choicest comforts grow?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Sin has been the cause of all!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "’Twas not thus before the fall:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What but pain and thorn and sting",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From the root of sin can spring?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Now with every good we find",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Vanity and grief entwined;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What we feel or what we fear",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "All our joys embitter here.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Yet, through the Redeemer’s love,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "These afflictions blessings prove;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He the wounding stings and thorns",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Into healing med’cines turns.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "From the earth our hearts they wean,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Teach us on his arm to lean;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Urge us to a throne of grace;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Make us seek a resting-place.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "In the mansions of our King",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Sweets abound without a sting;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thornless there the roses blow,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And the joys unmingled flow,",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}