'Such antinomian ftuff, with labour'd toil, 'Would human beauty's native luftre spoil. "What wickednefs beneath the covering lurks, That lewdly would divorce us all from works? 'Why such a stir about the law and grace? "We know that merit cannot now take place. 'And what needs more? Well, to let flander drop, Be merit for a little here the fcope.
Ah! many learn to lifp in gospel terms,
Who yet embrace the law with legal arms.
By wholesome education fome are taught
To own that human merit now is naught;
Who faintly but renounce proud merit's name,
And cleave refin'dly to the Popish scheme.
For graceful works expecting divine blifs,
And, when they fail, truft Chrift for what's amifs.
Thus to his righteoufnefs profefs to flee,
Yet by it ftill would their own faviours be.
They feem to works of merit bloody foes,
Yet feek falvation as it were* by thofe.
Blind Gentiles found, who did nor feek nor know;
But Ifrael loft it whole, who fought it fo.
Let all that love to wear the legal drefs,
Know that as fin, fo baftard righteousness
Has flain its thoufands, who in towering pride
The righteoufnefs of Jefus Chrift deride;
A robe divinely wrought, divinely won,
Yet caft by men for robes that are their own.
But fome to legal works feem whole deny'd,
Yet would by gospel works be justify'd,
By faith, repentance, love, and other fuch:
These dreamers being righteous overmuch,
Like Uzza, give the ark a wrongful touch.
By legal deeds, however gospeliz'd,
Can e'er tremendous juftice be appeas'd,
Or finners juftify'd before that God,
Whofe law is perfect, and exceeding broad?
Nay, faith itself, that leading gospel grace,
Holds as a work no juftifying place.
Just Heav'n to man for righteousness imputes
Not faith itself, or in its acts or fruits;
But Jefus' meritorious life and death,
Faith's proper object, all the honour hath.
From this doth faith derive its glorious fame,
Its great renown and justifying name;
Receiving all things, but deferving nought;
By faith all's begg'd and taken, nothing bought..
Its highest name is from the wedding vote,
So inftrumental in the marriage knot.
Jehovah leads the bride in that bleft hour,
Th' exceeding greatness of his mighty pow'r ;*
Which fweetly does her heart confent command,
To reach the wealthy Prince her naked hand.
For close to his embrace fhe'd never ftir,
If first his loving arms embrac'd not her:
But this he does by kindly gradual chace,
Of roufing, raifing, teaching, drawing grace,.
He fhews her, in his sweetest love address,
His glory as the Sun of righteousness;
At which all dying glories earth adorn,
Shrink like the fick moon at the wholesome morn..
This glorious Sun arifing with a grace,
Dark fhades of creature righteoufnefs to chase,
Faith now disclaims itself, and all the train
Of virtues formerly accounted gain ;
And counts them dung,† with holy, meek disdain.
For now appears the height, the depth immenfe
Of divine bounty and benevolence ;
Amazing mercy! ignorant of bounds!
Which moft enlarged faculties confounds.
How vain, how void now seem the vulgar charms,
The monarch's pomp of courts, and pride of arms?
The.boafted beauties of the human kind,
The pow'rs of body, and the gifts of mind?
Lo! in the grandeur of Immanuel's train,
All's fwallowed up as rivers in the main.
He's feen, when gospel light and fight is giv'n,
Encompass'd round with all the pomp of heav'n..
The foul, now taught of God, fees human schools
Make christless rabbis only lit'rate fools;
And that, till divine teaching pow'rful draw,
No learning will divorce them from the law.
Mere argument may clear the head, and force
A verbal, not a cordial clean divorce.
Hence many, taught the wholesome terms of art,
Have gofpel heads, but still a legal heart.
Till fov'reign grace and pow'r the finner catch,
He takes not Jefus for his only match.
Nay, works complete! ah! true, however odd,
Dead works are rivals with the living God.
Till heav'n's preventing mercy clear the fight,
Confound the pride with fupernatʼral light:
No haughty foul of human kind is brought
To mortify her felf-exalting thought.
Yet holiest creatures in clay tents that lodge,
Be but their lives fcann'd by the dreadful Judge;
How fhall they e'er his awful search endure,
Before whofe pureft eyes heav'n is not pure
?
How muft their black indictment be enlarg'd,
When by him angels are with folly charg'd?
What human worth fhall stand, when he shall scan?
O may his glory stain the pride of man.
How wond'rous are the tracks of divine grace! How fearchless are his ways, how vast th' abyss! Let haughty reason stoop, and fear to leap; Angelic plummets cannot found the deep. With fcorn he turns his eyes from haughty kings, With pleasure looks on low and worthless things; Deep are his judgments, fov'reign is his will, Let ev'ry mortal worm be dumb, be still. In vain proud reason fwells beyond its bound; God and his counfels are a gulph profound, An ocean wherein all our thoughts are ́drown'd.
Arguments and Encouragements to Gofpel Minifters to avoid a legal strain of Doctrine, and endeavour the Sinner's match with Chrift by Gospel means.
SECT. I. A legal Spirit the root of damnable Errors.
YE heralds great, that blow in name of God
The filver trump of gofpel grace abroad;
And found by warrant from the great I AM,
The nuptial treaty with the worthy Lamb;
Might ye but stoop th' unpolifh'd mufe to brook,
And from a fhrub an wholesome berry pluck;
Ye'd take encouragement from what is faid,
By gofpel means to make the marriage bed,
And to your glorious Lord a virgin chafte to wed.
The more proud nature bears a legal fway,
The more fhould preachers bend the gospel way:
Oft in the church arise destructive fchifms
From anti-evangelic aphorifms;
A legal spirit may be juftly nam'd
The fertile womb of ev'ry error damn'd.
Hence Pop'ry, fo connat'ral fince the fall,
Makes legal works like faviours merit all;
Yea, more than merit on their fhoulder loads,
To fupererogate like demi-gods.
Hence proud Socinians feat their reason high
'Bove ev'ry precious gospel mystery,
Its divine Author ftab, and without fear
The purple covert of his chariot tear.
With these run Arian monsters in a line,
All gospel truth at once to undermine !
To darken and delete, like hellish foes,
The brightest colour of the Sharon Rose.
At beft its human red they but decry
That blot the divine white the native dye.
Hence dare Arminians too, with brazen face,
Give man's free will the throne of God's free grace;
Whofe felf-exalting tenets clearly fhew
Great ignorance of law and gofpel too.
Hence Neonomians fpring, as fundry call
The new law makers to redress our fall.
The law of works, into repentance, faith,
Is chang'd, as their Baxterian Bible faith.
Shaping the gofpel to an eafy law,
They build their tott'ring house with hay and firaw;
Yet hide, like Rachel's idols in the stuff,
Their legal hands within a gospel muff.
Yea, hence fprings Antinomian vile refuse,
Whofe grofs abettors gospel grace abuse;
Unfkill'd how grace's filken latchet binds
Her captives to the law with willing minds.
SECT. II. A legal frain of doctrine difcovered and difcarded.
No wonder Paul the legal spirit curse, Of fatal errors fuch a feeding nurse. He, in Jehovah's great tremendous name, Condemns perverters of the gospel scheme. He damn'd the fophift rude, the babbling priest Would venture to corrupt it in the least; Yea, curs'd the heavenly angel down to hell Who, daring, would another gospel tell.+ Which crime is charg'd on these that dare difpenfe The felf-fame gospel in another sense.
Chrift is not preach'd in truth but in disguise,,
If his bright glory half obfcured lies.
When gofpel foldiers, that divide the word,
Scarce brandifh any but the legal fword;
While Chrift the author of the law they prefs,
More than the end of it for righteoufnefs;
Christ as a feeker of our service trace,
More than a Giver of enabling grace;
The King commanding holiness they show
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