Lully, lullay, Thou little tiny Child,
By, by, lully, lullay.

Vita mutatur, non tollitur.
[Life is changed, not destroyed.]

1. O sisters too,
How may we do,
For to preserve this day
This poor youngling
For whom we do sing
By, bye, lully, lullay?

2. Herod, the king,
In his raging,
Charged he hath this day
His men of might,
in his own sight,
All young children to slay.

3. That woe is me,
Poor child, for thee!
And ever morn and day,
For thy parting
Neither say nor sing,
By, by, lully, lullay.

Orate pro nobis. Amen.

(Sixteenth Century Pageant of the Shearmen and Tailors, with a phrase from the Preface of the Mass for the Dead and a final invocation of the Holy Innocents.)