158 BAXTER'Ii POEMS. Did not God's holy spirit quicken ours, And cause us unseen things by faith to see ? Renew and raise our dead, corrupted powers, None could from flesh, lust, sin, Hell, saved be. Flesh is not sin, it's made for holy use, In it souls here must seek and serve the Lord; But it's the tempting object of abuse, While we its life and lust too much regard. The body as a servant we must love, But souls have sense, aild sense to flesh is tried; And so qrawn down from God and things above, The soul that hath not faith is brutified. The interest of flesh perverts the will, It conquers reason, and corrupts the mind, No other enemy doth ·so much ill, To self-destroying, perishing mankind. AND now oh man, is flesh all that thou art? Worthy of all thy stir, and cost, and care, Live not as if thou hadst tio better part, Men's souls like God, and kin to angels are. Even brutes have souls possess'd of life and sense, Made to serve man, who's made his God to praise! Whether distinct or one, when taken hence, Subject to us, whom God will higher raise. What's flesh, but water mix'd with senseless earth? Viler than dirt, when souls awhile are gone, It's unseen spirit which causetl1 life and birth, This moveth all that's mov'd, doth all that's done.
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