Song With Sometimes You Have to Die to Live Again

Now I lay me down to sleep is a classic children's bedtime prayer from the 18th century.

Text [edit]

Perhaps the primeval version was written past Joseph Addison in an essay appearing in The Spectator on 8 March 1711. It says: ^[one]

When I lay me down to Sleep,
I recommend my self to his Care;
when I awake, I give my self up to his Direction.

A later version printed in The New England Primer goes:

At present I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my Soul to go along[;]
If I should die before I 'wake,
I pray the Lord my Soul to take.^[2]

Other versions [edit]

Now I lay me downward to sleep,
I pray thee, Lord, my soul to keep;
If I should die before I wake,
I pray thee, Lord, my soul to have.
If I should alive for other days,
I pray thee, Lord, to guide my ways.
Amen.

Now
I lay me downward to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep;
His Love to guard me through the dark,
And wake me in the morning time's calorie-free amen.^[iii]

At present I lay me downward to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep;
May the angels watch me through the night,
and keep me in their blessed sight.
Amen.

Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep;
Please angels watch me through the dark,
And keep me safe till forenoon light.^[iii]

Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to continue;
Angels watch me through the nighttime,
And wake me with the morning light.
Amen^[4]

Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep;
If I shall die before I wake,
I pray the Lord my soul to have,
All the angels watching over me.
Amen.

Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to proceed;
Guide me safely through the nighttime,
And wake me with the morn light.
Amen.

Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to go along:
Watch and guard me through the nighttime,
Until Yous bring the morning low-cal.
Amen.

At present I lay me downward to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to go on;
When in the morning calorie-free I wake,
Evidence me the path of love to take.
Amen.

(Additional tertiary verse)
If I should alive another twenty-four hours,
I pray the Lord to guide my way.
Amen.

Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to proceed;
For if I die before I wake,
That'south one less examination I take to take. [Parodic]

It is sometimes combined with the "Black Paternoster", one version of which goes:

Matthew, Mark, Luke and John,
Bless the bed that I prevarication on.
Iv corners to my bed,
Iv angels round my head;
One to watch and one to pray
And two to bear my soul abroad.^[5]

In pop culture [edit]

• The Doors performed a part of this prayer alive in New York in 1970 every bit an added verse to their song "Soul Kitchen".
• In James O'Barr'south most famous comic "The Crow", the main character Eric Draven recites the prayer during the fight against Tom Tom.
• The prayer is used in the bridge of Metallica's hitting "Enter Sandman" from their 1991 eponymous anthology, with James switching to a deep ghost vocalization and saying the lines.
• Circle of Grit used an edited version of this prayer in the vocal "Prayers of a Dead Man" from their 1994 album of Brainchild.
• It was used in the opening lines of Megadeth's 1991 song "Go to Hell" from the soundtrack to the 1991 film Neb & Ted's Bogus Journey.
• In "Murder Was the Case", a song from his debut album Doggystyle, Snoop Dogg included a verse with this prayer.
• In Notorious B.I.1000. song called "Ready to Die" this prayer can exist heard.
• American vocalizer-songwriter, Halsey, used this prayer in the opening lines of the song "Nightmare".^[6]
• Rapper and songwriter 21 Savage used the after version of the poem in the opening track, "Lord Forgive Me", of his album Slaughter Male monarch.
• Rapper and songwriter XXXTentacion used the poem in his song "before I close my eyes", from his album ?.
• The musical, Carrie had the poem featured in the middle of the vocal "Evening Prayers".
• In A Nightmare on Elm Street, the poem is recited by the main character before confronting Freddy.
• In A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: Dream Master, a rhyme based on this prayer was used to defeat Freddy
• American metalcore band Water ice Ix Kills use another version of this rhyme in the span of their song "Communion of the Cursed", on the album Every Trick In The Book.
• Rapper Calboy as well used this rhyme in the beginning of his song "Envy Me".
• American rapper Kid Cudi features the latter two lines of the rhyme repeatedly in the hook to his song "The Prayer," on his debut mixtape A Kid Named Cudi.
• The prayer is also mentioned in Margaret Atwood'south novel The Testaments.
• The WWE used some lines of the prayer for the entrance theme of The Undertaker in 2000.
• The phrase "I pray the Lord my soul to proceed" appears in Bob Dylan's vocal "Roll on John" from the album Storm.
• "If I dice earlier I wake" is followed by the line "at to the lowest degree in heaven I can skate" in the 2000 top 40 vocal "Heaven Is a Halfpipe" by OPM
• In the "Fathers and Sons" episode of the TV series Blue Bloods the prayer is used.
• "Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep" was inscribed on the headstone of Amber Rene Hagerman in 1996 after her death.
• Keith & Kristyn Getty used the first two lines of the poem in the first verse of "Evensong".
• In an episode of the Television receiver serial M*A*South*H, Father Mulcahey recites a common children'southward parody of the prayer: "Now I lay me downward to sleep / A purse of peanuts at my feet / If I should die earlier I wake / Give them to my Uncle Jake".
• In Poltergeist, Carol Anne recites this prayer when Carol Anne and her mother Diane coffin her pet.
• Rap group Czarface also used the line "If I die earlier I wake pray the lord my soul to take" in The Souvenir That Keeps on Giving on the 2019 album The Odd Czar Against Usa.

See also [edit]

• Christian kid's prayer

References [edit]

1. ^ The Spectator Vol. I, 1729
2. ^ The New England Primer Archived 10 May 2017 at the Wayback Auto, 1750 ed., p. 23.
3. ^ ^{a b} Debbie Trafton O'Neal; Nancy Munger (1994), Now I Lay Me Down to Slumber: Action Prayers, Poems, and Songs for Bedtime, Augsburg Books, p. vi, ISBN978-0-8066-2602-4
4. ^ James Limburg (2006), Encountering Ecclesiastes: a volume for our time, Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, p. 103, ISBN978-0-8028-3047-0
5. ^ I. Opie and P. Opie, The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1951, 2d edn., 1997), ISBN 0-19-860088-7, pp. 357–60.
6. ^ Nightmare , retrieved 15 June 2019

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Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Now_I_Lay_Me_Down_to_Sleep

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