These gaudy strains would lovely truth disgrace,
As purest paint deforms a comely face.
Heav'n's mysteries are 'bove art's ornament,
Immensely brighter than its brightest paint.
No tow'ring lit'rator could e'er outwit
The plainest diction fetch'd from sacred writ;
By which mere blazing rhet'ric is outdone,
As twinkling stars are by the radiant sun.
The soaring orators, who can with ease
Strain the quintessence of hyperboles,

And clothe the barest theme with purest dress,
Might here expatiate much, yet say the less,
If w' th' majestical simplicity

Of scripture orat'ry they disagree.

These lines pretend not to affect the sky,
Content among inglorious shades to lie,
Provided sacred truth be fitly clad,

Or glorious shine ev'n through the dusky shade.
Mark, then, though you should miss the gilded strain,
If they a store of golden truth contain:

Nor underrate a jewel rare and prime,

Though wrapt up in the rags of homely rhyme.
Though haughty Deists hardly stoop to say,
That nature's night has need of scripture day:

Yet gospel light alone will clearly show
How ev'ry sentence here is just and true,
Expel the shades that may the mind involve,
And soon the seeming contradiction solve.
All fatal errors in the world proceed

From want of skill such mysteries to read.
Vain men the double branch of truth divide,
Hold by the one, and slight the other side.

Hence proud Arminians cannot reconcile
Freedom of grace with freedom of the will.
The blinded Papist wont discern nor see
How works are good unless they justify.
Thus legalists distinguish not the odds
Between their home-bred righteousness and God's.
Antinomists the saints' perfection plead,

Nor duly sever 'tween them and their head.
Socinians wont these seeming odds agree,

How heav'n is bought, and yet salvation free.
Bold Arians hate to reconcile or scan,

How Christ is truly God and truly man:
Holding the one part of Immanuel's name,
The other part outrageously blaspheme.
The sound in faith no part of truth control:
Heretics own the half, but not the whole.

Keep then the sacred mystery still entire ; To both the sides of truth do favor bear, Not quitting one to hold the other branch; But passing judgment on an equal bench; The riddle has two feet, and were but one Cut off, truth falling to the ground were gone. "T is all a contradiction, yet all true,

And happy truth, if verifi'd in you.

Go forward then to read the lines, but stay

To read the riddle also by the way.

THE RIDDLE.

SECTION I.

THE MYSTERY OF THE SAINTS' PEDIGREE, AND ESPECIALLY OF THEIR RELATION TO CHRIST'S WONDERFUL PERSON.

My life's a maze of seeming traps, a

A scene of mercies and mishaps; b

A heap of jarring to and fros, c

A field of joys, a flood of woes.

d

a Josh. xxiii. 13. And Joshua said, Know for a certainty, that the Lord your God will no more drive out any of these nations from before you; but they shall be snares and traps unto you, and scourges in your sides, and thorns in your eyes, &c. Psalm cxxiv. 7. Our soul is escaped as a bird out of the snare of the fowlers; the snare is broken, and we are escaped.

b Or miseries. Lam. iii. 19. Remembering mine affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the gall. Ver. 22. It is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not. Psalm ci. 1. I will sing of mercy and judgment: unto thee, O Lord, will I sing.

c Psalm cii. 10. Thou hast lifted me up, and cast me down. Psalm cix. 23. I am tossed up and down as the locust.

d Hab. iii. 17, 18. Although the fig-tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in the vines; the labor of the olive shall fail, and the fields shall yield no meat; the flocks shall be cut off from

I'm in mine own and others' eyes,

A labyrinth of mysteries. e

I'm something that from nothing came, ƒ

Yet sure it is, I nothing am. g

Once I was dead, and blind, and lame, h

Yea, I continue still the same. i

the fold, and there shall be no herd in the stalls; yet will I rejoice in the Lord, I will joy in the God of my salvation.

e Isa. viii. 18. Behold, I and the children whom the Lord hath given me are for signs and for wonders in Israel from the Lord of hosts, which dwelleth in Mount Zion. Zech. iii. 8. Hear now, O Joshua, the high priest, thou and thy fellows that sit before thee for they are men wondered at, &c. Psalm lxxi. 7. I am as a wonder unto many, but thou art my strong refuge.

f Gen. i. 1. In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth Heb. xi. 3. Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.

g Isa. xl. 17. All nations before him are as nothing, and they are accounted to him less than nothing, and vanity. Dan. iv 35. All the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing.

h Eph. ii. 1. And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins. Rev. iii. 17. Because thou sayest, I am rich, and increased in goods, and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked. Isa. xxxv. 6. Then shall the lame man leap as an hart, and the tongue of the dumb sing; for in the wilderness shall waters break out, and streams in the desert.

i Rom. vii. 14. For we know that the law is spiritual: but I