temptations or to lusts and desires of evil This Point summed up 63â— CHAP. V. Of two other causes of groundless Scruple to good Souls The Contents A second cause of scruple is their uâ—affectedness or distraction sometimes in their prayers Of the necessity of fixedness and fervency in Devotion when we can and of Gods readiness to dispense with them when we cannot enjoy them Attention disturbed often whether we will or no. A particular cause of it in fervent prayers Fervency and affection not depending so much upon the command of our wills as upon the temper of our Bodies Fervency is unconstant in them whose temper is fit for it God measures us not by the fixedness of our thoughts or the warmth of our tempers but by the choice of our wills and the obedience of our lives Other qualifications in prayer are sufficient to have our prayers heard when these are wanting Yea those Vertues which make our prayers acceptable are more eminently shown in our Obedience so that it would bring down to us the blessings of prayer should it prove in those respects defective A third cause of scruple is the danger of idle or impertinent words mentioned Mat. 12.36 The scruples upon this represented The practical errour of a morose behaviour incurred upon it This discountenanced by the light of Nature and by Christianity The benefits and place of serious Discourse Pleasurable conversation a great Field of Vertue The idle words Mat. 12 not every vain and useless but false slanderous and reproachful words this proved from the place 664 CHAP. VI. Of the sin against the Holy Ghost which is a fourth cause of scruple The Contents Some good mens fear upon this account What is meant in Scripture by the Holy Ghost Holy Ghost or Spirit is taken for the gifts or effects of it whether they be first ordinary either in our minds or understandings or in our wills and tempers or secondly extraordinary and miraculous Extraordinary gifts of all sorts proceed from one and the same Spirit or Holy Ghost upon which account any of them indifferently are sometimes called Spirit sometimes Holy Ghost Holy Ghost and Spirit are frequently distinguished and then by Holy Ghost is meant extraordinary gifts respecting the understanding by Spirit extraordinary gifts respecting the executive powers The summ of the explication of this Holy Ghost What sin against it is unpardonable To sin against the Holy Ghost is to dishonour him This is done in every act of sin but these are not unpardonable What the unpardonable sin is Of sin against the ordinary endowments of the Holy Ghost whether of mind or will the several degrees in this all of them are pardonable Of sin against the Spirit Blaspheming of this comes very near it and was the sin of the Pharisees Mat. 12 but it was pardonable Of sinning against the Holy Ghost The Holy Ghost the last means of reducing men to believe the Gospel that Covenant of Repentance The sin against it is unpardonable because such Sinners are irreclamable All dishonour of this is not unpardonable for Simon Magus dishonoured it in actions who was yet capable of pardon but only a blaspheming of it in words No man is guilty of it whilst he continues Christian. 681 CHAP. VII The Conclusion The Contents Some other causless scruples The Point of growth in Grace more largely stated A summary repetition of this whole Discourse They may dye with courage whose Conscience doth not accuse them This accusation must not be for idle words distractions in Prayer c. but for a wilful transgression of some Law of Pieey Sobriety c. above mentioned It must further be particular and express not general and roving If an honest mans heart condemn him not for some such unrepented sins God never will 700 THE INTRODUCTION ROM viij 1 There is no Condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus who walk not after the Flesh but after the Spirit The Contents Religious men inquisitive after their future State Three Articles of Christian belief cause such inquisitiveness The Articles of Eternal Life and the Resurrection make men desire satisfaction The Article of the last Judgment encourages the search and points out a way towards it A proposal of the present design and the matters treated of in the ensuing Discourse AMong all those things which employ the minds of Religious and Considerate men there is none that is so much a matter of their thoughtful care and solicitous enquiries as their Eternal happiness or Misery in the next World For in Christs Religion there are three great Articles which being believed and seriously considered by a nature restlessly desirous of its own happiness and such ours is must needs render it very inquisitive after some security of its future good estate and they are these The Immortality of the Soul the Resurrection of the Body and the great Day of Doom or last Judgment Whosoever is firmly perswaded of these three as every man is or at least pretends to be who professes himself a Christian he assuredly believes that when this Life is over both his Body and Soul shall live again and be endlessly Delighted or Tormented Comforted or Distressed in the next world according as their condition is when they leave this For by the Doctrine of Eternal Life he is assured that his Soul shall live and be adjudged to an Eternal bliss or misery By the Article of the Resurrection he is perswaded that his Body with all its powers shall spring out of the dust and be again enlivened with its ancient Soul to be a sharer of its state and joyntly to undergo an endless train of most exquisite woes or pleasures And since it is the very frame and fundamental principle of our Natures studiously to pursue Pleasure and to fly as fast from Pain to seek good and to avoid evil These states of future Happiness and Misery are such as no man who sees and believes them can possibly be unaffected with or unconcern'd in But whosoever in his own thoughts views and beholds them must needs find all his faculties awake and through an innate care and natural instinct solicitously inquisitive after that lot which shall fall to their own share Now if this endless happiness and misery both of Soul and Body in the next world were only casual and contingent the gift of blind chance or partial and arbitrary favour then would the belief of it perplex us indeed with fears and misgiving thoughts but never encourage us on to any exact care or diligent enquiry It would be in vain for us to seek what we could never find and downright folly to endeavour after satisfaction and certainty in things which are utterly casual and Arbitrary For what comes by chance is neither foreseen by us nor subject to us And what is given arbitrarily without all rule or reason is as fickle and unconstant as Arbitrary will it self is It cannot be prevented by any endeavours because it doth not
and unprofitable were noted by the word it self which we translate idle yet is it no unusual thing in the Scriptures by several words to mean and intend more than in their literal sense they do express Thus are the abominable works of darkness mentioned Eph. 5 called unfruitful works where the meaning surely is not only that they bring in no profit or advantage but also that they are most deadly and mischievous v. 11 and the wicked servant spoken of Mat. 25 is called the unprofitable servant v. 30. And after the same use of speech our words which do not only tend to none but to very ill fruit may be called idle or unprofitable words And so they are in this place For the idle words whereof our Saviour speaks v. 36 are such words as are not only idle and unprofitable but positively wicked and evil being indeed false slanderous and reviling words as will appear from the consideration of these particulars For the words which are threatned in that 36. ver are such as are a sign not of a trifling but of an evil heart How can ye says he being evil speak good things for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh So that as a good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth or speaketh good things an evil man likewise out of the evil treasure of his heart bringeth forth evil things v. 34 35. And being the fruits of an evil heart they are the signs not of an impertinent but of an evil man The tree is corrupt says he if the fruit be corrupt for the tree is known by its fruits v. 33. And since they are such words as are thus sinful in themselves and an argument of so much sin in us they shall in the last Judgment be charged upon us to condemn us For by thy words says he as well as actions thou shalt be justified and by thy words if they be such idle words as I mean thou shalt be condemned v. 37. The words then which are spoken of in this place from the 33. to the 38. ver are such as are a sign of a wicked heart as make a wicked man and render us in the last Judgment liable to condemnation But now words of this black dye and of these mischievous effects are not every idle and impertinent but false slanderous railing or otherwise sinful and forbidden words But false and slanderous words are especially struck at in this place such as were those lying and contumelious ones that occasioned all this discourse when the Jews most reproachfully charged his Miracles upon the Devil telling him that he cast out Devils through Beelzebub the Prince of the Devils v. 24. Upon occasion of which black calumny he proceeds in all the following verses to warn them against such blasphemous speeches demonstrating clearly the unreasonableness of them v. 25 to 31 the sinfulness of them ver 33 34 35 and the mischievous effects of them in the two next verses Such reproachful words as these let me tell you says he you shall be called to an account for as well as for your works and actions I say unto you and you may believe me for you will find it true that every idle or slanderous and reproachful word such as now you have spoken against me that men shall speak they shall give an account thereof in the day of judgment For when that day comes think you of it as you please now mens words as well as their actions shall be called to an account by thy words thou shalt be justified and if they have been such as yours now are by thy words thou shalt be condemned ver 36 37. And thus by all this it appears that the idle word here threatned by our Lord is not every word that is vain and useless but only such as are railing false or slanderous And in this sense some Manuscripts read the place For in the Book of Steph. it is not every idle but every wicked word that men shall speak they shall give an account thereof in the day of judgment So that as for this third scruple it is as groundless as was the former no good man need to be disquieted by it since they shall never be condemned for it CHAP. VI. Of the Sin against the Holy Ghost which is a fourth cause of scruple The CONTENTS Some good mens fear upon this account What is meaâ—â— in Scripture by the Holy Ghost Holy Ghost or Spirit is taken for the gifts or effects of it whether they be first ordinary either in our minds and understandings or in our wills and tempers or secondly extraordinary and miraculous Extraordinary gifts of all sorts proceed from one and the same Spirit or Holy Ghost upon which account any of them indifferently are sometimes called Spirit sometimes Holy Ghost Holy Ghost and Spirit are frequently distinguished and then by Holy Ghost is meant extraordinary gifts respecting the understanding by Spirit extraordinary gifts respecting the executive powers The summ of this Explication of the Holy Ghost What sin against it is unpardonable To sin against the Holy Ghost is to dishonour him This is done in every act of sin but these are not unpardonable What the unpardonable sin is Of sin against the ordinary endowments of the Holy Ghost whether of mind or will the several degrees in this all of them are pardonable Of sin against the Spirit Blaspheming of this comes very near it and was the sin of the Pharisees Mat. 12 but it was pardonable Of sinning against the Holy Ghost The Holy Ghost the last means of reducing men to believe the Gospel that Covenant of Repentance The sin against it is unpardonable because such sinners are irreclamable All dishonour of this is not unpardonable for Simon Magus dishonoured it in actions who was yet capable of pardon but only a blaspheming of it in words No man is guilty of it whilst he continues Christian. ANother causless ground of fear which disquiets the minds and affrights the hearts of good Christian people is the sin against the Holy Ghost They hear very dreadful things spoken of it for our Saviour Christ who knew it best and who at the last Day is to judge of it has told us plainly before-hand that he who blasphemeth the Holy Ghost shall never be forgiven neither in this world nor in the world to come Mat. 12.32 or as S t Mark expresses it he shall never have forgiveness but is liable to eternal damnation Mark 3.29 This is a fearful Sentence upon a desperate sin and seeing they are in darkness about it and do not well understand it they know not but that they themselves may be guilty of it nay some of a timorous temper and abused minds go further and think that they really are But to cure their fears and to quiet their minds in this matter there needs nothing more be done than to give them right apprehensions and a clear
explication of this sin for if they once knew what it is they would be at ease from such tormenting suspicions and unreasonable fears about it To explain this I will consider 1. What is meant in Scripture by the Holy Ghost 2. What is meant here by sinning against it 1. What is meant in Scripture by the Holy Ghost By the word Holy Ghost or holy Spirit according to an usual Metonymie of the giver for the gift or of the cause for the effect is very often meant the gifts or effects of the holy Spirit whether they be such as he ordinarily produces in us or such as are extraordinary and miraculous Sometimes it signifies such gifts and dispositions whether of mind or temper as the Holy Ghost or Spirit of God is wont ordinarily to produce in men It notes I say the good qualifications of our minds or understandings which as all other good gifts are wrought in us by the Spirit and derived to us from God Thus a man endued with wisdom and discretion such as Joseph advised Pharaoh to set over all the Land of Egypt is called a man in whom the Spirit of God is Gen. 41.33 38 and the Spirit of the Lord mentioned Isai. 11 is in the very next words explained by the Spirit of wisdom the Spirit of understanding the Spirit of counsel the Spirit of knowledge and the Spirit of quick understanding vers 2 3. It signifies also the vertuous tempers and good qualifications of our hearts which like as the former were are given us of God Thus that good and charitable temper which is so exemplary in God and which is wrought in our souls by him is called the Spirit of God 1 John 4. If we love one another God dwells in us so that hereby know we that we dwell in him and he in us because he hath given us that loving temper of his Spirit ver 12 13. The temper which was so observable in Christ is called the Spirit of Christ Rom. 8.9 the temper of Elias is called the spirit of Elias Luke 1.17 the Spirit of the Lord is explained by the Spirit of the fear of the Lord Isai. 11.2 and that spirit which God hath given us says S t Paul is not the spirit of fear but the spirit of power of love and of a sound mind 2 Tim. 1.7 Thus doth the Spirit of God signifie many times in Scripture those ordinary gifts and Graces which are the good effects of the Spirit But besides these effects of it in the good endowments and perfections of our natural faculties whether of mind or temper which are common and ordinary sometimes it signifies more especially those gifts which are extraordinary and miraculous Of which sort are the gift of tongues of prophecy of healing Diseases without any natural means and performing other miraculous operations so famous in the first times of the Gospel Thus for example that Saying I will pour out in those days of my Spirit is interpreted by this in the next words And they shall prophesie Acts 2.18 And the elder Brothers which was a double share of the prophetick power of Elias is called a double portion of his Spirit 2 Kin. 2.9 And the Corinthians zealous pursuit of the miraculous and extraordinary gifts of prophecy speaking with tongues healing diseases and working miracles is called by the Apostle their being zealous of Spirits or as we translate it of spiritual gifts 1 Cor. 14.12 Now as for these extraordinary gifts they are all wrought in us by the same cause and proceed from the same Principle viz. the holy Spirit of God or the holy Ghost There are in the Church now in our times saith the Apostle diversities of gifts but yet one and the same Spirit is the Donor of them all For to one is given by the Spirit the word of wisdom or of Gospel truths and revelations to another the word of knowledg or discerning of remote things and prophetical predictions by the same Spirit to another faith of his being Divinely assisted to produce supernatural effects to another miraculous gifts of healing Diseases without use of means by the same Spirit to another the working of miracles or the utmost activity and energy of powers in the highest instances and effects of them of which sort are raising the Dead casting out Devils inflicting bodily torments on contumacious Sinners c. to another prophecy or exposition of Scripture and inspired Hymns to another discerning of Spirits both in seeing into mens spiritual thoughts and intentions and also in discerning who wrought true Miracles and who Satanical Delusions who were divinely inspired and who were mere Pretenders to another the ecstatick gift of speaking divers kinds of tongues in such rapturous transports as permitted them not to stay to interpret what they said and made them afterwards forget it to another the gift of interpreting into the vulgar language of any in the Congregation those strange tongues But all these diversities of gifts worketh that one and the self same Spirit dividing all these different gifts to every man severally as he will 1 Cor. 12.4 8 9 10 11. And seeing it is the same Spirit or Holy Ghost which is the Authour and Giver of them all therefore are they all indifferently called by either name For sometimes all these extraordinary gifts both the power of miracles and the gift of tongues and prophecy are called the Spirit Thus when the Apostles began to speak with tongues and to prophesie as well as to work miracles and heal diseases it is said that the Spirit was poured out upon them Acts 2.17 18 19 and all these varieties of gifts oâ— one sort or other which are reckoned up by S t Paul in this twelfth Chapter to the Corinthians are attributed to the Spirit and said to be wrought by it and the Apostles being filled with the Holy Ghost and speaking with tongues is called their speaking by the spirit they were all filled with the Holy Ghost says S t Luke and began to speak as the Spirit gave them utterance Acts 2.4 And in like manner at other times all these same powers whether of understanding or action of tongues or miracles are called the Holy Ghost Thus the gifts of signs and wonders and divers miracles are reckoned among the gifts of the Holy Ghost Heb. God says Saint Paul bearing the Apostles witness with signs and wonders and divers miracles and other gifts of the Holy Ghost ver 4. And the signs and wonders which were done by the hands of the Apostles particularly that of healing the lame man so much taken notice of Acts 3 is said to be the witness of the Holy Ghost Acts 5.12 32. Thus I say by reason that all these extraordinary gifts whether relating to our minds in knowledge and speaking with tongues or to our executive powers in healing diseases and working miracles proceed all from the self same Holy Ghost or Holy Spirit the gifts of either sort are called
utterly unpardonable and hopeless For our Lord himself in this very Chapter encourages their hopes by giving them a promise that some further means should still be used to cure their Infidelity after that they had blasphemed this telling these very men that the sign of his Death and Resurrection with the other evidences of the Holy Ghost which were to ensue upon it should be a further argument to satisfie them in what they inquired after viz. his being the Messiah or the Son of God For when certain of the Pharisees presently upon his finishing this Discourse of their Blaspheming of the Holy Spirit v. 37 made Answer to him saying Master we would see a sign from thee to confirm to us the truth of that pretension he answered as S t Matthew goes on an evil and an Adulterous Generation seeketh a sign and there shall no further sign be given it but only the sign of the Prophet Jonas and that indeed shall For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the Whales Belly and was afterwards deliver'd out of it to go and preach to the Ninevites so shall the son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth and after that rise again to preach by his Apostles to you and all the world sending to you for a further evidence still the Holy Ghost v. 38 39 40. So that as for this blasphemy of the spirit wherewith the Pharisees reviled it it was not utterly unpardonable but was still within the possibility of pardon For after they had committed it Christ promised them a further Argument in his Resurrection after the Example of Jonas which should be a new sign added to all that they had already seen to gain them over to faith or belief and thereby to pardon and forgiveness every sin being pardonable to him that believeth And this pardonableness of blaspheming of the spirit our Lord further intimates in that very place by a wary change of the phrase when he comes to speak of the unpardonableness of it calling the unpardonable blasphemy not a blasphemy against the spirit although it was the spirit which was indeed blasphemed v. 24 and whereof he had just made mention v. 28 but a blasphemy against the Holy Ghost which being as S t John says not yet given could not yet be blasphemed v. 31 32. But Thirdly The desperate and unpardonable sin here mentioned which shall never be forgiven neither in this world nor in that which is to come is a sin against the last and greatest evidence of all viz. the gift of tongues of prophecy and of other things called the Holy Ghost In all the other evidence that came before to win men to a belief of Christ's Religion which is the only means of pardon to the World God had still a reserve and resolved upon some further course if they proved ineffectual If the testimony of John Baptist to Christ's being the Lamb of God if the message of an Angel at his conception the Star at his birth and the Quire of Angels at his entrance into the World if the innocency of his life the wisdom of his words and the mightiness of his wonders in commanding the winds and seas in curing diseases in casting out Devils in restoring the weak to strength and the dead to life if all these prove unsuccessful and unable to perswade an Infidel and perverse Generation yet still God resolves to try one means more which before that time the World never saw nor heard of and that is the ample and most full effusion of the Holy Ghost upon the Apostles at Pentecost and upon others at the imposition of their hands for a long time after This further evidence shall still be given to subdue the stubbornness of mens unbelief which had proved too hard for all the former When I am departed from you says our Saviour to his Apostles I will send the Holy Ghost who is the Comforter or Advocate unto you And when he is come he shall plead my Cause more convincingly than the operations of the Spirit have done hitherto For he shall reprove and convince the world and those who remained Infidels after they had seen all the evidence of the Spirit of their own sin in not believing on me and of my righteousness and truth in saying I am the Messiah because he shall shew that I am owned above and am gone to my Father whence I have sent him down so plentifully upon you John 16.8 9 10. But when once God had given this proof he had done all that he designed for this is the last remedy which he had decreed to make use of to cure the infidelity of an unbelieving Age. So that if men shall use it as they have done all that went before and if instead of being perswaded by it they shall proceed not only to sleight and despise but what is more to revile and blaspheme it as they have already done with the Spirit then is the irreversible Decree gone out against them and God is unalterably resolved to strive no more with them but to let them dye in their unbelief If they should be won by it indeed and believe upon it be their former offences what they will no less than a blaspheming of the Spirit yet may they justly expect to be pardoned For the offer of Grace is universal Whosoever believes and is baptized shall be saved Mark 16.16 and nothing is impossible to him that believeth Mark 9.23 But when once men have gone so far as to be guilty of it their sin is unpardonable because their Faith is impossible For they have rejected all the evidence which any man can urge for their conviction seeing they have despised all that which God has offered Their infidelity is stronger than can be cured by any Argument that Christ either has or will afford to prevail over it so that they must dye in their sin and there is no hope for them Indeed if God so please there is no question but that after they have once blasphemed it he can still so melt and soften fashion and prepare their minds that afterwards they shall hearken to the incomparable evidence of the Spirit and the Holy Ghost which to any honest mind are irresistible But this sin is of so provoking a nature that when once they are guilty of it he will not He has past an irreversible Decree upon them never more to meddle with them so that they never will be pardoned because as things stand they never will be reclaimed Which is the very reason which the Apostle himself gives of the desperate state of Apostate Christians For by renouncing of that faith which upon the evidence both of the spirit and the Holy Ghost they had been before convinced of they despite says he the Spirit of Grace as it implies both the Spirit and the Holy Ghost too so that as for them it is impossible to renew them again unto
at the beginning and for some time yet after he had laboured long under his affliction he breaks out at last in the discomposure of his soul into these repining thoughts and distrustful expostulations Will the Lord cast off for ever and will he be favourable no more Is his mercy clean gone for ever and doth his promise fail for evermore Hath God forgotten to be gracious and hath he in anger shut up his tender mercies Psal. 77.7 8 9. But when once he had got liberty to recollect his thoughts and to recover again his former guard he doth not any longer give way to these distrustful surmises but immediately suppresses and corrects them Then I said as he goes on this is mine own infirmity v. 10 3. A third innocent Cause of inconsideration in our Actions is the discomposure and disturbance of our thinking powers which should consider of them Our souls as I said are united to our bodies and make use of their powers in their most spiritual actions of Knowledge and Apprehension And therefore upon any ruffling discomposure in our bodily spirits our thoughts are ruffled and discomposed likewise They see nothing clearly at such times nor have any distinct notices of things but are blunder'd and confused even as our bodily powers themselves are Now that which thus discomposes our bodily spirits so as that our souls can see and consider of nothing through their disorder is either strong Drink or a strong Passion For so much is all exercise of reason and consideration disturbed and hindred by these that of men in drink or in a high passion it is usually said that they are not themselves and that they have not their wits about them But although either Wine or any violent passion are sufficient causes of disturbance in our spirits and of discomposure in our thinking powers which unfit us to consider of what we do during such time as we are disturbed by them yet are not both of them innocent and able to excuse those inconsiderate slips which we commit by reason of them For drunkenness is always our own fault and if we sin unadvisedly through its discomposure we shall certainly suffer punishment because that is a discomposure of our own seeking As for our passions indeed they are causes of ambiguous quality For sometimes they grow strong in us by our own fault Either we feed them or we indulge them we suggest such things to them as will foment them or we permit them to grow unruly of themselves without checking and repressing of them as we might and should were we so minded And when our passions are thus indulged and the violence of them is of our own chusing they are themselves our sin and so cannot plead our excuse and vindication But then at other times they are forced upon us by the power and suddenness of outward objects whether we will or no. For we hate them and are afraid of them and if we were aware we would stand upon our guard and call in against them all the Aids of Reason and Religion to preserve us from being too much disturbed by them But God's Providence casts them upon us on the sudden so that we do not see them before they come nor can consider aforehand to prevent and avoid them And when once they are come by their very natural force in disturbing of our Spirits they take away from us all power of consideration So that they are unconsidered in themselves and unconsidered in their effects and therefore they are involuntary all the way And when our passions are made violent this way viz. by being raised in us not by any thing of our own search or indulgence but by the timing of God's Providence and by the suddenness and greatness of outward objects they are pardonable in themselves and will excuse our inconsiderate transgressions Those slips which we incur under them are prepared for pardon because we did not seek nor could avoid them Thus then our innocent Discomposures which unfit us for consideration are those only which are caused in us by strong passions not of our own indulging The passion which begets them must enter against our wills through the greatness and suddenness of outward objects it must be forced upon us suddenly and by surprize and then we cannot refuse it or the discomposure which ensues upon it because we have no time beforehand wherein to consider how to prevent it Now it is not every passion which the power of outward objects can force upon us on such a sudden For love desire and all those passions which have good for their object are more under our own Command and spring up in us more gradually They arrive not to such a discomposing pitch in a moment but they require more time and go on more leisurely and in all the intermedial steps they are subject to our own power so that we may arrest them if we please before they have got so far And therefore all the inconsideration which they effect in us is more or less wilful and a matter of our own choice because it proceeds from our own permission and indulgence But then as for other passions of grief anger and fear especially which have evil for their object if the opportunity be sudden and the object great enough they may be raised in us to such a degree as to amaze and confound us in a moment A man may be in such a fright upon the sudden as not to know what he doth as we see by daily experience and the case is the same in the others likewise And the reason of this difference between these passions and the former is this because the suffering of evil is far more repugnant to self-preservation and self-love which are the fundamental principle of all our passions than the absence of good For if we sit without that good which would move our love and desire we are still where we were but if we fall under that evil which excites our fear we are made miserable and much the worse that is only a denial of a farther delight but this is a real deprivation and a step towards destruction And since our self-love and self-preservation are so much more nearly concerned in the suffering of evil than in the absence of good our passions which are only their several aspects and expressions must needs be more quick and violent in that than they are in this and the discomposure upon them will be so likewise This difference there is betwixt our inconsiderateness upon the violent fears of evil and upon our violent desires and pursuit of good Which is observed by our Saviour in an instance where both were criminal in which notwithstanding the discomposure upon the fears of evil being fit to plead the more excuse made the transgression that ensued upon it to be a lesser sin For both the Jews and Pilate concurred in the grievous sin of shedding innocent blood when they crucified and murthered him