Exceeding old, and wholly dead,
Unlike to bear the promis'd feed:
Faith faid, Ifball an Ifaac fee;
No, no, faid fenfe, it cannot be:
Blind reafon to augment the ftrife,
Adds, How can death engender life?
My heart is like a rotten tomb,
More dead than ever Sarah's womb;
O can the promis'd feed of grace,
Spring forth from fuch a barren place?
Senfe gazing but on flinty rocks,
My hope and expectation chokes:
But could I, fkill'd in Abram's art,
O'erlook my dead and barren heart;
And build my hope on nothing lefs
Than divine pow'r and faithfulness;
Soon would I find him raife up fons
To Abram, out of rocks and ftones.
Faith acts as bufy boatmen do,

Who backward look and forward row;
It looks intent to things unfeen,
Thinks objects vifible too mean.
Senfe thinks it madnefs thus to fteer,
And only trufts its eye and ear;
Into faith's boat dare thruft its oar,
And put it further from the thore.
Faith does alone the promife eye;
Senfe won't believe unless it fee;
Nor can it truft the divine guide,
Unless it have both wind and tide.
Faith thinks the promife fure and good;
Senfe doth depend on likelihood;
Faith ev'n in ftorms believes the feers;
Senfe calls all men, ev'n prophets, liars.

Faith ufes means, but refts on none;

Senfe fails when outward means are gone;

Trufts more on probabilities,

Than all the divine promises.
It refts upon the rufty beam

Of outward things that hopeful feem;
Let these its fupports fink or cease,
No promife then can yield it peace.
True faith that's of a divine brood,
Confults not bafe with flesh and blood;
Bur carnal fenfe which ever errs,
With carnal reason ftill confers.
What! won't my disciples believe
That I am rifen from the grave?
Why will they pore on duft and death,
And overlook my quick'ning breath ?-
Why do they flight the word I fpake?
And rather forry counsel take

With death, and with a pow'rful grave,
If they their captive can relieve?
Senfe does enquire if tombs of clay.
Can fend their guefts alive away;
But faith will hear JEHOVAH's word,
Of life and death the fov'reigu Lord.
Should, I give ear to rotten duft,
Or to the tombs confine my truft;
No refurrection can I fee,

For duft that flies into mine eye..
What! Thomas, can't thou truft fo much
To me as to thy fight and touch?
Won't thou believe till fenfe be guide,
And thruft its hand into my fide?
Where is thy faith, if it depends
On nothing but thy finger-ends?

But blefs'd are they the truth who seal
By faith, yet neither fee nor feel.

SECT. IL

Faith and Senfe Spiritual, compared and diftinguifed. Where alfo the Difference between the Alfurance of Faith, and the Affurance of Senfe.

HE certainty of faith and fenfe

TH

Wide differ in experience :

Faith builds upon, Thus faith the Lord;
Senfe views his work, and not his word.
God's word without is faith's refort,
His work within doth fense support.
By faith we trust him without "pawns, *Pledges
By fense we handle with our hands.
By faith the word of truth's receiv'd,
By fense we know we have believ❜d.
Faith's certain by fiducial acts,
Senfe by its evidential facts.

Faith credits the divine report,

Senfe to his breathings makes refort:
That on his word of grace will hing,
This on his Spirit witneffing.

By faith I take the Lord for mine,
By fenfe I feel his love divine :
By that I touch his garment's hem,
By this find virtue thence to ftream.
By faith I have mine all on band,
By fenfe I have fome ftock in band:
By that fome vifion is begun,
By this I fome fruition win.
My faith can fend ev'n in exile,
Senfe cannot live without a finile.

By faith I to his promife fly,
By fenfe I in his bofom lie.
Faith buds upon the truth of God,
That lies within the promise broad;
But fenfe upon the truth of grace
His hand within my heart did place.
Thus Chrift's the object faith will eye,
And faith's the object fenfe may fee:
Faith keeps the truth of God in view,
While fense the truth of faith may fhew.
Hence faith's affurance firm can ftand,
When fenfe's in the deep may strand;
And faith's perfuafion full prevail,
When comfortable fenfe may fail.
I am affur'd when faith's in act,
Though fenfe, and feeling both I lack:
And thus myfterious is my lot,
I'm oft affur'd when I am not;

Oft pierc'd with racking doubts and fears:
Yet faith these brambles never bears;
But unbelief that cuts my breath,
And stops the language of my faith,
Glamours of unbelieving fears,
So frequently difturb mine ears,
I cannot hear what faith would fay,
Till once the noify clamours ftay.
And then will fresh experience find,
When faith gets leave to speak its mind,
The native language whereof is,
My Lord is mine, and I am his.
Sad doubtings.compaís me about,
Yet faith itself could never doubt;
For, as the facred volume faith,
Much doubting argues little faith.

The doubts and fears that work my grief,
Flow not from faith, but unbelief;
For faith, whene'er it acteth, cares
The plague of doubts, and me afsures.
But when mine eye of faith's afleep,
I dream of drowning in the deep;
But as befals the fleeping eye,
Though fight remain, it cannot fee;
The feeing faculty abides,

Though fleep from active feeing hides :
So faith's affuring pow'rs endure
Ev'n when it ceafes to affure.
There's ftill perfuafion in my faith,
Ev'n when I'm fill'd with fears of wrath;
The trusting babit ftill remains,

Though flumbers hold the act in chains.
The affuring faculty it keeps,

Ev'n when its eye in darkness fleeps,
Wrapt up in doubts; but when it wakes,
It roufes up affuring acts.

SECT. III.

The Harmony and Difcord between Faith and Senfe; how they help, and how they mar each other.

HOUGH gallant faith can keep the field-
When cow'rdly fenfe will fly or yield:

TH

Yet while I view their ufual path,
Senfe often ftands and falls with faith.
Faith ufhers in fweet peace and joy,
Which further heartens faith's employ :
Faith like the head, and fenfe the heart,
Do mutual vigour fresh impart.
When lively faith and feeling fweet,
ke dearett darlings, kindly meet,