Truths are often delivered to us, like wheat in full ears, to the end we should rub them out before we eat them, and take pains about them, before we have the comfort of them.
STYLE.
I could, were I so pleased, use higher-strains,
And for applause on tenters stretch my brains;
But what needs that? The arrow out of sight
Does not the sleeper nor the watchman fright:
To shoot too high doth make but children gaze,
'Tis that which hits the man doth him amaze.
Should all be forced their brains to lay aside,
That cannot regulate the flowing tide
By this or that man's fancy, we should have
The wise unto the fool become a slave.
Words easy to be understood do often hit the mark, when high and learned ones do only pierce the air. He also that speaks to the weakest, may make the learned understand him; when he that striveth to be high, is not only for the most part understood but of a sort, but also many times is neither understood by them nor by himself.
THE OLD AND NEW DISPENSATIONS.
There is as great a difference between their dispensation and ours for comfort, as there is between the making of a bond with a promise to seal it, and the actual sealing. It was made indeed in their time, but it was not sealed until the blood was shed on Calvary.
THE PILGRIM IN NEW ENGLAND.
My Pilgrim's book has travelled sea and land;
Yet could I never come to understand
That it was slighted, or turned out of door
By any kingdom, were they rich or poor.
In France, and Flanders, where men kill each other
My Pilgrim is esteemed a friend, a brother.
In Holland too, 'tis said, as I am told,
My Pilgrim is with some worth more than gold;
Highlanders and wild Irish can agree
My Pilgrim should familiar with them be.
'Tis in New England under such advance,
Receives there so much loving countenance,
As to be trimmed, new clothed, and decked with gems,
That it may show its features and its limbs.
Yet more, so public doth my Pilgrim walk,
That of him thousands daily sing and talk.