John Byrom: Verses about Soul

Prayer and thanksgiving is the vital breath
That keeps the spirit of a man from death;
For pray'r attracts into the living soul
The life, that fills the universal whole.

My spirit longs for thee
Within my troubled breast
Though I unworthy be
Of so divine a guest:

Of so divine a guest
Unworthy though I be,
Yet has my heart no rest,
Unless it come from Thee:

Unless it come from Thee,
In vain I look around:
In all that I can see
No rest is to be found:

No rest is to be found,
But in thy blessed love:
O let my wish be crowned,
And send it from above!

A Local union, on the other hand,
Though crowded numbers should together stand,
Joining in one same Form of pray'r and praise,
Or Creed express'd in regulated phrase;
Or ought beside - though it assume the name
Of Christian-Church, may want to real claim.

For if it want the spirit and the sign,
That constitute all worship as divine,
The love within, the test of it without,
In vain the union passes for devout:
Heartless, and takenless if it remain,
It ought to pass, in strictness, for profane.

At first, an unity of heart and soul,
A distribution of an outward dole,
And ev'ry member of the body fed,
As equally belonging to the head,
With what it wanted, was, without suspense,
True Church-Communion in the Christian sense.

Whether averse the many, or the few,
To hold communion in this right'ous view,
Their thought commences heresy, their deed
Schismatical, though they profess the Creed;
Ways of distributing, if new, should still
Maintain the old communicative will.

Broken by ev'ry loveless, thankless thought,
And not behaving as a Christian ought;
By want of meekness, or a show of pride,
Tow'rds any soul for whom our Saviour died;
While this continues, men may pray and preach,
In all their forms, but none will heal the breach.

Whatever helps an outward form may bring,
To Church-communion, it is not the thing;
Nor a Society, as such, nor place,
Nor any thing besides uniting grace:
They are but accessaries at the most,
To true communion of the Holy Ghost.

This is th' essential fellowship, the tie,
Which all true Christians are united by:
No other union does them any good,
But that which Christ cemented with his blood,
As God and Man; that having lost it, men
Might live in unity with God again.

What he came down to bring us from above,
Was grace, and peace, and law-fulfilling love;
True spirit-worship which his Father sought,
Was the sole end of what he did and taught:
That God's own Church and Kingdom might begin,
Which Moses and the Prophets usher'd in.

A Christian, in so catholic a sense,
Can give to none, but partial minds offence;
Forc'd to live under some divided part,
He keeps entire the union of the heart,
The sacred tie of love; by which alone
Christ said that his disciples should be known.

He values no distinction, as profest
By way of separation from the rest;
Oblig'd in duty, and inclin'd by choice,
In all the good of any to rejoice;
From ev'ry evil, falsehood, or mistake,
To wish them free, for common comfort's sake.

Freedom, to which the most undoubted way
Lies in Obedience (where it always lay)
To Christ himself, who with an inward call
Knocks at the door, that is, the heart of all.
At the reception of this heav'nly guest
All good comes in, all evil quits the breast.

The free receiver, then becomes content
With what God orders, or does not prevent
To them that love him, all things, he is sure,
Must work for good, though how, may be obscure;
Even successful wickedness when past,
Will bring to them some latent good at last.

Fall'n as divided churches are, and gone
From the perfection of the Christian one.
Respect is due to any that contains,
The venerable, though but faint remains.
Of ancient rule, which had not, in its view
The letter only, but the spirit too.

When that variety of new-found ways,
Which people so run after in our days,
Has done its utmost, - when,
Lo here, lo there,

Shall yield to inward seeking and sincere;
What was at first, may come to be again,
The praise of Church-assemblies amongst men.

Mean while, in that to which we now belong,
To mind in public lesson, pray'r and song,
Teaching and preaching what conduces best,
To true devotion in the private breast,
Wishing increase of good to ev'ry soul
Seems to be our concern upon the whole.

To God, and Christ and holy angels stand,
Dispos'd to ev'ry Church, in ev'ry land,
The growth of good still helping to compleat,
Whatever tares be sown among the wheat;
Who would not wish to have, and to excite,
A disposition so divinely right?

’TIS Man’s own Nature, which in its own Life,
Or Centre, stands in Enmity and Strife,
And anxious, selfish, doing what it lists,
(Without God’s Love) that tempts him, and resists;
The Devil also shoots his fiery Dart,
From Grace and Love to turn away the Heart.

This is the greatest Trial; ’tis the Fight
Which Christ, with His internal Love and Light,
Maintains within Man’s Nature, to dispel
God’s Anger, Satan, Sin, and Death, and Hell;
The human Self, or Serpent, to devour,
And raise an Angel from it by His Pow’r.

Now if God’s Love in Christ did not subdue
In some Degree this Selfishness in you,
You would have no such Combat to endure;
The Serpent, then, triumphantly secure,
Would unoppos’d exert its native Right,
And no such Conflict in your Soul excite.

For all the huge Temptation and Distress
Rises in Nature, tho’ God seeks to bless;
The Serpent feeling its tormenting State,
(Which of itself is a mere anxious Hate,)
When God’s amazing Love comes in, to fill
And change the selfish to a God-like Will.

Here Christ, the Serpent-bruiser, stands in Man,
Storming the Devil’s hellish, self-built Plan;
And hence the Strife within the human Soul,—
Satan’s to kill, and Christ’s to make it whole;
As by Experience, in so great Degree,
God in His Goodness causes you to see.…

The next Temptation, which befalls of Course
From Satan and from Nature’s selfish Force,
Is, when the Soul has tasted of the Love
And been illuminated from above;
Still in its Self-hood it would seek to shine,
And as its own possess the Light Divine.

That is, the soulish Nature,—take it right,
As much a Serpent, if without God’s Light,
As Lucifer,—this Nature still would claim
For own Propriety the Heav’nly Flame,
And elevate its Fire to a Degree
Above the Light’s Good Pow’r, which cannot be.

This domineering Self, this Nature-Fire,
Must be transmuted to a Love-Desire.
Now, when this Change is to be undergone,
It looks for some own Pow’r, and, finding none,
Begins to doubt of Grace, unwilling quite
To yield up its self-willing Nature’s Right.

It never quakes for Fear, and will not die
In Light Divine, tho’ to be blest thereby:
The Light of Grace it thinks to be Deceit,
Because it worketh gently without Heat;
Mov’d too by outward Reason, which is blind,
And of itself sees nothing of this Kind.

Who knows, it thinketh, whether it be true
That God is in thee, and enlightens too?
Is it not Fancy? For thou dost not see
Like other People, who as well as thee
Hope for Salvation by the Grace of God,
Without such Fear and Trembling at his Rod.…

The own Self-will must die away, and shine,
Rising thro’ Death, in Saving Will Divine;
And from the Opposition which it tries
Against God’s Will such great Temptations rise;
The Devil too is loth to lose his Prey,
And see his Fort cast down, if it obey.

For, if the Life of Christ within arise,
Self-Lust and false Imagination dies,—
Wholly, it cannot in this present Life,
But by the Flesh maintains the daily Strife,—
Dies, and yet lives; as they alone can tell
In whom Christ fights against the Pow’rs of Hell.

The third Temptation is in Mind and Will,
And Flesh and Blood, if Satan enter still;
Where the false Centres lie in Man, the Springs
Of Pride and Lust, and Love of earthly Things,
And all the Curses wish’d by other Men,
Which are occasion’d by this Devil’s Den.

These in the Astral Spirit make a Fort,
Which all the Sins concentre to support;
And human Will, esteeming for its Joy
What Christ, to save it, combats to destroy,
Will not resign the Pride-erected Tow’r,
Nor live obedient to the Saviour’s Pow’r.…

Let go all earthly Will, and be resign’d
Wholly to Him with all your Heart and Mind!
Be Joy or Sorrow, Comfort or Distress,
Receiv’d alike, for He alike can bless,
To gain the Victory of Christian Faith
Over the World and all Satanic Wrath!