RALPH ERSKINE.
THE second Adam, Sovereign Lord of all,
Did by His Father’s authorising call,
From bosom of eternal love descend,
To save the guilty race that Him offend;
To treat an everlasting peace with those
Who were, and ever would have been, His foes
His errand, never-ending life to give
To them, whose malice would not let Him live.
To make a match with rebels, and espouse
The brat which at His love her spite avows.
Himself He humbled to depress her pride,
And make His mortal foe His loving bride.
But ere the marriage can be solemnized,
All lets must be removed, all parties pleased.
Law-righteousness required must be procured;
Law-vengeance threatened must be full endured;
Stern justice must have credit by the match;
Sweet mercy by the heart the bride must catch
Poor bankrupt! all her debt must first be paid,
Her former husband in the grave be laid;
Her present lover must be at the cost,
To save and ransom to the uttermost.
If all these things this Suitor kind can do,
Then He may win her, and her blessing, too.
Hard terms indeed! While death’s the first demand,
But love is strong as death, and will not stand,
To carry on the suit and make it good,
Though at the dearest rate of wounds and blood.
The burden’s heavy, but the back is broad,
The glorious Lover is the mighty God.
Kind bowels yearning in the eternal Son,
He left His Father’s court, His heavenly throne.
Aside He threw His most divine array,
And wrapt His Godhead in a veil of clay.
Angelic armies, who in glory crowned,
With joyful harps His awful throne surround,
Down to the crystal frontier of the sky,
To see the Saviour born did eager fly;
And ever since behold, with wonder fresh,
Their Sovereign and our Saviour wrapt in flesh.
Who in this garb did mighty love display,
Restoring what He never took away;—
To God His glory, to the law its due,
To heaven its honour, to earth its hue,
To man a righteousness divine, complete,
A royal robe to suit the nuptial rite—
He in her favours whom He loved so well,
At once did purchase heaven and vanquish hell.
Oh! unexampled love, so vast, so strong,
So great, so high, so deep, so broad, so long!
Can finite thought this ocean huge explore,
Unconscious of a bottom or a shore?
His love admits no parallel; for why?—
At one great draught of love He drank hell dry.
No drops of wrathful gall He left behind,
No dreg to witness that He was unkind.
The sword of awful justice pierced His side,
That mercy thence might gush upon His bride.
The meritorious labours of His life,
And glorious conquests of His dying strife,
Her debt of doing, suffering, both cancelled,
And broke the bars His lawful captive held.
Down to the ground the hellish hosts He threw,
Then mounting high, the trump of triumph blew,
Attended with a bright seraphic band,
Sat down enthroned sublime on God’s right hand;
Where glorious choirs their various harps employ,
To sound His praises with confederate joy.
There He, the bride’s strong intercessor sits,
And thence the blessings of His blood transmits,
Sprinkling all o’er the flaming throne of God,
Pleads for her pardon His own atoning blood;
Sends down His holy co-eternal Dove,
To show the wonders of Incarnate Love.
To woo and win the bride’s reluctant heart,
And pierces it with His kindly killing dart;
By gospel-light to manifest, that now
She has no further with the law to do,
That her new Lord has loosed the federal tie,
That once hard bound her to do or die.
That precepts, threats, no single mite can crave,
Thus for her former spouse He digged a grave.
The law fast to His cross did nail and pin,
Then buried the defunct His tomb within,
That He the lonely widow to Himself might win.
—Gospel Sonnets.