SECTION I.

Conviction offered to sinners, especially such as are wedded strictly to the law, or selfrighteous, that they may see the need of Christ's righteousness.

If never yet thou didst fair Jesus wed,
Nor yield thy heart to be his marriage-bed:
But hitherto are wedded to the law,

Which never could thy chained affections draw
From brutish lusts and sordid lovers' charms;
Lo! thou art yet in Satan's folded arms.
Hell's pow'r invisible thy soul retains
His captive slave, lock'd up in massy chains.
O sinner, then, as thou regard'st thy life,
Seek, seek with ardent care and earnest strife
To be the glorious Lamb's bethrothed wife.
For base corrivals never let him lose
Thy heart, his bed of conjugal repose.
Wed Christ alone, and with severe remorse
From other mates pursue a clean divorce;
For they thy ruin seek by fraud or force,
As lurking serpents in the shady bow'rs
Conceal their malice under spreading flow'rs;
So thy deceitful lusts with cruel spite
Hide ghastly danger under gay delight.

Art thou a legal zealot, soft or rude?
Renounce thy nat'ral and acquired good.
As base deceitful lusts may work thy smart,
So may deceitful frames upon thy heart.
Seeming good motions may in some be found,
Much joy in hearing, like the stony ground';
Much sorrow too in praying, as appears
In Esau's careful suit with rueful tears2.
Touching the law, they blameless may appear3,
From spurious views most specious virtues bears,
Nor merely be devout in men's esteem,
But prove to be sincerely what they seem,
Friends to the holy law in heart and life,
Suers of heav'n with utmost legal strife;
Yet still with innate pride so rankly spic'd,
Converted but to duties, not to Christ;
That Publicians and harlots heav'n obtain*
Before a crew so righteous and so vain.
Sooner will those shake off their vicious dress,
Than these blind zealots will their righteousness,
Who judge they have (which fortifies their pride)
The law of God itself upon their side.

(1) Luke viii. 13. (2) Heb. xii. 17. (3) Phil. iii. 6.

(4) Mat. xxvi. 31.

Old nature new brush'd up with legal pains,
Such strict attachment to the law retains,
No means, no motives can to Jesus draw
Vain souls, so doubly wedded to the law.

But wouldst the glorious Prince in marriage have,
Know that thy nat'ral husband cannot save.
Thy best essays to pay the legal rent
Can never, in the least, the law content.
Didst thou in pray'rs employ the morning light,
In tears and groans the watches of the night,
Pass thy whole life in close devotion o'er;
'Tis nothing to the law still craving more.
There's no proportion 'twixt its high commands,
And puny works from thy polluted hands;
Perfection is the least that it demands,
"Wouldst enter into life, then keep the law',"
But keep it perfectly without a flaw.

It won't have less, nor will abate at last
A drop of vengeance for the sin that's past:
Tell, sinful mortal, is thy stock so large
As duly can defray this double charge?

Why these are mere impossibles," sayst thou:
Yea, truly so they are; and therefore now,
That down thy legal confidence may fall,
The law's black doom home to thy bosom call.
Lo! I (the divine law,) demand no less
Than perfect, everlasting righteousness:
But thou hast fail'd, and lost thy strength to Do:
Therefore I doom thee to eternal wo;
In prison close so be shut uip for ay,
Ere I be baffled with thy partial pay.

Thou always didst, and dost my precepts break;
I therefore curse thee to the burning lake.
In God, the great Lawgiver's glorious name,
I judge thy soul to everlasting shame.
No flesh can by the law be justified2.
Yet darest thou thy legal duties plead?
As Paul appeal'd to Cæsar, wilt thou so
Unto the law? then to it thou shalt go,
And find it doom thee to eternal wo.

What would ye have us plunged in deep despair? Amen; yea, God himself would have you there,

His will it is that you despair of life,

And safety by the law or legal strife;
That cleanly thence divorc'd at any rate
His fairest Son may have a faithful mate.

'Till this law-sentence pass within your breast,
You'll never wed the law-discharging Priest.

(1) Mat. xix. 17. (2) Rom. iii. 20.

You prize not heav'n, till he through hell you draw;
Nor love the gospel, till ye know the law.

Know then, the divine law most perfect cares
For none of thy imperfect legal wares;
Dooms thee to vengeance for thy sinful state,
As well as sinful actions small or great.
If any sin can be accounted small,

To hell it dooms thy soul for one and all.
For sins of nature, practice, heart, and way
Damnation-rent it summons thee to pay.
Yea, not for sin alone, which is thy shame,
But for thy boasted service too, so lame,
The Law adjudges thee and hell to meet,
Because thy righteousness is incomplete.
As tow'ring flames burn up the wither'd flags,
So will the fiery law thy filthy rags.

SECTION II.

Direction given with reference to the right use of the Means, that we rest not on these instead of Christ, the glorious Husband, in whom our help lies.

ADAM, where art thou'? Soul, where art thou now?
Oh! art thou saying, Sir, what shall I do2?
I dare not use that proud self-raising strain,
Go help yourself, and God will help you then.
Nay, rather know, O Israel, that thou hast
Destroy'd thyself, and carst not in the least
From sin nor wrath thyself the captive free,
Thy help, says Jesus, only lies in me3:
Heav'n's oracles direct to him alone,
Full help is laid upon thy mighty One.
In him, in him complete salvation dwells;
He's God the helper, and there is none else.
Fig leaves won't hide thee from the fiery show'r,
'Tis he alone that saves by price and pow'r.

Must we do nothing then, will mockers say,
But rest in sloth till Heav'n the help convey?
Pray, stop a little, sinner; don't abuse
God's awful word, that charges thee to use
Means, ordinances, which he's pleas'd to place
As precious channels of his pow'rful grace.
Restless improve all these, until from heav'n
The whole salvation needless thus be giv'n.
Wait in his path, according to his call,
On him whose pow'r alone affecteth all.
Would'st thou him wed?
In duties wait, I say;

(1) Gen. iii. 9. (2) Mark x. 17.

(3) Hos. xiii. 9.

(4) Isa. xlv. 22.

But marry not thy duties by the way.
Thou'lt wofully come short of saving grace,
If duties only be thy resting place.

Nay, go a little further' through them all,
To him whose office is to save from thrall,
Thus in a gospel-manner hopeful wait,
Striving to enter by the narrow gate2:
So strait and narrow, that it won't admit
The bunch upon thy back to enter it.
Not only bulky lusts may cease to press,
But even the bunch of boasted righteousness.
Many, as in the sacred page we see,
Shall strive to enter, but unable be3:
Because, mistaking this new way of life,
They push a legal not a gospel strife:
As if their duties did JEHOVAH bind,
Because 'tis written, "Seek, and ye shall find."
Perverted scripture does their error fence,
They read the letter, but neglect the sense.
While to the word no gospel-gloss they give;
Their seek and find's the same with do and live.
Hence would they a connection native place
Between their moral pains and saving grace:
Their nat❜ral poor essays the Judge wont miss,
In justice, to infer eternal bliss.

Thus commentaries on the word they make,
Which to their ruin are a grand mistake:
For, though the legal bias in their breast,
They scripture to their own destruction wrest,
Why, if we seek, we get, they gather hence;
Which is not truth save in the scripture sense.
There Jesus deals with friends, and elsewhere saith,
These seekers only speed that ask in faith."
"The prayer of the wicked is abhorr'd,

As an abomination to the Lord."

Their suits are sins, but their neglects no less,
Which can't their guilt diminish but increase.
They ought, like beggars, lie in grace's way:
Hence Peter taught the sorcerer to pray ;7
For though mere natʼral men's address or pray'rs
Can no acceptance gain as work of theirs,
Nor have, as their performance, any sway;
Yet as a divine ordinance they may.
But spotless truth has bound itself to grant
The suit of none but the believing saint.
In Jesus persons once accepted, do
Acceptance find in him for duties too.

For he, whose Son they do in marriage take,

(4) Matth. vii. 7.

(1) Song iii. 1, 4. (2) Matth. vii. 13, 14. (3) Luke xiii. 24.
(6) Prov. xv. 9. xxviii. 9. (7) Acts viii. 22.

(5) James i. 6.

Which righteousness receiv'd, is, without strife,
The true condition of eternal life.

But still, say you, pow'r to believe I miss.
You may; but know you what believing is?
Faith lies not in your building up a tow'r
Of some great action by your proper pow'r.
For heav'n well knows, that by the killing fall,
No pow'r no will remains in man at all
For acts divinely good; 'till sov'reign grace
By pow'rful drawing virtue turn the chase.
Hence none believe in Jesus, as they ought
'Till once they do believe they can do nought,
Nor are sufficient e'en to form a thought'.
They're conscious in the right believing hour,
Of human weakness, and of divine pow'r.
Faith acts not in the sense of strength and might,
But in the sense of weakness acts outright.
It is (no boasting arm of pow'r or length)
But weakness acting on Almighty strength2.
It is the pow'rless, helpless sinner's flight
Into the open arms of saving might:
"Tis an employing Jesus to do all
That can within salvation's compass fall;
To be the agent kind in ev'ry thing
Belonging to the Prophet, Priest, and King;
To teach, to pardon, sanctify, and save,
And nothing to the creature's pow'r to leave.
Faith makes us joyfully content that he

Our head, our husband, and our all should be;
Our righteousness and strength, our stock and store,
Our fund for food and raiment, grace and glore.
It makes the creature down to nothing fall,
Content that Christ alone be all in all.

The plan of grace is faith's delightful view,
With which it closes both as good and true,
Unto the truth, the mind's assent is full;
Unto the good, a free consenting will.
The holy Spirit here, the agent chief,
Creates this faith, and dashes unbelief.
That very God who calls us to believe,
The very faith he seeks, must also give.

Why calls he then? say you. Pray, man, be wise;
Why did he call dead Lazarus to rise?

Because the orders in their bosom bear

Almighty power to make the carcass hear.

But heav'n may not this mighty power display. Most true; yet still thou art oblig'd t' obey.

But God is not at all obliged to stretch