greatest outward darknesse may have yea often use to have most light in their spirits But here is such an estate spoken of such a darknesse as hath no light in it Therefore secondly it is principally to be understood of the want of inward comfort in their spirits But chiefely inward from the want of the sense of Gods favour from something that is betweene God and them and so meant of that darknesse and terrours which accompany the want and the sense of Gods favour And so darknesse is elsewhere taken for inward affliction of spirit and minde and want of sight in point of assurance that God is a mans God and of the pardon of a mans sinnes so Psal 88. 6. Heman useth this word to expresse his distresse and the reasons why it is thus to be understood here are First Proved by 3. reasons The first because the remedy here prescribed is faith to stay himselfe upon God and that as upon His God he puts in His God emphatically because that is the point he is troubled about and concerning which he is in darknesse and that is it which faith which is propounded here as the remedy doth in the first place and principally looke unto as its primary aime and object Secondly The second in the foregoing verses he had spoken of Iustification whereby God pardons our sinnes and accepts our persons The Prophet or Christ in the person of his elect as some having expressed his assurance of this God is neare that justifies me who shall condemne Which words the Apostle Rom. 8. 32 33. doth alleadge in the point of justification and to expresse the triumphing assurance of it and applies them in the name and persons of true beleevers now because there might be some poore soules who though truely fearing God yet might want this assurance and upon the hearing of this might be the more troubled because not able to expresse that confidence which he did therefore he addes who is among you that feareth the Lord c. as if he should have said though you want the comfortable sense and assurance of this be not discouraged but doe you exercise faith goe out of your selves rely upon Christ and that mercy which is to be found in God you may feare God and want it and you are to trust in God in the want of it Thirdly The third these words have a relation also to the fourth verse where he sayes as that God had given him this assurance of his owne justification for his owne particular comfort in the foregoing verses so that God had also given him the tongue of the learned to minister a word of comfort in season to him that is weary and heavy laden and thereupon in this verse he accordingly shewes the blessed condition of such persons as are most weary through long walking in darknesse and withall hee discovereth to them the way of getting out of this darknesse and recovering comfort againe And in all the word of God there is not a more comfortable and seasonable word to one in such a condition to bee found All which argues it is spoken of inward darknesse and trouble of spirit and that in point of applying justification and God to be a mans God CHAP. II. The particulars of the distresse contained in these two phrases Walking in Darknesse Having no Light THe second thing to be enquired into is What is His condition whilest hee walkes in darknesse c. What is the condition of such an one who is thus in darknesse and who hath no light Which I will so farre discover as the phrases used here will give light into by the help of other Scriptures First §. 1. as exprest 1. by having no light he is said to have no light Light saith the Apostle Ephes 5. 13. is that whereby things are made manifest that is to the sense of sight to which light properly belongs and as light and faith are here severed as you see so sight also is in 2 Cor. 5. 7. distinguished from faith Heb. 11. 1. which is the evidence of things absent and not seene Light distinct from faith when therefore here he sayes he hath no light the meaning is he wants all present sensible testimonies of Gods favour to him he sees nothing that may give sensible present witnesse of it to him Gods favour and his owne graces and all the sensible tokens and evidences thereof which are apprehended by spirituall sight are become all as absent things as if they were not or never had been that light which ordinarily discovers these as present he is cleane deprived of To understand this A threefold light added to faith to cause assurance wee must know that God to helpe our faith which as I said before is distinguisht from sight as we now speake of it vouchsafeth a threefold light to his people to adde assurance and joy to their faith which is to faith as a backe of steele to a bow to strengthen it and made to be taken off or put on to it at Gods good pleasure First 1. The immediate light of Gods countenance the immediate light of his countenance which is a cleare evident beame and revelation of Gods favour immediately testifying that wee are his which is called the sealing of the Spirit received after beleeving Ephes 1. 13. which David desired and rejoyced in more then in all worldly things Lord lift up the light of thy countenance Psal 4. 6. in which more or lesse in some glimpses of it some of Gods people have the priviledge to walke with joy from day to day Psal 89. 15. They shall walke in the light of thy countenance in thy name shall they rejoyce all day which he may want And this is here utterly withdrawne and it may thus come to passe that the soule in regard of any sense or sight of this may bee left in that case that Saul really was left in 1 Sam. 28. 15. God is departed from me and answers me not neither by Prophets nor by dreames though with this difference that God was really departed from Saul but to these but in their owne apprehensions yet so as for ought they can see of him God is departed cleane from them answers them neither by prayer nor by word proved nor by conference they cannot get one good look from him Jonah 2. 4. Such was Ionahs case I am cast out of thy sight that is he could not get a sight of him not one smile not one glaunce or cast of his countenance not a beame of comfort and so thought himselfe cast out And so hee dealt with David often and sometimes a long time together Psal 13. 1. How long wilt thou hide thy face from mee and Psal 89. 46. How long c. even so long as David puts God in remembrance and pleades how short a time in all he had to live and complaines how in much of that time his
himselfe our righteousnesse make himselfe under the law Gal. 4. 4. and to make up a full righteousnesse fulfill every part of it Rom. 8. 3 4. Is it thy continuance in sinne and the number and iteration of them that amazeth thee All fulnesse dwells in him who is our righteousnesse Col. 1. 19. and hath dwelt in him longer then sinne in thee and the righteousnesse of our Messiah is everlasting righteousnesse Dan. 9. 24. The merit of which an eternity of sinning could not expend or make void And is all this righteousnesse laid up for himselfe onely or for any other so as thou mightest never come to have interest in it No the top of our comfort is that Our righteousnesse is one letter of his Name and that our names are put into his For us it is and Ours it is ordained to be as much ours to save us trusting upon it as his owne to glorifie him Ours not for himselfe he had no need of it being God blessed for ever Ours not the Angells neither the good for they are justified by their owne nor the bad they are put out of Gods will for ever But ours who are the sonnes of men and among them theirs especially who are broken lost whose soules draw neere to the grave and their lives to the destroyers that come pray unto God and stay themselves upon it unto them God cannot deny it for it is theirs For he will render to man His righteousnesse Job 33. 22 26. So as his Sonnes Name also is al-sufficient to answer all objections for faith to rest upon So as they that know his name will trust in him Psal 9. 10. A second reason why his name is sufficient Reason 2 though you have and see nothing in you nor any promise made to any grace in you to rest upon is because even all those promises made to cōditions in us which we ordinarily looke unto are Yea and Amen onely in this his Name and his Sonnes Name That is the originall of them all the root the seed of them all his Name is the materia prima the first matter of all those secondary promises ex quo fiunt in quod resolvuntur his Name gives being to them all if it were not for the mercy grace truth kindnesse in him and the righteousnesse which is in his Sonne all the promises which are made what were they worth As the worth of bonds depends upon the sufficiency of the man who makes them so all these promises upon his Name Therefore now when you relye upon his Name having as yet no promise made to any thing in you to relye upon you then relye upon that which is the foundation of all those promises you then have recourse to the originall which is more authenticall then extract copies you relye on that which all those other are resolved into and therefore is sufficient though all the rest faile you in your apprehension Thirdly Reason 3 his meere Name is support enough for faith and may bee so because it is for his Names sake and his Sons Names sake hee doth all he doth and for nothing in us but meerely for what is in himselfe so Esay 48. 9 10. For my Names sake c. So also Ezek. 36. 22 32. For my Names sake and not your sake and Esay 43. 25. I am he that blotteth out thy transgression for my owne sake and will not remember thy sinnes For it he blotteth out transgression and pardoneth And if it be for his Names sake he doth all he doth and fulfilleth all promises made to us and to what is in us Then when thou seest nothing in thy selfe to which any promise is made nothing which may appeare to be any argument or motive that he will pardon thee then trust thou in that his Name that because he is God and hath mercy in him that therefore he will doe it For that thing which is the onely or maine motive to God himselfe to doe any thing for us must needs be when apprehended and beleeved the strongest and surest ground for our faith also to perswade the heart that he will doe it As it is in knowledge the knowledge of the causes of things causeth the surest knowledge So in faith the knowledge of the maine motive to God the cause of all causeth the greatest certainty of perswasion This then may direct poore soules in distresse what to venture all upon upon what ground to hazard soules labours endeavours faith repentance obedience and all upon his Name when they see nothing in themselves to which any promise belongs as David sayes Psal 73. 26. My heart may faile and my flesh may faile but God will never faile So I may say your comforts in prayers in hearing your joyes your earnest-penies you have laid up may be all spent in a dearth your owne graces and all promises made to them your owne hearts may faile and being creatures they use to faile againe and againe but Gods Name and his Sonnes Name rested on will never faile you Leane on these not by halves in distresse 1 Pet. 1. 13. but trust perfectly as the Apostle sayes on that mercy you heare is in God upon that grace revealed That is throw and cast your whole soules your whole weight upon it he onely hath perfect peace Isa 26. 3. whose minde is staid on thee Psal 61. 2. have not halfe thy soule upon that rock which is higher then thee but creep up and get all upon it and when all faile renew thy faith on his Name Thereon rest there die To this purpose may that of Solomon serve Prov. 18. 10. His Name sayes he is a strong Tower and the righteous flye to it and are safe Now what end is there and use of a Tower in a City but that when all outworkes are taken the walls scaled all fortifications forsaken houses left then a Tower holds out last and is a refuge to flye to So also when the devill and Gods wrath beleaguers thee round and encompasseth thy soul and the comfort of every grace in thee is taken from thee and thou art driven from and art forced to forsake all other thy holds and grounds of comfort then flye to the Name of the Lord as thy City of refuge as Heb. 6. 18. it is compared Say there is mercy in thee Lord and that is thy Name and there is righteousnesse in thy Son and that is his Name and I am directed to trust in thy Name in time of need and here rest and catch hold as on the hornes of the Altar and if thou dyest dye there Direction 8. THe eighth direction is To waite in the use of all meanes to Waite upon God thus trusting in his Name in the constant use of all ordinances and meanes of comfort Waiting is indeed but an act of faith further stretched out As an Allegory is but a continued Metaphor so waiting is but a continuing to beleeve on God and
somewhat common to us men each of other they have a further and and more neere way of knowing the acts of the reasonable powers the understanding and will then we men can have even as they have also a way of communicating their thoughts to us in a more intimate close secret manner yet still such as falls short of an intuitive knowledge of them they can goe into a roome further then wee and into a roome which is next the privy chamber which yet remaines fast lockt up unto them As their power in all other things reacheth a degree higher then ours so in this also To open this a little Those reasonable powers and faculties in us the understanding and the will the immediate immanent acts of which are thus in themselves fast lockt up being yet in this life drencht in the body and bodily organs upon which their working doth depend As 1. The understanding is joyned to the fancy which makes parelii and resemblances and shadowes of those thoughts the minde secretly conceives and formes so as scarce any thoughts doe stir but the fancie imitates them and acts them as far as it is able And 2. The will also is conjoyned with the affections which are drencht and shew themselves in bodily organs and spirits so as not any motion of the will puts it self forth but more or lesse some affections of the bodie doe stirre with it and therefore affections are as well defined by their motion in the body as by their seat in the will it selfe As when anger is defined ira est ebullitio sanguinis circa cor a boiling of bloud about the heart and affections are but the flowings and reflowings of spirits to and from the heart Now both these both phantasmes and passions all divines doe grant that the devills may know and that to know them they have a nearer accesse to us then men can have each to other yea and that they may discern them intuirivè as we do things which are present before us how else should they worke upon fancy and otherwise there were no diabolicall dreames nor angelicall neither caused by good angels But we finde that a good angell dictated to Ioseph a great article of faith Christs divinity and nativity it was done in a dreame and therefore to his fancy So they inspired the Sibylls and dictated prophecies as was said And so the evill angells prompted Sauls fancy And this they doe not by creating new species and images but evocando calling forth the images there already For the images of things in the fancy being corporeall species they can no more beget a new corporeall image then they can make a body anew And therefore all the power of the angels cannot cause a blinde man to dreame of colours And therefore their way in communicating their suggestions to us herein must be by discerning the species to wit of all words heard or read that lye in the fancy already and so by ordering and composing them even as a Compositor in printing doth his letters that lye confused afore him into words and sentences to represent to the readers eye what hee would have read by him So he to the understanding which naturally prints off from the fancy what ever is in it as fast as he doth set them And by the like reason that he can call them forth and so view the species and images laid up there already to set them thus as he pleaseth by the same reason it must be supposed that he is as able to discerne any of them in the fancy at any time then when reason it selfe calls up any of them and maketh use of them as it doth when ever it sets it selfe to thinke or muse and these and all operations of the sensitive powers they may view and see as truly for ought I know and as intuitively even as wee see colours and species of things in the eye of a man So as these evill angels may when God permits get into the head and see all the images and species in the fancy and those that are in direct conjunction with the understanding which it is then thinking and musing of even as a man doth what images are in the apple of the eye of another man and so by discerning those phantasmes which the understanding actually then vieweth and makes use of he may then judge what the minde is musing of And againe as wee discerne mens passions when they dye and affect the outward parts as if shame dyes the face red and feare paints it white so may the angels more secretly discerne the motion of them within which is the cause of this alteration without they can goe further and see the inward commotion of the spirits in our inward parts even in their channels and springs in that bodily heart we cary within us and in the veines and arteries and so know what affections are stirring And this is evident by this in that they are also able to worke upon these passions Now their power of working on the affections ariseth from their knowing them and skill to move and stir those spirits and humours electively wherein these passions are seated And herein their power of discerning us exceeds that in us men in discerning other men as that of communicating their mindes to us also doth For as they can communicate secretly by fancy it selfe we but by outward words and signes to the outward senses of others so they can discern more secretly what is in the fancy and not only what appeares in the outward parts which is yet but a roome further that they get into which we men cannot come to so as they can discern the least rising of the tide the least turn of the streame of affections in our veines and in the corporeall heart Satan can discerne those lesser aguish fits of passion that accompanies any act of the will which men discerne not But of this great and necessary quaere as also how by meanes of this he communicates all his temptations to us more largely in an Appendix to bee annexed to this Treatise CHAP. IX How able Satan is to worke upon that third principle The passions and corrupt affections and bring home his false conclusions with terrours THus we have seene how able Satan is to work upon those two forementioned principles of carnall reason and abuse it with false Majors and also upon conscience in laying our sinnes to our charge with mis-representations of our estates It remaines now onely that we shew how hee can stirre and worke upon the passions and corrupt affections in us and make use of them and so set on all those false conclusions That wee are hypocrites thence deduced with hideous and horrid feares and terrours And hence § 1. as hee is called a Serpent as was said That Satan can raise up terrors for slights and cunning reasonings and wiles So likewise a Lion of all beasts the strongest Esay 38. 13. A roaring Lion of
and thus to call all into question These are two distinct things For though God hath just cause and reason to leave us to this trouble yet often the thing that troubles and disquiets us is a meere mistake a misapprehension even as a father sees good reason often to scare the childe but yet the thing he suffers him to be affrighted with is but a meere bugbeare It is necessary to enquire into both First 1. What is the true cause which provoketh God to leave thee to this distresse examine what might be the true cause that provokes God thus to leave thee So Lament 3. 40. Let us search and try our wayes it was spoken by the Church in desertion as appeares by the former part of the Chapter And to helpe your selves in this goe over all the Cases which have beene propounded hast thou not been carnally confident in false signs or rested too much on true to the neglect of Christ and Gods free grace Didst thou not afore neglect to stir up thy own graces c. go over all those cases mentioned something or other will bee found to be the cause This is necessary for all the cause be known the heart submits not neither will it sanctifie Gods name nor will the trouble cease till that which provokes God to lay it on bee confessed and forsaken And if it bee a particular sinne that God aimes at then usually God useth the horrour for and the guilt of that very sinne to afflict thee with and then that sin it selfe is made the cause of thy trouble in thy owne apprehension So as then it is easily found out thou wilt finde thy sinne to be the thorne in thy foot the stone in thy shoo that did grate gal and vexe thee David 〈◊〉 knew in Psal 51. what it was for which God broke his bones for his very sin was it was the iron Mace the instrumentall cause it selfe of Gods executing it upon him the horrour of that murther God used as the hammer to breake him withall and as the rod to whip him with ver 3. My sinne sayes he is ever before me it was ever in his eye Indeed in outward afflictions it is more difficult to finde out the cause why God afflicts a man unlesse sometimes you may through Gods wise-disposing hand finde and reade the sinne in the punishment they so resemble one another so as a man may say this crosse lay in the wombe of such a sinne they are so like in quo peccamus in eodem plectimur but in those inward distresses of conscience that sin which is the true cause and that moveth God to afflict God often useth even the guilt of that very sinne to terrifie thee to cast a man into the distresse and to keepe him in it it is both the procatarticall cause and executioner also But in case thou canst not finde out the cause as Iob it seemes did not and Elihu did suppose hee might not therefore gives him this counsell which doe thou also follow till God shew thee the cause Job 34. 31 32. to say unto God as hee adviseth there That which I see not teach thou me and I will not offend any more and if thou findest it say also as ver 31. I have borne chastisement for such a sinne I will never offend any more Till then God will not let thee downe The second thing to be searched into is 2. What is the maine reasoning in thy heart that causeth this question of thy estate What is the chiefe and maine reasoning in thy heart which makes thee call all into question whether God bee thy God What is the reason why thou thinkest so what makes thee conclude so For this you must consider that although God for some sinne committed doth hide himselfe from thee terrifies and lasheth thy conscience yet that which causeth in thee and worketh in thee this apprehension that God hath cast thee off is usually some false reasoning or misapprehension some meere mistake some devise and sophistry of Satan When the Corinthian was excommunicated for his sinne Satan had leave to terrifie his conscience for it but Satan went further he would have swallowed him up of sorow by perswading him that such a sinne was unpardonable and that God would never owne him againe now the reasoning Satan used to bring this upon him was a false one some tricke and devise 2 Cor. 2. 7. compared with the eleventh verse whereof if a man bee ignorant hee may goe mourning a long while as a cast-away Therefore take thy soule aside and seriously aske it and examine it Why it is thus troubled What reason what ground thou hast to thinke that God is not thy God and then examine it whether it be a true ground yea or no As the Apostle bidâ— us 1 Pet. 3. 15. Give a reason of our faith so aske thou of thy soule the reason of its doubting Thus David Psal 42. ver 5. Why art thou cast downe oh my soule and because doubts arise againe and againe therefore he asketh the reason againe ver 11. Why art thou cast downe David knew the way to dissolve them was to search into and examine the reason of them for still when he had throughly examined theÌ„ he found them needlesse causelesse to put him into such desperate feares The childe of God is often cast into prison 〈◊〉 feares and bondage and after hee hath layen long in them and begins to reade over the 〈◊〉 and Mittimus hee findes it to bee false imprisonment a meere trick of Satan his Jaylour For as carnall men when they thinke their estate good and that they are in the favour of God it is some delusion some false reasoning that is still the ground of such their opinion as because they prosper in the world therefore God loves them because they performe some duties have some good motions which grounds they cannot endure to have examined 〈◊〉 contrarily one that feares God the ground of his apprehension that he is out of the favour of God is likewise some false reasoning which when examined appeares to be such and when it appearâ—â— the soule is freed out of its feares and doubts Heman thought Psal 88. 14. and said that God had cast him off and what was the reason perswaded him to thinke so ver 14. Because God had hidden his face It doth not follow Heman a Father may hide his face from his sonne and yet not cast him off So David also reasoneth Psal 77. ver 2 3. I have sought God prayed and used the meanes and yet I am troubled and yet God reveales not himselfe and what doth he conclude from this ver 7. Will the Lord cast off for ever He thought if God had loved me he would presently have heard me he thought his soule would not have beene worse after praying This was a false reasoning for Psal 70. 4. sometimes God shuts out his peoples prayers A father may