This flint, time out of mind, has there abode, <br />Where crystal streams make their continual road. <br />Yet it abides a flint as much as 'twere <br />Before it touched the water, or came there <br />Its hard obdurateness is not abated, <br />'Tis not at all by water penetrated. <br />Though water hath a soft'ning virtue in't, <br />This stone it can't dissolve, for 'tis a flint. <br />Yea, though it in the water doth remain, <br />It doth its fiery nature still retain. <br />If you oppose it with its opposite, <br />At you, yea, in your face, its fire 'twill spit. <br /> <br />Comparison. <br /> <br />This flint an emblem is of those that lie, <br />Like stones, under the Word, until they die. <br />Its crystal streams have not their nature changed, <br />They are not, from their lusts, by grace estranged.<br /><br />John Bunyan<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/upon-the-flint-in-the-water/