AN OLD GEM by Flavel

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jun 4, 1867

AN OLD GEM.

By Flavel

JUDGE in thyself, O Christian! is it meet To set thy heart on what boasts set their feet? 'Tis no hyperbole, if you be told, You dig for dross with mattocks made of gold. Affections are too costly, to bestow Upon the fair-faced noddings here below. The eagle scorns to fall down from on high, The proverb saith, to catch a silly fly. And can a Christian leave the face of God, T' embrace the earth, or dote upon a clod! Can earthly things thy heart so strangely move, To tempt it down from the delights above; And now to court the world at such a time, When God is laying judgment to the line? It's just like him that doth his cabin sweep And trim, when all is sinking in the deep: Or like the silly bird, that to her nest Doth carry straws, and never is at rest Till it be feathered well, but doth not see The ax beneath that's hewing down the tree. If on a thorn thy heart itself repose With such delight, what if it were a rose? Admire, O saint! the wisdom of thy God, Who of the self-same tree doth make a rod, Lest thou shouldst surfeit on forbidden fruit, And live not like a saint, but like a brute.—Flavel.