Poem 12

supported so as shall amaze Their proudest persecutors. For the Spirit, Poured first on his Apostles, whom he sends To evangelize the nations, then on all Baptized, shall them with wondrous gifts endue To speak all tongues, and do all miracles, As did their Lord before them. Thus they win Great numbers of each nation to receive With joy the tidings brought from Heaven: at length Their ministry performed, and race well run, Their doctrine and their story written left, They die; but in their room, as they forewarn, Wolves shall succeed for teachers, grievous wolves, Who all the sacred mysteries of Heaven To their own vile advantages shall turn Of lucre and ambition, and the truth With superstitions and traditions taint, Left only in those written records pure, Though not but by the Spirit understood. Then shall they seek to avail themselves of names, Places, and titles, and with these to join Secular power, though feigning still to act By spiritual; to themselves appropriating The Spirit of God, promised alike and given To all believers; and, from that pretence, Spiritual laws by carnal power shall force On every conscience, laws which none shall find Left them enrolled, or what the Spirit within Shall on the heart engrave. What will they then, But force the Spirit of Grace itself, and bind His consort, Liberty? what but unbuild His living temples, built by faith to stand, Their own faith, not another’s? for, on Earth, Who against faith and conscience can be heard Infallible? Yet many will presume: Whence heavy persecution shall arise On all who in the worship persevere Of Spirit and Truth; the rest, far greater part, Will deem in outward rites and specious forms Religion satisfied; Truth shall retire Bestuck with slanderous darts, and works of faith Rarely be found. So shall the world go on, To good malignant, to bad men benign, Under her own weight groaning till the day Appear of respiration to the just, And vengeance to the wicked, at return Of Him so lately promised to thy aid, The Woman’s Seed⁠—obscurely then foretold, Now amplier known thy Saviour and thy Lord; Last in the clouds from Heaven to be revealed In glory of the Father, to dissolve Satan with his perverted world; then raise