Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, ON THE GROUND OF TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION, by JOHN BYROM


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

ON THE GROUND OF TRUE AND FALSE RELIGION, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: Explain religion by a thousand schemes
Last Line: From earth to heav'n, where god is all in all.
Subject(s): Bible; Faith; Religion; Religious Discrimination; Belief; Creed; Theology; Religious Conflict


EXPLAIN religion by a thousand schemes,
Still God and self will be the two extremes;
In Him the one true good of it is found;
In self, of all idolatry the ground:
False worship, paid at all its various shrines,
One same departure from his love defines.

By love to Him blest angels kept their state;
Which the apostate lost by cursed hate;
Setting up self in the ALMIGHTY'S room,
It sunk them down into its dreadful gloom:
On separation from his love, the source
Of all felicity was lost, of course.

By love to Him, the first-created man
Was highly blest; till selfishness began,
Thro' serpentine delusion, to arise,
And tempt above God's wisdom to be wise;
When he had chosen to prefer his own,
The naked, miserable self was known.

Hence we inherit such a life as this,
Dead, of itself, to paradisic bliss:
Hence all our hopes of a diviner birth
Depend on Christ, and his descent on earth;
Subduing self, as Adam should have done,
And loving God thro' his Beloved Son.

The Mediator betwixt God and men,
Who brings their nature back to Him again,
Sav'd from all sinful self, or deadly wrath,
Or hellish evil, by the pow'r of faith
Working by love, of which it is the strength;
And must attain the full true life at length.

Born of this holy, virgin Seed Divine,
To a new life within this mortal shrine,
The faithful breathe a Spirit from above,
And make of self a sacrifice to love:
By Christ redeem'd, they rise from Adam's fall,
From earth to Heav'n, where God is all in all.





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