Which swore solemnly, Man shall do or die?
Will God, most true, extend to us forsooth,
His goodness to the damage of his truth?
Will spotless holiness be baffled thus ?
Or awful justice be unjust for us?
Shall faithfulness be faithless for our sake,
And he his threats, as we his precepts break?
Will our great creditor deny himself?
And for full payment take our filthy pelf?
Dispense with justice, to let mercy vent?
And stain his royal crown with 'minish'd rent?
Unworthy thought, O let no mortal clod
Hold such base notions of a glorious God.
Heav'n's holy cov'nant, made for human race,
Consists, or whole of works, or whole of grace.
If works will take the field then works must be
For ever perfect to the last degree:
Will God dispense with less? Nay sure, he won't
With ragged toll his royal law affront.
Can rags, that Sinai flames will soon dispatch,
E'er prove the fiery law's adequate match?
Vain man must be divorc'd, and choose to take
Another husband, or a burning lake.
We find the divine volume no where teach
New legal terms within our mortal reach.
Some make, tho' in the sacred page unknown,
Sincerity assume perfection's throne:
But who will boast this base usurper's sway,
Save ministers of darkness, that display,
Invented night to stifle scripture-day?
The nat'ralist's sincerity is naught;
That of the gracious is divinely taught;
Which teaching keeps their graces, if sincere,
Within the limits of the gospel-sphere,
Where vaunting, non-created graces sing,
Nor boast of streams, but of the Lord the spring.
Sincerity's the soul of ev'ry grace,
The quality of all the ransom'd race.
Of promis'd favour 'tis a fruit, a clause:
procuring term, no moving cause.
How unadvis'd the legal mind confounds
The marks of divine favour with the grounds,
And qualities of covenanted friends
With the condition of the covenant blends?
Thus holding gospel truths with legal arms,
Mistakes new cov'nant fruits for fed'ral terms.
The joyful sound no change of terms allows,
But change of persons, or another spouse.
The nature same that sinn'd must do or die;
No milder terms in gospel offers lic.
For grace no other law abatement shows,
But how law debtors may restore its dues :
Restore, yea, thro' a surety in their place,
With double int'rest, and a better grace.
Here we of no new terms of life are told,
But of a husband to fulfil the old;
With him alone by faith we're call'd to wed,
And let no rival bruik' the marriage bed.
Man's vain attempt to seek life by Christ's righteousness, joined with their own ; and legal hopes natural to all.
But still the bride reluctant disallows
The junior suit, and hugs the senior spouse.
Such the old selfish folly of her mind,
So bent to lick the dust, and grasp the wind,
Alleging works and duties of her own
May for her criminal offence atone;
She will her antic dirty robe provide,
Which vain she hopes will all polution hide.
The filthy rags that saints away have flung,
She holding, wraps and rolls herself in dung.
Thus, maugre all the light that gospel gives,
Unto her nat'ral consort fondly cleaves.
Though mercy set the royal match in view,
She's loth to bid her ancient mate adieu.
When light of scripture, reason, common sense,
Can hardly mortify her vain pretence
To legal righteousness; yet, if at last
Her conscience rous'd begins to stand aghast,
Press'd with the dread of hell, she'll rashly patch,
And halve a bargain with the proferred match;
In hopes his help, together with her own,
Will turn to peaceful smiles the wrathful frown.
Though grace the rising sun delightful sings,
With full salvation in his golden wings,
And righteousness complete; the faithless soul,
Receiving half the light rejects the whole;
Revolves the sacred page, but reads purblind
The gospel-messsge with a legal mind.
Men dream their state, ah! too, too slightly view'd,
Needs only be amended, not renewed
Scorn to be wholly debtors unto grace,
Hopeful their works may meliorate their case.
They fancy present pray'rs and future pains
Will for their former failings make amends:
To legal yokes they bow their servile necks.
And, least foul slips their false repose perplex,
Think Jesus' merits make up all defects.
They patch his glorious robes with filthy rags,
And burn but incense to their proper drags',
Disdain to use his righteousness alone,
But as an aiding stirr'p to mount their own:
Thus in Christ's room his rival self enthrone,
And vainly would, dress'd up in legal trim,
Divide salvation 'twixt themselves and him.
But know, vain man, that to his share must fall
The glory of the whole, or none at all.
In him all wisdom's hidden treasures lie2,
And all the fulness of the Deity3.
This store alone, immense and never spent,
Might poor insolvent debtors well content;
But to hell-prison justly Heav'n will doom
Proud fools that on their petty stock presume.
The softest couch that gilded nature knows
Can give the waken'd nature no repose.
When God arraigns, what mortal pow'r can stand
Beneath the terror of his lifted hand?
Our safety lies beyond the nat'ral line,
Beneath the purple covert all divine.
Yet how is precious Christ the way despis'd,
And high the way of life by doing priz'd?
But can its vot'ries all its levy show?
They prize it most, who least its burden know:
Who by the law, in part, would save his soul,
Becomes a debtor to fulfil the whole.*
Its pris'ner he remains, and without bail,
'Till ev'ry mite be paid; and if he fail
(As sure he must, since, by our sinful breach,
Perfection far surmounts all mortal reach)
Then curst for ever must his soul remain;
And all the folk of God must say AMEN.5
Why, seeking that the law should help afford;
In honouring the law he slights its Lord,
Who gives his law-fulfilling righteousness
To be the naked sinners perfect dress,
In which he might with spotless beauty shine.
Before the face of majesty divine:
Yet, lo! the sinner works with mighty pains.
A garment of his own to hide his stains;
Ungrateful, overlooks the gift of God,
The robe wrought by his hand dy'd in his blood.
In vain the Son of God this web did weave,
Could our vile rags sufficient shelter give.
(1) Hab. i. 16. (2) Col. ii 3. (3) Col. ii. 9. (4) Gal. v. 3. (5) Deut. xxvii. 26.
In vain he ev'ry thread of it did draw,
Could sinners be o'ermantled by the law.
Can men's salvation on their works be built,
Whose fairest actions nothing are but guilt?
Or can the law suppress the avenging flame,
When now its only office is to damn?
Did life come by the law, in part or whole,
Bless'd Jesus dy'd in vain to save a soul.
Those then who life by legal means expect,
To them is Christ become of no effect';
Because their legal mixtures do, in fact,
Wisdom's grand project plainly counteract.
How close proud carnal reasoning combine,
To frustrate sov'reign grace's great design?
Man's heart by nature weds the law alone,
Nor will another paramour enthrone.
True, many seem by course of life profane,
No favour for the law to entertain:
But break the bands, and cast the cords away,
That would their raging lusts and passions stay:
Yet ev'n this reigning madness may declare,
How strictly weeded to the law they are:
For now (however rich they seemed before)
Hopeless to pay law-debt, they give it o'er,
Like desp'rate debtors mad, still run in more.
Despair of success shews their strong desires,
'Till legal hopes are parch'd in lustful fires.
"Let's give, say they, our lawless will free scope,
And live at random, for there is no hope."
The law, that can't 'em help, they stab with hate,
Yet scorn to beg, or court another mate.
Here lusts, most opposite their hearts divide,
Their beastly passion, and their bankrupt pride.
In passion they their native mate deface,
In pride disdain to be obliged to grace:
Hence plainly, as a rule 'gainst law they live,
Yet closely to it as a cov'nant cleave.
Thus legal pride lies hid beneath the patch,
And strong aversion to the gospel match.
(1) Gal. ii. 21. v. 2. 4. (2) Jer. xviii. 12.
THE MANNER OF A SINNER'S DIVORCE FROM THE LAW IN A WORK OF HUMILIATION, AND OF HIS MARRIAGE TO THE LORD JESUS CHRIST; OR, THE WAY HOW A SINNER COMES TO BE A BELIEVER.
Of a Law-work, and the workings of legal pride under it.
So proud's the bride, so backwardly dispos'd;
How then shall e'er the happy match be clos'd?
Kind grace
the tumults of her heart must quell,
And draw her heav'nward by the gates of hell.
The Bridegroom's Father makes by's holy Spirit
His stern command with her stiff conscience meet;
To dash her pride, and show her utmost need,
Pursues for double debt with awful dread.
He makes her former husband's frightful ghost
Appear and damn her, as a bankrupt lost;
With curses, threats, and Sinai thunder-claps,
Her lofty tow'r of legal boasting saps.
These humbling storms in high or low degrees,
Heaven's Majesty will measure as he please:
But still he makes the fiery law at least
Pronounce its awful sentence in her breast,
'Till thro' the law' convict of being lost,
She hopeless to the law gives up the ghost:
Which now in rigour comes full debt to crave,
And in close prison cast; but not to save.
For now 'tis weak, and can't (thro' our default)
Its greatest votaries to life exalt.
But well it can command with fire and flame,
And to the lowest pit of ruin damn.
Thus doth it by commission from above,
Deal with the bride, when heav'n would court her love.
Lo! now she startles at the Sinai trump,
Which throws her soul into a dismal dump;
Conscious another husband she must have,
Else die for ever in destruction's grave.
While in conviction's jail she's thus enclos'd,
Glad news are heard, the royal mate's proposed.
And now the scornful bride's inverted stir
Is racking fear, he scorn to match with her.
She dreads his fury, and despairs that he
Will ever wed so vile a wretch as she.
And here the legal humour stirs again,
To her prodigious loss and grievous pain:
For when the Prince presents himself to be
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