that 't is not only a denyal of God that is above but usually a vesting some mean and contemptible thing with those Attributes which only suit a God Infinite and Eternal As Israel did not only forsake the Almighty by their distrust but place their hopes upon Ashur upon their own Horses and Warlike Preparations and at last upon the works of their hands which they called their Gods How offensive this is to the Lord we may observe by that notable check which the Prophet gave Ahaz Esay 7. 8 13. notwithstanding his complement of refusing a Sign which God offered him for the strengthning of his hope upon a pretence that he would trust without it though indeed he absolutely distrusted him as appears by 2 Chron. 28. 20. that it was a weaning and tyring out the Patience of a long-suffering God Is it a small thing for you to weary Men but will you weary my God also God is so active and jealous of all incroachments of this kind that they may expect he will give up such Offenders to be punished by the terrors of an higher distrust He that is not owned as a God in his Providences will not be owned as a Father for Spiritual Mercies they that will not own him for the Body shall not be able to lay hold upon him or his strength to be at peace with him for their Souls and by this piece of just discipline he often cures the distrust of Providence in his Children who when they see themselves plunged into terrors and fears about their everlasting Welfare do not only call God Just and accept of the punishment of their Iniquity in distrusting him for smaller matters but now wish with all their hearts that they might have no greater thing to trouble them than what relates to the Body or this Life To Sum up all these reasons in one word Satan hath from the forementioned considerations a certain expectation of prevalency For not only in this case doth God as it were fight for him by giving them up to distrust their Filial Interest that have provoked him by a distrust of Providence and our Faith is also so weakned by the former overthrow that 't is not able to maintain its ground in an higher matter but also this distrust carries that in the nature and grounds of it that will of it self work up to a disbelief of spiritual Mercies He knows then that this piece of the Victory is an easy Consequence of the former and we may say of it as the Prophet Nahum chap. 3. 12. of the Strong-holds of Nineveh 't is like a Fig-tree with the first ripe Figs if they be shaken they shall even fall into the mouth of the eater This Temptation of distrusting our Son-ship falls into Satans Mouth with a little Labour when once he hath prevailed so far as to make us distrust the Providence of God in outward matters This must warn and caution us against any unbeseeming unbelieving entertainment of jealousy against the Lords Providence we are but too apt in our straits to take a greater liberty to question his Mercy and Power not foreseeing how closely this borders upon a greater evil we may say of it as the Apostle speaks of babling in Controversies that they lead to more ungodliness and that such words eat as a Canker so doth this distrust usually carry us further and when we fall out with God for small matters he will be angry in earnest and withdraw from us our Consolations in greater In the depth of your distresses when your fears are round about you and God seems to compass you about with his Net when Lover and Friend forsakes and when there is no appearance of help endeavour for the keeping hold of your Interest in God to behave your selves according to the following directions First Look upon the Providences of God to be as a great deep the bottom of whose ways and designs you cannot reach think of them as of a Mystery which indeed you must study but not throw away because you cannot at first understand it Providences are not to be dealt with as Alexander did by Gordius his knot who when he could not loose it he cut it If you see not the end of the Lord or cannot meet with a door of hope in it yet lay your Hand upon your Mouth speak not think not evil of things you know not but wait till the time of their bringing forth Secondly You must keep up in your hearts high and honourable thoughts of God yea of his Mercy and Goodness and where you cannot see your way or God's way before you yet as it were by a kind of implicit Faith must you believe that he is Holy and Good in all his ways Thirdly Though you may read your Sins or God's displeasure in them and accordingly endeavour to humble your selves and call your selves vile yet must it be always remembred that Eternal Love or Hatred is not to be measured by them Fourthly Restrain complainings 'T is indeed an ease to complain I will speak saith Job that I may be refreshed notwithstanding a vent being given 't is difficult to keep within bounds Our complainings entice us to distrust as may appear in Job who took a boldness this way more than was fit as Chap. 10. 3. Is it good unto thee that thou shouldest oppress and that thou shouldest despise the work of thine hands All this hath been said in the opening of the Temptation it self now must I consider the motive that Satan used to bring on the Temptation by If thou be the Son of God c. The Question that is here moved by some is whether Satan really knew or truly doubted Christ to be the Son of God Several Learned Men think that he was in doubt and the reasons are variously conjectured Cyprian conceives that the unity of the two Natures in one Person did blind him he knew it to be impossible that the Divine Nature should hunger and might think it strange that the Humane Nature should fast so long Cornelius a Lapide thinks that Satan knew that there should be two Natures united in one Person and that this occasioned Satans Fall while he proudly stomacked the exaltation of the Humane Nature but he imagins Satan's doubt arose from a doubtful Sence of that phrase This is my beloved Son as not knowing whether Christ were the Natural or an Adopted Son of God But notwithstanding these apprehensions others conceive that Satan knew very well who Christ was and that being privy to so many things relating to him as the Promises which went before and directly pointed out the time the Angels Salutation of Mary at his Conception the Star that conducted the Wise Men to him the Testimony from Heaven concerning him with a great many things more he could not possibly be ignorant that he was the Messias and the Son of God by Nature Neither doth that expression If thou be the Son of God
occasions though compared with that measure of Grace which usually is acted by the Children of God upon ordinary occasions it is a special assistance of the Spirit Of this nature is that Boldness which the Servants of Christ receive to confess Christ before Men in times of Persecution and to Die for the Truth with Constancy Courage and Joy 3. There are also singular Eminencies of Grace which some diligent careful and choice Servants of God attain unto far above what the ordinary sort arrive at Enoch had his Conversation so much in Heaven that he was said to walk with God David's Soul was often full of delight in God Some in the height of Assurance rejoyce in God with joy unspeakable and full of Glory Moses was eminent in Meekness Job in Patience the Apostle Paul in Zeal for promoting the Gospel c. Now Satan when he comes to question the Graces of Men he presents them with these Measures and if they fall short as ordinarily they do he concludes them altogether Graceless 2. Satan also can do much to heighten the ordinary work and usual fruits of every Grace His Art herein lies in two things 1. He gives us a description of Grace as it is in it self abstracted from the Weakness Dulness Distraction and Infirmities that are Concomitant with it as it comes forth to Practice He brings to our view Grace in its Glory and without the Spots by which our Weakness and Satan's Temptation do much disfigure it 2. He presents us with Grace in its whole Body compleated with all its Members Faith Love Hope Patience Meekness Gentleness c. From both these he sets before those whom he intends to discourage a compleat Copy of an exact holy Christian As if every true Christian were to be found in the constant Practice of all these Graces at all times on all occasions and that without weakness or Infirmity Whereas indeed a true Christian may be found sometimes evidently practising one Grace and weak or at present defective in another And sometimes the best of his Graces is so interrupted with Temptation so clogged with Infirmity that its workings are scarce discernable 3. He hath a Policy in heightning those Attainments and workings of Soul in things relating to God and Religion which are to be found in Temporary Believers which because they sometimes appear in the Unconverted as well as in the Converted though all Unconverted Men have them not are therefore called Common Graces This he doth that he may from thence take occasion to disprove the Real Graces of the Servants of God of whom better things and things that accompany Salvation that is special saving Graces are to be expected Heb. 6. 9. His way herein is 1. To shew the utmost bravery of these Common Graces how much Men may have how far they may go and yet at last come to nothing For Gifts they may have powerful Eloquence Prophecy understanding of Mysteries faith of Miracles For good Works they may give their Estates to relieve the Poor In Moral Vertues they may be Excellent their Illumination may be great they may taste the good Word of God and the Powers of the World to come Heb. 6. 4. Their Conversation may be without offence and their Conscience Honest as Paul's was before his Conversion 2. With these heights of common Grace he compares the lowest degree of Special Grace And because the Principles Motives and Ends which constitute the difference betwixt these two are as it were under-ground more remote from Sense and Observation and oftentimes darkned by Temptation He takes the boldness to deny the Truth of Grace upon the account of the small inconsiderable appearance that it makes confidently affirming that Special Grace must of necessity make a far greater outward shew than these Common Graces In what manner and to what end Satan doth heighten Grace in the abstract we have seen It remains that we discover 2. How he doth lessen Grace in the Concrete this is the center of his Design He would not extol Grace so much but that he hopes thereby to condemn the Generation of the Just and to make it appear that there are few or none that are truly Gracious When he comes to apply all this to the condition of any Child of God he deals treacherously and his cunning consists of three Parts 1. He compares the present state of any one with whom he deals to the highest attainments and excellencies of Grace allowing nothing to be Grace but what will answer these Descriptions he had already given Here the Tempter doth apparently make use of a false Ballance and a Bag of deceitful Weights For thus he puts them to it Thou sayest thou hast Grace but thou dost altogether deceive thy self for indeed thou hast none at all Compare thy self with others that were in Scripture noted as undoubtedly Gracious and thou wilt see that in the Ballance thou art lighter than Vanity Abraham had Faith but he believed above hope Moses and Paul had love but they manifested it by preferring their Brethrens happiness before their own David was a Saint but he had a Heart ravished with God The Martyrs spoken of in Heb. 11. they could do Wonders they were above fears of Men above the love of the World they loved not their Lives to the Death How joyfully took they the spoyling of their Goods How couragiously did they suffer the sharpest Torments Besides saith he all the Children of God are described is Sanctified throughout abounding with all fruits of Righteousness their Faith is Working their Love still Laborious their Hope produceth constant Patience What art thou to these That in thee which thou callest Faith or Love or Patience c. 't is not fit to be named with these Thy fears may tell thee that thou hast no Faith and so may thy Works thy murmurings under God's Hand is evidence sufficient that thou hast no Patience The little that thou dost for God or especially wouldst do if it were not for thy own advantage may convince thee that thou hast no love to him thy weariness of Services and Duties thy confessed unprofitableness under all do proclaim thou hast no delight in God nor in his Ways He further adds for the confirmation of all this Consider how far Temporaries may go that shall never go to Heaven Thou art far short of them thy Gifts thy Works thy Vertues thy Illumination thy Conversation thy Conscientiousness are nothing like theirs How is it possible then that such as one as thou a pittiful contemptible Creature shouldst have any thing of true Grace in thee Thus he makes the Application of all the Discovery of Grace which he presented to them Though he needs not urge all these things to every one any one of these particulars frequently serves the turn When a trembling Heart compares it self with these Instances it turns its Back yields the Argument and is ashamed of its former Hopes as those are of their former Confidence
who flee from Battel Hence then do we hear of these various Complaints One saith Alas I have no Grace because I live not as other Saints have done in all exactness Another saith I have no Faith because I cannot believe above Reason and contrary to Sense as Abraham did A third crys out He hath no Love to God because he cannot find his Soul ravished with desire after him Another thinks He hath a hard Heart because he cannot weep for Sin Another concludes against himself because He finds not a present chearful resolve while he is not under any question for Religion to suffer Torments for Christ Some fear themselves Because Temporaries in some particulars have much out-gone them You see how Complaints may upon this score be multiplied without end and yet all this is but Fallacy Satan tells them what Grace is at the highest but not a word of what it is at lowest And so unskilful is a tossed weak Christian that he in examining his Condition looks after the highest Degrees of Grace as affording clearer Evidence and not after the Sincerity of it which is the safest way for Trial where Graces are weak In a word this kind of Arguing is no better than that of Children who cannot conclude themselves to be Men because their present stature is little and they are not as tall as the Adult 2. Another part of his cunning in lessening the real Graces of God's Children is to take them at an advantage when their Graces are weakest and themselves most out of order He that will chuse to measure a Man's Stature while he is upon his Knees seems not to design to give a faithful account of his Height No more doth Satan who when he will make Comparisons always takes the Servants of God at the worst And indeed many advantages do the Children of God give him insomuch that it is no wonder that he doth so oft Baffle them but rather a wonder that they at any time return to their Comforts 1. Sometimes he takes them to task while they are yet young and tender when they are but newly converted before their Graces are grown up or have had time to put forth any considerable Fruit. 2. Or when their Graces are tired out by long or grievous assaults of Temptation for then they are not what they are at other times 3. When their Hearts are discomposed or muddied with fear for then their sight is bad and they can so little judg of things that differ that Satan can impose almost any thing upon them 4. Sometimes he comes upon them when some Grace acts his part but poorly as not having its perfect work and is scarce able to get through sticking as it were in the Birth 5. Or when the progress of Grace is small and imperceptible 6. Or while in the absence of the Sun which produceth Flowers and Fragrancy and is the time of the singing of Birds Cant. 2. 11 12. it is forced to cast off its Summer Fruits of Joy and sensible Delights and only produceth Winter Fruits of Lamenting after God Longing and Panting after him justifying of God in his Dealings and Condemning it self all this while sowing in Tears for a more pleasing Crop 7. Or while Expectations are more than Enjoyments the Man it may be promised himself large incomes of greater measures of Comforts Ease or Strength under some particular Ordinances or Helps which he hath lately attained to and not finding things presently to answer what he hoped for is now suspitious of his case and thinks he hath attained nothing because he hath not what he would 8. Sometimes Satan shews them his Face in this Glass when 't is foulest through the spots of some Miscarriage 9. Or he takes advantage of some Natural Defects as want of Tears which might be more usual in former times but are now dried up or from the Ebbings and uncertainty of his Aâ—â—ections which are never sure rules of Trials 10. Or in such acts that are of a mixed nature in the Principles and Motives where it may seem to be uncertain to which the Act must be ascribed as to the true Parent The Heart of a gracious Person being challenged upon any of these Points and under so great a Disadvantage being called out to give a proof of himself especially in the view of Grace set forth in all its Excellency and Glory shall have little to plead but will rather own the Accusation And the rather because 3. It is another part of Satan's cunning to urge them whilst they are thus at a stand with a Possibility nay a Probability of their mistaking themselves by passing too favourable an opinion formerly of their Actions To confirm them in this apprehension 1. He lays before them the consideration of the deceitfulness of the Heart which being so above all things and desperately wicked beyond ordinary discovery makes a fair way for the entertainment of a suspition of Self-delusion in all the former hopes which a Man hath had of himself Satan will plainly speak it Thou hast had some thoughts and workings of Mind towards God but seeing they carry so great a disproportion to Rule and Example and come so far short of Common Graces 't is more than probable that such poor weak confused appearances are nothing How knowest thou that thine adherence to and practice of the Command and Services of God are any more than from the power of Education the prevalency of Custom or the impressions of Moral swasion How dost thou know that thy desires after God and thy delight in him are any more than the products of Natural Principles influenced by an Historical faith of Scripture Doctrine 'T is oftentimes enough for Satan to hint this A suspitious Heart as it were greedy of its own misery catcheth at all things that make against it and hence complains That it hath no Grace because it sees not any visible Fruits or makes not a sufficient appearance at all times when opposed or resisted or because it wants sensible progress or gives not the Summer Fruits of Praises Rejoycings and Delights in God or because it seems not to meet with remarkable improvements in Ordinances or because it cannot produce Tears and raise the Affections and because the Party doth not know but his Heart might decieve him in all that he hath done Which the Devil yet further endeavoureth to confirm 2. By a consideration of the seeming Holiness and Graces of such as believed themselves to be the Children of God and were generally by others reputed so to be who yet after a glorious profession turned Apostates This being so great and undeniable an Instance of the Hearts deceitfulness makes the poor tempted Party conclude that he is certainly no true Convert Thus have we seen Satan's Sophistry in the management of those five grand Topicks from whence he draws his false Conclusions against the Children of God pretending to prove that they are not Converted or at least if they
desireable a thing as many dream did but Men consider how great a snare it is and what dangers attend the fullness of it they would not so earnestly covet it nor so passionately lament when it flys from them If thou hast so much Godliness as can quiet thy Heart in a contented enjoyment of thy little that little which thou hast is better than great riches of the wicked thou little knowest from what Pride Insolency Contempt of God and Men and many other Temptations and Lusts God doth preserve thee by denying thee Earthly things thou art now it may be often looking up to God striving to believe his Word often examining thy Heart labouring to live upon God and his Allsufficiency looking after the Bread that endures to Eternal Life when if thou hadst the Temptations of Plenty it may be feared thou wouldst be another Man and be carried away to forget God to be careless of Holy walking and so make way for Bitterness and Sorrow at last Secondly I would also caution Poor Men not to enlarge their desires too much after the World but to fear the Temptations of the World it is not only a snare to those that enjoy it but to those that want it for while they admire it and engage their Affections for it it ensnares them in sinful undertakings they are tempted to Lye Cheat Dissemble to use unlawful Shifts to Rob Steal over-reach in Bargaining and to neglect the care of the Soul in all Let such call to mind 1. that often the Providence of God doth of purpose thwart and cross the designs of such so that though they toyland sweat running from Market to Market rising early and sitting up late yet he blowes upon their gettings and they wither to nothing while it is yet in their hand or if they seem to keep them longer yet all the end they make with them is but to put them into a bag with holes they perish by evil travel Eccles 5. 14. 2. They often are at a great deal of labour in pursuit and then when the desired object is within their reach they are overwhelmed with their disappointment as if Providence designed to mock them for their Folly This is excellently set forth in the Emblem of a Man climbing up a Rock with great labour to reach a Crown that hung upon the Precipice who when he had stretched himself to grasp it falls down and breaks his Neck 3. And when they do by great toyl rake together an heap of Riches they are starved frequently in their Plenty and so cursed that they have no more than the beholding of their Goods with their Eyes in that God denies them a Heart to use them 4. Their gettings allay not their Thirst for more He that loveth Silver shall not be satisfyed with Silver Eccles 5. 10. 5. Often they are given as a scourge and Plague as the Quales given to the Israelites came out of their Nostrils The wise Man notes it Eccles 5. 13. Riches are kept for the Owners thereof to their hurt Secondly To those that have the delights of the World plentiful Estates full Tables beautiful Houses rich Tradings Honours and Dignities I would desire to give the greatest caution that they take heed to themselves because they walk in the midst of Snares These should consider 1. that the great God hath laid most serious charges upon them not to love the World but to withdraw their Affections from it nay to be Crucified to it as to any captivating delight and to use it with such an Indifferency of mind that they should be in their deportments towards it as if they used it not 2. They should have their danger in their Eye How careful is he of his steps that knows he walks in the midst of Serpents which are ready to sting him the thoughts of this should blunt the edg of our Delights If you were at a Feast where you knew there were poysoned Dishes you would be affraid to eat any thing Do you think that Captain Smith when he was taken by the Salvages of America and had plenty of Meat set before him which he knew was given to fatten him that he might be better Meat when he was killed had any Stomack to Eat or to Drink Was that Feast pleasing to him that fat under a sharp Sword hung over his Head in a Horse Hair when he expected every moment it should fall upon him and kill him Such are great Men rich Men with what fear and care should they use these things when they know there is hazard of mischief from them upon every occasion How much doth Christ speak in that one Sentence it is easier for a Camel to go through the Eye of a Needle than for a rich Man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven He means not that 't is absolutely impossible but extreamly difficult and the difficulty lies in the hinderances which their Riches casts before them 3. They should carefully consider for what ends God gives these and to what use they are to be put Rich Men are but God's Pursers they do but carry the Bag and what is put therein for publick uses if accordingly as faithful Stewards they lay it out upon those that have need they shall make Friends of the unrighteous Mammon and it will turn to a Spiritual Account but if they think that all is for themselves and so shut their Bowels and Purses from others then they carry the Bag no otherwise than as Judas did and will be easily perswaded to sell Christ and Heaven for a little more of Earth CHAP. XXII Of Christ's Answer in the general That these Temptations were upon design for our Instruction Of the Agreement betwixt Ephes 6. and Matth. 4. The first Direction Of couragious Resolves in resisting Temptations It s consistency with some kind of fear The necessity of this Courage Wherein it consists and that there is a courage in mourning Spirits THese Answers of Christ to the several Temptations which are now to be explained are different as to their matter yet the general Purport of them being the same I shall therefore handle them together They may be considered two ways First As they are fit and pertinent answers to particular Temptations of Distrust of Presumption of Debauching the Heart by Worldly Delights to the Service of Satan and thus may they be useful in their consideration to those who are directly moved by Satan to such Sins And when at any time we are tempted in straits to cast away our reliance upon the careful Providence of God we may look upon Christ's Answer that Man's Life doth not so depend upon the usual means but that any other thing blessed by Divine Appointment may be useful to that end When we are enticed to presume of extraordinary supports then by Christ's Example the Temptation may be resisted by considering that however God be to be trusted yet he is at no time to be tempted by unnecessary expectations
Imprimatur Hic Liber cui Titulus Daemonologia Sacra Or A Treatise of Satans Temptations in Three Parts Guil. Sill. Martii 26. 1677. DAEMONOLOGIA SACRA OR A TREATISE OF Satans Temptations In Three Parts By RICHARD GILPIN 2 Cor. 2. 11. We are not ignorant of his Devices LONDON Printed by J. D. for Richard Randel and Peter Maplisden Booksellers in New Castle upon Tine 1677. To the Reader THe accurate searches into the Secrets of Nature which this Age hath produced though they are in themselves sufficient evidences of a commendable Industry yet seeing they fall so exceedingly short of that discovery which Men aim at giving us at best but probable conjectures and uncertain guesses they are become as little satisfactory to Men that look after the true causes of things as those Ships of desire whose great undertaking for Gold had raised high expectations in their attempts but in the return brought nothing home for their Ventures but Apes and Peacocks While Men reflect upon themselves under such Disappointments they cannot but check themselves for over-promising themselves in their Adventures with that of Zophar Vain Man would be wise But how happy would it be for Men if such failures of expectation might better inform them If our Attainments in these pursuits will not bear our Charges nor recompence our pains and loss of time with an answerable profit though we may see cause sometimes as a Divertisement or Recreation to use them yet how shall we satisfie our selves to make them our chief and sole business If we knew of nothing of higher concern to us than these our neglect of greater Matters were more excusable but seeing we are sufficiently instructed that we have more weighty things to look after such as relate to a certain future estate of happiness or misery the very discovery of this to a Rational Being must needs intitle such things to the first and greatest part of his care He that knows that there is one thing necessary and yet suffers himself to be diverted from the pursuit of that by troubling himself about many things is more justly chargable with folly than he that neglects his Estate and finds himself no other Imployment but to pursue Feathers in the Wind. Among those things that Religion offers to our study God and our own hearts are the chief God is the First and Last and whole of our Happiness the Beginning Progress and Compleatment of it is from him and in him for in that Centre do all the Lines meet but our Heart is the Stage upon which this Felicity as to the application of it is transacted upon this little spot of Earth doth God and Satan draw up their several Armies here doth each of them shew their Power and Wisdom this is treated by both each of them challenge an interest in it 't is attaqued on the one side and defended on the other So that here are Skirmishes Battels and Stratagems managed that Man then that will not concern himself in his Enquiries how the Matter goes in his own Heart what Ground is got or lost what Forts are taken or defended what Mines are sprung what Ambuscado's laid or how the Battel proceeds must needs lie under a just imputation of the greatest folly neither can he be excused in his neglect by the most pressing sollicitations of other things that seem to require his attendance upon the highest imaginable pretences of necessity For what is he profited that gains the whole World if he loses his Soul But the exact and faithful management of such spiritual Enquiries with their necessary improvement to diligent watchfulness and careful endeavours of resistance is another manner of work than most Men dream of To discover the intrigues of Satans policy to espie his haunts and lurking places in our hearts to note his subtile contrivances in taking advantages against us and to observe how the Pulse of the Soul beats under his provocations and deceitful allurements how far we comply or dissent requires so much attendance and laborious skilfulness that it cannot be expected that such Men who design no more than to be Christians at the easiest rate and content themselves with a formal superficiality of Religion or such who having given up themselves to the deceitful sweets of worldly carnal delights are not at leisure to engage themselves in so serious a Work or such whose secret guilt of rebellious Combination with the Devil against God makes them fearful to consider fully the hazards of that wickedness which they had rather practise with forgetfulness lest the review of their ways and sight of their danger should awaken their Consciences to give them an unwelcome disquiet it cannot I say be expected that any of these sorts of Men whilst they are thus set should give themselves the trouble of so much pains and toil as this Business doth require Upon this consideration I might rationally fix my Prognostick of the entertainment of the following Treatise What acceptance soever it may find with such as are cordially concerned for their Souls and the Realities of Religion and of such I may say as the Apostle Paul concerning Brotherly Love 1 Thess 4. 9. as touching this Matter They need not that I write unto them for they themselves are taught of God to be suspicious of Satans devices and by experience they find his deceits so secret and withal so dangerous that any help for further discovery and caution must needs be welcome to them yet to be sure the Prince of Darkness who is always jealous of the least attempts that may be made against his Empire will arm his forementioned Subjects against it and whomsoever else he can prevail upon by the power of prejudice to reject it as urging us to a study more severe or harsh than is consistent either with the lower degrees of knowledge of many or with that ease which most Men desire to indulge to themselves or as offering such things which they to save themselves from further trouble will be willing to call Chimaera's or idle Speculations and this last I may rather expect because in this latter Age Satan hath advanced so far in his general design against all Christianity and for the introduction of Paganism and Atheism that now none can express a serious conscientious care for holiness and the avoidance of sin but upon pain of the imputation of silliness or whining preciseness and none can speak or write of Conversion Faith or Grace but he shall be hazarded by the scoffs of those that are unwilling to judge the private workings of the heart to Godward or spiritual exercises of Grace to be any better than conceited Whims and unintelligible Nonsense but seeing such Men make bold to jeer not only that Language and those forms of Speech which the Holy Ghost thought fit to make use of in the Scriptures but also the very things of Faith Grace and Spirit which are every where in the Sacred Oracles recommended to us
but straight takes another course such is his Diligence that we may say of him as it was said of Paul upon a better ground he will become all things to all Men that he may gain some Fifthly Diligence will most shew it self when things are at the greatest hazard or when the hopes of success are ready to bring forth In this point of diligence our Adversary is not wanting if Men are upon the point of Errour or Sin how industriously doth he labour to bring them wholly over and to settle them in Evil one would think at such times he laid aside all other business and only attended this How frequent incessant and earnest are his Perswasions and Arguings with such the like diligence he sheweth in obstructing disturbing and discouraging us when we are upon our greatest Services or near our greatest Mercies what part of the day are we more wandring and vain in our thoughts if we take not great care than when we set about Prayer at other times we find some more ease and freedom in our Imaginations as if we could better rule or command them but then as if our thoughts were only confusion and disorder we are not able to master them and to keep the door of the heart so close but that these troublesome unwelcome guests will be crouding in is impossible Let us observe it seriously and we shall find that our thoughts are not the same and after the same manner impetuous at other times as they are when we set about holy things which ariseth not only from the quickness of our Spiritual Sense in our readier observation of them at that time but also from the Devils busie Molestation and special diligence against us on such occasions Besides when he foresees our Advantages or Mercies he bestirs himself to prevent or hinder us of them if Ministers set themselves to study and preach Truths that are more piercing weighty or necessary they may observe more molestations interruptions or discouragements of all sorts than when they less concern themselves with the business of the souls of Men. He foresees what Sermons are provided and often doth he upon such foresight endeavour to turn off those from hearing that have most need and are most likely to receive benefit by them Many have noted it that those Sermons and Occasions that have done them most good when they came to them they have been some way or other most disswaded from and resolved against before they came and then when they have broken through their strongest hindrances they have found that all their obstruction was Satans diligent foresight to hinder them of such a Blessing as they have beyond hope met withal The like might be observed of the constant returns of the Lords day if Men watch not against it they may meet with more than ordinary either Avocations to prevent and hinder them or Disturbances to annoy and trouble or bodily Indispositions to incapacitate and unfit them And 't is not to be contemned that some have observed themselves more apt to be Drousie Dull or Sleepy on that day Others have noted greater bodily Indispositions then ordinarily than at other times all which make no unlikely conjecture of the Devils special diligence against us on such occasions Let 's cast in another instance to these and that is Of those that are upon the point of Conversion ready to forsake Sin for Christ Oh! what pains then doth the Devil take to keep them back He visits them every Moment with one hindrance or other sometimes they are tempted to former Pleasures sometime affrighted with present Fears and future Disappointments sometimes discouraged with Reproaches Scorns and Afflictions that may attend their alteration otherwile obstructed by the perswasion or threatning of Friends and old Acquaintances but this they are sure of that they have never more Temptations and those more sensibly troubling than at that time a clear evidence that Satan is as Diligent as Malicious I should now go on to display the Subtilty of this Powerful Malicious Cruel and diligent Adversary There is but one thing in the way which hitherto I have taken for granted and that is Whether indeed there be any such things as Devils and wicked Spirits or that these are but Theological Engines contrived by Persons that carry a good will to Morality and the publick Peace to keep Men under an awful fear of such Miscarriages as may render them otherwise a Shame to themselves and a Trouble to others It must be acknowledged a transgression of the rules of Method to offer a proof of that now which if at all ought to have been proved in the beginning of the Discourse And indeed the question at this length whether there be a Devil hath such affinity with that other though for the matter they are as different as Heaven and Hell whether there be a God that as it well deserves a confirmation for the use that may be made of it to evidence that there is a God because we feel there is a Devil so would it require a serious endeavour to perform it substantially But it would be not only a needless labour to levy an Army against professed Atheists who with high scorn and derision roundly deny both God and Devils seeing others have frequently done that but also it would occasion too large a digression from our present design I shall therefore only speak a few things to those that own a God and yet deny such a Devil as we have described and yet not to all of these neither for there were many Heathens who were confident Assertors of a Deity that nevertheless denied the Being of Spirits as severed from Corporeity and others were so far from the acknowledgment of Devils that they confounded them in the number of their Gods others there were who gave such credit to the frequent relations of Apparitions and disturbances of that kind that many had attested and complained of that they expressed more Ingenuity than Lucian who pertinaciously refused to believe because he never saw them and yet though they believed something of reality in that that was the affrightment and trouble of others they nevertheless ascribed such extraordinary things to Natural Causes Some to the powers of the Heavens and Stars in their Influences upon Natural Bodies or by the mediation of certain Herbs Stones Minerals Creatures Voices and Characters under a special observation of the motion of the Planets Some refer such things to the subtilty and quickness of the Senses of hearing and seeing which might create Forms and Images of things or discover I know not what Reflections from the Sun and Moon Some fancy the Shapes and Visions to be exuviae thin Scales or Skins of Natural things giving representations of the Bodies that cast them off or Exhalations from Sepulchres representing the shape of the Body Others make them the Effects of our untrusty and deceitful Senses the debility and corruption
some perfect some less perfect some little Children some young men some Fathers The end of all this is to make them apprehend themselves Christians of an higher rank and order which also makes way consequently for a further inference viz. That there must needs be immunities and priviledges suitable to these heights and attainments To this purpose 3 he produceth those Scriptures that are design'd by God to raise up the minds of Men to look after the internal Work and Power of his Ordinances and not to center their minds and hopes in the bare formal use of them without applying their thoughts to God and Christ unto whom they are appointed to lead us Such as these Scriptures Rom. 2. 28. He is not a Jew which is one outwardly neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh but he is a Jew which is one inwardly and circumcision is that of the heart in the spirit and not in the letter And Rom. 6. 7. we should serve in newness of spirit and not in the oldness of the letter 2 Cor. 5. 16. Wherefore henceforth know we no man after the flesh yea though we have known Christ after the flesh yet now henceforth know we him no more Ephes 4. 13. He gave some Apostles and some Prophets c. for the perfecting of the Saints till we all come in the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God unto a perfect man By a perverse Interpretation of these and some other Scriptures of like import he would perswade them That the great thing that Christ designed by his Ordinances was but to train up the weaker Christians by these rudiments as the A B C to Children to a more spiritual and immediate way of living upon God and that these become altogether useless when Christians have gotten up to any of these imaginary degrees of a supposed Perfection Enough of this may be seen in the writings of Saltmarsh Winstanly and others in the late times How great a Trade Satan drove by such misapprehensions not long since cannot easily be forgotten so that God's Worship did almost lye wast and in many places the way to Sion did mourn Secondly He will sometimes confess an equality of priviledge among the Children of God and yet plead an inequality of duty that God is as good and strong to us and that we have all an equal advantage by Christ he will readily acknowledge But then when we should propound the diligence of the Saints in their Services for our pattern as of Davids praying seven times a day Daniels three times Anna's serving God with fastings and prayers night and day c. He tells us these were extraordinary Services and as it were works of supererrogation more than the Command of God laid upon them So that we are not tyed to such strictness and we being naturally apt to indulge our selves in our own ease are too ready to comply with such Delusions And by degrees Men are thus brought to a confident belief that they may be good enough and do as much as is required though they slacken their pace and do not Fast Pray or Hear so often as others have done Thirdly Another Sophism of his is to heighten one Duty to the ruine of another He strives to make an intestine War among the several parts of the Services we owe to God and from the excellency of one to raise up an enmity and undervaluing disregard of another Thus would he sever as inconsistent those things that God hath joyned together As among false Teachers some say Lo here is Christ and others Lo he is there So we find Satan dealing with Duties he puts some upon such high respects to Preaching that say they Christ is to be found here most frequently rather than in Prayer or other Ordinances others are made to have the like esteem for Prayer and they affirm in this is Christ especially to be met withal Others say the like of Sacraments or Meditation In all these Satan labours to beget a dislike and neglect of other Services Thus in what relates to the Constitution of Churches he endeavours to set up purity of Churches to the Destruction of Vnity or Vnity to the ruine of Purity A notable Example hereof we have in the Euchytae a Sect of praying Hereticks which arose in the time of Valentinian and Valens who upon the pretence of the Commands of Christ and Paul for Praying continually or without ceasing and fainting owned no other Duty as necessary vilifying Preaching and Sacraments as things at best useless and unprofitable The like attempts he makes daily upon Men where though he prevail not so far as to bring some necessary Duties of Service into open contempt yet he carries them into too much secret neglect and disregard Fourthly He improves the grace of the Gospel to infer an unnecessariness of Duty and this he doth not only from the advantage of a prophane and careless Spirit in such as presumptuously expect Heaven though they mind not the way that leads to it for with such it is usual as one observes for Satan to sever the means from the end in things that are good to make them believe they shall have Peace though they walk in the Imaginations of their Heart to make them lean upon the Lord for Heaven in the apparent neglect of Holiness and Duty As in evil things he severs the end from the means making them confident they shall escape Hell and Condemnation though they walk in the path that leads thither But besides this he abuseth the understandings and affections of Men by strange and uncouth inferences as that God hath received a satisfaction and Christ hath done all so that nothing is left for us to do The Apostle Paul was so much aware of this kind of arguing that when he was to magnifie the Grace of God he always took care to fence against such perverse reasonings severely rebuking and refelling such objections as in Rom. 3. 7 8. Where speaking that our unrighteousness did commend the righteousness of God he falls upon that reply Why then am I judged as a sinner Which he sharply refells as an inference of slanderous imputation to the Gospel which hath nothing in it to give the least countenance to that Conclusion Let us do evil that good may come And adds That Damnation shall justly overtake such as practise accordingly The like we have Rom. 6. 1. Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound which he rejected with the greatest abhorrency God forbid From both which places we may plainly gather that as unsound as such arguings are yet Men through Satans subtilty are too prone upon such pretences to dispute themselves to a careless neglect of Duty This might be enlarged in many other instances as that of Maximus Tyrius who disputed all Duties unnecessary upon this ground That what God will give cannot be hindred and what he
produce he professeth he was affraid lest he had bestowed upon them labour in vain Gal. 4. 11. And that he did no less than travel of them in birth the second time vers 19. If one Alexander could do Paul so much Evil by withstanding his Words that he complains of him and cautions Timothy against him If one Diotrephes by prating against John with malicious Words prevailed with the Church that they received not him nor the Brethren What hurt might a Multitude of such be able to do In the Primitive times of the Church after the Apostles days when those Worthies were to contest with the Heathen World the Serpent cast out of his mouth water as a flood after the Woman which most interpret to be a Deluge of Heresies And some particularly understand it of the Arrian Heresie that he might hinder the progress of the Gospel Which design of his did so take that many complaints there were of hindring the Conversion of the Heathens by the Errours that were among Christians Epiphanius tells us That Pagans refused to come near the Christians and would not so much as hear them speak being affrighted by the wicked practices and wayes of the Priscilianists Austin complains to the same purpose That loose and lascivious Hereticks administred matter of Blaspheming to the idolatrous Heathens In after-times when Religion grew so corrupt by Popery that God extraordinarily raised up Luther Calvin and others in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries to discover those Abominations and to bring back his People from Babylon The Devil gave them no small trouble by a growth of Errours so that they were forced to Fight against the Papists before and those Philistines behind insomuch that Reformation attained not that height and universality which might rationally have been expected from such blessed undertakings This was the conjecture of many particularly of our Country-man Dr. Prideaux That if these Fanatick Enthusiasts which with so great a scandal to the Gospel then brake forth had not retarded and hindred those glorious proceedings that Apocalyptical Beast of Rome had been not only weakned and wounded but utterly overthrown and slain In particular Cities where any of the faithful Servants of Christ endeavoured to detect the Errours of Popery these instruments of Satan were ready to joyn with the common Adversary in reproaches and disturbances How they opposed Musculus at Augusta and with what fierceness they called him Viper false Prophet Woolf in sheeps cloathing c. you may see in those that write his Life How these Men hindred the Gospel at Limburg against Junius At Zurich against Zuinglius At Ausburg against Vrbanus Regius you may also see in their Lives In all which and others of like nature you will still find 1 That there was never a Reformation begun but there were erroneous Persons to hinder and distract the Reformers 2 That these Men expressed as great hatred against the Reformers and oftentimes more than against the Papists and were as spitefully bitter in Lies Slanders and Scorns against them as the Papists themselves Sixthly Satan can also make use of Errour either to fix Men in their present mistaken wayes and careless course or as a temptation to Atheism Varieties or Opinions and Doctrines do amuse and amaze Men while one cryes Lo here is Christ And another Lo he is there Men are so confounded that they do not know what to chuse 'T is one of the greatest difficulties to single out Truth from a croud of specious confident pretences especially seeing Truth is modest and oftentimes out-noised by clamorous bold Errour yea sometimes out vyed by the pretensions of Spirit and Revelation in an Antiscriptural falshood At what a loss is an unskilful Travellour where so many wayes meet while one party cries up this another that mutually charging one another with Errour They whose hearts are any thing loosened from a sence and reverence of Religion are easily tempted to disbelieve all Thus Errour leads to Atheisme and layes the Foundation for all those slanderous exceptions against Scripture by which Godless Men usually justifie themselves in their Religion Now though all wicked Men are not brought to this because the Consciences of some do so strongly retain the sentiments of a Deity that all Satans Art can not obliterate those Characters yet the consideration of the multitude of Errours doth rivet them in the perswasion of the Truth and goodness of that way of Religion wherein they had been Educated Papists are hardned by this and though they have no reason to boast of their unity among themselves as they have been often told and now of late by Dr. Stillingfleet who hath manifested that their Divisions among themselves are as great and managed with as great Animosity as any amongst us yet are their Ears so beaten with the Objection of Sects and Schisms elsewhere that they are generally confirmed to stay where they are Besides this is a stumbling-block which the Devil throws in the way of poor Ignorant People if they are urged to a serious strictness in Religion they are affrighted from it by the consideration of Sects and parties and the woful miscarriages of some erronious Persons that at first pretended to strictness imagining that strictness in Religion is an unnecessary dangerous thing and that the sober godly Christians are but a company of giddy unsetled conceited precise Persons who will in a little time run themselves into madness and distraction or into despair And thus out of fear of Schism or Errour they dare not be Religious in good earnest but content themselves with drawing near to God with their mouthes and confessing him with their lips whilst their hearts are far from him and in their works they deny him There is such a propensity in the hearts of Men to be staggered by the multitude and boldness of Errours that the Apostle Paul expresseth a sence of it and seems tenderly careful to avoid that blow which he knew Satan would readily give through that consideration by the apology that he makes for God in his holy wise providential Permission of them 1 Cor. 11. 19. There must be Heresies among you His intent is not barely to put them off with this That Heresies are unavoidable but to satisfie them that there is a necessity of them and that they are useful as God's Furnace and Fan to purifie and to cleanse that they which are approved may be made manifest The like care he hath in 2 Tim. 2. 19 20. upon the mention of the Errour of Hymeneus and Philetus where he obviateth the offence that might arise by reason of their Apostacy partly by removing the fears of the Upright in affirming their safety whatever became of other Men seeing the Foundation of God standeth sure and partly by declaring it no more suitable or dishonourable for God to permit the rise of Errours in his Church than for great Men to have in their houses not only Vessels of Gold and
Errour it only now remains that something be spoken of his attempts against the Peace and Comfort of the Children of God That 't is also one of Satans chief designs to cheat us of our Spiritual Peace may be fully evinced by a consideration of his Malice the great concern of inward Comfort to us and the many Advantages which he hath against us by the disquiet of our Minds First whosoever shall seriously consider the Devil 's implacable Malice will easily believe that he so envies our Happiness that he will industriously rise up against all our Comforts 'T is his inward fret and indignation that Man hath any interest in that Happiness from which he irrecoverably fell and that the Spirit of God should produce in the hearts of his People any spiritual joy or satisfaction in the belief and expectation of that Felicity and therefore must it be expected that his Malice heightned by the torment of his own guilt which as some think are those Chains of darkness in which he is reserved at present to the judgment of the great day will not cannot leave this part of our Happiness unattempted He endeavours to supplant us of our Birth-right of our Blessing of our Salvation and the comfortable hopes thereof From his common imployment in this matter the Scripture hath given him names importing an opposition to Christ and his Spirit in the ways they take for our Comfort and Satisfaction Christ is our Advocate that pleads for us Satan is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Calumniator The Spirit interceds for us Satan is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Accuser of the Brethren who accuseth them before God night and day The Spirit is our Comforter Satan is our Disturber a Beelzebub who is ever raking in our Wounds as Flyes upon Sores The Apostle Paul had his Eye upon this when he was advising the Corinthians to receive again the penitent incestuous Person his caution was most serious 2 Cor. 2. 11. lest Satan get advantage of us lest he deceive and circumvent us for his expression relates to Men cunningly deceitful in Trade that do over-reach and defraud the unskilful and the reason of this caution was the known and commonly experienced subtilty of Satan for we are not ignorant of his devices implying that he will and frequently doth ly at catch to take all advantages again 〈◊〉 Some indeed restrain these advantages to Vers 10. as I ld 〈◊〉 only meant that Satan was designing to fix the Corinthians upon an Opinion that Backsliders into great Sins were not to be received again or that he laid in wait to raise a Schism in the Church upon the account of this Corinthian Others restrain this advantage which he waited for to Vers 7. where the Apostle expresseth his fear lest the excommunicated Person should be swallowed up of too much sorrow but the caution being not expressly bound up to any one of these seems to point at them all and to tell us that Satan drives on many designs at once and that in this Mans case Satan would endeavour to put the Corinthians upon a Pharisaical rigour or to rend the Church by a division about him and to oppress the Penitent by bereaving him of his due comfort so that it appears still that it is one of his designs to hinder the Comfort and molest the Hearts of God's Children Secondly Of such concern is inward spiritual Peace to us that 't is but an easie conjecture to conclude from thence that so great an Adversary will make it his design to rob us of such a Jewel For 1. Spiritual Comfort is the sweet Fruit of Holiness by which God adorns and beautifies the ways of Religious Service to render them amiable and pleasant to the Undertakers Her ways are ways of pleasantness and all her paths are peace Prov. 3. 17. and this is the present rest and refreshment of God's faithful Servants under all their toil that when they have tribulation from the World yet they have peace in him Joh. 16. 33. and that being justified by Faith they have peace with God and sometimes joy unspeakable and full of glory 1 Pet. 1. 8. and this they may the more confidently expect because the fruits of the Spirit are Love Joy Peace c. Gal. 5. 22. 2. Spiritual Comfort is not only our satisfaction but our inward Strength and Activity for all holy Services doth depend upon it By this doth God strengthen our Heart and gird up our Loyns to run the ways of his Commandments it doth also strengthen the soul to undergo Afflictions to glory in Tribulations to triumph in Persecutions the outward Man is also corroborated by the inward peace of the Mind A merry Heart doth good like a Medicine but a broken Spirit drieth the Bones Prov. 17. 22. all which are intended by that expression Neh. 8. 10. The joy of the Lord is your strength 't is strength to the Body to the Mind and that both for service and suffering the reason whereof the Apostle doth hint to us Phil. 4. 7. The peace of God which passeth all understanding shall keep your Hearts and Minds that is Peace doth so guard us as with a Garison for so much the word imports that our Affections our Hearts being entertained with divine satisfactions are not easily enticed by baser proffers of worldly delights and our Reasonings our Minds being kept steady upon so noble an object are not so easily perverted to a treacherous recommendation of vanities 3. Joy and Peace are propounded to our careful endeavours for Attainment and Preservation as a necessary duty of great importance to us Rejoycings are not only recommended as seemly for the Vpright but injoined as Service and that in the constant practice Rejoyce evermore In every thing give thanks 1 Thess 5. 16 18. Rejoyce in the Lord alway and again I say rejoyce Phil. 4. 4. In the Old Testament God commanded the observation of several Feasts to the Jews these though they had their several respective grounds from God's appointment yet the general design of all seems to have been this that they might rejoyce before the Lord their God Lev. 23. 40. as if God did thereby tell them that it was the comely complexion of Religion and that which was very acceptable to himself that his Children might always serve him in chearfulness of Heart seeing such have more cause to rejoyce than all the World besides They are then much mistaken that think mounful Eyes and sad Hearts be the gretest Ornaments of Religion or that none are serious in the Profession of it that have a chearful Countenance and a rejoycing frame of Spirit 'T is true there is a Joy that is devilish and in Mirth which is madness to which Christ hath denounced a Wo Wo be to them that laugh now for they shall mourn and weep but this is a Joy of another nature a carnal delight in Vanity and Sin by which Men fatten their hearts to
frightful thoughts about it so that we judg of it according to our fears and make it frightful to our selves as if it would be to no purpose rather a mischief than an advantage 2. Sometime our satisfaction ariseth from some special token of Favour which our indulgent Father le ts fall upon us while we are in his work As when he gives us more than ordinary assistance or puts Joy and Comfort into our Hearts And this he often doth to make us come again and to engage afresh in the same or other services as having tasted and seen that the Lord is gracious and that there is a blessedness in waiting for him As in our Bodies he so orders it that the concocted juices become a successive Ferment to those that succeed from our daily Meat and Drink So from Duties performed doth he beget and continue Spiritual Appetite to new undertakings But O how sadly is all this hindered by the disquiet of the Heart The Graces of Faith and Love are usually obstructed if not in their Exercise yet in their delightful Fruits and if God offer a kindness inward sorrow hinders the perception As when Moses told the Israelites of their deliverance they hearkned not for hard bondage If a message of Peace present it self in a Promise or some consideration of Gods merciful disposition yet usually this is not credited Job confesseth so much of himself Job 19. 16. If I had called and he had answered me yet would I not believe that he had hearkened unto my Voice David also doth the like Psal 77. 2 3. My Soul refuseth to be comforted I remember God and was troubled Matter of greatest comfort is often so far from giving ease that it augments the trouble However the Heart is so hurried with its fears and discomposed with grief that it cannot hearken to nor consider nor believe any kind offer made to it By all these ways doth the Devil through the disquiet of Mind unfit the Lord's People for Duty and what a sad advantage this is against us cannot easily be told By this means he may widen the distance betwixt God and us keep our Wounds open make us a reproach to Religion And what not But 3. By these disquiets he pusheth us on to reject all duties for when he hath tyred us out by wearisom endeavours under so great indispositions and unfitness he hath a fair advantage to tempt us to lay all aside Our present posture doth furnish him with arguments he forgeth his Javelings upon our Anvil and they are commonly these three 1. That duties are difficult And this is easily proved from our own experience while we are broken or bowed down with sorrows we make many attempts for duty and are oft beat off with loss our greatest toil helps us but to very inconsiderable performances hence he infers 'T is foolishness to attempt that which is above our strength better sit still then toil for nothing 2. That they are unfruitful and this is our own complaint for troubled Spirits have commonly great expectations from duties at first and they run to them as the impotent and sick people to the Pool of Bethesda with thoughts of immediate ease as soon as they shall step into them but when they have tryed and waited a while siretching themselves upon duty as Elisha's Servant laid the Staff upon the Face of the Shunamites Son and yet there is no voice nor hearing no answer from God no peace then are they presently disatisfied reflecting on the Promises of God and the Counsels of good Men with this Where is all the pleasantness you speak of what advantage is it that we have thus run and laboured when we have got nothing and then 't is easy for the Devil to add And why do you wait on the Lord any longer 3. His last and most dangerous argument is that they are sinful Unfitness for Duty produceth many distractions much deadness wandering thoughts great interruptions and pittiful performances Hence the troubled Soul comes off from duty wounded and halting more distressed when he hath done than when he began upon these considerations that all his service was sin a mocking of God a taking his name in vain nay a very blasphemous affront to a divine Majesty Upon this the Devil starts the question to his Heart whether it be not better to forbear all Duty and to do nothing Thus doth Satan improve the trouble of the mind and often with the designed success For a dejected Spirit doth not only afford the materials of these Weapons which the Devil frames against it but is much prepared to receive them into its own Bowels The grounds of these Arguments it grants and the inferences are commonly consented to so that ordinarily duty is neglected either 1. Through sottishness of Heart or 2. Through frightful fears Or 3. Through desperateness bringing a Man to the very precipice of that Atheistical determination I have cleansed my hands in vain 4. Satan makes use of the troubles of Gods Children as a stumbling-block to others 'T is no small advantage to him that he hath hereby an occasion to render the ways of God unlovely to those that are beginning to look Heaven-ward he sets before them the Sighs Groans Complaints and restless Out-cries of the wounded in Spirit to scare them off from all seriousness in Religion and whispers this to them Will you chuse a Life of Bitterness and Sorrow can you eat Ashes for Bread and mingle your Drink with Tears will you exchange the comforts and contents of Life for a melancholly Heart and a dejected countenance how like you to go Mourning all the day and at night to be scared with Dreams and terrified with Visions will you chuse a Life that is worse than Death and a condition which will make you a terrour to your selves and a burthen to others can you be in love with an heart loaden with grief and perpetual fears almost to distraction while you see others in the mean time enjoy themselves in a contented peace Thus he follows young beginners with his suggestions making them believe that they cannot be serious in Religion but at last they will be brought to this and that 't is a very dangerous thing to be religious overmuch and the high way to dispair So that if they must have a Religion he readily directs them to use no more of it than may consist with the pleasures of Sin and the World and to make an easy business of it not to let Sin lye over-near their Heart lest it disquiet them nor over-much to concern themselves with Study Reading Prayer or hearing of threatning awakening Sermons lest it make them Mad nor to affect the sublimities of Communion with God exercises of Faith and Divine Love lest it discompose them and dash their worldly Jollities out of Countenance A Counsel that is readily enough embraced by those that are almost perswaded to be Christians and the more to confirm them in it he
delivered from their fears 5. They are also apt after ease of their troubles to have frequent returns What disposition all these things being considered can be more exactly shaped to serve Satans turn If he would have Men to believe the worst of themselves he hath such imaginations to work upon as are already misshapen into a deformity of evil surmising Would he terrifie by Fears or distress by Sadness he hath that already and 't is but altering the Object which oftentimes needs not for naturally the serious Melancholick imploys all his Griefs upon his supposed miserable estate of Soul and then he hath Spiritual distress Would he continue them long under their sorrows or take them upon all occasions at his pleasure or act them to a greater height than ordinary Still the Melancholick temper suits him This is sufficient for caution that we take special care of our Bodies for the preventing or abating of that Humour by all lawful means if we would not have the Devil to abuse us at his will 6. Sickness or Death-Bed is another solemn occasion which the Devil seldom misseth with his will Death is a serious thing it represents the Soul and Eternity to the Life While they are at a distance Men look slightly upon these but when they approach near to them Men usually have such a sight of them as they never had before We may truly call Sickness and Death-Bed an hour of Temptation which Satan will make use of with the more mischievous industry because he hath but a short time for it That 's the last Conflict and if he miss that we are beyond his reach for ever So that in this case Satan incourageth himself to the Battel with a now or never And hence we find that it is usual for the dying Servants of God to undergo most sharp Encounters then to tell them when the Soul is about to loose from the Body that they are yet in their Blood without God and Hope is enough to affright them into the extreamest Agonies for they see no time before them answerable to so great a work if it be yet to do And withal they are under vast discouragments from the weariness and pains of Sickness their understandings and faculties being also dull and stupified so that if at this last plunge God should not extraordinarily appear to rebuke Satan and to pluck them out of these great Waters as he often doth by the fuller interposition of the Light of his Face and the larger Testimony of his Spirit after their long and comfortable profession of their Faith and holy Walking their Light would be put out in Darkness and they would lie down in Sorrow Yet this I must note That as desirous as Satan is to improve this occasion he is often remarkably disappointed and that wherein he it may be and we would least expect I mean in regard of those who through a timerous Disposition or Melancholy or upon other Accounts are as I may so say all their life-time subject to Bondage those Men who are usually exercised with frequent fits of Spiritual Trouble when they come to Sickness Death-Bed and some other singular occasions of trouble though we might suspect their fears would then be working if ever Yet God out of gracious Indulgence to them considering their Mould and Fashion or because he would prevent their extream fainting c. doth meet them with larger Testimonies of his Favour higher Joys more confident satisfactions in his Love than ever they received at any time before and this to their wonder their high admiration making the times which they were wont to fear most to be times of greatest Consolation This Observation I have grounded not upon one or two Instances but could produce a cloud of Witnesses for it Enough it is to check our forward fears of a future evil day and to heal us of a sighing Distemper while we afflict our selves with such thoughts as these If I have so many fears in Health how shall I be able to go through the valley of the shadow of Death 4. I have one thing more to add for these discovery of these Spiritual Troubles and that is to shew you the Engines by which Satan works them and they are these two Sophistry and Fears 1. As to his Sophistry by which he argues the Children of God into a wrong apprehension of themselves it is very great He hath a wonderful dexterity in framing Arguments against their Peace he hath variety of shrewd Objections and subtile Answers to the usual Replies by which they seek to beat him off There is not a Fallacy by which a cunning Sophister would seek to entangle his Adversary in Disputation but Satan would make use of it as I might particularly shew you if it were proper for a common Auditory Though he hath so much impudence as not to blush at the most silly contemptible Reason that can be offered notwithstanding he hath also so much wit as to urge though never true yet always probable Arguments How much he can prevail upon the beliefs of Men in cases relating to their Souls may be conjectured by the success he hath upon the understandings of Men when he argues them into Errour and makes them believe a lye We usually say and that truly that Satan cannot in any case force us properly to consent yet considering the advantages which he takes and the ways he hath to prepare the Hearts of Men for his impressions and then his very great subtilty in disputing we may say that he can so order the matter that he will seldom miss of his aim It would be an endless work to gather up all the Arguments that Satan hath made use of to prove the Condition or State of God's Children to be bad But that I may not altogether disappoint your expectations in that thing I shall present to your view Satan's usual Topicks the Common-places or Heads unto which all his Arguments may be reduced And they are 1. Scripture abused and perverted His way is not only to suggest that they are Unregenerate or under an evil frame of Heart but to offer proof that these Accusations are true And because he haâ—h to do with them that profess a belief of Scriptures as the Oracles of God he will fetch his proofs from thence telling them that he will evidence what he saith from Scripture Thus sometimes he assaults the weaker unskilful sort of Christians Thou art not a Child of God for they that are so are Enlightned translated from Darkness they are the Children of the Light but thou art a poor ignorant dark blind Creature and therefore no Child of God Sometimes he labours to conclude the like from the Infirmities of God's Children abusing to this purpose that of 1 John 3. 9. He that is born of God doth not commit sin And He cannot sin because he is born of God Thus he urgeth it Can any thing be more plainly and fully asserted Is not this
Sin that is not some way or other committed c. Can such an Heart as thine be the Temple of the Holy Ghost For the Temple of the Lord is Holy and his People are washed and cleansed c. These are all of them strong objections and frequently made use of by Satan as the complaints of the Servants of God do testify who are made thus to except against themselves If our Sins were but the usual failings of the converted we might comfort our selves but they are great they are back-slidings they are against Conscience they are many what can we judge but that we have hitherto deceived our selves and that the work of conversion is yet to do The Objections that are from great Sins or from recidivation or wilful violation of Conscience do usually prevail for some time against the best that are chargable with them they cannot determine that they are converted though they might be so so long as they cannot deny the matter of Fact upon which the accusation is grounded till their true repentance give them some light of better information they are in the dark and cannot answer the Argument Jonah being imprisoned in the Whales Belly for his stubborn rebellion at first concluded himself a Cast-away Jon. 2. 4. Then I said I amccast out of thy Sight Neither could he think better of himself till upon his Repentance he recovered his Faith and Hope of Pardon Yet will I look again toward thy Holy Temple Yea those objections that are raised from the multitude and frequency of lesser failings though they may be answered by a Child of God while his Heart is not overshadowed with the Mists and Clouds of Temptation yet when he is confused with violent commotions within his Heart will fail him and till he can bring himself to some composure of Spirit he hath not the boldness to assert his integrity David was gravelled with this Objection Psal 40. 12. Innumerable evils have compassed me about mine iniquities have taken hold upon me so that I am not able to look up they are more than the Hairs on my Head therefore my Heart faileth me 2. He aggravates the sinfulness of our condition from the frequency and violence of his own Temptations 'T is an usual thing for him to give a young Converts incessant onsets of Temptation to Sin most commonly he works upon their natural constitution he blows the Coals that are not yet quite extinguished and that have greater forwardness from their own inclination to kindle again as Lust and Passion The first motions of the one though it go no further than those offers and risings up in the Heart and is there damped and kept down by the opposing principle of Grace and the occasional out-breakings of the other which he provokes by a diligent preparation of occasion from without and violent incitations from within furnish him with sufficient matter for his intended accusations and sometimes being as it were wholly negligent of the advantages which our tempers give him or not being able to find any such forwardness to these evils in our Constitution as may more eminently serve his ends he satisfies himself to molest us with earnest motions to any Sins indifferently and all this to make us believe that Sin is not crucified in us Which some are more apt to believe because they observe their Temptations to these Sins to importune them more and with greater vehemency than they were wont to do before and this doth yet the more astonish them because they had high expectations that after their conversion Satan would fall before them and their Temptations abate that their natures should be altered and their natural inclinations to these Sins wholly cease but now finding the contrary they are ready to cry out especially when Satan violently buffets them with this objection We are yet in our Sins and under the dominion thereof neither can it be that we are converted because we find Sin more active and stirring than formerly 't is not then surely mortified in us but lively and strong Though in this case it be very plain that Temptations are only strong and Sin weak and that Grace is faithfully acting its part against the Flesh arguing not that Grace is so very weak but that Satan is more busy than ordinary the Sins are not more than formerly but the Light that discovers them more is greater and the Conscience that resents the Temptation is more tender Yet all this doth not at first give ease to the fears that are now raised up in the Mind they find Sin working in them their expectations of attaining a greater conquest on a sudden and with greater ease are disappointed and the desire of having much makes a Man think himself poor and withal they commonly labour under so much Ignorance or perverse credulity that they conclude they consent to every thing which they are tempted to insomuch that 't is long before these Clouds do vanish and the afflicted brought to a right understanding of themselves 3. From some remarkable appearances of God doth Satan aggravate our sinful condition If God shew any notable act of Power he makes the Beams of that act reflect upon our unworthiness with a dazling Light When Peter saw the Power of Christ in sending a great multitude of Fishes into his Net having laboured all Night before and caught nothing it gave so deep an impression to the conviction of his vileness that he was ready to put Christ from him as being altogether unfit for his Blessed Society Depart saith he from me for I am a sinful Man If God discover the Glorious Splendor of his Holiness 't is enough to make the holiest Saints such as Job and Isaiah to cry out they are undone being Men of unclean Lips and to abhor themselves in Dust and Ashes The like may be said of any discovery of the rest of the Glorious Attributes of God Of all which Satan makes this advantage that the Parties tempted should have so deep a consideration of their unworthiness as might induce them to believe as if it were by a Voice from Heaven that God prohibits them any approaches to him and that they have nothing to do to take Gods Name within their Mouths And though these remarkable discoveries of God either by his acts of Power and Providence or by immediate impressions upon the Soul in the height of contemplation have ordinarily great effects upon the Hearts of his Children but not of long continuance yet where they strike in with other Arguments by which they were already staggered as to their Interest in God they mightily strengthen them and are taken for no less than Gods own determination of the question against them But this is not all the use that Satan makes of them for from hence he sometimes hath the opportunity to raise new accusations against them and to tax them with particular crimes which in a particular manner seem to prove them Unregenerate For what
would seem to be a clearer Character of a Man dead in Trespasses and Sins than a hard Heart that can neither be sensible of Judgments nor Mercies This he sometimes chargeth upon the Children of God from the great disproportion that they find in themselves betwixt the little sence that they seem to have and that which is disproportionable they reckon to be nothing and the vast greatness of Gods Mercy or Holiness I have observed some to complain of utter unthankfulness and insensibleness of Heart from thence concluding confidently against themselves because when God hath remarkably appeared for them in deliverances from dangers or in unexpected kindnesses they could not render a thankfulness that carried any proportion to the Mercy While they were in the highest admiration of the kindness saying What shall I render to the Lord they were quite out of the sight of their own sence and feeling and thought they returned nothing at all because they returned nothing equivalent to what they had received Others I have known who from the confusion and amazement of their Spirit when they have been overwhelmed with troubles have positively determined themselves to be sensless stupid past feeling hardened to destruction when in both cases any might have seen the working of their Hearts to be an apparent contradiction to what Satan charged them withal For they were not unapprehensive either of Mercies or Judgments but on the contrary had only a greater sence of them than they were able to manage 4. To make full measure Satan doth sometimes aggravate the miscarriages of those whom he intends to accuse by comparing their lives and actions with the holy Lives of some eminent Servants of God especially such as they have only heard of and not known personally For so they have only their Vertues represented without their failings Here Satan takes a liberty of declaming against them and though he could never spare a Saint a good word out of respect yet that others might be put out of heart and hope he will commend the holiness strictness care constancy of dead Saints to the Skies And then he Queries Art thou such an one Canst thou say thou art any thing like them for a heavenly Heart a holy Life a contempt of the World a zeal for God for good Works for patient Suffering c. All this while not a word of their Weaknesses These saith he were the Servants of the Most High their Examples thou shouldst follow if thou expectest their Crown Had they any more Holiness than they needed And if thouhast not so much thou art nothing What can Humility Modesty and sense of Guilt speak in such a case They go away mourning their Fears increase upon them and what God hath set before them in the Examples of his Servants for the increase of their diligence they take to be as a Witness against them to prove them Unconverted 5. The last part of Satan's Sophistry is to lessen their Graces that so he may altogether deny them In this he proceeds upon such Scriptures as do assert the Fruits of the Spirit and urgeth for his foundation that none are the Children of God but such as are led by the Spirit and that he that hath not the Spirit of Christ is none of his The necessity of Faith Love Patience Humility with the Fruits of these and other Graces he presseth but still in order to a Demonstration as he pretends that such are not to be found in those whose Gracious state he calls into question and consequently that they are not the Children of God The Rule by which he manageth himself in this Dispute is this The more Graces are heightned in the Notions that must give an account of their Nature and Beings the more difficult it will be to find out their Reality in the Practice of them His design then hath these two parts 1. He heightens Grace in the Notion or Abstract all he can 2. He lessens it in the Concrete or Practice as much as is possible that it may appear a very Nullity a shadow and not a substance I shall speak a little of both 1. As to the first part of his Design he hath many ways by which he aggravates Grace in the Notion We may be sure if it lie in his way he will not stick to give false definitions of Grace and to tell Men that it is what indeed it is not He is a Lyar and in any case whatsoever he will lie for his advantage if he have hope his Lye may pass for current but he cannot always use a palpable Cheat in this matter where the nature of any Grace is positively determined in Scripture except it be with the Ignorant or where the nature of Grace is made a business of Controversie among Men. I will not make Conjectures what Satan may possibly say in belying the nature of Grace to make it seem to be quite another thing than it is but shall rather shew you the more usual plausible ways of Deceit which herein he exerciseth and they are these that follow 1. As the same Graces have different Degrees in several Persons and these different Degrees have Operations suitable some Acts being stronger some weaker some more perfected and ripened others more imperfect and immature So when Satan comes to describe Grace he sets it forth in its highest Excellencies and most glorious Attainments You shall never observe him to speak of Graces at their lowest pitch except where he is carrying on a design for Presumption and then he tells Men that any Wishing or Woulding is Grace and every formal Lord forgive me is true Repentance but on the contrary he offers the highest reach of it that any Saint on Earth ever arrived at as essentially necessary to constitute its Being and tells them if they have not that they have nothing Let us see it in the Particulars 1. Grace sometimes hath its Extraordinaries as I may call them We have both Precept and Example of that nature in Scripture which are propounded not as the common Standard by which the Being and Reality of Grace is to be measured but as Patterns for imitation to provoke us to Emulation and to quicken us in pressing forward Of this nature I reckon to be the Example of Moses desiring to be blotted out of God's Book whatever he meant by it in his love to the People and the like of the Apostle Paul wishing himself to be accursed from Christ for his Brethrens sake Of this nature also we have many Precepts as rejoyce evermore of waiting and longing for the Appearance of Christ of rejoycing when we fall into divers Temptations and many more to this purpose All which are heights of Grace that do rarely appear among the Servants of God at any time 2. Grace hath sometimes its special Assistances this is when the occasion is extraordinary but the Grace befitting that occasion is promised in ordinary and ordinarily recieved When God calls any to such
be in a state of Grace that they in that state are in a very bad unsuitable condition to it For if his Arguments fall short of the first they seldom miss the latter mark This was his first Engine Now follows 2. The other Engine by which he fixeth these Conclusions which though it be not Argumentative yet it serves to sharpen all his Fallacies against the Comforts of God's Children this is fear which together with his Objections he sends into the Mind That Satan can raise a storm and commotion in the Heart by fear hath been proved before I shall now only in a few things shew how he doth forward his design by astonishing the Heart with his frightful thundrings 1. His Objections being accompanied with Affrightments they pass for strong undeniable Arguments and their Fallacy is not so easily detected Fear as well as Anger darkens Reason and disables the Understanding to make a true faithful search into things or to give a right judgment As Darkness deceives the Senses and makes every Bush affrightful to the Passenger or as muddied Waters hinder the sight so do Fears in the Heart disable a Man to discover the silliest Cheat that Satan can put upon it 2. They are also very Credulous When Fear is up any Suggestion takes place As suspitious Incredulity is an effect of Joy the Disciples at first hearing that Christ was risen for Joy believed it not so suspitious Credulity is the effect of Fear And we shall observe several things in the Servants of God that shew a strange Inclination as it were a Natural aptitude to believe the evil of their Spiritual Estate which Satan suggests to them As 1. There is a great forwardness and Precipitancy in the Heart to close with evil Thoughts raised up in us When jealousies of God's Love are injected there is a violent Hastiness forthwith all calm deliberation being laid aside to entertain a belief of it This is more than once noted in the Psalms In this case David acknowledgeth this hasty Humour I said in my haste Psal 31. 22. and Psal 116. 11. This hasty forwardness to determine things that are against us without due examination Asaph calls a great weakness This is my Infirmity Psal 77. 10. 2. There is observable in those that are under Spiritual Troubles a great kind of Delight if I may so call it to hear Threatnings rather than Promises and such Discourses as set forth the misery of a Natural State rather than such as speak of the Happiness of the Converted Because these things in their apprehension are more suitable to their Condition and more needful for them in order to a greater measure of Humiliation which they suppose to be necessary However thus they add fuel to the Flame 3. They have an aptitude to hide themselves from Comfort and with a wonderful nimbleness of Wit and Reasoning to evade and answer any Argument brought for their Comfort as if they had been Volunteers in Satans service to fight against themselves 4. They have also so great a blasting upon their Understanding that Satan's tempting them to doubt of their good Estate is to them a sufficient reason to doubt of it and that is Ground enough for them to deny it because Satan questions it 3. These Fears make all Satan's suggestions strike the deeper they point all his Arrows and make them pierce as it were the Joynts and Marrow they poyson and envenom them to the great increase of the Torment and hinderance of the Cure they bind the Objections upon them and confirm them in a certain belief that they are all true We have now viewed Satan's Engines and Batteries against the Servants of the Lord for the destuction of their Joy and Peace by Spiritual Troubles but these are but the beginnings of sorrows if compared with those distresses of Soul which he sometimes brings upon them Of which next CHAP. IX Of his fourth way to hinder Peace by Spiritual Distresses 1. The Nature of these Distresses the Ingredients and Degrees of them Whether all distresses of Soul arise from Melancholy 2. Satan's method in working them the Occasions he makes use of the Arguments he urgeth the strengthening of them by Fears 3. Their Weight and Burthen explained in several Particulars Some concluding Cautions THe last sort of Troubles by which Satan overthrows the peace of the Soul are Spiritual Distresses these are more grievous Agonies of Soul under deepest apprehensions of Divine Wrath and dreadful Fears of everlasting Damnation differing in nature and degree from the former sorts of Troubles though in these Satan observes much what the same General Method which he used in Spiritual Troubles last mentioned For which cause and also that these are not so common as the other I shall speak of them with greater Brevity Herein I shall shew 1. Their Nature 2. Satan's Method in working them 3. Their Weight and Burthen 1. The Nature of Spiritual Distresses will be best discovered by a consideration of those Ingredients of which they are made up and of the different degrees thereof 1. As to the Ingredients there are several things that do concur for the begetting of these violent Distresses As 1. There is usually a Complication of several kinds of Troubles Sometimes there are outward Troubles and inward discomposures of Spirit arising from thence sometimes Affrightments of blasphemous thoughts long continued and usually Spiritual Troubles in which their State or Condition have been called to question have gone before Heman who is as famous an Instance in this case as any we meet withal in Scripture in Psal 88. seems not obscurely to tell us so much his Soul was full of troubles ver 3. And in ver 7. he complains that God had afflicted him with all his Waves And that these were not all of the same kind though all concurred to the same end he himself Explains ver 8 18. where he bemoans himself for the unkindness of his Friends Thou hast put away mine Acquaintance Lover and Friend hast thou put far from me 2. These Troubles drive at a further end than any of the former for their design was only against the present Quietness and Peace of God's Children but these design the ruine of their hopes for the future they are troubled not for that they are not Converted but for that they expect never to be Converted This is a trouble of an high nature making them believe that they are eternally Reprobated cut off from God for ever and under an impossibility of Salvation 3. These troubles have the consent and belief of the Party In some other troubles Satan disquieted the Lords Servants by imposing upon them his own cursed suggestions violently bearing in upon them temptations to Sin and Blasphemy or objections against their state of Regeneration while in the mean time they opposed and refused to give consent but in these Satan prevails with them to believe that their case is really such as their Fears represent it to be
worst than the first So also 2 Pet. 2. 20. To this purpose is that of Soloman concerning the danger of continuance in sin after many Reproofs Prov. 29. 1. He that being often reproved hardneth his Neck shall suddenly be destroyed and that without remedy These and many such like Scriptures Satan hath in readiness which he plies home upon the Consciences of those that are troubled with the sense of Sin telling them That their Hearts and Ways being continually evil notwithstanding all the Courses that God hath taken to reclaim them that they having so long neglected so great Salvation or that after having seemed to entertain it became more sinful than before Which they will easily believe because they are now more sensible of Sin and more observant of their Miscarriages than formerly There can be no question but they are given up to vile Affections and like the Ground that bears nothing but Briers and Thorns they are rejected and nigh unto Cursing whose end is to be Burned The Wound that is made with this Weapon is not so easily healed as some others already mentioned because though Satan do unduly wrest these Passages to such failures in the Children of God as have little or no affinity with them for they only speak of falling into open prophaneness with contumacy yet they that have deep Convictions accompanied with great Fears do usually think that there are none worse than they are And though they will grant that some others have more flagitious lives yet they think they have Hearts so desperately wicked that they must needs be under as great hazards as those whose Lives seem to be worse 4. There is but one Argument more that carries any probability of proof for everlasting Condemnation and that is from an hard and impenitent Heart How Satan will manage himself to make a Child of God believe that he hath such an Heart is our last observation relating to his Sophistry And it is this He unjustly aggravates the discomposures of the spirits of those that are troubled for Sin and from thence draws his Arguments of irrecoverable Damnation pleading that their Hearts are Seared Hardned uncapable of Repentance and consequently of Heaven That final Impenitency will conclude Damnation is certain and that some have been given up to such a judicial hardness long before Death that they could not Repent may not only be evidenced from the Threatning of God to that purpose Mat. 13. Make the Heart of this People fat c. but also from the sad Instances of Pharaoh of whom 't is said that God hardned his Heart and the Jews who were blinded Rom. 11. 8. God hath given them the Spirit of slumber Eyes that they should not see and Ears that they should not hear But still the Art lieth in this How to make a Child of God believe that it 's so with him For this purpose he must take him at some advantage he cannot terrifie him with this Argument at all times While he is acting Repentance with an undisturbed settled frame of Heart 't is not possible to make him believe he doth not or cannot Repent for this were to force him contrary to sense and experience But he must take him at some season which may with some probability admit of his Plea and nothing is more proper for that design than a troubled Heart so that he hath in this case two things to do 1. He disquiets the Soul into as great an height of Confusion as he can That 2. When he hath melted it into heaviness and torn it into pieces he may work upon its distractions There are many things that fall out in the case of great anxiety of Mind that are capable of improvement for the accomplishment of this design As 1. Distracting troubles bring the Heart under the stupidity of Amazement Their thoughts are so broken and disjoynted that they cannot unite them to a composed settled resolution in any thing they can scarce joyn them together to make out so much as might spell out their distinct desires or endeavours they scarce know what they are doing or what they would do 2. They also poyson the thoughts with harsh apprehensions against God Great distresses make the thoughts sometimes recoil against the Holy Lord with unseemly questionings of his Goodness and Compassion and this puts Men into a bad sullen humour of untowardness from whence through Satan's improvement arise the greatest plunges of dispair 3. Most usually in this case the greatest endeavours are Fruitless and Dissatisfactory Satan though he be no friend to Duty doth unseasonably urge them to Repent and Pray but 't is because they cannot do either with any satisfaction and then their Failures are matter of Argument against them For it they resolve to put themselves upon a more severe course of Repentance and accordingly begin to think of their sins to number them or to aggravate them they are usually affrighted from the undertaking by the hainous appearance of them they cannot they dare not think of them the remotest glimps of them is terrible to an affrighted Conscience the raising of them up again in the Memory like the rising of a Ghost from the Grave is far more astonishing than the first prospect of them after Commission So true is that of Luther If a Man could see Sin perfectly it would be a perfect Hell If they set themselves to beg their Pardon by earnest Prayer they are so distracted and confused in Prayer that their Prayers please them not they come off from the Duty more wounded than when they began Or if in any measure they overcome these difficulties so that they do pray and confess their Iniquities then they urge and force a sorrow or compunction upon themselves but still to a greater dissatisfaction For it may be and this usually happens in greater Distresses they cannot weep nor force a tear or if they do still they judg their sorrow is not deep enough nor any way suitable to the greatness of their sin 4. To all these Satan sometimes makes a further addition of trouble by injecting blasphemous thoughts Here he sets the Stock with an intention to Graff upon it afterward When all these things are thus in readiness then comes he to set fire to the Train and thus he endeavours to blow up the Mine Is not thy Heart hardned to everlasting destruction How canst thou deny this Art thou not grown stupid and senseless of all the hazards that are before thee Here he insists upon the amazement and confusion of their Spirit and 't is very natural for those that are drunk with the Terrours of the Almighty to think themselves stupid because of the distraction of their thoughts I have known several that have pleaded that very Argument to that purpose Satan goes on What greater evidence can there be of an hardned Heart than Impenitency Thou canst not mourn enough Thou hast not a tear for thy sins though thou couldst weep enough formerly upon
violence of the Adversary in this Suggestion Fourthly This is a Stratagem for laying the Foundation of direful Accusations the Devil in this doth as the Russians are reported to do they when they have a spite against any of their Neighbours hide secretly some of their Goods in their Houses and then accuse them of Theft When blasphemous Thoughts are injected and Men refuse to consent then Satan raiseth an accusation against them as Josephs Mistress did as if they were guilty of all that Blasphemy that he tempted them unto and 't is a difficult task to perswade them that these things should be in their Minds and that they should not be the proper Issues of their own Heart And very often doth he from hence accuse them of sinning against the Holy Ghost because of the hideous Blasphemies which he had first suggested to them First This will give us considerations of Consolation and that 1. In regard of others We observe often our sick Friends speak what we would not willingly hear and it cannot chuse but be sadly afflictive to hear their Curses and blasphemous Speeches but when we consider the advantage that Satan takes of their Distemper if their lives heretofore have been Pious and Religous we comfort our selves in this that it is more his Malice than their own Inclinations neither should we suffer our Hope or Charity to be distressed on their behalf 2. It is the like ground of Consolation for our selves or others that are violently afflicted with blasphemous Thoughts For First If we call to mind that our Lord and Master suffered such things we that are of his Houshold need not think we receive a strange or unusual Measure in that we are molested as he was Secondly If we consider that Christ was tempted without Sin on his part then may we fetch this conclusion from it That it is possible that such thoughts should be cast upon us and yet that we may not be chargeable with them as our Iniquities Thirdly We may hence see that such Temptations are more frightful than hurtful these as one observes seldom take they carry with them so much horror to those that believe and love the true God that it keeps them from a participation with Satan in the Sin it self nay it fills them with fear and striving against it they rather as Bugbears scare and disquiet them than produce the real Effects of compliance with them Secondly The consideration of this kind of Temptation may fill the Hearts and Mouths of those of us as have not hitherto been troubled with it with Praise for so Merciful a Preservation If we have not been under this kind of Exercise it is not from any good Will that Satan hath to us but because our God withholds a Commission from him A poor weak Christian wonders that Satan hath not made him a Mark for this Arrow that he hath not broken him with this Tempest To answer that Wonder he may know that the same tenderness in God that will not put new Wine into old crazy Bottles nor a new stiff piece of Cloth in to an old tender Garment nor that will oppress the weak and infirm with strong Exercise or Burthens that same tenderness of a Compassionate Father doth keep off such Tryals because he will not suffer them to be tempted above what they are able Thirdly This Temptation calls for advice to those that are under it to whom I shall direct a few things First When any are troubled with blasphemous thoughts let it be considered in what state and temper their Body is if it be distempered with Melancholy as is most usual then the Prescription of an able Physitian is necessary in the first place without which he that would spiritually advise or counsel shall but beat the Air and his words be so far from the fastness of Nails that they shall be as Wind. I have known many under great complaints and fears by reason hereof that have been cured by Physick alone for when in this Case the Fewel is withdrawn the Fire goes out correct the Melancholy Temper that gives the Devil this advantage and the Trouble will cease Secondly It is of great Consequence to understand the Nature of these Temptations if the tempted could see these to be their Sufferings rather than their Sins they would with greater ease bear it as an Affliction And to those that complain abhor resist and pray against them they are not Sins no more than when an Harlot layeth her Child at an Honest Womans Door that Child is to be reckoned as the Fruit of her Wickedness A Gyant may dash the Son against his Father but so far will the Father be from imputing it as rebellious Insolence in his Child that he will pitty him the more as suffering by a double Injury for 't is not only against his natural Affection and Reverence to his Parent but 't is a bodily hurt beside thus will God much more pitty his Children under these Sufferings Thirdly We must not suffer such thoughts to lodge in us but before they settle if possible we must repel them as Abraham drove away the Fowls that came down upon his Sacrifice I know the Tempted will say this advice is not Practicable they find these thoughts swarm about them as Bees and when one is driven back another straight comes in its place But to them I Answer that blasphemous thoughts are repelled two ways 1. By stout and resolute resistance This though it do not extinguish them nor free us of the trouble yet it keeps them from setling upon us and us from the Guilt of them 2. By Diversion which the work of a lawful Imployment or good Society and other Discourses may do this may give some ease from the Molestation and the other preserves us innocent Fourthly In Temptations to Blasphemy confident Refusals do better then Disputings here we are to resist with Courage and a Holy Contempt of Satan if we be too timerous and fearful he insults suits the more upon us as Dogs when they are observed follow the Passenger with greater eagerness and noise Abhorrencies and positive Discharges like that of Christ in the same Case Get thee hence Satan do more for us than to debate the matter with him CHAP. XX. The Nature of Idolatry Satan's Design to corrupt the Worship of God The Evidences thereof with the Reasons of such endeavours His general Design of withdrawing the Hearts of Men from God to his Service The Proof that this is his Design upon whom he prevails That Professions and Confidences are no Evidences to the contrary His deceit of propounding Sin as a small Matter The Evidences of that Method and the Reason thereof THus have I considered the Temptation as Blasphemous I proceed next to consider it as Idolatrous the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if thou wilt fall down and worship do give us the true Notion of Idolatry The Word which we call Worship comes
which strike not at the root as one observed of himself that instead of denying a sinful Motion he began to dispute whether it came from Satan of his own inclination and so instead of quenching the Fire he busied himself to enquire whence it came Men deal with Temptations in this case as they who being asked whether they will buy such a Commodity hastily answer no but yet call back the Party again and ask whence it came or what it must cost and by such intanglements of Curiosity engage themselves at last to buy it Eve failed by such an inconsiderate conference with Satan for the abrupt beginning of the Serpents Speech Yea hath good said ye shall not eat c. and the summing up of the Arguments which prevailed with her to eat when the Woman saw that the Tree was good for Food and pleasant to the Eyes c. do clearly evidence that there was more discourse than is there expressed and that also tending to ascertain the Goodness Pleasantness and Profit of the Fruit. This kind of disputing is always unlawful and dangerous for it is but a wanton dallyance with a Temptation a playing upon the hole of the Asp and commonly ends in a sinful complyance Thirdly There is a disputing of a deliberating and parlying indifferency this is when the Devil puts a thought of Sin into their Minds and while they seem not to be forward to imbrace it leaves it to further conâ—ideration and then they float betwixt resolved and unresolved betwixt pro con being at a great dispute within themselves what is best to be done whether the conveniencies on the one hand will weigh down the inconveniencies on the other this in cases of apparent Sin is a wicked â—alting betwixt two always unlawful Fourthly There are also treacherous partial arguings wherein the Heart akes part with Satan These are those debates that are to be found in Natural Men about the doing or not doing of sinful things This looks so like the Combat betwixt the Flesh and the Spirit that it hath occasioned an enquiry how they may be distinguished each from other 'T is generally concluded that in that strife of the Natural Man the Light of the Understanding and Conscience gives opposition to the bent of the Affections and the same faculties though sanctifyed in part in the Regenerate are the Parties that give opposition each to other but with this principal difference that in this strife of the Flesh and Spirit the Man takes part with God whereas in the other the Affections take the Devils part and in a malignant averseness to the Light strive to put it out and to get over the conviction of Conscience so that the Man strives to Sin and to stop the Mouth of such objections as come into the contrary this kind of disputing is always sinful Fifthly There is yet a disputing in a strict Sense which is a full and solemn debating of a Satanical injection by giving it the full hearing and admitting Satan to be a Respondent to our objections Of this it is queried how far it may be convenient and how far inconvenient because we see Christ in this place did not thus dispute with Satan and yet we find instances in Scripture of some Holy Men that have been unavoidably engaged to dispute a Temptation to the utmost To Answer this Query I shall Secondly shew in what cases it may be necessary or convenient to enter the Lists with Satan in an Holy arguing and in what cases it is inconvenient and dangerous There are four cases in which we may dispute a Temptation First When the Motion is of things doubtful and disputable whether they be lawful or not Here it cannot be avoided for albeit as the Apostle adviseth Rom. 14. 1. doubtful disputations are not to be imposed upon others so as to tye them up to our perswasions yet in these things every Man before he can act clearly is to endeavour his own satisfaction in the lawfulness or unlawfulness of the thing that so he may be fully perswaded in his own Mind ver 5. And he gives two strong reasons of this ver 22 23. 1. From the rack and trouble which otherwise the Man may be put upon while his Conscience unsatisfied condemneth him in that which by a contrary practice he alloweth 2. In that this condemnation of Conscience while he doth that the lawfulness whereof he believeth not is an evidence of his Sin as well as an occasion of his trouble Secondly Disputings have place when a Temptation hath taken hold upon the thoughts and so far possessed it self that our corruption riseth up in the defence of the Suggestion Satan will not quit that hold though he be an intruder without our leave till he be beat out of his Quarters The Apostle Eph. 6. implies so much by that expression of quenching the fiery Darts of Satan It is not proper to understand it of a refusal of the first Motion of Sin though Interpreters do usually make it comprehensive both of the keeping out of the Dart and the plucking it out because this evidently supposeth that the Dart hath pierced the Soul and now begins to burn and enflame which will require more labour for the quenching of it than a refusal of the first Motion would put us to As when Fire hath taken hold upon our Houses we shall be forced to bring Water for the extinguishing of the Flame which before it had broke out upon the Building an ordinary care might have prevented And this we further taught by a distinction which the same Apostle useth in the same place of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 standing and withstanding We must keep off the Temptation that it enter not by standing against the Assault in a peremptory refusal but if it do enter then we must be put to it by a force of holy arguing to pull out the Arrow and to withstand it Thirdly Much more need have we of disputing when the present Temptation is a Motion of such a Sin which we are habituated unto and have long practised for these kind of sinful Motions are not cast out easily In this case David adviseth his Enemies Psal 4. who had for a long time loved Vanity and sought after leasing that by communing with their own Heart and by disputing against their sinful Practices they should bring themselves under an Holy awe and by that means stop the course of their sinning ver 4. This indeed is the great thing that Sinners are called to by God to ponder their Estate to consider their ways to study the evil and danger of Sin to examin themselves and to reason together with God about the wickedness and ingratitude of their Actions and about the contrary loveliness blessedness and happiness of the ways of God that so they may be brought to repentance all which are done only by a serious arguing of their case and hazard Fourthly It is convenient and
deliverances that they would not take into consideration the unrighteous terms upon which they might have escaped Thirdly When a Temptation after all means used continues to be troublesom and is rather an annoyance than an infection then must we not dispute it but by an Holy Contempt despise it Temptations to Blasphemy are oft of this nature as hath been noted in its place and there are other things by which Satan creates to God's Children great disquiet while they in the mean time abhor the Sin and cry out of the Tryal Here when the Messenger of Satan will not depart 't is an advice that hath the general approbation of Holy experienced Men that we should despise the Temptation as an approved way to our quiet and ease for while we think to repel such assaults by strugling with Arguments we do but increase the force of them as he that thinks to shelter himself against the Wind by holding up his Cloak before him doth but derive upon himself a stronger blast Fourthly In Temptations of inward trouble and terror it is not convenient to dispute the matter with Satan David in Psal 42. 11. seems to correct himself for his mistake his Soul was cast down within him and for the cure of that Temptation he had prepared himself by Arguments for a Dispute but perceiving himself in a wrong course he calls off his Soul from disquiet to an immediate application to God and the Promises Trust still in God for I shall yet praise him but in Psal 11. 1. he is more aforehand with his work for while his Enemies were acted by Satan to discourage him he rejects the Temptations at first before it setled upon his thoughts and chaseth it away as a thing that he would not give ear to In thee Lord do I put my trust how say ye then to my Soul flee as a Bird to your Mountain And there are weighty reasons that should disswade us from entring the lists with Satan in Temptations of inward trouble As 1. the determination of the Sincerity of the Soul and its converted state is a Question of no small difficulty a knotty Controversy more intricate and abstruse than those Controversies that in the Schools are of greatest Name for difficulty for this is lyable to more weighty Objections and stands in need of nicer distinction As Dr. Goodwin Observes They that converse with dejected Spirits find so much quickness and nimbleness of reasoning turning every way to ward off the force of an Argument brought for their consolation that even wise and able Heads are oft put to a stand and know not what to answer Would it then be fit to give Satan this advantage or to admit him so far into our reasoning He that will invite Satan to such a contest shall be sure to have his hands full Secondly This kind of Temptation doth usually disable Men for arguing it oftentimes confounds the Brain stupifies the understanding and weakens the Memory Heman complains of himself as distracted by terrors Job calls himself desperate Such Persons are not surely in a fit case to manage a Temptation with so cunning a Sophister as Satan Thirdly If they descend into the Battel he is not only too strong for them but commonly after a while they take Satan's part against themselves and comply with him concluding against their own peace Fourthly There is also a better way at hand than to enter into a Dispute and that is By going to God by a present Faith Love or Repentance when the truth of any of these is questioned It is a difficult task to prove some time that former acts of Faith Love or other Graces were sincere this may admit of such objections from a wounded Spirit that it will be hard to answer them but in this case 't is a nearer way to see if there be not in all these complainings some present acts of these Graces whether such complainants are not willing to embrace Christ upon any terms whether they do not have Sin whether they would not unfeignedly be reconciled to God c. It oft falls out that this doth stay the trouble when examinations of former acts do nothing for them Some Men are at more pains as one saith to repair and fit an old Building then would serve to rear a new one Yet must it be remembred that though it were the best course to resist Temptations of this nature at first by avoiding unnecessary disputings notwithstanding when this as I noted before of other Temptations hath seized upon the heart and taken possession then shall we be forced to fill our Mouths with Arguments and whether we will or no must we undergo a Contest As we see in David who when his troubles had prevailed upon him was forced to plead with God with himself with the Temptation and to have recourse to former Experience the days of old and the years of the right hand of the most High and all little enough Thirdly All that I shall further say concerning the inconvenienceies of disputing with Satan shall be to give you the reasons manifesting these unnecessary Communings with him to be every way hazardous and unsuitable As First 'T is an Honour to Satan and a disgrace to our selves Men are loth to be seen contesting with Persons of a far inferiour rank especially in such things which have procured to such a noted Infamy 'T is an usual peice of Generosity in Men of Spirit that they scorn to strive with a Scold or contend with a Beggar or be found in Company of those that are under an evil name deservedly and in matters that are vile and base 't is highly disgraceful to admit them to a debate Such things will either get more credit than they deserve while they seem to be countenanced by a dispute or else shall communicate their discredit to those that shall shew such familiarity with them Secondly By refusing to dispute Temptations we raise up in our hearts an active abhorrency of them and by that abhorrency we are cautioned and strengthned against them It must needs awaken our hatred into a present activity against that Sin which our consideration at first view presents to us so abominable that it deserves no other Answer but to be whipt out of our sight And when our Heart is thus alarmed it cannot but stand upon its Guard 'T is a course that Holy Men have taken to keep Men at a greater distance from Sin to present it as a thing of greatest abhorrency and that is the intendment of that Expression Rom. 6. 1. Shall we Sin that Grace may abound God forbid The vileness of that abuse of Gospel Grace he shews by setting it below the merit of any serious thought he sharpens their apprehensions against it by an out-cry of detestation The like he doth Eph. 5. 3. where he indeavours to set their Hearts against uncleanness and covetousness by telling them that it was unbecoming Saintship that such things should be
ruine and whatsoever is said against this can be no prejudice to Spiritual holy Joy in God his Favour and Ways 4. Spiritual Comfort is also a badg of our Heavenly Father's kindness As Joseph the Son of his Fathers affections had a special testimony thereof in his party-coloured Coat so have Gods Favourites a peculiar token of his good Will to them when he gives them the Garments of Praise for the Spirit of Heaviness if Spiritual Comfort be so advantagious to us it will be no wonder to see Satan so much rage against it it would be a satisfaction to him to tear these Robes off us to impede so needful a Duty to rob us of so much Strength and to bereave us of the sweet fruits of our Labours Thirdly It further appears that Satan's design is against the Comforts of God's Children by the many advantages he hath against them from the trouble and disquiet of their Hearts I shall reckon up the chief of them As 1. From the Trouble of the Spirit he raiseth confusions and distractions of Mind For 1. 'T is as natural to Trouble to raise up a swarm of muddy Thoughts as to a troubled Sea to cast up Mire and Dirt and hence is that comparison Isa 57. 20. a thousand fearful Surmises evil Cogitations Resolves and Counsels immediatly offer themselves This disorder of Thoughts Christ took notice of in his Disciples when they were in danger Why do thoughts arise in your hearts Luk. 24. 38. And David considered it as matter of great anxiety which called for speedy help Psal 94. 19. In the multitude of my thoughts within me thy comforts delight my soul Sometimes one fear is suggested then presently another now this doubt perplexeth then another question is begot by the former they think to take this course then by and by they are off that and resolve upon another and as quickly change again to a third and so onward one Thought succeeding another as Vapours from a boyling Pot. 2. Such Thoughts are vexatious and distracting the very Thoughts themselves being the poysonous steams of their running Sores are sadly afflictive and not unfitly called Cogitationes onerosae burdensom Thoughts But as they wrap up a Man in Clouds and Darkness as they puzzle him in his Resolves non-plus him in his Undertakings distract him in his Counsels disturb and hinder him in his Endeavours c. so do they bring the Mind into a labyrinth of confusion What advantage the Devil hath against a Child of God when his heart is thus divided and broken into Shivers 't is easie to imagine And David seems to be very sensible of it when he put up that request Psal 86. 11. Vnite my heart to fear thy Name 2. By disquiet of Heart the Devil unfits Men for Duty or Service Fitness for Duty lies in the orderly temper of Body and Mind making a Man willing to undertake and able to finish his work with comfortable satisfaction if either the Body or Mind be distempered a Man is unfit for such an undertaking both must be in a suitable frame like a well-tun'd Instrument else there will be no melody Hence when David prepared himself for Praises and Worship he tells us his Heart was ready and fixed and then his Tongue was ready also so was his Hand with Psaltery and Harp all these were awakened into a suitable posture That a Man is or hath been in a fit order for Service may be concluded from 1. His Alacrity to undertake a Duty 2. His Activity in the prosecution 3. His Satisfaction afterward right Grounds and Principles in these things being still presupposed This being laid as a foundation we shall easily perceive how the troubles of the Spirit do unfit us for Duty For 1. These do take away all Alacrity and forwardness of the Mind partly by diverting it from Duty Sorrows when they prevail do so fix the Mind upon the present Trouble that it can think of nothing but its Burthen they confine the Thoughts to the pain and smart and make a Man forget all other things as David in his trouble forget to eat his Bread and sick Persons willingly discourse only of their Diseases partly by indisposing for action Joy and Hope are active Principles but Sorrow is sullen and sluggish As the Mind in trouble is wholly imployed in a contemplation of its Misery rather than in finding out a way to avoid it so if it be at leisure at any time to entertain thoughts of using means for recovery yet 't is so tired out with its Burden so disheartned by its own Fears so discouraged with Opposition and Disappointment that it hath no list to undertake any thing by this means the Devil brings the soul into a spiritual Catoche so congealing the Spirits that it is made stiff and deprived of motion 2. Disquiets of Heart unfit us for Duty by hindering our activity in prosecution of Duty The whole Heart Soul and Strength should be engaged in all religious Services but these Troubles are as Clogs and Weights to hinder motion Joy is the dilatation of the Soul and widens it for any thing which it undertakes but Grief contracts the Heart and narrows all the faculties hence doth David beg an enlarged heart as the principle of Activity Psal 119. 32. I will run the way of thy Commandments when thou shalt enlarge my Heart for what can else be expected when the Mind is so distracted with Fear and Sorrow but that it should be uneven tottering weak and confused so that if it do set it self to any thing it acts troublesomly drives on heavily and doth very little with a great deal ado and yet were the unfitness the less if that little which it can do were well done but the Mind is so interrupted in its endeavours that sometimes in Prayer the Man begins and then is presently at a stand and dare not proceed his words are swallowed up he is so troubled that he cannot speak Psal 77. 4. Sometimes the Mind is kept so imployed and fixed on Trouble that it cannot attend in Hearing or Praying but presently the Thoughts are called off and become wandring 3. Troubles hinder our satisfaction in Duty and by that means unfit us to present Duties and indispose us to future Services of of that kind Our satisfaction in Duty ariseth 1. Sometimes from its own lustre and sweetness the conviction we have of its pleasantness and the spiritual advantages to be had thereby these render it alluring and attractive and by such considerations are we invited to their performance as Isa 2. 3. Come ye let us go up to the Mountain of the Lord and he will teach us of his ways and we will walk in his paths Hos 6. 1. Come and let us return unto the Lord for he hath torn and he will heal us he hath smitten and he will bind us up but trouble of Spirit draws a black Curtain over the excellencies of Duty and presents us with