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

Text[edit]

Perhaps the earliest version was written by George Wheler in his 1698 book The Protestant Monastery, which reads:[1]

Upon lying down, and going to sleep.

Here I lay me down to sleep.
To thee, O Lord, I give my Soul to keep,
Wake I ever, Or, Wake I never;
To thee O Lord, I give my Soul to keep for ever.

A later version printed in The New England Primer goes:[2]

Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my Soul to keep[;]
If I should die before I 'wake,
I pray the Lord my Soul to take.

Other versions[edit]

Grace Bridges, 1932:

Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray my lord my soul to keep,
In the morn when I awake
Please teach me the path of life to take.

Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep;
His Love to guard me through the night,
And wake me in the morning's light amen.[3]

Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep;
Please angels watch me through the night,
And keep me safe till morning light.[3]

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

Now I wake to see the light,
As God has kept me through the night;
And now I lift my voice to pray,
That Thou wilt keep me through the day.

Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep,
See me safely through the night,
And wake me with the morning light. Amen.

It is sometimes combined with the "Black Paternoster", one version of which goes:[5]

Matthew, Mark, Luke and John,
Bless the bed that I lie on.
Four corners to my bed,
Four angels round my head;
One to watch and one to pray
And two to bear my soul away.

Sometimes the prayer ends with, “and this I ask for Jesus’ sake. Amen.”[6]

In popular culture[edit]

Music
Literature
Film and television
  • In Poltergeist (1982), Carol Anne recites this prayer when she and her mother bury her pet canary in their garden.[9]
  • In A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984), as Nancy goes to bed to prepare for her final battle with Freddy Krueger.
  • In The Simpsons episode "Lisa's First Word" (1992), Homer builds a terrifying clown bed for a young Bart. In Bart's imagination, the clown says 'if you should die before you wake.'
  • In Bad Times at the El Royale (2018), Laramie Seymour Sullivan recites this prayer to his daughter on the phone before bedtime.
  • In Supernatural episode "Something Wicked This Way Comes" (2006), the episode opens with a young girl reciting the prayer before bed.

Theatre

  • In The Color Purple (2005 musical), a variation of the prayer is used in the songs Our Prayer (sung by sisters Celie and Nettie) and Big Dog (sung by Celie alone).

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^ The Protestant Monastery; or Christian OEconomicks, containing Directions for the Religious Conduct of a Family, 1698
  2. ^ The New England Primer Archived 10 May 2017 at the Wayback Machine, 1750 ed., p. 23.
  3. ^ a b Debbie Trafton O'Neal; Nancy Munger (1994), Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep: Action Prayers, Poems, and Songs for Bedtime, Augsburg Books, p. 6, ISBN 978-0-8066-2602-4
  4. ^ James Limburg (2006), Encountering Ecclesiastes: a book for our time, Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, p. 103, ISBN 978-0-8028-3047-0
  5. ^ I. Opie and P. Opie, The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1951, 2nd edn., 1997), ISBN 0-19-860088-7, pp. 357–60.
  6. ^ https://www.catholicprayer.ca/Prayers/Now-I-Lay-Me-Down-To-Sleep.html
  7. ^ Thunderdome 2022 | DRS, retrieved 10 February 2023
  8. ^ "JPEGMafia - the 27 club | Genius".
  9. ^ "Poltergeist (1982 film) Quotes | IMDB". IMDb.
source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Now_I_Lay_Me_Down_to_Sleep

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