wrought out to us by the Scripture and its Ordinances Faith which is our Shield and Hope which is our Helmet they neither of them act without the warrant and encouragement of it and whereas other parts of the Armour are defensive this of the Scripture is compared to the Sword which not only defends but also offends and beats back the Enemy If the matter be seriously considered all these parts of Armour are but these two the Graces of the Spirit Faith Hope Patience in their sincere exercise and the word of Scripture as the Instrument by and in which they shew their Operations so that all this Armour being put to use in every particular Temptation it amounts to no more than this we are speaking of viz. That sinful Motions are to be rejected by a believing sincerely resolute opposing of them with Arguments from the Word of God Thirdly Scripture as it is the Word and Command of the great King of Heaven hath a dâ—â—nting and commanding Authority over the Consciences of Men. Where the Word of a King is there is Power Eccles 8. 4. and such is the Majesty of a Divine Law that it hath Power over the Consciences of those that are yet in their Sins and can wound affright constrain and bind even the Rebellious so that so long as they retain any of their Natural Impressions of a Divine Power they have some awe for his Commands which may be seen and argued where it would be least expected from the enragement of the Hearts of Sinners when Sin by the Commandment accidentally becomes exceeding sinful For as that outragious fierceness doth arise from the contrariety that is betwixt a Carnal Heart and a Spiritual Law so that contrariety would never work if the Authority of that Law having a Power to restrain and give check to the corruption of the Heart were not some way owned by the Conscience for where no countermanding Law is owned there can be no irritating provoking restraint This it can do to the vilest of Men but of how much more Power may we imagine the Word to be with good Men whose Hearts tremble at the Word when they bind the Law upon their Heart and charge their Consciences with it 't is surely quick and powerful sharper than a two edged Sword nor doth it only by unlovely affrightments terrify them from Sin but by commanding Duty make the Heart in love with it so that it becomes a delightful satisfaction to be preserved from the Snare Fourthly There is no Argument that can be used against Temptations that can be more afflictively discouraging to Satan Satan as bad as he is cannot but believe those Truths which he knows and he knows that there are many Truths in Scripture which respect him as threatnings of Punishment and Divine Vengeance he believes these things and trembles Jam. 2. 19. His unavoidable knowledg or remembrance of these things begets horrour in him he cannot but be under a dread of these Truths What can be supposed so to wound him as the bringing these things to memory by urging the Command of God against him Dr. Arrowsmith gives two instances of this kind the one of Christopher Haas in Sweedland from the Epistle Dedicatory to the 5 tomes of Brentius's works The other of Daniel Cramer Rector of a School at Stetin in Germany on both which the Devil made a bold attempt in a personal Appearance from the first demanding a Catalogue of his Sins in Writing from the other demanding a Paper in which one of the Students had obliged himself to Satan's Service they both referred him to that Text of Gen. 3. 15. The Seed of the Woman shall bruise the Head of the Serpent And this was retorted upon him with such a strong exercise of Faith that he presently desisted the suit and vanished Fifthly This Weapon cannot easily be wrested out of our hands When we urge a Divine Prohibition against a Temptation what can he say in Answer he cannot deny it to be the Word of God or to be true or that we are not obliged to it he made none of these returns to Christ but by his silence owned that it was God's Holy Command obliging us to Duty Neither dares he stand upon these exceptions to us except he find our Faith inclined to waver or our minds weak and wounded by inward troubles of Spirit and when he puts on a boldness to deny Scripture to be the Word of God or that it signifies God's real intendments in his threatning for by begetting unbelief of the Truth of Scripture and by suggesting hopes of escape and pardon notwithstanding the violation of the Commands of it the wrests when he doth prevail this Weapon out of our hands yet he is forced to fetch a compass and by many previous insinuations to make his way to these atheistical assertions Thus he did with Eve first finding her a little inclinaable he dropt in privily something that might argue the Improbability of the threatned Penalty and then at last positively denyed it But now if we hold to this that the Command is true and holy and just and good he cannot wrest our plea from us Sixthly Nothing doth more undermine Temptations by rendring the reasons and motives thereof vain and empty than doth the contrary commands of Scripture Temptation hath always some inticement of pleasure or profit and these only seem to be taking or reasonable while we consider not the Word of God as rotten wood or Fish shine only in the dark but when we are urged with sinful pleasures how mean base dangerous and unlovely be they when the command to the contrary gives information that they are snares and lead to Death or the provocation of the Almighty Seventhly While we resist with Scripture-Arguments we engage God whose Command we would stand by to go down to the Battel with us we lay hold upon his strength and put obligations upon him to take us out of the snare and to deliver us from him who is too strong for us Fourthly It remains that in a word I shew how the Commands or Arguments of Scripture are to be used in resisting Satan which is thus When you have any sinful thought cast into your mind presently reject the offer by charging your heart with duty from some opposite command As if you be urged to acts of Uncleanness presently refuse thus No I must not God hath commanded the contrary he hath said thou shalt not commit Adultery If a covetous thought arise reject it with this God hath said thou shalt not Covet If you be tempted to please the Flesh and follow vain delights answer it with this If ye live after the Flesh ye shall die and the like must be done in other Temptations Some may perhaps think that this is easy work and quickly done and that it seems to attribute a Virtue and Power to the words of Scripture as if Satan were charmed by the language or phrase However
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
pretence that Satan hath for this dealing is raised from some passages of the New Testament wherein many things of the Old Testament are said to have had a Mystical signification of things expressed or transacted then and some things are expresly called Allegories Hence Papists determine the Scripture to have besides the Grammatical Sence which all of us do own and besides the Tropological sence which is not divers or distinct from the Grammatical as when from Histories we deduce instructions of holy and sober carriage an Allegorical and Analogical sense in which dealing men consider not that the Spirit of God his interpreting a passage or two allegorically will never justify any Mans boldness in presuming to do the like to any other passage of Scripture and beside when any hath tryed his skill that way another may with equal probability carry the same Scripture to a different interpretation and by this means the Scripture shall not only become obscure but altogether uncertain and doubtful and unable to prove any thing so that this doth extreamly dishonour Scripture by making it little less than ridiculous Porphyry and Julian made themselves sport with it upon the occasion of Origens allegorizing and no wonder seeing that humour as one calls it is no better than a learned Foolery Notwithstanding this Men are sometime transported with a strange delight in turning all into Allegories and picking Mysteries out of some by-passages and circumstances of Scripture where one would least expect them which I can ascribe to no second cause more than to the working and power of Fancy which as it can frame Ideas and Images of things out of that that affords no real likeness or proportion as Men that create to themselves Similitudes and Pictures in the Clouds or in the Fire so doth it please it self in its own work and with a kind of natural affection it doth kiss and hug its own Baby It hath been my wonder sometimes to see how fond Men have been of their own Fancies and how extreamly they have doted upon a very bauble I might note you examples of this even to nauseousness in all Studies as well as in this of Religion Those that affect the sublimities of Chymistry do usually by a strange boldness stretch all the sacred Mysteries of Scripture as of the Trinity of Regeneration c. to represent their Secrets and Processes as may be seen sufficiently in their Writings One of them I cannot forbare to name and that is Glauber who doth so please himself with some idle whims about Sal and Sol that at last he falls in with Bernardinus Gomesius whom he cites and approves who in this one word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies Salt finds the Trinity the Generation of the Son the two natures of Christ the calling of the Jews and Gentiles the procession of the Spirit and the communications of the Spirit in the Law and Gospel and all this he gathers from the shapes stroaks and positions of these three Letters a very subtile invention Not unlike to this were some of the dotages of the Jewish Cabala which they gathered from the different writing of some Letters in the sacred Text from the transposing of them and from their Mystical Arithmetick R. Elias from the letter Aleph mentioned six times in Gen. 1. 1. collected his Notion of the Worlds continuance for 6000 years because that letter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 stands for a thousand in the Hebrew computation Another Rabbi mentioned by Lud. Cappellus hath a profound speculation concerning the first letter of Genesis which as he saith doth therefore begin with Beth and not with Aleph to shew the unexceptionable verity of God's Word against which no Mouth can justly open it self and this he gathers from the manner of the pronunciation of that letter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is performed by the closure of the Lips It were not possible to imagine that wise Men should be thus carried away with childish Follies if there were not some kind of inchantment in Fancy which makes the hit of a Conceit though never so silly intoxicate them into an apprehension of a rare Discovery And doubtless this is the very thing that doth so transport the Allegorizers and Inventers of Mysteries that they are ravished either with the discovery of a New-nothing or with the rare invention of an Aenigmatical Interpretation Thirdly The Devil hath yet another way of coining Mysteries and that is a pretence of a more full discovery of Notions and Ways which as he tells those that are willing to believe him are but glanced at in the Scripture and this doth not only contain his boast of unfolding Prophecies and the dangerous applications of them to Times and Places that are no way concerned which hath more than once put Men upon dangerous undertakings but also his large promise of teaching the Way of the Lord more perfectly and of leading Men into a full comprehension of those tremendous Mysteries wherein the Scripture hath as industriously concealed the Reasons Way and Manner of their Being as it hath fully asserted that they are such are the Decrees of God the Trinity c. as also of unfolding and teaching at large those things that the Scripture seems only to hint at In all which points we have instances enough at hand which will shew us how the Devil hath played his Game either by making Men bold in things not revealed or by drawing Men to dislike solid Truths and by puffing them up with notions till at last they were prepared for the impression of some grand Delusion All this while I have only explained the first head of Satan's specious pretences which consists in the promise of Discoveries and Mysteries The next head of pretences are those that relate to the persons inamoured with these supposed Mysteries With these he strokes their heads and causeth them to hug themselves in a Dream of an imaginary happiness For if they have the knowledg of Mysteries which are locked up from other Men they cannot avoid this Conclusion That they are the only Favourites of Heaven that they only have the Spirit are only taught of God c. Such swelling words of vanity have ever accompanied Delusion And indeed we shall find the confidence of such Men more strong and their false embracements more rapturous than ordinarily the ways of Truth do afford upon this account that in such cases Fancy is elevated and the delights of a raised Fancy are excessive and Enthusiastical 'T is a kind of Spiritual Frenzy which extends all the Faculties to an extraordinary Activity the Devil doing all he can to further it by his utmost Contributions Joy delight hope love are all raised to make an hubbub in the heart whereas on the contrary Truth is modest humble sober and affords a more silent joy though more even and lasting Here might I set Errour before you in its rant and give you a taste of
Spirit carryes more in it than either Doctrine or Doctor for to call either the one or the other a Spirit would be intollerably harsh if it were not for this that that Doctor is hereby supposed to pretend an infallability from the Spirit of God or which is all one that he received his Doctrine by some immediate Revelation of the Spirit so that by seducing Spirits must be Men or Doctrines that seduce others to believe them by the pretence of the Spirit or Inspiration and that text of 1 Joh. 4. 1. doth thus explain it believe not every Spirit but try the Spirits whether they are of God which is as much as if he had said believe not every Man or Doctrine that shall pretend he is sent of God and hath his Spirit and the reason there given makes it yet more plain because many false Prophets are gone out into the World So that these Spirits are false Prophets Men that pretend inspiration And the warning believe not every Spirit tell us that Satan doth with such a dexterity counterfeit the Spirits Inspirations that holy and good Men are in no small hazard to be deceived thereby Most full to this purpose is that of 2 Thess 2. 2. That ye be not soon shaken in Mind or be troubled neither by Spirit nor by Word nor by Letter as from us as that the day of Christ is at hand where the several means of seduction are particularly reckoned as distinct from the Doctrine and Doctors and by Spirit can be meant no other than a pretence of Inspiration or Revelation 'T is evident then that Satan by this Artifice useth to put a stamp of divine Warrant upon his adulterate Coyn and if we look into his practice we shall in all ages find him at this work Among Heathens he frequently gained a repute to his superstitious Idolatrous worship by this device The Men of greatest note among them feigned a spiritual commerce with the Gods Empedocles endeavoured to make the people believe that there was a kind of Divinity in him and affecting to be esteemed more than a Man cast himself into the burnings of Mongebel that they might suppose him to have been taken up to the Gods Pythagoras his Fiction of a Journey to Hell was upon the same account Philostratus and Cedrenus report no less of Apollonius than that he had familiar converses with their supposed Dieties and the like did they believe of their Magi and Priests insomuch that some cunning Politicians observing how the vulgar were under a deep reverence to such pretences gave it out that they had received their Laws by divine Inspirations Numa Pompilius feigned he received his Institutions from the Nymph Aegeria Lycurgus from Apollo Minos the Law-giver of Candy baosted that Jupiter was his Familiar Mahomet also speaks as high this way as any his Alcoran must be no less than a Law received from God and to that end he pretends a strange Journey to Heaven and frequent converse with the Angel Gabriel If we trace Satan in the Errours which he hath raised up under the profession of the Scriptures we may observe the same method the Valentinians Gnosticks Montanists talked as confidently of the Spirit as Moses or the Prophets could do and a great deal more for some of them blasphemously called themselves the Paraclete or Comforter Among the Monsters which later Ages produced we still find the same strain one saith he is Enoch another stiles himself the great Prophet another hath raptures and all immediately inspired The Papists have as much of this cheat among them as any other and some of their learned Defenders avouch their Lumen Propheticum and Miraculorum Gloria Prophesies and Miracles to be the two eyes or the Sun and Moon of their Church nay by a strange transportment of Folly to the forfeiture of the reputation of Learning and Reason they have so multiplied Revelations that we have whole Volumns of them as the Revelations of their Saint Brigit and others and by wonderful credulity they have not only advanced apparent dreams and dotages to the honour of Inspirations or Visions but upon this sandy Foundation they have built a great many of their Doctrines as Purgatory Transubstantiation auricular Confession c. By such warrants have they instituted Festivals and founded several Orders the particulars of these things you may see more at large in Dr. Stillingfleet and others And that there might be nothing wanting that might make them shamelesly impudent they are not content to equal their Fooleries with the Scriptures of God as that the rule of their St. Francis for I shall only instance in him omitting others for brevity sake was not composed by the Wisdom of Man but by God himself and inspired by the Holy Ghost but they advance their Prophets above the Apostles and above Christ himself Their St. Benedict if you will believe them was rapt up to the third Heavens where he saw God Face to Face and heard the choire of Angels and their St. Francis was a none-such for Miracles and Revelations Neither may we wonder that Satan should be forward in urging this cheat when we consider First What a reverence Men naturally carry to Revelations and how apt they are to be surprised with an hasty credulity An old Prophecy pretended to be found in a Wall or taken out of an old Manuscript of I know now what uncertain Author is usually more doted on than the plain and infallible rules of Scripture this we may observe daily and Forreiners do much blame the English for a facile belief of such things but it is a general fault of mankind and we find even wise Men forward in their perswasions upon meaner grounds than those that gain credit to old Prophecies For their antiquity and strangeness of discovery especially at such times wherein the present posture of Affairs seem to favour such predictions with a probadility of such events are more likely to get credit than these artificial imitations of the Ways and Garbs of the old Prophets and the cunning Legerdemain of those that pretend to Inspirations by seeming Extasies Raptures and confident Declarations c. nevertheless arrant Cheats have by these ways deceived no mean Men. Alvarus acknowledgeth that he honoured a Woman as a Saint that had Visions and Raptures as if really inspired and the same apprehensions had the Bishop and Fryars who was afterward discovered to be a naughty Woman who shall then think it strange that the unobservant Multitude should be deluded by such an Art Secondly Especially if we consider that God himself took this course to signify his mind to Men his Prophets were divinely inspired and the Scriptures were not of any private interpretation the words that the Pen Men of Scriptures wrote were not the interpretations of their own private thoughts for the Prophecy came not in old time by the will of Man but holy Men of God spake as they were moved by the
Holy Ghost 2 Pet. 1. 20 21. Now though the Prophecies of Scripture are sealed and no more is to be added to them upon any pretence whatsoever yet seeing there are Promises left us of the giving of the Spirit of being taught and led by the Spirit it is an easy matter for Satan to beguile Men into an expectation of prophetick inspirations and a belief of what is pretended so to be for all Men do not or will not understand that these promises of the Spirit have no intendment of new and extraordinary immediate Revelations but only of the efficacious applications of what is already revealed in Scripture This kind of Revelation we acknowledg and teach which is far enough from Enthusiasm that is a pretended Revelation of new Truths and we have reason to assert that internal perswasions without the external word are to be avoided as Satan's cozenages But for all this when Mens minds are set a gadding if they meet with such as magnify their own Dreams and call their Fancies Visions the suitableness of this to their humour makes them to reject our interpretations of these Promises as false and to perswade themselves that they are to be understood of such Inspirations as the Prophets of old had and then they presently conclude they are to believe them lest otherwise they should resist the Holy Ghost Thirdly But the advantage which the Devil hath to work Delusion upon by this pretence is an high motive to him to practise upon it For Inspirations Visions Voices Impulses Dreams and Revelations are things wherein wicked Impostors may by many ways and artifices play the counterfeits undiscovered 't is easy to prophesy false Dreams and to say thus saith the Lord when yet they do but lye and the Lord never sent them nor commanded them nay 't is easy by tricks and illusions to put that honour and credit upon their designs which they could not by their bare assertions backed with all their art of seeming seriousness the inventions of Men that have been formerly successful in this deceit being now laid open to our knowledg may make us more wary in our trust Among the Heathens you may find notable ways of deceits of this nature The Story of Hanno and Psappho is commonly known they tamed Birds and learned them to speak Hanno and Psappho are Gods and then set them at liberty that Men hearing such strange voices in the Woods from Birds might imagine that these Men were declared Gods by special discovery Mahomets device of making a Dove to come frequently to his Ear which he did by training her up to an use of picking Corn out of it served him for an evidence among the vulgar beholders who knew not the true cause of it of his immediate Inspiration by the Angel Gabriel who as he told them whispered in his ear in the shape of a Dove The like knavery he practised for the confirmation of the truth of his Alcoran by making a Bull taught before to come at a call or sign to come to him with a Chapiter upon his Horns Hector Boetius tells us of a like stratagem of a King of Scots who to animate his fainting Subjects against the Picts that had beaten them caused a Man clothed in the shining skin of Fishes and with rotten Wood which as a Glow-worm in the Night represents a faint Light to come among them in the dark and through a Reed or hollow Trunk that the Voice might not appear to be humane to incite them to a vigorous onset this they took to be an Angel bringing them this command from Heaven and accordingly fought and prevailed Crafty Benedict who was afterward Pope under the name of Boniface the eighth made simple Celestine the fifth give over the Popedom by conveying to him a Voice through a Reed to this purpose Celestine Celestine renounce the Papacy give it over if thou wouldst be saved the burthen is beyond thy Strength c. The silly Man taking this for a Revelation from Heaven quitted his Chair and left it for that crafty Fox Benedict Not very many years since the same trick was played in this Country to a Man of Revelations who called himself David in Spirit when he had wearied his Entertainer with a long stay he quitted himself of his Company as I was credibly informed by a Policy which he perceived would well suit with the Man's conceitedness for through a Reed in the night time he tells him that he must go into Wales or some such Country and there preach the Gospel the next Morning the Man avouches a Revelation from God to go elsewhere and so departs These instances shew you how cunningly a cheating knave may carry on a pretence of Revelation or Vision And yet this is not all the advantage which the Devil hath in this matter though it is an advantage which he sometime makes use of when he is fitted with suitable Instruments But he works most dangerously when he so acts upon Men that they themselves believe they have Visions Raptures and Revelations for some are really perswaded that it is so with them Neither is it strange that Men should be deluded into an apprehension that they hear and see what they do not in Feavers Frenzies and Madness we clearly see it to be so and who can convince such Persons of their mistakes when with as high a confidence as may be they contend that they are not deceived Shall we think it strange that Satan hath ways of conveying false apprehensions upon Mens minds no surely do we not see that the Senses may be cheated and that the Fancies of Men may be corrupted is it not easy for him to convey Voices to the Ear or shapes and representations to the Eye and in such cases what can ordinarily hinder a belief that they hear or see such things but he needs not always work upon the Fancy by the Senses If he hath the advantage of a crazy distempered Fancy as commonly he hath in Melancholly Persons he can so strongly fix his suggestions upon them and so effectually set the Fancy on work to embrace them that without any appearance of Madness they will perswade themselves that they have discoveries from God Impulses by his Spirit Scriptures set upon their Hearts and what not and because they feel the workings of these things within them it is impossible to make them so much as suspect that they are deceived Do but consider the power of any Fancy in a Melancholick Person and you may easily apprehend how Satan works in such delusions Melancholy doth strangely pervert the imagination and will beget in Men wonderful misapprehensions and that sometimes doth bewitch them into peremptory uncontroulable belief of their Fancy 't is a vehement confident humour what way soever it takes the imagination thus corrupted hath an enormous strength so that if it fix upon things never so absurd or irrational 't is not reducible by the strongest reasons If such
vexation yet we might justly on that single account call him the troubler of the Spirits of Men considering that naturally the thoughts of Men are restless and their imaginations ever rowling If Men sequester themselves from all business if they shut themselves up from commerce with Men turn Eremites as Jerom did on purpose to avoid disquiet yet their thoughts would hurry them from place to place sometimes to the Court sometimes to the Market sometimes to Shews and Pastimes sometimes to quarrellings sometimes they view Fields Buildings and Countries sometimes they fancy Dignities Promotions and Honours they are ever working upon one object or other real or supposed and according to the object such will the affections be high or low joyful or sorrowful so that if the utmost of what Satan could do were no more than to provide occasions discomposures would follow naturally The evil dispositions of Men would thereby be set a working though Satan stood by as an Idle Spectator The Serpent in our Breasts as Solomon tells us Eccles 10. 11. would bite without inchantment that is except it were charmed But Satan can do more than tempt objectively when he hath provided the Fewel he can also bring Fire For 2. He can also set our passions on work and incense them to greater fury than otherwise they would arrive at We see persons that are distempered with passion may be whetted up to an higher pitch of rage by any officious Flatterer that will indulge the humor and aggravate the Provocation Much more then can Satan do it by whispering such things to our Minds as he knows will increase the Flame and therefore is it that where the Scripture doth caution us against anger as the proper product of our own corruption calling it our wrath Eph. 4. 26 27. There also it warns us against the Devil as the incendiary that endeavours to heighten it And where it tells us of the disorders of the tongue which though a little Member can of it self do great mischief Jam. 3. 6. there it also tells us that the Devil brings it an additional Fire from Hell It is set on Fire of Hell And there are several ways by which Satan can irritate the Passions As 1. By presenting the occasions worse than they are or were ever intended unjustly aggravating all circumstances By this means he makes the object of the passions the more displeasing and hateful this must of necessity provoke to an higher degree 2. He can in a natural way move as it were the Wheels and set the passions a going if they were of themselves more dull and sluggish for he hath a nearer access to our Passions than every one is aware of I will make it evident thus our Passions in their workings do depend upon the fluctuations excursions and recursions of the Blood and animal Spirits as Naturalists do determines Now that Satan can make his approaches to the Blood Spirits and Humors and can make alterations upon them cannot be denied by those that consider what the Scripture speaks in Jobs case and in the cases of those that were by possession of the Devil made Dumb Deaf or Epileptick for if he could afflict Job with grievous Boils 't is plain he disordered and vitiated his Blood and Humors which made them apt to produce such Boils or Ulcers and if he could produce an Epilepsy 't is evident that he could infect the Lympha with such a sharpness as by vellicating the Nerves might cause a Convulsion and these were much more than the disorderly Motions of Blood Spirits or Humors which raise the passions of Men. If any object to this That then considering Satan's malicious diligence we must expect the Passions of Men would never be at rest 'T is answered that this power of Satan is not unlimited but oft God prohibits him such approaches and without his leave he can do nothing and also grace in God's Children working calmness submission and patience doth ballance Satan's contrary endeavour For as hurtful and vexatious occasions being represented by the Sence to the imagination are apt to move the Blood and Spirits so on the contrary the Ballast of Patience and other Grace doth so settle the Mind that the Blood and Spirits are kept steady in their usual course 3. When the Passions are up Satan can by his suggestions make them more hâ—ady and violent He can suggest to the Mind Motives and Arguments to forward it and can stir up our natural corruption with all its powers to strike in with the opportunity Thus he not only kindles the Fire but blows the Flame 4. And he can further fix the Mind upon these thoughts and keep them still upon the Hearts of Men. And then they eat in the deeper and like Poyson diffuse their malignity the further We see that Men who are at first but in an ordinary fret if they continue to meditate upon their Provocation they increase their vexation and if they give themselves to vent their Passions by their Tongues though they begin in some moderation yet as motion causeth heat so their own words whet their rage according to Eccles 10. 13. The beginning of the words of his Mouth is foolishness but the latter end of his talk is mischievous madness The same advantage hath Satan against Men by holding down their thoughts to these occasions of discomposure If occasions be so much in Satan's power and he have also so great an hand over Mens Passions 't is too evident that he can do very much to discompose the Spirits of Men that are naturally obnoxious to these troubles except God restrain him and Grace oppose him Thus have I spoken my thoughts of the first sort of troubles by which Satan doth undermine the peace of Mens Hearts CHAP. VII Of the second way to hinder Peace Affrightments the general Nature and Burthen of them in several Particulars What are the Ways by which he affrights 1. Atheistical Injections Observations of his proceeding in them 2. Blasphemous Thoughts 3. Affrightful Suggestions of Râ—probation Observations of his proceedings in that course 4. Frightful Motions to Sâ—n. 5. Strong immediate impressions of Fear 6. Affrightful scrupulosity of Conscience THe next rank of troubles by which the Devil doth endeavour to molest us I call Affrightments It is usual for those that speak of Temptations to distinguish them thus Some are say they Enticements some are Affrightments but then they extend these Affrightments further than I intend comprehending under them all those Temptations of sadness and terror of which I am next to speak but by Affrightments I mean only these perplexities of Spirit into which Satan casts Men by overacting their fears or astonishing their minds by injecting unusual and horrid thoughts against their consents Some there are that have thought those Temptations of which the Apostle complains 2 Cor. 12. 7. there was given me a Thorn in the Flesh the Messenger of Satan to buffet me were of this kind
truculent temper whose power being put forth from such an implacable malice must needs become rage and fierceness Fourthly His Diligence which together with his Cruelty are consequences of his Malice and Power he goes about and seeks he is restless in his pursuit and diligent as one that promiseth himself a satisfaction or joyful contentment in his Conquests CHAP. II. Of the Malice of Satan in particular The Grounds and Causes of that Malice The Greatness of it proved and Instances of that Greatness given I Shall first give some account of his Malice by which it shall appear we do not wrong the Devil in calling him malicious the truth of which Charge will evidence it self in the following particulars First The Devil though a Spirit yet is a proper Subject of Sin We need no other evidence for this than what doth by daily experience result from our selves we have sins which our Spirits and Hearts do act that relate not to the Body called a filthiness of the Spirit in contradistinction to the filthiness of the Flesh 'T is true it cannot be denyed but that those Iniquities which have a necessary dependance upon the Organs of the Body as Drunkenness Fornication c. cannot properly as to the formality of the Act be laid at Satan's door though as a tempter and provoker of these in Men he may be called the Father of these sins yet the forementioned Iniquities which are of a Spiritual Nature are properly and formally committed by him as Lying Pride Hatred and Malice And this distinction Christ himself doth hint Joh. 8. 44. When he speaketh a Lye he speaketh of his own where he asserts such spiritual Sins to be properly and formally acted by himself The certainty of all appears in the Epithites given him the wicked One the unclean Spirit as also those places that speak his fall They kept not their first Estate Jude 6. The Angels that sinned 2 Pet. 2. 4. If sins Spiritual are in a true and proper sense attributed to the Devil then also may Malice be attributed to him Secondly The wickedness of Satan is capable of increase a magis minus though he be a wicked Spirit and as to inclination full of wickedness though so strongly inclined that he cannot but sin and therefore as God is set forth to us as the Fountain of Holiness so is Satan called the Author and Father of Sin Yet seeing we cannot ascribe an infiniteness to him we must admit that as to acts of Sin at least he may be more or less sinful and that the wickedness of his heart may be more drawn out by Occasion Motives and Provocations besides we are expresly taught thus much Rev. 12. 12. The Devil is come down having great wrath because his time is short where we note 1. that his wrath is called great implying greater than at other times 2. That External Motives and Incentives as the shortness of his time prevail with him to draw forth greater acts of fury Thirdly Whatsoever Occasions do draw out or kindle malice to a rage Satan hath met with them in an eminent degree in his own fall and Man's happiness Nothing is more proper to beget malice than hurts or punishments degradations from happiness Satan's Curse though just fills him with rage and fretting against God when he considers that from the state and dignity of a blessed Angel he is cast down to darkness and to the basest condition imaginable for the part of his Curse which concerned Satan as well as the Serpent Vpon thy belly shalt thou go and dust shall be thy Meat implies a state most base as the use of the phrase proves they shall lick the dust of thy feet Thine enemies shall lick the dust Psal 72. 9. They shall lick the dust as a Serpent Mich. 7. 17. Where the Spirit is so wicked that it cannot accept the punishment of its iniquity All punishment is as a poyson and invenoms the heart with a rage against the hand that afflicted it thus doth Satan's fall enrage him and the more when he sees Man enstated into a possibility of enjoying what he hath lost The envy and pride of his heart boils up to a madness for that is the only use that the wretchedly miserable can make of the sight of that happiness which they enjoy not especially if having once enjoyed it they are now deprived this begot the rage and wrath in Cain against Abel and afterward his Murther The eye of the wicked is evil where God is good Hence may it be concluded that Satan being a wicked Spirit and this wickedness being capable of acting higher or lower according to occasions and with a suitableness thereto cannot but shew an unconceiveable malice against us our happiness and his misery being such proper occasions for the wickedness of his heart to work upon Fourthly This Malice in Satan must be great First If we consider the greatness of his wickedness in so great and total an Apostacy He is so filled with iniquity that we can expect no small matters from him as to the workings of such cursed Principles not only is he wicked but the spirit and extract of wickedness as the phrase signifies Ephes 6. 12. Secondly The Scripture lays to his charge all Degrees Acts and Branches of Malice As 1. Anger in the impetuous hast and violence of it Rev. 12. great wrath 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 there signifies Excandescentia the Inflammation of the Heart and whole Man which is violent in its motion as when the Blood with a violent stream rusheth through the Heart and sets all Spirits on fire and therefore this Wrath is not only called great but is also signified to be so in its threatning a wo to the Inhabitants of the Earth 2. Indignation is more than Anger as having more of a fixed fury and this is applyed to him Ephes 4. 27. in that those that have this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are said to give place to the Devil which is true not only in point of temptation but also in respect of the resemblance they carry to the frame and temper of Satan's furious heart 3. Hatred is yet higher than Wrath or Indignation as having deeper roots a more confirmed and implacable resolution Anger and Indignation are but short Furies which like a Land Flood are soon down though they are apt to fill the Banks on a sudden but Hatred is lasting and this is so properly the Devil's disposition that Cain in hating his Brother is 1 John 3. 12. said to be the proper Off-spring and lively Picture of that wicked One who is there so called rather than by the name of the Devil because the Apostle would also insinuate that hatred is the Master-piece of Satan's wickedness and that which gives the fullest Character of him 4. All Effects of his cruelty arise from this Root this makes him accuse and calumniate this puts him upon breathing after those murthers and destructions which damned
did it will argue much for his Power if we can imagine as some do that they turned their Rods into real Serpents the Power is evident and there is this that favours that Opinion it is said They could not make Lice which seems to imply they really did the other things and it had been as easy to delude the Senses in the matter of Lice as in the Rods if it had been no more than a Delusion neither are some a-wanting to give a reason of such a Power viz. Serpents Lice c. being the Off-spring of Putrefaction by his dextrous application of the seminal Principles of things he might quickly produce them If we go lower and take up with the Opinion of those that think that they were neither meer Delusions nor yet true Serpents but real Bodies like Serpents though without life this will argue a very great Power Or if we suppose as some do that Satan took away the Rods and secretly conveyed Serpents in their stead or which is the lowest apprehension we can have that Pharaoh's sight was deceived The matter is still far from being contemptible for as much as we see the Spectators were not able to discern the Cheat. Thirdly The next Instance produceable for evidencing his Power is that of Apparitions It cannot be denyed but that the Fancy of melancholick or timerous Persons is fruitful enough to create a thousand Bugbears And also that the villany of some Persons hath been designedly imployed to deceive People with Mock-Apparitions of which abundance of Instances might be given from the knavery of the Papists discovered to the World beyond contradiction but all this will not conclude that there are no real Appearances of Spirit or Devils Such sad effects in all Ages there have been of these things that most Men will take it for an undenyable Truth Instead of others let the Apparition at Endor to Saul come to examination Some indeed will have us believe that all that was but a subtil Cheat managed by that Old Woman and that neither Samuel nor the Devil did appear but that the Woman in another Room by her self or with a Confederate gave the answer to Saul But whosoever shall read that Story and shall consider Saul's Bowing and Discourse and the Answers given must acknowledg that Saul thought at least he saw and spake with Samuel and indeed the whole Transaction is such that such a Cheat cannot be supposed Satisfying our selves then that there was an Apparition we must next enquire whether it was true Samuel or Satan it cannot be denyed but that many judg it was true Samuel but their Reasons are weak 1. That Proof from Ecclesiasticus 46. 23. is not Canonical with us 2. That he was called Samuel is of no force Scripture often gives names of things according to their appearances 3. That things future were foretold was but from conjecture in which Satan yet all things considered had good ground for his guessing 4. That the Name Jehovah is oft repeated signifies nothing the Devil is not so scarce of words Jesus I know saith that Spirit in the Acts. 5. That he reproved Sin in Saul is no more than what the Devil doth daily to afflicted Consciences in order to despair I must go then with those that believe this was Satan in Samuel's likeness 1. Because God refused to answer Saul by Prophets or Vrim And 't is too harsh to think he would send Samuel from the Dead and so answer him in an extraordinary way 2. This if it had been Samuel would have given too much countenance to Witchcraft contrary to that check to Ahaziah 2 King 1. 3. Is it not because there is not a God in Israel that ye go to enquire of Baalzebub 3. The prediction of Sauls Death though true for substance yet failed as to the exactness of time for the Battel was not fought the next day 4. The acknowledgment of the Witches Power Why hast thou disquieted me shews it could not be true Samuel the Power of Witchcraft not being able to reach Souls at rest with God 5. That Expression of Gods ascending out of the Earth is evidently suspicious The reality of Apparitions being thus established Satan's Power will be easily evinced from it To say nothing of the Bodies in which Spirits appear the haunting of Places and Persons and the other Effects done by such Appearances speak abundantly for it Fourthly The last Instance is of Possessions the reality of which can no way be questioned because the New Testament affords so much for it I shall only note some things as concerning this Head As First The multitudes of Men possessed scarce was there any thing in which Christ had more opportunities to shew his Authority than in casting out of Satan such Objects of Compassion he met with in every place Secondly The multitudes of Spirits in one Person is a consideration not to be passed by Thirdly These Persons were often strongly acted sometime with fierceness and rage Matth. 8. 28. some living without Cloaths and without House Luke 8. 27. some by an incredible strength breaking Chains and Fetters Mark 5. 3. Fourthly Some time the Possessed were sadly vexed and afflicted cast into the Fire and Water c. Fifthly Some were strengely influenced we read of one Acts 16. 16. that had a Spirit of Divination and told many things to come which we may suppose frequently came to pass else she could have brought no gain to her Master by South-saying Another we hear of whose Possession was with a Lunacy and had fits at certain times and seasons The Possessed Person with whom Mr. Rothwell discoursed within the memory of some living could play the Critick in the Hebrew Language Sixthly In some the Possession was so strong and so firmly seated that ordinary means and ways could not dispossess them This kind comes not out but by Prayer and Fasting Mat. 27. 21. which shews that all Possession was not of one kind and manner nor alike lyable to ejection To all these may be added Obsessions where the Devil afflicts the Bodies of Men disquiets them haunts them or strikes in with their melancholy temper and so annoys by hideous and black representations Thus was Saul vexed by an evil Spirit from the Lord which as most conceive was the Devil working in his melancholy Humor That the Devil should take possession of the Bodies of Men and thus act drive trouble and distress them so distort distend and rack their Members so seat himself in their Tongues and Minds that a Man cannot command his own Faculties and Powers but seems to be rather changed into the nature of a Devil than to retain any thing of a Man this shews a Power in him to be trembled at Satan's Power being thus explained and proved I shall next speak something of his Cruelty CHAP. VI. Of Satan's Cruelty Instances thereof in his dealing with wounded Spirits in ordinary Temptations of the
10. was by the influence of the evil Spirit and this as Junius Tirinus and others interpret must of necessity be understood of such a kind of action and speaking as the true Prophets of the Lord usually expressed under the Influences of the blessed Spirit for from the likeness of the action in both must the name be borrowed The experience that we have of inward Disputings the bandying of Arguments and Answers in several Cases is a proof of this beyond exception Wounded Consciences express an admirable dexterity in breaking all Arguments urged for their peace and establishment as also in framing Objections against themselves so far above the usual measure of common Capacities that we cannot ascribe it to any other than Satan's private aid this way Fourthly The motion being made if there be need he doth irritate and stir up the mind to the embracement of it and this he doth two ways First By an earnestness of Sollicitation when he urgeth the thing over and over and gives no rest when he joyns with this an importunity of begging and intreating with the repeated motion when he draws together and advantageously doth order a multitude of considerations to that end and when in all this he doth hold down the mind and thoughts and keep them upon a contemplation of the Object Motions and Reasons Thus he provoked David 1 Chron. 21. 1. And this kind of dealing occasioned the Apostle to name his Temptations and our resistance by the name of wrestlings in which usually there appears many endeavours and often repeated to throw down the Antagonist Secondly He doth irritate by a secret power and force that he hath upon our Fancies and Passions When Men are said to be carried and led by Satan it implyes in the judgment of some more than importunity and that though he cannot force the spring of the Will yet he may considerably act upon it by pulling at the Weights and Plummets that is by moving and acting our Imaginations and Affections The motion being thus made notwithstanding all his importunity often finds resistance in which case he comes to the practice of a fourth Rule which is to draw away and entice the heart to consent as 't is expressed Jam. 1. 14. Everyman is tempted when he is drawn away and enticed I shall avoid here the variety of the apprehensions which some declare at large about the meaning of the words satisfying my self with this that the Apostle points at those Artifices of Satan by which he draws and allures the will of Man to a complyance with his motions which when he effects in any degree then may a Man be said to be prevailed upon by the Temptation But then here is the wonder how he should so far prevail against that Reason and Knowledg which God hath placed in Man to fence and guard him against a thing so absurd and unreasonable as every sin is The Solution of this knot we have in 2 Cor. 4. 4. The God of this World blinds the eyes of Men draws a curtain over this Knowledg and raiseth a darkness upon them which darkness though we cannot fully apprehend yet that it is a very great and strange darkness may be discovered 1. Partly by considering the subject of it Man a rational Creature in whom God hath placed a Conscience which is both a Law and Witness and Judge It cannot be supposed an easie matter to cloud or obliterate that Law to silence or pervert that Witness or to corrupt that Judge but it will rise higher in the wonder of it if we consider this in a godly Man one that sets God before him and is wont to have his fear in his heart such a man as David was that in so plain a case in so high a manner so long a time with so little sense and apprehension of the evil and danger Satan should so quickly prevail 't is an astonishment neither will it be less strange if we consider 2. The issue and effect of this blindness Some rise up against this Law of Conscience arguing it false and erronious and making conclusions directly contrary as Deut. 29. 19. I shall have peace though I walk on in the imaginations of my heart I have fellowship with him though I walk in darkness 1 Joh. 1. 6. We will not hearken unto thee but will certainly do whatsoever thing goeth out of our own mouth Jer. 45. 16 17. in which cases the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or principles of Conscience are quite overthrown Some are hardned and as to any application of their acts to this Rule quite dead and sensless though they rise not up against the light yet are they willingly ignorant without any consideration of what they are doing here the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or witnessing and excusing power of Conscience is idle and asleep Some though they know the Law and in some measure see their actions are sinful yet they pass no judgment apprehend no danger No man smites upon his thigh saying what have I done Jer. 8. 6. Nay some are so far from this that they presumptuously justify themselves though they see their own blame and ruine before them I do well to be angry and that to the death saith Jonah when Satan had spread a darkness upon him What shall we say of these things here is darkness to be felt Egyptian darkness to explain the way of it fully is impossible for us to do it in any tollerable way is difficult To make some discovery herein I shall 1. Shew that the Devil doth entice to sin by stirring up our lust 2. That by the power and prevalency of our lust he brings on the blindness spoken of CHAP. X. That Satan enticeth by our Lust The several ways by which he doth it Of the power and danger of the violence of Affections THe way then by which he doth entice is by stirring up our lust By lust I mean those general desirings of our minds after any unlawful object which are forbidden in the tenth Commandment thus we read of worldly lusts of the lusts of the flesh of lustings to envy and in a world we read of divers lusts the whole attempt and striving of corrupt Nature against the Spirit being set forth by this expression of lusting against the Spirit That Satan takes advantage of our own lusts and so plows with our Heifer turning our own Weapons against our selves is evident by the general vote of Scripture The Apostle James 1. 14. tells us that every Temptation prevails only by the power and working of our own lusts Satan is the Tempter but our lusts are the advantages by which he draws and enticeth the corrupt principle within us is called flesh but the way whereby it works either in its own proper motion or as stirred up by the Devil is that of lust and affection and therefore he that would stop that issue must look to mortify it in its affections and
way of blinding us Follows next The fourth way by which our Lust prevails in Satan's hand to blind Knowledg and that is by distracting and disturbing it in its work This piece of subtilty Satan the rather useth because 't is attended with a double advantage and like a two-edged sword will cut either way For 1. A confusion and distraction in the Understanding will hinder the even and clear apprehensions of things so that those principles of Knowledg cannot reach so deep nor be so firm and full in their application For as the Senses if any way distracted or hindred though never so intent must needs suffer prejudice in their operations a thick Air or Mist not only hinders the sight of the Eye but also conduceth to a misrepresentation of Objects Thus is the Understanding hindred by confusion But 2. If this succeed not yet by this he hinders the peace and comfort of God's Children 'T is a trouble to be haunted with evil thoughts To work this distraction First Satan useth a clamorous importunity and doth so follow us with Suggestions that what way soever we turn they follow us we can think nothing else or hear nothing else they are ever before us Secondly He worketh this disturbance in our thoughts by levying a legion of Temptations against us many at once and of several kinds from within from without on every side he gathers all from the Dan to the Bersheba of his Empire to oppress us with a multitude so that while our thoughts are divided about many things they are less fixed and observant in any particular Thirdly He sometimes endeavours to weary us out with long Sollicitations As those that besiege a City when they cannot storm endeavour to waste their Strength and Provisions by a long Siege His design in this is to come upon us as Ahitophel counselled Absolom when we are weary and weak-handed by watching and long resistance Fourthly But his chief design is to take the advantage of any trouble inward or outward and by the help of this he dangerously discomposeth and distracts our Counsels and Resolves If any have a Spirit distemper'd only under the apprehensions of Wrath 't is easie for him to confound and amaze such that they shall scarce know what they do or what they think The like advantage he hath from outward Afflictions and these opportunities he the rather takes for these Reasons First Usually inward or outward troubles leaves some stamp of murmuring and fullenness upon our Hearts and of themselves distemper our Spirits with a sad inclination to speak in our haste or to act unadvisedly Job's affliction imbittered his Spirit and Satan misseth not the advantage then he comes upon him with Temptations and prevailed so far that he spake many things in his anguish of which he was ashamed afterward and hides his face for it Once have I spoken but I will not answer yea twice but I will proceed no further Secondly By reason of our Burthen we are lâ—ss weildy and more unapt to make any resistance God himself expresseth the condition of such under the similitude of those that are great with young who because they cannot be driven fast he gently leads them But Satan knows a small matter will discompose them and herein he deals with us as Simeon and Levi dealt with the Sechemites who set upon them when they were sore by circumcision Thirldly Troubles of themselves occasion Confusion multitudes of Thoughts Distractions and Inadvertencies If Men see a hazard before them they are presently at their wits end they are puzled they know not what to do thoughts are divided now resolving this then presently changing to a contrary purpose 'T is seldom but as in a multitude of words there is much folly so in a distraction of Thoughts there are many Miscarriages and Satan with a little labour can improve them to more here he works unseen in these troubled Waters he loves to angle because his Baits are not discerned Fifthly Our Considerations and Reasonings against Sin are hindred by a bold forward precipitancy When Men are hasted and pressed to the committing of Sin and like the deaf Addar stop their Ears against the voice of the Charmer in this case the rebellious Will is like a furious Horse that takes the Bridle in his Teeth and instead of submitting to the government of his Rider he carries him violently whither he would not Thus do Men rush into Sin as the Horse into the Battel The devices by which Satan doth forward this we may observe to be these among others First He endeavours to affright Men into an hopelesness of prevailing against him and so intimidates Men that they throw down their Weapons and yield up themselves to the Temptation they conclude there is no hope by all their resistance to stand it out against him and then they are easily perswaded to comply with him To help this forward Satan useth the Policy of Souldiers who usually boast high of their strength and resolutions that the hearts and courage of their Adversaries failing the Victory may fall to them without stroke The Devil expresseth a disdain and scorn of our weak opposition as Goliah did of David Am I a Dog that thou comest to me with Staves doest thou think to stand it out against me 't is in vain to buckle on thine Armour and therefore better were it to save the trouble of striving than to fight to no purpose With such like arguings as these are Men sometimes prevailed with to throw down their Weapons and to over-run their Reason through fear and hopelesness Secondly Sometimes he is more subtile and by threaping Men down that they have consented already he puts them upon desperate adventures of going forward This is usually where Satan hath used many sollicitations before after our hearts have been urged strongly with a Temptation when he sees he cannot win us over to him then he triumphs and boasts we are conquered already and that our thoughts could not have dwelt so long upon such a subject but that we had a liking to it and thence would perswade us to go on and enjoy the fulness of that delight which we have already stoln privately over Shooes over Boots Now though his arguings here be very weak for though it be granted that by the stay of the Temptation on our thoughts he hath a little entangled us it cannot hence be inferred that it is our wisdom to entangle our selves further yet are many overcome herewith and give up themselves as already conquered and so give a stop to any further consideration Thirdly When Men will not be trapanned into the Snare by the former delusions he attempts to work them up to a sudden and hasty resolve of sinning he prepares all the materials of the Sin puts every thing in order and then carries us as he did Christ into the Mountain to give us a prospect of their beauty and glory All these saith he will I give thee
do but consent and all are thine Now albeit there are arguments at hand and serious considerations to deter us from practice yet how are all laid aside by a quick resolve Satan urgeth us by violent hurry as Christ said to Judas what thou hast to do do it quickly the Soul perswaded with this puts on a sudden boldness and resolution and when Reason doth offer to interpose it holds fast the door because the sound of its Masters feet is behind it doth it not say to it self Come we will not consider let us do it quickly before these lively considerations come in to hinder us 't is loth to be restrained and conceiteth that if it can be done before Conscience awaken and make a noise all is well as if Sin ceased to be sinful because we by a violent haste endeavoured to prevent the admonition of Conscience Thus they enjoy their Sin as the Israelites eat their Passover in haste and with their staves in their hands Fourthly When Opportunities and Occasions will well suit it He takes the advantages of a passionate and sullen Humor and by this means he turns us clearly out of our Byass Reason is trampled under-foot and Passion quite over-runs it At this disadvantage the Devil takes Jonah and hardens him to a strange resolve of quarrelling God and justifying himself in that Insolency The Humor that Satan wrought upon was his fretful sullenness raised up to a great height by the disappointment of his expectation and this makes him break out into a Cholerick resolution I do well to be angry Had he been composed in his Spirit had his Mind been calm and sedate the Devil surely could not by any arguments have drawn him up to it but when the Spirit is in a rage a little matter will bind Reason in Chains and push a Man upon a desperate carelesness of any danger that may follow sutable to that expression of Job chap. 13. 13. Let me alone that I may speak and let come on me what will Fifthly All these are but small in comparison of those deliberate determinations which are to be found with most Sinners who are therefore said to sin with an high hand presumptuously wilfully against Conscience against Knowledg and this ordinarily to be found only among those whom a custom of Sin hath hardned and confirmed into a boldness of a wicked way and course When the spirits of Men are thus harnessed and prepared Satan can at pleasure almost form them into a deliberate resolve to cast the commandment behind their back and to refuse to hearken When any Temptation is offered them if God say Ask for the old paths and walk therein as Jer. 6. 16. they will readily answer We will not walk therein If God say Hearken to the sound of the Trumpet they will reply We will not hearken When the People by a course of sinning had made themselves like the wild Ass used to the Wilderness then did they peremptorily set up their Will against all the Reason and Consideration that could come in to deter them though they were told the inconveniences Jer. 2. 25. that this did unshoo their Foot and afflicted them with Thirst and Want yet was the advice slighted there is no hope said they there is no expectation that we will take any notice of these pleadings for we have fixed our resolve We have loved Strangers and after them will we go So Jer. 44. 16. As for the word that thou hast spoken unto us in the Name of the Lord we will not hearken unto thee but we will certainly do whatsoever thing goeth out of our own Mouth A plain and full resolve of Will dischargeth all the powers of Reason and commands it silence And that this is most ordinary among Men may appear by these frequent expressions of Scripture wherein God lays the blame of all that madness which their lives bring forth upon their Will Ye would not obey ye will not come to me their heart is set to do evil c. It may indeed seem strange that Satan should proceed so far with the generality of Men and that they should do that that should seem so inconsistent with those Principles which they retain and the Light which must result from thence But we must remember that these wills and shalls of wicked Men are for the most part God's interpretation of their Acts and Carriage which speaks as much though it may be their Minds and Hearts do not so formally mould up their Thoughts into such open and brazen-fac'd assertions And yet we ought also further to consider that when the Spirit of God chargeth Man with wilfulness there is surely more of a formal wilfulness in the heart of Man than lyeth open to our view And this will be less strange to us when we call to mind Sixthly That through the working of Satan the Minds of Men are darkned and the light thereof put out by the prevalency of Atheistical Principles Something of Atheism is by most Divines concluded to be in every Sin and according to the height of it in its various degrees is Reason and Consideration overturned There are it may be few that are professed Atheists in Opinion and Dogmatically so but all wicked Men are so in Practice though they profess God yet the Fool saith in his heart there is no God and in their works they deny him This is a Principle that directly strikes at the root for if there be no God no Hell or Punishment who will be scared from taking his delight in Sin by any such consideration The Devil therefore strives to instil this Poyson with his Temptation When he enticed Eve by secret insinuations he first questions the truth of the threatning and then proceeds to an open denyal of it ye shall not surely die and 't is plain she was induced to the Sin upon a secret disbelief of the danger she reckons up the advantages good for Food pleasant to the Eye to be desired to make one wise wherein 't is evident she believed what Satan had affirmed that they should be as God and then it was not to be feared that they should die This kind of Atheism is common Men may not disbelieve a Godhead nay they may believe there is a God and yet question the truth of his threatnings Those conceits that Men have of God whereby they mould and frame him in their fancies sutable to their humors which is a thinking that he is such an one as our selves are Streams and Vapours from this Pit and the Hearts of the Sons of Men are desperately set within them to do evil upon these grounds much more when they arise so high as in som who say Doth God know Is there knowledg in the most High If Men give way to this what reason can be imagined to stand before them All the comminations of Scripture are derided as so many Theological scare-Crows and undervalued as so many pitiful contrivances to keep
careful to keep Jeroboam quiet in his sinful course of Idolatry that he stirs up Amaziah to banish Amos from the Court lest his plain dealing should startle or awaken the Conscience of the King Amos 7. 12 13. Go flee thee away into the land of Judah c. but Prophesie not any more at Bethel for it is the Kings Chappel it is the Kings Court. Thirdly In order to the keeping out the Light from the consciences of Men he insinuates himself as a lying Spirit into the mouthes of some of his mercenaries and they speak smooth things and deceit to Satan's Captives telling them that they are in a good condition Christians good enough and may go to Heaven as well as the precisest 't is a fault in unfaithful Ministers they do the Devil this service God highly complains of it Jer. 6. 14. They have healed also the hurt of the daughter of my people slightly saying Peace peace when there is no peace Ezek. 13. 10. They have seduced my people saying Peace and there was no peace and one built up a Wall and others daubed it with untempered morter Besides this Stratagem is the more likely to prevail because it takes the advantage of the humours and inclinations of Men who naturally think the best of themselves and delight that others should speak what they would have them so that when Men by the Devil's instigation prophesie deceit to sinful Men 't is most likely they should be heard seeing they desire such Prophets and love to have it so Fourthly Satan keeps off the Light by catching away the Word after it is sown This policy of his Christ expresly discovers Math. 13. 19. When anyone heareth the Word of the Kingdom and understandeth it not then cometh the wicked one and catcheth away that which was sown in his heart such opportunities the Devil doth narrowly watch to be sure he will be present at a Sermon or good discourse and if he perceive any thing spoken that may endanger his peaceable Possession how busie is he to withdraw the heart sometime by the sight of the Eyes sometimes by vain thoughts of business occasions delights and what not and if this come not up to his end then he endeavours after Men have heard to justle all out by impertinent Discourses urgencies of Imployment and a thousand such divertisements that so Men may not lay the warning to heart nor by serious meditation to apply it to their Consciences Fifthly He sometimes snuffs out the Light by Persecution Those hearers Mat. 13. 20 21. that had received the Word with some workings of affections and joy are presently offended when Persecution because of the Word ariseth By this he threatens Men into an acquiescency in their present condition that if they depart from iniquity they shall make themselves a prey Bonds Imprisonments and Hatreds he suggests shall abide them and by this means he scares Men from the Light Sixthly He sometimes smothers and choaks it with the Cares of the World As those that received Seed among Thornes by earnest engagements in business all that time strength and affection which should have been laid out in the prosecution of Heavenly things are wholly taken up and spent on outward things by this means that Light that shines into the hearts of Men is neglected and put by Seventhly He staves off Men from coming to the Light by putting them upon misapprehensions of their Estate in judging themselves by the common opinion Satan hath so far prevailed with Men that they are become confident of this conceit That Men may take a moderate liberty in Sinning and yet nevertheless be in a good condition that Sin is not so great a matter in God's esteem as in the judgment of some rigorous precisian that he will not be so extream to mark what we do amiss as some strict Professours are What can be of greater hindrance to that ingenuous search strict examination and impartial judging or shaming our selves for our iniquities which the Light of Scripture would engage us unto than such a conceit as this and yet that this opinion is not only common but ancient is manifest by those warnings and cautions given by the Apostle to the contrary Gal. 6. 7. Be not deceived God is not mocked whatsoever a Man soweth that shall he also reap Eph. 5. 6. Let no man deceive you with vain words for because of these things cometh the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience If it had not been usual for Men to live in Uncleanness Covetousness and such like offences which he calls sowing to the flesh and yet in the midst of these to think they were not under the hazard of Wrath or if Men had not professedly and avowedly maintained such an opinion it had been superfluous for the Apostle to have warned us with so much earnestness Be not deceived let no man deceive you with such vain words Eighthly 'T is usual for Satan to still and quiet the stirring thoughts of Sinners with hopes and assurances of secresie As children are quieted and pleased with toyes and rattles so are Sinners put off and diverted from prosecuting the discoveries that the Light would make in them by this confidence that though they have done amiss yet their miscarriages shall not be laid open or manifested before Men. 'T is incredible how much the hopes of concealment doth satisfie and delight those that have some sense of Guilt Sometime Men are Impudent that they declare their Sin as Sodom they hide it not But before they arrive at so great an Impudency they usually seek deep to hide their counsel from the Lord and their works are in the dark and they say who seeth us and who knoweth us Isa 29. 15. Like those foolish Creatures that think themselves sufficiently concealed by hiding their heads in a Bush though all their bodies be exposed to open view Isa 28. 15. Those that made lies their refuge and under falshood hid themselves became as confident of their security as if they had made a covenant with death and were at an agreement with hell and when they have continued in this course for some time with impunity the Light is so banished that they carry it so as if God observed their Actions done in the dark as little as Men do How doth God know say they can he judge through the dark clouds thick clouds are a covering to him that he seeth not and hence proceed they to promise themselves a safety from judgements When the overflowing scourge shall pass through it shall not come nigh unto us for we have made lies our refuge c. Ninthly Satan keeps them from going to the Light by demurrs and delays If the Light begin to break in upon their Consciences then he tells them that there is time enough afterward Oh saith he thou art young and hast many days before thee 't is time enough to repent when you begin to be old or thou art a Servant an
when the Devil was sometime forward to give his testimony to Christ as Mark 1. 25. I know thee who thou art the holy one of God Jesus rebuked him and commanded him to hold his peace he clearly saw that he confessed him not to honour him but by such a particular acknowledgment to stir up the rage and fury of the People against him To this end Satan in Acts 16. 17. many days together publickly owns Paul and Silas These Men are the servants of the most high God which shew unto us the way of Salvation though he spake truth yet had he a malicious aim in it which he accordingly brought about by this means and that was to raise up persecution against them and to give ground to that accusation which they afterward met withall vers 21. That they taught customs which were not lawful to be received But 3. His particular spite against God in seeking to undermine his Service is further manifested in this That the Devil is not content to root out the service due to God but when he hath done that he delights to abuse those places where the Name of God was most celebrated with greatest prophanations I shall not in this insist upon the conjecture of Tilenus that Sylva Dodonaea a place highly abused by the Devil and respected for an Oracle was the seat or a religious place of Dodanim mentioned in Gen. 10. 4. nor upon that supposal mentioned also by the same Author that the Oracle of Jupiter Hammon was the place where C ham practised that religious worship which he learned in his Fathers house We have at hand more certain evidences of the Devils spite Such was his abuse of the Tabernacle by the prophane sons of Eli who prophaned that place with their uncleanness and filthy adulteries Such was his carriage to the Ark while it was captivated by the Philistims Of like nature were his attempts against the Temple it self Solomon in his latter days was tempted to give an affront to it he built an high place for Chemosh the Abomination of Moab in the hill that is before Jerusalem in the very sight and face of the Temple but afterward he prevailed to defile the Temple it self Gilgal and Beth-aven are places of such high prophanation that the Prophet Hos 9. 15. tells them all their wickedness was in Gilgal none of their abominations were like to those and in Hos 4. 15. they are dehorted from going to Gilgal or Bethaven and yet both these places had been famous for Religion before Gilgal was the place of the general Circumcision of the Israelites that were born in the Wilderness there was their first solemn Passover kept after their entring into the Land Bethel was a place where God as it were kept House the house of God Here Jacob had his vision But the more famous they had been for duties of Worship the Devil sought to put higher abuses upon them so that Gilgal became on Hatred and Bethel became a Beth-aven an house of Vanity Fourthly Satan is the more animated to undertake a design against the ways of religious Service because he seldom or never misseth at least something of success This attempt is like Saul and Jonathan's Bow that returned not empty In other Temptations sometimes Satan comes off basfled altogether but in this work as 't was said of some Israelites he can throw a stone at an hairs breadth and not miss he is sure in one thing or other to have the better of us his advantage in this case is from our unsutableness to our service What we do in the duties of Worship requires a choice frame of Spirit our hearts should be awed with the most serious apprehensions of divine Majesty filled with Reverence animated with Love and delight quickned by Faith clothed with Humility and self-abhorrency and in all the procedure of duties there must be a steady and firm prosecution under the strictest watchfulness Of this nature is our work which at the first view would put a Man to a stand and out of amazement force him to say who is sufficient for these things who can stand before such an holy Lord God But when we come to an impartial consideration of our manifold weaknesses and insufficiences in reference to these Services what shall we say we find such a narrowness of Spirit such ignorances sottishness carelesness of Mind Thoughts so confused tumultuous fickle slippery and unconstant and our hearts generally so deceitful and desperately wicked that 't is not possible that Satan should altogether labour in vain or catch nothing this being then a sure gain we may expect it to be under a most constant practice Fifthly If he so prevails against us that the services of Worship become grosly abused or neglected then doth he put us under the greatest hazards and disadvantages Nothing so poysonous as duties of Worship corrupted for this is to abuse God to his face by this not only are his Commands and Injunctions slighted as in other sins but we carry it so as if we thought him no better than the Idols of the Heathens that have Eyes and see not that have Ears and hear not To come without an Heart or with our Idols in our Heart is it any thing of less scorn than to say Tush doth the most High see Besides he hath given such severe Cautions and Commands in these matters as will easily signify the aggravation of the offence You see how sharply God speaks of those that came to enquire of the Lord with the stumbling-block of their iniquity before their face Ezek. 14. 4 7. I will answer them according to the multitude of their Idols I will answer them by my self Saul's miscarriage in offering Sacrifice 1 Sam. 13. 13. was that great offence for which God determined to take the Kingdom from him God's severity against Nadah and Abihu his stroke upon Vzzah do all shew the hazard of such prophanations But above all that danger which both Old and New Testament speak of the hardning of the Heart blinding the Eyes dulling the Ears that Men should not hear nor see nor be converted and saved but that the Word should instead of those cordial refreshing smells which beget and promote spiritual life in the obedient breath forth such envenomed poysonous exhalations when 't is thus abused and prophaned that it becomes the savour of death unto death is most dreadful No wonder then if Satan be very busie against these holy things when if he catch us at an advantage of this nature it proves so deadly and dangerous to us for what can more please him that makes it his delight and imployment to destroy All these Reasons evince that Satan hath an aking tooth against religious Services and that to weaken prevent or overthrow them is his great endeavour Here then especially may we expect an assault according to the advice of Sirach My Son when thou entrest God's Service stand fast in
righteousness and fear and prepare thy soul for temptation What are the Subtilties of Satan against the holy things of God I am next to discover Duties and Services are opposed two ways 1. By Prevention when they are hindred 2. By Corruption when they are spoiled He hath his Arts and Cunning which he exerciseth in both these regards First then Of Satan's Policy for the preventing of religious Services he endeavous by various means to hinder them As First By External hindrances In this he hath a very great foresight and accordingly he foresees Occasions and Opportunities at a distance and by a long reach of contrivance he studies to lay Blocks and Hindrances in the way Much he doth in the dark for this end that we know not As God hath secrets of wisdom that are double to that which is known so also hath Satan many ways and actings that are not discerned by us his contrivances of businesses and avocations long aforehand are not so observed by us as they might be where he misseth of his end it comes not to light and often where he is successful in his preventions we are ready to ascibe it to contingencies and the accidental hits of affairs when indeed the Hand and Policy of Satan is in it Paul that was highly studied and skilful in Satan's devices observing how his purposes of coming to the Thessalonians were often broken and obstructed he knew where the blame lay and therefore instead of laying the fault upon Sickness or Imprisonments or the oppositions of false Brethren which often made him trouble beyond expectation he directly chargeth all upon Satan 1 Thess 2. 18. We would have come unto you even I Paul once and again but Satan hindred us At the same rate understanding the purposes of faithful Men for the promoting the good of Mens souls he often useth means to stop or hinder them Some have observed having a watchful and jealous eye over Satan that their Resolves and Endeavours of this nature have usually been put to struggle sore in their birth when their purposes for worldly Affairs and Matters go smoothly on without considerable opposition Secondly He makes use of Indispositions to hinder Service and here he works sometimes upon the Body sometimes upon the Soul for both may be indisposed First Sometimes he takes the advange of Bodily indispositions He doth all he can to create and frame these upon us and then pleads them as a discharge to duty If he can put the Body into a fit of drowsiness or distemper he will do it and surely he can do more this way than every one will believe he may agitate and stir the humors Hence some have observed more frequent and stronger fits of sleepiness and illness to come upon them on the days and times that require their attendance upon God than on other days when they shall be lively active and free of dulness upon common occasions at Sports Songs Interludes when they shall not have the like command of themselves in the exercises of Worship Surely it was more than an ordinary drowsiness that befell the Apostles Matth. 26. 41. He had told them the seriousness of the occasion that he was betrayed that his soul was exceeding sorrowful even to the death these were considerations that might have kept their Eyes from slumber When they sleep he awakens them with a piercing rebuke Could ye not watch with me one hour and adds to this an admonition of their own danger and the temptation that was upon them and yet presently they are asleep again and after that again strange drowsiness But he gives an excuse for them which also tells us the cause of it the Spirit is willing their hearts were not altogether unconcerned but the Flesh that is the Body that was weak that is subject to be abused by Satan who brought them into a more than ordinary indisposition as is noted vers 43. their Eyes were heavy Secondly The Soul hath also its indispositions which he readily improves against Duty to hinder it As First It is capable of a spiritual sluggishness and dulness wherein the spiritual Senses are so bound up that it considers not minds not hath no list nor inclination to acts of service What a stupifaction are our Spirits capable of as David in his Adultery seems not to mind nor care what he had done In like manner are some in a Lethargy as the Prophet speaks they care not to seek after God Bernard hath a description of it Contrahitur animus subtrahitur gratia defervescit novitius fervor ingravescit tepor fastidiosus the Spirit is contracted Grace withdrawn Fervour abates Sluggishness draws on and then Duties are neglected Secondly The Spirit is indisposed by a throng of worldly affairs and these oft justle out duty Christ tells us they have the same influence upon Men that Gluttony and Drunkenness have and these unfit Men for action Take heed saith Luk. 21. 34. to your selves lest at any time your heart be overcharged with surfeiting and drunkenness and the eares of this life These then may at so high a rate overcharge the souls of Men so as to make them frame excuses I have bought a Farm or Oxen and therefore I cannot attend and by this means may they grow so neglective that the day of the Lord may come upon them at unawares Thirdly Sometimes the Soul is discomposed through Passion and then 't is indisposed which opportunity the Devil espying he closeth in with it sometime he blows the fire that the heat of anger may put them upon a carelesness sometimes he pleads their present frame as an unfitness for Service and so upon a pretence of reverence to the Service and leaving the gift at the Altar till they be in a better humor many times the gift is not offered at all 1 Pet. 3. 7. The Apostle directs Husbands to manage their authority over their Wives with prudence for the avoiding of Brawls and Contentions Ye Husbands dwell with them according to Knowledg giving honour to the Wife aâ— the weaker Vessel the reason of which advice he gives in these words that your prayers be not hindred Prayers are hindred partly in their success when they prevail not partly they are hindred when the duty of Prayer is put by and suspended and this doubtless the Apostle aimes at to teach us that Contentious Quarellings in a Family hinder the exercise of the duty of Prayer Elisha 2 Kings 3. discomposed himself in his earnest reproof of Jehoram for with great vehemency he had spoken to him vers 13 14. What have I do with thee get thee to the Prophets of thy Father Wâ—eâ—â— it not that I regard the presence of Jehosaphat I would not look toward thee nor see thee But when he set himself to receive the visions of God he calls for a Minstrel vers 15. the reason whereof as P. Mantyr and others suppose was this that however
what he spoke to Jehoram proceeded from zeal yet being but a Man and subject to the like infirmities of other Men it had distracted and discomposed his Spirit which made him unfit and uncapable to entertain the visions of God Musick then being a natural means for the composure and quiet of the Mind he takes that course to calm and fit himself for that work Fourthly Ignorance and Prejudice are spiritual Indispositions which are not neglected by the Devil Knowledg is the eye and guide of the Soul If there be darkness there all acts which depend upon better Instruction must cease The Disciples ignorance of Scriptures brought in their unbelief Christ notes that as the Fountain-head of all their backwardness Luk. 24. 25. O fools and slow of heart to believe all that the Prophets have spoken In like manner if Men are not clear or knowing in the ways and necessities of Duty and Service the Devil can easily prevail with them to forbear and neglect Prejudice riseth up to justifie the disregard of Duty and offers Reasons which it thinks cannot be answered Thirdly Satan endeavours to prevent Duty by discouragements If he can make the knees feeble and the hands hang down he will quickly cause Activity and Motion to cease The wayes by which he endeavours to discourage Men from the duties of Service are these First He sets before them the toile and burthen of Duty If a Man sets his Face toward Heaven thus he endeavours to scare him off Is not saith he the way of Religion a dull melancholy way It is not a toile A tedious task Are not these unreasonable injunctions Pray continually Pray without ceasing Preach in season and out of season This suggestion though it be expresly contrary to command yet being so suitable to the idle and sluggish tempers of Men they are the more apt to take notice of it and accordingly they seek ways and shifts of accommodating the command to their inclinations In Amos 8. 5. the toyl of Sabbaths and Festival Services as they thought it makes them weary of the duty When will the New Moon be gone that we may sell corn and the Sabbath that we may set forth Wheat These Men thought their Services tedious and intrenching upon their Callings and Occupations Mal. 1. 13. They said Behold what a weariness is it looking upon it as an insufferable burthen nay they proceeded so far as to snuff at it Now when the Devil had so far prevailed with them it was easie to put them upon neglect which as the place cited speaks presently followed upon it they brought the torne and the lame and the sick for a Sacrifice Satan first presented these Services as a wearisome burthen then they snuffed at them next they thought any Service good enough how mean soever though to an open Violation of the Law of Worship and lastly from a pollution of the Table of the Lord they proceeded to a plain contempt of duty the table of the Lord is polluted and the fruit thereof even his meat is contemptible vers 12. In the management of this discouragement the Devil hath most success upon those that have not yet tasted the sweetness and easiness of the wayes of the Lord his yoke is indeed easie his burthen is light his service is a true freedom to those that are acquainted with God and exercised in his Service But when Men are first beginning to look after God and Duty and are not yet filled and satisfied with the fatness of his house this Temptation hath the greater force upon them and they are apt to be discouraged thereby Secondly He endeavours to discourage them from the want of success in the Duties of Worship When they have waited long and sought the Lord then he puts them upon resolves of declining any further Prosecution as he did with Joram at the Siege of Samaria Why wait I upon the Lord any longer said he after he had expected deliverance a long time without any appearance of help When Saul saw that God answered him not neither by Dreams nor by Vrim nor by Prophets the Devil easily perswaded him to leave off the ordinary ways of attendance upon God and to consult with the Witch of Endor The prophane Persons mentioned in Mal. 3. 14. that had cast off all regard to his Laws all respect to his Ordinances were brought to this pitch of Iniquity by the suggestions of want of success they said It is vain to serve God and what profit is it that we have kept his ordinances and that we have walked mournfully before the Lord of Hosts It seems they were like the people spoken of in Isa 58. 2 3. They had fasted and prayed and God delayed to answer them which they looked upon as a disobligement from duty and that which they could peremptorily insist upon as a reason which might justifie their neglect Wherefore have we fasted say they and thou seest not wherefore have we afflicted our soul and thou takest no knowledge Neither doth this discouragement fall heavy only upon those whose hearts are departed already from God who might be supposed to be forward to imbrace any excuse from his Service but we shall find it bears hard upon the Children of God David was ready to give over all as a Man forsaken of God Psal 22. 1 2. Why hast thou forsaken me O my God I cry in the day time but thou hearest not and in the night season and am not silent We may clearly gather from his expressions that this Temptation had sorely bruised him and that upon God's delay of Answer he was ready to charge an unrighteousness upon Gods carriage toward him for in that he adds that he kept his ground and did not consent to it as the words following But thou continuest holy do imply it shewed what the Devil was objecting to him And elsewhere in Psal 69. 3. When he had cryed and was not answered he began to be weary and his eyes failed nay his flesh and heart failld his Spirit sunk as a Man almost vanquished and overcome with the Temptation Thirdly This our Adversary raiseth up discouragements to us from the unsuitableness of our Hearts to our Services herein he endeavours to deaden our Hearts to clog our Spirits to hinder and molest us and then he improves these indispositions and discomposures against the duty in which he hath a double advantage for 1 He deprives us of that delight in duty which should whet on our desires to undertake it so that we come to the Lord's Table as old Barzillai without a taste or relish of what we eat or drink When we come to hear the Ear that tryeth words as the Pallat tasteth meat finds no savour in what is spoken and this Satan can easily do by the inward deadness or disquiet of the Heart even as the anguish of Diseases takes away all Pleasures which the choicest dainties afford As Job observes
the wasting of his strength which the Apostle takes notice of and adviseth against it Drink no longer water c. The Corinthians were so when out of a high detestation of the miscarriage of the Incestuous Person they were backward to forgive him and to receive him into the Church again Peter is another instance to us of excess Jo. 13. 8. First in a modest humility he refuseth to let Christ wash his feet but after understanding the meaning of it then he runs to the other extream and offers not only his feet but his hands and his head When the Servants of God are conscious of defects in their Services as if they would make amends for these by the length and continuance of their Services they are easily drawn into an excess every way disadvantagious to themselves and the Service Thirdly When Satans Designs do not take to spoil the Duties either by the manner of the attempt or in the Act he then seeks to play an after game and endeavours to spoil them by some after-miscarriage of ours in reference to these Services As First When he makes us proud of them we can scarce perform any Service with a tollerable suitableness but Satan is at hand to instill thoughts of Applause vain Glory and Boasting and we readily begin to think highly of our selves and performances as if we were better than others whom we are apt to censure as low and weak in comparison of our selves Though this be an apparent deceit yet 't is a wonder how much the minds even of the best are apt to be tainted with it even where there are considerable endeavours for humility and self-denial these thoughts are apt to get too much entertainment Now though we run well and attain some comfortable strength and watchfulness in the Services of God yet if they be afterward fly-blown with Pride or if we think to embalm them with Praises or reserve them as matter of Ostentation though they be Angels food yet like the Manna of the Israelites when kept too long they will putrifie and breed Worms and so be good for nothing after that we have been at the pains of gathering it Secondly When well-performed Services are perverted to security then are they also spoiled we are ready to say of them as the rich Man of his abundance Soul take thine ease thou hast much laid up for many years Satan is willing for a further advantage that we think our selves secure from him and as after a full Meal we are apt to grow drowsie so after Services we are apt to think our selves out of harms way The Church after an High Feast with Christ presently falls asleep and highly miscarries in Security and Neglect by this means do the best of Saints sometimes lose the things they have wrought and throw down what they formerly built up DAEMONOLOGIA SACRA OR A TREATISE OF Satans Temptations The Second Part. CONTAINING The manifold Subtilties and Stratagems of Satan for the corrupting of the minds of Men with Errour and for the destruction of the Peace and Comfort of the Children of God By R. G. London Printed by J. D. for Richard Randel and Peter Maplisden Booksellers in New-Castle upon Tine 1677. PART II. CHAP. I. That it is Satan's grand Design to corrupt the Minds of Men with Errour The Evidences that it is so And the Reasons of his Endeavours that way NExt to Satan's Deceits in tempting to Sin and against Duty his design of corrupting the Minds of Men by Errour calls for our search and indeed this is one of his principal endeavours which takes up a considerable part of his time and diligence He is not only called in Scripture an Vnclean Spirit but also a Lying Spirit and there are none of these cursed qualifications that lie idle in him as by his Uncleanness we may easily conjecture his attempts upon the Will and Affections to defile them by Lust so by his Lying we may conclude that he will certainly strive to blind the Understanding by Errour But a clear discovery of this we may have from these Considerations First From God's interest in Truth in reference to his great designs of Holiness and Mercy in the World Truth is a Ray and Beam of him who is the Father of Lights All revealed Truths are but Copies and Transcripts of that Essential Archetypal Truth Truth is the Rod of his Strength Psal 110. 2. the Scepter of his Kingdom by which he doth subdue the hearts of Men to his obedience and service in conversion Truth is that Rock upon which he hath built his Church the foundations are the Prophets and Apostles Eph. 2. 20. that is the Doctrine of the Prophets and Apostles in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament Truth is that great depositum committed to the care of his Church which is therefore called the pillar of Truth because as Princes or Rulers put their Proclamations on Pillars for the better information of their Subjects so doth his Church hold out Truth to the World Holiness is maintained by Truth our ways are directed by it and by it are we forewarned of Satan's Devices Now the Prince of Darkness carrying himself in as full an opposition to the God of Truth as he can in all his ways God's interest in Truth will sufficiently discover the Devil's design to promote Errour for such is his hatred of God that though he cannot destroy Truth no more than he can tear the Sun out of the Firmament yet he will endeavour by corrupting the Copy to disgrace the Original though he cannot break Christ's Scepter yet by raising Errour he would hinder the encrease of his Subjects though he cannot remove the Rock upon which the Church is built he will endeavour to shake it or to interrupt the Building and to tear down God's Proclamation from the Pillar on which he hath set it to be read of all and if we can conceive what an hatred the Thief hath to the Light as it contradicts and hinders his Designs we may imagine there is nothing against which the Devil will use greater contrivances than against the light of Truth He neither can nor will make a league with any but upon the terms that Nahash propounded to the Men of Jabesh-Gilead that is that he may put out their right eye and so lay it for a reproach upon the Israel of God 'T is the work of the Holy Spirit to lead us into Truth and by the rule of contraries 't is the Devil's work to lead into Errour Secondly Though the Scripture doth charge the Sin and danger of Delusion and Errour upon those Men that promote it to the deception of themselves and others yet doth it chiefly blame Satan for the great Contriver of it and expressly affirms him to be the grand Deceiver Instruments and Engeniers he must make use of to do him service in that work but still it is the Devil that is a Lying Spirit in their
Mouths 't is he that teacheth and prompts them and therefore may they be called as Elymas was by Paul the Children of the Devil or as Cerinthus of old the first-born of Satan The Church of Corinth among other distempers laboured under dangerous Errours against which when the Apostle doth industriously set himself he doth chiefly take notice 1. Of the false-Teachers who had cunningly wrought them up to an aptitude of declining from the simplicity of the Gospel these he calls false-Apostles as having no commission from God and Satan's Ministers 2 Cor. 11. 13 15. thereby informing us who it is that sends them out and imploys them upon this errand 2. He especially accuseth Satan as the great Contriver of all this evil if any shut their Eyes against the Light he gives this for the principal cause that the God of the World blinded their Minds If any stumbled at the simplicity of the Gospel he presently blames the subtilty of the old Serpent for it 2 Cor. 11. 3. When false Doctrine was directly taught and varnished over with the glorious pretexts of Truth still he chargeth Satan with it Vers 14. No marvel for Satan himself is transformed into an Angel of Light where he doth not only give a reason of the corrupting or the adulterating the Word of God by false-Apostles as Vintners do their Wines by mixtures a Metaphor which he makes use of cap. 2. 17. that they learned it of Satan who abode not in the Truth but was a Lyar from the beginning But also he further points at Satan to furnish us with a true account of the ground of that cunning Craft which these deceitful Workers used while they metamorphosed themselves by an imitation of the way and manner zeal and diligence of the Apostles of Christ they were taught by one who had exactly learned the Art of Imitation and who could to all appearance act to the life the part of an Angel of Light And to take away all objection or wonder that so many with such seeming earnestness and zeal should give up themselves to deceive by false-Doctrine he tells us that this hath been the Devil's work from the first beguiling of Eve vers 3. and that as he then made use of a Serpent for his Instrument so ever since in all ages he hath made so often and so much use of Men as his Emissaries that it should now neither seem a marvel nor a great matter to see the Devil at this work by his Agents Thirdly That this is Satan's great design may be further cleared from the constant course of his endeavours The Parable of the Tares Matth. 13. 25. shews that Satan is as busie in sowing Tares as the Master of the Field is in sowing Wheat that by Tares not Errors in the abstract but Men are to be understood is evident from the Parable it self but that which makes Men to be Tares is Sin and Errour so that in a complex sense we are taught how diligent the Devil who is expressly signified by the Enemy vers 39. is in that imployment much of his time hath been taken up that way There were false Prophets saith Peter 2 Epist 2. 1. and there shall be false-Teachers that is so it was of old and so it will be to the end The shortest abstract of Satan's acts in this matter would be long and tedious judge of the rest by a few instances In the Apostles times how quickly had the Devil broached false Doctrine That it was necessary to be circumcised was early taught Acts 15. 1. In Col. 2. 8. the vain deceit of Philosophy Traditions and the Elements of the World which were the body of Mosaical Ceremonies are mentioned as dangerous Intrusions and in vers 18. the worshipping of Angels as it seems was pleaded for with no small hazard to the Church The denial of the Resurrection is expressly charged upon some of the Corinthian Church 1 Cor. 15. 12. and that the Resurrection is past already 2 Tim. 2. 18. is affirmed to have been the Doctrine of Hymeneus Philetus and others but these are comparatively little to that gross Errour of denying Christ Jud. v. 4. or that Jesus is the Christ 2 Joh. 2. 22. or Jesus Christ is come in the flesh 1 Joh. 4. 3. which are branded for Antichristian Errours and were boldly asserted by many false Prophets that were then gone out into the World and to such a height came they at last that they taught the lawfulness of committing Fornication and to eat things offered to Idols Rev. 2. 20. All these falsehoods took the boldness to appear before all the Apostles were laid in their Graves And if we will believe what Austin tells us from Epiphanius and Eusebius there were no less than ten sorts of Heretical Antichrists in the Apostle John's days the Simonians Menandrians Saturnilians c. This was an incredible increase of false Doctrine in so short a time and in the times and preachings of the Apostles themselves whose power and authority one would think might have made Satan fall before them as lightning What progress then in this work of delusion might be expected when they were all removed out of the World They left indeed behind them sad predictions of the power of delusion in after-times Of your selves shall Men arise speaking perverse things After my departing shall grievous Wolves enter c. Acts 20. 30. The Spirit speaketh expressly that in the latter times some shall depart from the Faith 1 Tim. 4. 1. and Paul 2 Thess 2. 3. prophesies of a general Apostacy upon the revealing of the Man of Sin and the Mystery of Iniquity and that these should be perilous times 2 Tim. 3. 1. To the same purpose John mentions the coming of the great Antichrist as a thing generally known and believed 1 Joh. 2. 18. But before all these Christ also had fully forewarned his Servants of false-Christs the power and danger of their delusion and of the sad revolt from the Faith which should be before his second coming Matth. 24. 24. And as we have heard so have we seen all ages since the Apostles can witness that Satan hath answered the Prophecies that were concerning him what a strange increase of Errours hath been in the World since that time Iraeneus and Tertullian made Catalogues long since after them Epiphanius and Eusebius reckoned about eighty Heresies Austin after them brings the number to eighty eight Now though there be just exceptions against the largeness of their Catalogues and that it is believed by many that there are several branded in their Rolls for Hereticks that meerly suffer upon the account of their Name and Nation for Barbarism Scythism Hellenism are mustered in the Front and others also stand there for very small matters as the quarto decimani c. and that some ought altogether to be crossed out of their Books yet still it will appear that the number of Errours is great and that
common Rhetorick One gives us an Observation to that purpose of his own Preaching and so may many others While then Men hear such language they have a reverence to it And as Physitians cover their Pills with Gold that the Patient might more willingly take them so do Men often swallow down Errour without due consideration because conveyed to them in a Language which they respect Secondly Satans second care for the advancement of Errour after he hath given it all the countenance he can from Scripture is to gild it over with specious pretences he sets it off with all the bravery he can and then urgeth that as an Argument of its Truth Men are apt to judg that what doth better their Spiritual Condition cannot be a Lye or delusion and the Argument were the more considerable if the advantages were such as he pretends them to be but the very noise and boast of advantages please the unwary without a due enquiry into their reality The Apostle in Rom. 16. 18. reduceth all this Policy of the Deceiver to two heads 1. Good words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 words that set out the profit and advantage of the thing 2. And fair Speeches 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Speeches that flatter the Condition of the party His Art as to the first of these is to tell them that the Notions offered to them are special Discoveries rare Mysteries which have been hidden from others and thence infers that it must of necessity conduce much to their happiness and Spiritual Perfection to know and embrace them Those that troubled the Church in Pauls days with false Doctrines used this slight of boasting as appears by that expression in 1 Tim. 6. 20. Oppositions of Science it seems they called their opinions though they were but prophane and vain-bablings by the name of Science or Knowledg implying that all others even the Apostles themselves were in the Dark and came short of their Illumination The like we have in Rev. 2. 24. of that abominable Prophetess Jezebel who recommended her blasphemous filthy Doctrines under the name of Depths Profundities or hidden Knowledg though the Spirit of God told that Church they were not such but if Depths they were depths of Satan as 't is added there by way of Correction and not of the Spirit of God We may trace these â—ooâ—steps of Satan in all considerably prevailing Errors for what hath been more common than to hear Men speak of the designs they have been carrying on under the specious Titles Of Christ's coming to set up a Righteous Kingdom The Churches coming out of Babylon and out of the Wilderness the dawning of the day of the Lord the day of Reformation the time of the Restitution of all things with abundance of Brags of the same kind I shall add no particular Instance of this nature but a few strains of H. Nicholas with whom such high promising vaunts were ordinary His Service of Love he compares to the most Holy whereas Johns Doctrine of Repentance was but a preparation to the Holy and the Service of Christ he allowed to be no more than as the Holy of the Temple this his Service he calls the perfection of Life the completion of Prophecies the perfect conclusion of the Works of God the Throne of Christ the true Rest of the Chosen of God the last Day the sure Word of Prophecy the New Jerusalem and what not If we make further enquiry into the nature of these fair promising Mysteries we shall find that Satan most frequently pitcheth upon these three First He befools Men into a belief that the Scriptures do under the Vail of their Words and Sentences contain some hidden Notions that are of purpose so disguised that they may be locked up from the generality of Men at least from learned and wise Men and that these Rarities cannot be discerned from the usual significations of the Words and Phrases as we understand other Books of the same Language but they fancy these Sacred Writings to be like the Writings of the Aegyptians by which they absconded their Mysteries especially like that kind of Writing whereby under words of common known sence they intended things which the Words themselves could not signify and that which occasions this imagination is this that we read frequently of Mysteries in Scriptures and hidden Wisdom and the special Revelation of them to God's Children which are very great Truths but yet not to be so understood as this Delusion supposeth for these expressions in Scripture intend no more than this that the design of God to save Man by Christ is in it self a Mystery which never would have been found out without a special Revelation and that though this Mystery is now revealed by the Gospel yet as to the application of it to the Hearts of Men in Conversion by the Operation of the Spirit it is yet a Mystery But none of these intend any such suggestion that there are private Notions of Truth or Doctrine that are lying under ground as it were in Scripture words which the words in the common Language will not acquaint us withal nay the contrary is expresly affirmed when we are told that all is plainly laid open to the very simple so that from the Scriptures they may as well understand the fundamental principles of Religion as they may understand any other thing which their language doth express to them However in this Satan takes advantage of Mens Pride and Curiosity to make them forward in the acceptation of such offers especially when such things are represented as the only saving discoveries which a Man cannot be ignorant of but with hazard of Damnation Secondly In this boast of Mystery Satan sometimes takes another course somewhat differing from the former and that is to put Men upon Allegorical reflections and allusions by which the Historical Passages of Scripture are made besides the import of the History resemblances of spiritual Truths which supposeth the Letter of Scripture to be true but still as no better than the first Rudiments to train up Beginners withal yet withal that the spiritual meaning of it raiseth the skilful to a higher Form in Christ's School At this rate all are turned into Allegories If they fall upon the first of Genesis they think they then truly understand it when they apply the Light and Darkness and God's separating of them with such other Passages to the regeneration of the Soul The like work make they with the Sufferings of Christ But then the crafty Adversary at last enticeth them on to let go the History as if it were nothing but a Parable not really acted but only fitted to represent Notions to us Allegories were a Trap which the Devil had for the Jews and wherein they wonderfully pleased themselves How much Origen abused himself and the Scriptures by this humour is known to many and how the Devil hath prevailed generally by it upon giddy people in later times I need not tell you The
for a Remembrancer according to Prov. 3. 3. Bind them about thy neck write them upon the Table of thine heart However if they were literally enjoyned they would have them as Christ tells them broader than others as an evidence of their greater care The Cathari boasted of Sanctity and good Works and rejected second Marriages the Apostolici were so called from a pretended stricter imitation of the singular holiness of the Apostles The Valesians made themselves Eunuches according to the Letter for the Kingdom of God The Donatists accounted that no true Church where any spot or infirmity was found The Messalians or Euchytae were for constant praying The Nudipedales for going bare-foot c. The Papists urge Canonical Hours Whippings Pennances Pilgrimages voluntary Poverty abstinence from Meats and Marriage in their Priests and Votaries In a word all noted Sects have something of special singularity whereby they would difference themselves from others as a peculiar character of their greater strictness and for want of better stuff they sometimes take up affected gestures devotional looks and outward garbs all which have this note That what they most stand upon God hath least or not at all required at their hands their voluntary Humility or neglecting of the Body being but will-worship and a self-devised piece of Religion Thirdly When once Men are set in the way of exercising severities Satan endeavours by working upon their fancies to press them on further to a delight and satisfaction in these wayes of strictness so that the practiser themselves are not only confirmed in these usages and the opinions that are concomitant with them but others are the more easily drawn to like and profess the same things Any serious temper under any Profession of Religion easily comes to be devout and readily complies with opportunities of evincing its Devotion by strictness And therefore we shall find among Heathens a great devotional severity and such as far exceeds all of that kind which the Papists do usually brag of the Magi abstained from Wine eat not the flesh of living Creatures and professed Virginity The Indian Brachmans did the like and besides used themselves to incredible hardship they laid upon skins sustained the violence of the Sun and Storms and exercised themselves therewith some spending Thirty seven years in this course others more We read strange things of this nature concerning the Aegyptian Priests and others The Mahumetans are not without their Religious Orders which pretend a more holy and austere Life than others and though of some as of the Torlachs and Dervizes several private Villanies are reported yet of others as of the Order of Calender we are assured from History That they profess Virginity and expose themselves to Hardship and a stricter Devotion in their way and generally 't is said of all of them That they go meanly clad or half naked some abstinent in Eating and Drinking professing Poverty renouncing the World some can endure cutting and slashing as if they were insensible some profess perpetual Silence though urged with Injuries and Tortures others have Chains about their Necks and Arms to shew that they are bound up from the World c. If such things may be found among Heathens no wonder that Errour boasts of them for in both there is the same reason of Mens pleasing themselves in such hardships which is from a Natural Devotion assisted by Satans cunning and the same Design driven on by it for the Devil doth confirm Heathens and Mahumetans in their false Worship by the reverence and respect they carry to such practices Fourthly Because Religious Holiness hath a beauty in it and is very lovely he doth all he can to affect Men with the highest revernce for these pretences of Religious strictness so that they that will not be at pains to practise them can bestow an excessive respect and admiration upon those that are grown famous in the use of such things and by that means being almost adored they are without doubt perswaded that all they teach or do is right and in a doting fondness they multiply Superstitious Errours Idolatry is supposed to have a great part of its rise from this While Men endeavoured to express their thankful and admiring remembrances of some excellent Persons by setting up their Pictures their Posterity began to worship them as Gods Pilgramages were first set on foot by the respects that Men gave to places that were made famous by Persons and Actions of more than ordinary Holiness and because the Devil found Men so very apt to please themselves in paying such Devotional Reverences he wrought upon their Superstitious humour to multiply to themselves the occasions thereof and by fabulous Traditions sent them to places no otherwise made memorable than by Dreams and Impostures Much of this you might see if you would accompany a Caravan from Cairo to Mecca and Medina where you would see the zealous Pilgrims with a great many Orisons and Prayers compassing Abrahams house kissing a Stone which they are told fell from Heaven blessing themselves with a relique of the old Vesture of Abrahams House washing themselves in the Pond which as their Tradition goes the Angel shewed to Hagar saluting the Mountain of Pardons throwing Stones in defiances of the Devil as their Legend tells them Ismael did their Prayers on the Mountain of Health their visit to the Prophets Tomb at Medina c. The like might you observe among the Papists in their Pilgrimages to Jerusalem and the Sepulchre to the Lady of Loretto's Chappel and other places By such devices as these the unobservant people are transported with a pleasure insomuch that they not only perswade themselves they are very devout in these Reverences but they also become unalterably fixed to these Errours that do support these delightful Practices or as consequences do issue from them Sixthly A more plausible Argument for Errour than the Learning and Holiness of the Persons that profess it is that of Inspiration in which the Devil soars a loft and pretends the highest divine warrant for his falshoods for God is Truth and we know that no lye is of the Truth Now to make Men believe that God by his Holy Spirit doth in any manner dictate such Opinions or certainly reveal such things for Truths is one of the highest Artifices that he can pretend to and such a confirmation must it be to those that are so perswaded that all disputes and doubtings must necessarily be silenced That the Devil can thus transform himself into an Angel of Light we are assured from Scripture which hath particularly cautioned us against this cheat The Apostacy of the later times 1 Tim. 4. 1. the Apostle foretells should be carried on by the prevalency of this pretence Some shall depart from the Faith giving heed to seducing Spirits That by Spirits there Doctrines are intended rather than Doctors is Mr. Medes interpretation but it will come all to one if we consider that the word
in some old customs of Gentilism and upon a design to win them they made bold to bend the Doctrine of the Gospel toward their former usages they thought indeed it was best to wink at things and not to bear too hard upon them at first but that tollerating a lesser evil they might avoid a greater inconvenience and withall they deemed they had done great service to the Church and Christian Religion if they could any way divert the Heathen from Worshipping their Idols And to effect this the easilier they seemed to cherish their customs and rites of Worship as consonant in the general to the Principles of Christianity only they excepted against the Object of their Worship as unlawful so that upon the matter they did no more than change the name The manifold inconveniences that followed this kind of dealing they did not discover at first but besides the infecting the simplicity of Christian Religion with the dirt and dregs of Paganism which they might easily have seen Time hath since discovered that here the Devil secretly laid the chief foundations of Popery Whosoever shall impartially compare the Rites Customs Usages and Garbs of Popery with those of Paganism will to his admiration find such an exact agreement and consonancy that he must necessarily conclude that either Paganism imitated Popery or Popery imitated Paganism but the latter is true and that these corruptions in Religion by Popery came in by a designment of conforming Christianity to Heathenism though it may be upon pious intentions at first is no difficult thing to evince for besides that the Rites of Paganism were more ancient and so could not be borrowed from Popery which came long after the Scripture did foretel a great defection from Truth which should be in the last days and this under a profession of Religion and the things particularized are such as shew that the defection should carry an imitation of Paganism for no less seems to be signified by 1 Tim. 4. 1. The Spirit speaketh expressly that in the latter times some shall depart from the Faith giving heed to seducing Spirits and Doctrines of Devils that is as Mr. Mede whose interpretation I follow doth prove Doctrines concerning Devils or Daemons as in Heb. 6. 2. we have the phrase of Doctrines of Baptisms which must needs signify Doctrines concerning Baptisms the Gentile Theology of Daemons is the thing which Paul prophesies should be introduced into Christianity How clearly this relates to Popery may be evident to any that doth not wilfully blind himself by prejudice Their Doctrine of Daemons was this they supposed two sorts of Gods supream and inferiour the supream they supposed did dwell in the Heavenly Lights Sun Moon and Stars without change of place these they judged were so sublime and pure that they might not be prophaned with the approach of earthly things and that immediate approaches to them were derogatory to their Soveraignty The inferiour order of Gods they imagined were of a middle sort betwixt the supream Beings and Men as participating of both these they called Mediators and Agents and supposed their business was to carry up Mens Prayers to God and to bring down Blessings from God upon Men these were in Scripture called Baalim and by the Greeks Daemons to this purpose Austin and others speak Now these Daemons they supposed were the souls of dead Men that had been more than ordinarily famous in their generation Thus Ninus made an Image to his Father Belus after he was dead and caused him to be worshipped Hermes confesseth that Aesculapius Grand-father to Asclepius and Mercury his own Grand-father were worshipped as Gods of this order Abundance of instances I might produce to this purpose but to go on these Daemons because to them was committed the care of Terrestrial affairs as Celsus argues against Origen and because of the help and advantage that Men might receive from them they supposed it gratitude and duty to worship them and this worship they performed at their Images Sepulchres and Reliques To this purpose Plutareb tells us of Theseus his Bones and Plato of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Shrines of their Daemons How evident is it that the Papists in their Doctrine and Practice about the Invocation of Saints and Angels have writ after this Copy and that they are the Men that have introduced this Doctrine of Daemons the thing it self declares without further evidence Had the Heathens their dead Hero's for Agents 'twixt the supream Gods and Men so have the Papists their dead Saints to offer up their Prayers Did the Heathen expect more particular aids from some of these Daemons in several cases than from others so do the Papists instead of Diana for Women in labour and Aesculapius for the diseased they have their St. Margaret and St. Mary for Travelling Sebastian and Roch against the Pestilence Apollonia against the Toothach St. Nicholas against Tempests c. Did the Heathen pray to these Daemons for their aid so do the Papists to their Saints as their Breviaries Rosaries and Ladies Psalters testify Had the Heathen their Feasts their Statas ferias to their Daemons so have the Papists Had they their Februalia Proserpinilia with Torches and Lights so have the Papists their Candlemas with Lights Did the Heathen erect Images and Pillars or keep the Ashes and Shrines of their Daemons so do the Papists the one had Processions and Adorations so have the other and a great many more things there are wherein Popery keeps a correspondence with Heathenism To this purpose you may read enough in Monsieur de Croy of the three Conformities To make it yet more clear that the corruptions in Religion by Popery came in by the design of suiting Christian Religion to Paganism I shall in a testimony or two shew you that they professedly avouched the design Gregory the Great writes chidingly to Serenus Bishop of Marseilles who it seems was no forward Man in this matter to this purpose Thou shouldest have considered that thou didst converse chiefly with the Gentiles to whom Pictures are instead of Reading to the end that no offence be given them under colour of lawful zeal wherewith thou art not cunningly endued And in another Epistle to Mellitus he adviseth That the Honours and Offerings which the Heathens gave to their Daemons should be transferred to the Martyrs and their Relickes and gives this reason for it it is impossible saith he to cut off all at once from stubborn minds Eusebius also endeavours to perswade to Christianity by this Argument that the Christians custom of honouring the memories of the Martyrs and solemnly assembling at their Sepulchres did agree with the custom of the Gentiles of doing the like honour to their Daemons and having mentioned what Hesiod speaks concerning Plato's Opinion that their Champions became Daemons after death Helpers and Protectors of Men for which cause they were worshipped at their Sepulchres as God
sticks not sometime to asperse the poor troubled Soul with Dissimulation where that accusation is proper for the Devil cares not how inconsistent he be to himself so that he may but gain his end affirming all his seriousness to be nothing but whining Hypocrisy So that whether they judg these troubles to be real or feigned his conclusion is the same and he perswades Men thereby to hold off from all religious strictness holy diligence and careful watchfulness 5. A further use which the Devil makes of these troubles of Spirit is to prepare the Hearts of Men thereby to give entertainment to his venomous impressions Distress of Heart usually opens the Door to Satan and lays a Man naked without Armour or Defence as a fair Mark for all his poysoned Arrows and 't is a hundred to one but some of them do hit I shall chuse out some of the most remarkable and they are these 1. After long acquaintance with grief he labours to fix them in it In some cases custome doth alleviate higher griefs and Men take an odd kind of delight in them 't is some pleasure to complain and Men settle themselves in such a course their Finger is ever upon their Soar and they go about telling their Sorrows to all they converse with though to some this is a necessity for real Sorrows if they be not too great for vent will constrain them to speak yet in some that have been formerly acquainted with grief it degenerates at last into a formality of complaining and because they formerly had cause so to do they think they must always do so But besides this Satan doth endeavour to chain Men to their mourning upon two higher Accounts 1. By a delusive contentment in sorrow as if our tears paid some part of our debt to God and made amends for the injuries done to him 2. By an obstinate sullenness and desperate resolvedness they harden themselves in sorrow and say as Job 7. 11. I will not refrain my Mouth I will speak in the anguish of my Spirit I will complain in the bitterness of my Soul Am I a Sea or a Whale that thou settest a Watch over me 2. Another impression that Mens Hearts are apt to take is unthankfulness for the favours formerly bestowed upon them their present troubles blot out the memory of old kindnesses they conclude they have nothing at all because they have not peace though God heretofore hath sent down from on high and taken them out of the great Waters or out of the Mire and Clay where they were ready to sink though he hath sent them many tokens of Love conferred on them many Blessings yet all these are no more to them so long as their sorrows continue than Haman's Wealth and Honour was to him so long as Mordecai the Jew sate at the Kings Gate Thus the Devil oft prevails with God's Children to deal with God as some unthankful Persons deal with their Benefactors who if they be not humour'd in every request deny the reality of their Love and dispise with great ingratitude all that was done for them before 3. By inward griefs the Heart of the afflicted are prepared to entertain the worst interpretation that the Devil can put upon the Providences of God The various Instances of Scripture and the gracious Promises made to those that walk in Darkness and see no Light do abundantly forewarn Men from making bad conclusions of God's dealings and do tell us that God in design for our tryal and for our profit doth often hide his Face for a moment when yet his purpose is to bind us up with everlasting compassions Now the Devil labours to improve the sorrows of the Mind to give a quite contrary construction if they are afflicted instead of saying Sorrow may endure for a Night but Joy will come in the Morning or that for a little while God hath hidden himself he puts them to say this Darkness shall never pass away If the grief be little he drives them on to a fearful expectation of worse as he did with Hezekiah Esa 38. 13. I reckoned till Morning that as a Lyon so will be break all my Bones from Day even to Night wilt thou make an end of me If God purpose to teach us by inward Sorrows our Pride of Heart carelessness neglect of dependance upon him the bitterness of Sin or the like the Devil will make us believe and we are too ready to subscribe to him that God proclaims open War against us and resolves never to own us more So did Job chap. 19. 6. Know now that God hath overthrown me and compassed me with his Net how often complained he thou hast made me as thy mark thou hast broken me asunder thou hast taken me by my Neck and shaken me to peices So also Heman Psal 88. 14. Why castest thou off my Soul why hidest thou thy Face from me 4. Upon this occasion the Devil is ready to envenome the Soul with sinful wishes and execrations against itself Eminent Saints have been tempted in their trouble to say too much this way Job solemnly cursed his Day Job 3. 3. Let the Day perish wherein I was born and the Night in which it was said there is a Manchild conceived c. So also Jeremiah chap. 20. 14. Cursed be the Day wherein I was Born let not the Day wherein my Mother bare me be Blessed Cursed be the Man who brought tydings to my Father saying a Man-child is Born unto thee and let that Man be as the Cities which God overthrew and repented not Strange rashness what had the Day deserved or wherein was the Messenger to be blamed Violent Passions hurried him beyond all bounds of reason and moderation When troubles within are violent a small push sets Men forward and when once they begin they are carried headlong beyond what they first intended 5. On this advantage the Devil sometimes imboldens them to quarrel God himself directly When Job and Jeremiah cursed their day it was a contumely against God indirectly but they durst not make bold with God at so high a rate as to quarrel him to his Face Yet even this are Men brought to often when their sorrows are long-lasting and deep The Devil suggests Can God be faithful and never keep Promise for help can he be merciful when he turns away his ears from the cry of the miserable where is his pity when he multiplies his wounds without cause Though at first these cursed intimations do a little startle Men yet when by frequent inculcating they grow more familiar to the Heart the distressed break out in their rage with those exclamations Where is the faithfulness of God where are his Promises hath he not forgotten to be gracious are not his Mercies clean gone And at last it may be Satan leads them a step higher that is 6. To a desparing desperateness For when all Passages of relief are stop up and the burthen becomes great Men are
apt to be drawn into rage and fury when they think their burthen is greater than they can bear and see no hope of ease in a kind of revenge they express their anger against the hand that wounded them The Devil is officiously ready with his advice of Curse God and die and they being full of anguish are quickly made to comply with it 7. When 't is at this height the Devil hath but one Stage more and that is the suggesting of irregular means for ease Rage against God doth not quench the inward burning Blasphemies against Heaven easeth not the Pain the Soar runs still and ceaseth not the trouble continues the Man cannot endure it longer all Patience and Hope is gone what shall he do in this case The Devil offers his Service he will be the Physician and commonly he prescribes one of these two things 1. That 't is best to endeavour to break through all this trouble into a resolved prophaneness not to stand in awe of Laws nor to believe that there is a God that governs in the Earth but that this is only the bitter fruit of melancholy and unnecessary seriousness and therefore 't is best to eat drink and be merry If a Man can thus escape out of his trouble the Devil needs no more but oft he cannot the wounds of Conscience will not be thus healed Then 2. He hath another remedy which will not fail as he tells them that is to destroy themselves to end their troubles with their lives How open are the Breasts of troubled Creatures to all these Darts and were it not that God secretly steps in and holds the afflicted with his right hand 't is scarce imaginable but that wounded Consciences should by Satan's subtile improvement of so fair an advantage be brought to all this misery 8. Satan can afflict the Body by the Mind For these two are so closely bound together that their good and bad estate is shared betwixt them If the Heart be merry the Countenance is chearful the Strength is renewed the Bones do flourish like an Herb. If the Heart be troubled the Health is impaired the Strength is dryed up the Marrow of the Bones wasted c. Grief in the Heart is like a Moth in the Garment it insensibly consumeth the Body and disordereth it This advantage of weakening the Body falls into Satans hands by necessary consequence as the Prophets ripe Figs that fell into the Mouth of the Eater And surely he is well pleased with it as he is an Enemy both to Body and Soul But 't is a greater satisfaction to him in that as he can make the Sorrows of the Mind produce the Weakness and Sickness of the Body So can he make the Distemper of the Body by a reciprocal requital to augment the trouble of the Mind How little can a sickly Body do it disables a Man for all Services he cannot oft Pray nor Read nor Hear Sickness takes away the Sweetness and Comfort of Religious Exercises this gives occasion for them to think the worse of themselves they think the Soul is weary of the ways of God when the Body cannot hold out All failures which weariness and faintness produce are ascribed presently to the bad dispostion of the Mind and this is like Oyl cast upon the Flame Thus the Devil makes a double gain out of Spiritual trouble 9. Let it be also reckoned among the advantages which Satan hath against Men from trouble of Spirit that 't is a contentment to him to see them in their Miseries 't is a sport to him to see them as Job speaks take their Flesh in their Teeth and cry out in the bitterness of their Souls their groanings are his Musick when they wallow in Ashes drown themselves in Tears roar till their Throat is dry spread out their Hands for help then he gluts his Heart in looking upon their woes When they fall upon God with their unjust Surmises evil Interpretations of Providence questioning his Favour denying his Grace whishing they had never been Born then he claps his Hands and shouts a Victory The pleasantest sight to him is to see God hiding himself from his Child and that Child broken with fears torn in peices with griefs made a Brother to Dragons a Companion to Owls under restless Anxities perpetual Lamentations feeble and sore broken their Strength dryed like a Potsheard their Throat dry their Tongue cleaving to their Jaws their Bowels boyling their Bones burnt with Heat their Skin black upon them their Flesh consumed their Bones sticking out chastened with strong pain upon their Bed This is one of Satan's delightful Spectacles and for these ends doth he all he can to bereave them of their Comfort which we may the more certainly perswade our selves to be true when we consider the grounds forementioned his malicious nature the advantages of Spiritual Peace and the disadvantages of Spiritual trouble CHAP. VI. Of the various Ways by which he hinders Peace 1. Way by discomposures of Spirit These Discomposures explained by shewing 1. What advantage he takes from our natural Temper and what Tempers give him this advantage 2. By what occasions he works upon our natural Tempers 3. With what success 1. These Occasions suited to natural Inclinations raise great disturbance 2. They have a tendency to Spiritual Trouble The thing proved and the manner how discovered 3. These Disturbances much in his Power General and Particular Considerations about that Power HAving evidenced that one of Satan's principal designs is against the Peace and Comfort of God's Children I shall next endeavour a discovery of the various ways by which he doth undermine them herein All inward troubles are not of the same kind in themselves neither doth Satan always produce the same effects out of all Some being in their own nature disquiets that do not so directly and immediately overthrow the Peace and Joy of believing and the Comforts of assurance of Divine Favour as others do Yet seeing that by all he hath no small advantage against us as to Sin and Trouble and that any of them at the long-run may lead us to question our interest in Grace and the Love of God and may accordingly afflict us I shall speak of them all which that I may do the more distinctly I shall rank these troubles into several heads under peculiar names it may be not altogether so proper but that the curious may find matter of exception to them that by them and their explanation the differences may the better appear I distinguish therefore of a fourfold trouble that the Devil doth endeavour to work up upon the Hearts of Men. They are 1. Discomposures 2. Affrightments 3. Dejections of Sadness 4. Distresses of Horrour Of all which I shall speak in their order And 1. Of Discomposures of Soul These are Molestations and Disturbances by which the Mind is put out of order and made unquiet the calm in which it should enjoy it self and by which it should be
Ecclesiastes to set forth the chief good shews that felicity consists not in the common abuse of outward things because that brings only vexation but in the fear of God leading to future happiness and in the mean time in a thankful comfortable use of things present without anxiety of Mind Hence doth he fix his conclusion as the result of his experience and often repeats it There is nothing better for a Man than that he should Eat and Drink and that he should make his Soul enjoy good in his Labour Eccles 2. 24. 3. 12 13. 5. 18 19. Not that Solomon plays the Epicure giving advice to eat and drink for to morrow we die nor that he speaks deridingly to those that seek their felicity in this life as if he should say If ye do terminate your desires upon a terrene felicity there is nothing better then to eat and drink c. But he gives a serious positive advice of enjoying the things of this life with cheerfulness which he affirms proceeds from the sole bounty of God as his singular gift It is the gift of God Eccles 3. 13. 't is our portion that is our allowance Eccles 5. 19. for these two expressions our Portion and God's gift they are of the same signification with Solomon here and when a Man hath power to enjoy this allowance in comfort 't is God that answereth him in the joy of his heart ver 20. 'T is plain then that God sows good Seed in his Field the springing up therefore of these Tares of vexation which so generally afflict the Sons of Men must be ascribed to this the Enemy hath done it 3. 'T is also a considerable ground of suspition that Satan can do much in discomposures of Spirit in that sometimes those whose tempers are most cool and calm and whose singular dependance upon and communion with God must needs more strengthen them against these passionate vexations are notwithstanding precipitated into violent commotions Moses was naturally meek above the common disposition of Men and his very business was converse with God whose presence kept his Heart under a blessed awe yet upon the Peoples murmuring he was so transported with fullenness and unbelief at the waters of Meribah Numbers 20. 10 12. that it went ill with him which David thus expresseth Psal 106. 33. they provoked his Spirit so that he spake unadvisedly with his Lips Who can suppose less in this matter than that Satan having him at advantage hurried him to this rashness specially seeing such vehemencies were not usual with Moses and that his natural temper led him to the contrary This hath some affinity with the next consideration Which is 4. That when Men most foresee the occasions of their trouble and do most fear the trouble that might thence arise and most firmly design to keep their hearts quiet yet are they oft forced against all care and resolution upon extravagant heats David resolved and strenuously endeavoured to possess his Soul in Serenity and Patience for what could be more than solemn engagement Psal 39. 1. I said I will look to my ways and what endeavours could be more severe than to keep himself as with Bit and Bridle what care could be more hopeful to succeed than to be dumb with silence yet for all this he could not keep his Heart calm nor restrain his Tongue ver 3. My Heart waxed hot within me while I was musing the Fire burned then spake I with my Tongue Who suspects not the hand of Satan in this 5. 'T is also remarkable that when we have least reason to give way to discomposure when we have most cause to avoid all provocations yet then we have most occasions set before us When we would most retire from the noise of the World for private devotion when we would most carefully prepare our selves for a solemn Ordinance if we be not very watchful we shall be diverted by business disturbed with noises or some special occasion of vexation shall importune us to disquiet our selves when yet we shall observe if we have not these solemn affairs to wait upon we shall have fewer of these occasions of vexation to attend us This cannot be attributed to meer contingency of occasions nor yet to our tempers solely for why they should be most apt to give us trouble when they are most engaged to calmness cannot well be accounted for 't is evidently then Satan that maliciously directs these occasions for they have not a malicious ingeniousness to prepare themselves without some other chief mover at such times as he knows would be most to our prejudice These general considerations amount to more than a suspition that it is much in Satan's power to give disturbances to the Minds of Men yet for the clearer manifestation of the matter I shall shew that he can do much to bring about occasions of discomposure and also to stir up the Passions of Men upon these occasions 1. That occasions are much in his hand I shall easily demonstrate For 1. There being so many occasions of vexation to a weak crasy Mind we may well imagine that one or other is still occuring and while they thus offer themselves Satan needs not be idle for want of an opportunity 2. But if common occasions do not so exactly suit his design he can prepare occasions for such is his foresight and contrivance that he can put some Men without their privity to his intentions or any evil design of their own upon such actions as may through the strength of prejudice misinterpretation or evil inclination be an offence to others and in like manner can invite those to be in the way of these offences I am ready to think there was a contrivance of Satan if we well consider all circumstances to bring David and the Object of his Lust together while Bathshebah was Bathing he might use his Art in private motions to get David up to the Roof of his House But more especially can the Devil prepare occasions that do depend upon the wickedness of his Slaves these are Servants under his command he can say to one God and he goes and to another Come and he comes If contempt or injury affronts or scorns c. be necessary for his present work against any whom he undertakes to disturb he can easily put his Vassals upon that part of the Service and if he have higher imployment for them he ever finds them forward And hence was it that when Satan designed to plunder Job he could quickly perform it because he had the Chaldeans and Sabeans ready at a call 3. If both these should fail him he can easily awaken in us the memory of old occasions that have been heretofore a trouble to us these being raised out of their Graves will renew old disturbances working afresh the same disquiets which the things themselves gave us at first If Satan's power were bounded here and that he could do no more than set before Men occasions of
that Scriptures and Ordinances are but low and sorry things c. That Satan doth delight to force such Thoughts upon Men is evident 1. From his Nature He is a blasphemous Spirit and withal so malicious that whatsoever is in his cursed Mind he will be ready to vent upon all occasions 2. From his Practice for where he can obtain the rule over Mens Imaginations as in some distracted Persons and those that are distempered with Feavers he usually makes them vomit forâ— Oaths Cursings and Blasphemies and this he doth to some that while they have had the use of their Reason have not been observed to give their Tongue the liberty of swearing or cursed speaking 3. From his professed Design in the case of Job concerning whom he boasted to God himself that he would make him curse him to his face and accordingly tempted him by his Wife to curse God and die 4. From the sad experience of those that have suffered under this sad Affliction for many have complained of blasphemous Thoughts and those whom he cannot conquer he will thus trouble Neither need we think it strange that the Devil can impress Blasphemies upon the Imaginations of Men against their wills when we consider that he could make Saul in his fits to behave himself like an inspired Person and cause him to utter things beyond and unsutable to his disposition after the rate and manner of those raptures which Idolatrous Priests used to be transported withal this in 1 Sam. 18. 10. is called Sauls prophesying when the evil Spirit from the Lord vexed him and is the same with that which is spoken concerning Baal's Priests 1 King 18. 29. They prophesied until the time of the offering of the Evening Sacrifice that is they were exercised with Trances and rapturous Furies in which they uttered strange Sounds and Speeches How easily then may Satan possess the Fancies of Men with Blasphemies so that the unwilling may be troubled with them and those that are deprived of the benefit of Reason may from the power of the impression upon their imagination vent them with a kind of unwilligness Melancholy Persons do very frequently meet with this kind of Trouble Satan having a great power upon their Imagination and great advantages from the darkness of that Humor to make the fear arising from such thoughts the more astonishing and to delude them into an apprehension that they are guilty of all that passeth through their thoughts and also to work this perplexity to more dismal effects In these kind of Men he doth play the Tyrant with such Injections abusing them to such an height as if they were his Vassals and Slaves whose Thoughts and Tongues were in his and not their own keeping and so strongly doth he possess them with this perplexity sometimes that all the counsels reasonings or advice of others cannot in the least satisfie or relieve them yet notwithstanding I have known several under this Affliction who when by Physick the state of their Bodies hath been altered have found themselves at ease immediately the Trouble gradually and insensibly ceasing of it self Others there are that have great vexation from these Thoughts and these are commonly such as by some long and grievous Pain Sickness or other Crosses have their Spirits fretted and imbittered then is Satan ready to suggest that God is cruel or regardless of his People and these Thoughts are the more dreadful because fretting and murmuring Spirits have a natural tendency to to think harshly of God so that Satan in this case doth with the more boldness obtrude these Suggestions upon them finding so great a forwardness toward such Imaginations and also with greater severity he doth reflect upon them as being in some likelihood compliant and consenting When other Persons not so concerned as these two sorts of Men above mentioned are assaulted with blasphemous thoughts the fits are less permanent and because they easily discover the design and Author of them not highly affrightful though still troublesome The burthen of these injections are much like the former very sadly afflicting For who can easily bear the noise of Satan while he shouts continually into their Ears odious Calumnies and Blasphemous Indignities against God David could not hear wicked Men blaspheme God but it was as a Sword in his Bones exceeding painful the impressions of Nature that teach us to revere and honour God the power of Education that confirms these impressions the perswasion of Faith that assures us of the reality and infinite Excellency of a Godhead and the force of Love that makes us more sensibly apprehensive of any Injury or Dishonour done to him whom we love above all all these do suffer by these violent Incursions of Satan and the Sufferer finds himself to be pained and tortured in these noble parts How grievous must it be to a Child of God to have his Ear chained to these intollerable ingrateful Reproaches Especially when we consider that the Devil will in this case utter the most dreadful Blasphemies he can devise which will still add to the Affliction for even those Men that through habit can well bear ordinary petty Oaths will yet startle at outragious prodigious Swearing and therefore what ever Covert and consequential Blasphemies may be to some Men these impudent hideous abuses of the Holy and Just God must needs sadly trouble those that are forced to hear them And the more constant the greater trouble Who would not be weary of their Lives that must be forced to undergo this Vexation still without intermission And yet the Devil can advance the trouble a little higher by the Apparatus or Artificial Dread which he puts upon the Temptation in the manner of the injection As the Roaring of the Lion increaseth terrour in the Beasts of the Field who without that would tremble at his presence and as the Thundering and Lightning at the giving of the Law increased the fear of Israel So when Satan is upon this design he shakes as it were the House and makes a noise that the fright may be increased 3. Suspicious fears of being excluded out of Gods eternal Decree of Election is another of his affrightments This is when Satan boldly takes upon him to determine God's secret Counsel concerning any Man peremptorily asserting that he is none of Gods Elect. In which case he often doth only inject the suspicion confidently without offer of Proof or if he use Arguments they never amount to a proof of his Assertion neither is it possible they should for these are among God's secrets and out of Satans reach though possibly they may prove the Person to be not Converted at present So that this kind of trouble differs exceedingly from those disquiets of Temptation which frequently Men suffer about their state of Regeneration And indeed the Question should not be confounded it being of great concern to Men when their Peace is assaulted to be able to observe the difference betwixt these two Assertions Thou
former hopes are taxed for self-delusion and his present state to be a state of Nature This trouble is far greater than the two former because the Party is judged to be in greater hazard and by many degrees more remote from hope 'T is the frequent and sad thought of such That if Death should in that estate cut off their days Oh! then they were for ever miserable The fears and disquiets of the Heart on this account are very grievous but yet they admit of degrees according to the Ignorance of the Party the Distemper of the Conscience the Strength of the Objections or Severity of the Prosecution in regard the Conscience is now sadly out of order We may call this degree of grief for distinction a wounded Spirit which how hard it is to be born Solomon tells us Prov. 18. 14. By comparing it with all other kind of troubles which the Spirit of a Man can make some shift to bear making this heavier than all and above ordinary strength Some make enquiry what may be the difference betwixt a wounded Spirit in the Regenerate and the Reprobate To which it may be answered 1. That in the Parties apprehension there is no difference at all both of them may be compassed about with the Sorrows of Death and suppose themselves to be in the Belly of Hell 2. Neither is there any difference in the degree of the trouble a Child of God may be handled with as much seeming Severity as he whom God intends for a future Tophet 3. Neither is there any such remarkable difference in the working of the Spirits of the one and other that they themselves at present or others that are by-standers can easily observe Yet a formal difference there is for Grace being in the Heart of the one will in some breathing or Pulse discover its Life And though sometimes it acts so low or confusedly that God only can distinguish yet often those that are experienced observes will discover some real Breathings after God and true loathing of Sin and other traces of Faith and Love that are not so discernible to the Parties themselves 4. But in God's design the difference is very great the wicked lye under his Lash as Malefactors but the regenerate are as Patients under Cure or Children under Discipline 5. And accordingly the Issue doth determine that Gods intention in wounding their Spirits were not alike to both the one at last coming out of the Furnace as Gold the other still remaining as reprobate Silver or being consumed as dross Thus have ye seen the nature and degree of Spiritual Sadness 2. For the further explanation whereof I shall next shew you that this is an usual trouble to the Children of God Which 1. I might evidence from several Instances of those that have suffered much under it as David whose complaints in this case are very frequent and Heman who left a memorial of his griefs in Psal 88. Jonah also in the Belly of the Whale had a sharp fit of it when he concluded that he was cast out of Gods Sight and his Soul fainted within him Jon. 2. 4. 7. Neither did Hezekiah altogether escape it for though his disquiet began upon another ground it run him into Spiritual trouble at last But besides these innumerable instances occur One shall scarce converse with any Society of Christians but he shall meet with some who with sad complaints shall bemoan the burthen of their Hearts and the troubles of their Conscience 2. The provisions which God hath made in his Word for such is an evidence that such Distempers are frequent He that in a City shall observe the Shops of the Apothecaries and there take notice of the great variety of Medicines Pots and Glasses full of Mixtures Confection and Cordials may from thence rationally conclude that 't is a frequent thing for Men to be Sick though he should not converse with any Sick Person for his information Thus may we be satisfied from the Declarations Directions and Consolations of Scripture that 't is a common case for the Children of God to stand in need of Spiritual Physitians and Spiritual Remedies to help them when they are wounded and fainting Solomon's exclamination a wounded Spirit who can bare shews that the Spirit is sometimes wounded The Prophets direction he that walks in darkness and sees no Light let him trust in the Lord clearly implies that some there are that walk in darkness God's creating the fruit of the Lips Peace peace his promises of restoring Comforts to Mourners his commands to others to comfort them do all inform us that 't is a common things for his Children to be under such Sadnesses of Spirit that all this is necessary for their relief 3. The reasons of this trouble do also assure us of the frequency of it for of them we may say as Christ speaks of the poor we have them always with us so that the grounds of Spiritual Sadness considered 't is no wonder to find many Men complaining under this Distemper The reasons are 1. The Malice of Satan who hath no greater revenge against a Child of God when translated from the Power of Darkness to the Kingdom of Christ than to hinder him of the Peace and Comfort of that condition 2. The many advantages which Satan hath against us For the effecting of this we cannot imagine that one so malicious as he is will suffer his Malice to sleep when so many fair opportunities of putting it in practice do offer themselves For 1. The Questions to be determined for setling the peace of the Soul are very intricate and often of greater difficulty than Doctrinal Controversies How hard is it to conclude what is the Minimum quod sic the lowest degrees of true Grace Or the Maximum quod sic the highest degree of sin consistant with true Grace To distinguish betwixt a Child of God at the lowest and an Hypocrite or Temporary Believer at the highest is difficult In mixt actions to be able to shew how the Soul doth manage its respect to God when the Man hath also a respect to himself especially when it is under any confusion is not easie And in thâ—se Actions where the difference from others of like kind lies only in the grounds and motives of the undertaking or where the prevailing degree must distinguish the Act in reference to different Objects that are subordinate to one another as our loving God above the World or our selves our fearinâ— God above Men c. 't is not every one that can give a satisfactory determination 2. As the intricacies of the Doubts to be resolved give the Devil an advantage to puzzle us so is the advantage heightned exceedingly by the great injudiciousness and unskilfulness of the greatest part of Christians These Questions are in their notion difficult more difficult in their application to particular Persons where the ablest Christian may easily be non-plust but most difficult to the weak Christians These Satan can
when Converted in the midst of his Persecuting rage or those whose Ignorance or Melancholy makes their Hopes and Comforts inaccessible for the present These troubles God owns to be the Work of his Spirit the same Spirit which is a Spirit of Adoption to the Converted is a Spirit of Bondage to these Rom. 8. 16. And accordingly we find it was so to the Converts in Acts 2. Who being pricked in their hearts by Peter's Sermon cried out Men and Brethren what shall we do The like did the Jaylor And the Promise which God makes of calling the Jews Zach. 12. 10. doth express God's purpose of dealing with them in this very Method They shall look upon him whom they have pierced and shall mourn for him as one that mourneth for his only Son and shall be in bitterness for him in that day shall be a great mourning 2. God also sometimes wounds the Conscience of his Children after Conversion and this he doth to convince and humble them for some Miscarriage which they become guilty of As when they grow secure carnally confident of the continuance of their Peace when they are carelesly negligent of Duty and the exercises of their Graces when they fall into gross and scandalous sins or wilfully desert the ways of Truth and in many more cases of like kind When his Children make themselves thus obnoxious to Divine Displeasure then God hides his Face from them takes away his Spirit signifies his Anger to their Consciences threatens them with the danger of that Condition from whence follows grief and fear in the Hearts of his People In this manner God expressed his Displeasure to David as his Complaints in Psal 51. do testifie Make me to hear joy and gladness that the Bones which thou hast broken may rejoyce hide thy Face from my sins Cast me not away from thy presence and take not thy holy Spirit from me Restore unto me the joy of thy Salvation c. 2. Notwithstanding all this there is a great difference betwixt God and Satan in this matter which mainly appears in two things 1. God doth limit himself in all the Trouble which he gives his Children to his great end of doing them Good and Healing them and consequently stints himself in the measure and manner of his Work to such a proportion as his Wisdom sees will exactly suit with his End So that his Anger is not like the brawlings of malicious Persons that know no bounds he will not always Chide his Debates are in measure and this lest the Spirit should fail before him Isa 57. 16. So that when he wounds the Conscience before Conversion 't is but to bring them to Christ and to prevent their taking such Courses as might through Delusion make them take up their stand short of him So much of Mourning and Fear as is requisite for the true effecting of this he appoints for them and no more When he wounds after Conversion 't is but to let them feel that it is an evil and bitter thing to sin against him that their Godly sorrow may work Repentance suitable to the Offence and that they may be sufficiently cautioned for the time to come to sin no more lest a worse thing befal them He that afflicts not willingly will put no more Grief upon them than is necessary to bring them to this But Satan when he is admitted and God doth ofter permit him in subservience to his design to wound the Conscience he proceeds according to the boundless fury of his malice and plainly manifests that his desire is to destroy and to tread them down that they may never rise again This though he cannot effect for God will not suffer him to proceed further than the bringing about his holy and gracious Purpose yet it hinders not but that still his envious thoughts boil up in his Breast and he acts according to his own Inclination For it is with Satan as 't is with wicked Men if God imploy them for the Chastisement of his Children they consider not who sets them on work nor what Measures probably God would have them observe but they propose to themselves more work than ever God cut out for them As Assyria when imployed against Jerusalem Isa 10. 7. had designs more large and cruel than was in Gods Commission God had stinted him in his holy Purpose yet the Assyrian meant not so neither did his heart think so but it was in his heart to destroy and cut off Nations not a few So that when God is a little displeased as he speaks Zach. 1. 15. they do all that lies in them to help forward the Affliction Thus doth the Devil endeavour to make all things worse to God's Children than ever God intended Here is one difference betwixt God and Satan in the wounding of Consciences But 2. They are yet further differenced in that all that God doth in this Work is still according to Truth For if he signifie to the Unconverted that they are in a state of Nature liable to the Damnation of Hell unless they accept of Christ for Salvation upon his Terms this is no more than what is true God doth not misrepresent their Case to them at that time Again if he express his displeasure to any of his Converted Children that have grieved his Spirit by their Follies by setting before them the Threatnings of his Word or the Examples of his Wrath he doth but truly tell them that he is angry with them and that de jure according to the Rigour of the Law and the demerit of their Offence he might justly cast them off But he doth not positively say that de eventu it shall infallibly be so with them But Satan in both these cases goes a great way further He plainly affirms to those that are in the way to Conversion that God will not pardon their Iniquities that there is no hope for them that Christ will not accept them that he never intended the benefit of his Sufferings for them And when the Converted do provoke God he sticks not to say the Breach cannot be healed and that they are not yet Converted All which are most false assertions And though God can make use of Satans malice when he abuseth his Children with his falshoods to their great fear to carry on his own ends by it and to give a greater impression to what he truly witnesseth against them Yet is not God the proper Author of Satans lying for he doth it of his own wicked inclination The effect of these desperate false Conclusions which is the putting his Children into a fear in order to his end may be ascribed to God but the falshood of these Conclusions are formally Satan's work and not God's For he makes use of so much of Satan's wrath as may be to his Praise and the remainder of his wrath he doth restrain I have discovered the nature and degrees of these Spiritual Troubles and that 't is a common thing for
born Or that Death could annihilate us Or that as soon as we had been born we had died As Job speaks Job 3. 11 12. Why died I not from the Womb Why did I not give up the ghost when I came out of the belly For then had we not contracted so much Guilt Or that the Mountains and Hills could fall upon us and cover us from the Face of our Judge 8. When all their Hopes are thus dashed and like a Shipwracked-Man on a Plank they are still knocked down with new Waves all their endeavours being still frustrated they seem to themselves to be able to hold out no longer then they give over all further Enquiries and the use of Means they refuse to Pray Read Hear They perceive as Spira said that they pray to their own Condemnation and that all is to no purpose They are weary of their Groanings Psal 6. 6. Their Eyes fail with looking up their Knees are feeble their Hands hang down And as Heman Psal 88. 4 5. They count themselves with those that go down to the Pit free among the Dead like the slain that lie in the Grove whom God remembreth no more Thus they lie down under their Burthen and while they find it so hard to be born 't is usual for them to come to the utmost point of Desperateness Satan suggesting and forwarding them Sometimes they open their Mouths with complaints against God and blaspheme And as the last part of the Tragedy being weary of themselves they seek to put an end to their present Misery by putting an end to their Lives I have presented you with Satan's Stratagems against the Peace of God's Children the Remedies against these and other Subtilties of our grand Enemy I shall not offer you because many others have done that already to whose Writings I must refer you Some principal Directions I have pointed at in the way and in the General have done this for the help of the Tempted that I have endeavoured to shew them the Methods of the Tempter which is no small help to preserve Men from being thus imposed upon and to recover out of his Snare those that are 'T is a great preservative from Sickness and no mean advantage to the Cure to have a discovery of the Disease and the Causes of it I shall conclude these Discoveries with a Caution or two 1. Let none think worse of the serious Practice of holy strictness in Religion because these Spiritual Distresses do sometimes befal those that are conscientiously careful in the Ways of God while the prophane and negligent Professors are strangers to such Trials These Troubles are indeed very sad but a sensless careless State is far worse these Troubles often end very Comfortably whereas the other end except God make them sensible by Conviction of their sin and danger in that real Misery the fears whereof occasion these Sorrows to God's Children And the danger of Spiritual Troubles is not so great as is that of an hardned Heart nay God frequently makes use of them to prevent eternal Ruine for one that goes roaring to the Pit there are thousands that go laughing to Hell 2. Let none slight or scoff at these Tremendous Judgments 'T is too common with Men either to ascribe Spiritual Troubles to Melancholy as if none were ever thus concerned but such as by too much seriousness in Religion are become Mad a fair pretence for Carelessness or to a whining Dissimulation To the former I have said something before and as for the latter I shall only reply in the words of Spira to one that objected Hypocrisie to him I am a Cast-away a Vessel of Wrath yet dare you call it Dissembling and Frenzy and can mock at the formidable example of the heavy Wrath of God that should teach you Fear and Terrour But 't is natural to the Flesh to speak either out of malice or ignorance perversly of the Work of God 3. Let none be afraid of this Goliah let no Man's heart faint because of him A fear of caution and diligence to avoid his Snares is a necessary Duty Be sober be vigilant because your adversary the Devil c. but a discouraging distrustful Fear is a dishonourable reflection upon God's Power and Promises to help us and upon the Captain of our Salvation who goeth out before us Let us hold on in the practice of Holiness and not be afraid The God of Peace shall tread down Satan under our feet shortly Amen DAEMONOLOGIA SACRA OR A TREATISE OF Satans Temptations The Third Part. CONTAINING An Account of the Combate betwixt Christ and Satan in Matth. 4. Wherein the deep Subtilty of Satan in managing those Temptations is laid open as the grand Instance of the Sum of his Policy in all his Assaults upon Men Leading to a consideration of many Temptations in particular and of special directions for Resistance By R. G. Heb. 4. 15. He was Tempted in all points like as we are yet without Sin London Printed by J. D. for Richard Randel and Peter Maplisden Booksellers in New-Castle upon Tine 1677. PART III. MATTH 4. 1. Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the Wilderness to be tempted of the Devil CHAP. I. The First circumstance of the Combate The time when it happened The two Solemn Seasons of Temptation The Reasons thereof I Shall here consider the great Temptation which it pleased our Lord Christ to submit unto as a most famous Instance for confirmation and illustration of the Doctrine of Temptations already handled The first Verse sets down several remarkable circumstances of this Combate all of them matter of weight and worth As First The Time when this fell out not as a loose and accidental Emergency but as particularly made choice of both by God and Satan being most fit and proper for the design which each of them were carrying on This is expresly noted in Mat. 4. 1. Then was Jesus led up but more fully in Mark 1. 12. Immediately the Spirit driveth him into the Wilderness Manifestly directing us to expect something worthy of our Observation in that circumstance Neither can we miss of it when the things unto which this directs us are so fully related immediately before For we find in both these Evangelists which speak so exactly of the time of these Temptations that Christ was baptized of John this was in order to the fulfilling the Righteousness of his Office As the Priests under the Law when they came to be thirty years old entred upon their Function by Washings or Baptizings and Anointings So Christ that he might answer his Type beginning to be about thirty years of Age was solemnly inaugurated into the great Office of the Mediatorship by Baptism and the extraordinary descending of the Holy Ghost by which he was anointed with the Oyl of gladness above his Fellows To this solemn Instalment the Father adds an honourable Testimony concerning him This is my beloved Son in whom I am
of advice from this consideration in reference to both Cases 1. If God is about to employ us in any Service 1. We have little need to be confident of our abilities or performance when we know that Temptations wait for us 2. We must not only be sensible of our weakness that we be not confident but we must be apprehensive of the Strength and Power of God to carry us through that we be not discouraged 3. We must see our Opposition that we may be watchful and yet must we refuse to give it the least place of consideration in our debates of Duty lest it sway us against Duty or dishearten us in it 2. If God be pleased to Honour us with peculiar Favours Then 1. Though we must improve them to the full yet must we not feed on them without fear 2. We must not stay in the Enjoyment or play with the Token but look to the tendency of such Favours and improve them to duty as to their proper end CHAP. II. The second Circumstance Christs being led by the Spirit What hand the Spirit of God hath in Temptations And of running into Temptation when not led into it THe second Circumstance acquaints how Christ was carcarried to the Combate In Solemn Combates and Duels the Persons undertaking the Fight were usually carried to the place with great Solemnity and Ceremony Christ in this Spiritual Battel is described as having the conduct of the Spirit He was led up of the Spirit c. What this Spirit was is though by a needless and over-officious diligence questioned by some but we need not stay much upon it if we consider the phrase of the Evangelists who mention Spirit without any Note of Distinction which of necessity must have been added if it had intended either his proper Spirit as Man or the wicked Spirit Satan directing thereby to understand it of him to whom the word Spirit is more peculiarly attributed viz. the Holy Ghost Or if we observe the close connexion in Luke betwixt that Expression of Christ's being full of the Holy Ghost and his being led by the Spirit it will be out of controversy that the Holy Spirit is here intended Hence was it that Beza translates it more fully Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost was led eodem Spiritu of the same Spirit and the Syriack in Matthew doubts not to express it by the Holy Spirit And what else can be imagined When in this Text the Spirit that led him up and the Devil that tempted are mentioned in so direct an opposition He was led of the Spirit into the Wilderness to be tempted of the Devil The manner of his being carried thither is expressed by such words as signify though not an External rapture like that of Philip a strong inward Motion and Impulse upon him The Spirit driveth him saith Mark. The Spirit led him saith Luke using the same word by which the Scripture elsewhere expresseth the Power of the Spirit upon the Children of God who are said to be led by him Hence note That the Spirit of God hath a hand in Temptations Christ was led by the Spirit to be tempted This must not be understood as if God did properly tempt any to sin either by inticing their hearts to evil or by moving and suggesting wicked things to their minds or by infusing evil Inclinations or by any proper compliance with Satan to undermine and delude us by any treachery or deceit none of these can be imagined without apparent derogation to the holiness of God who tempteth no man neither can he be tempted with evil But what we are to understand by the Holy Spirit 's concerning himself in temptations is included in these particulars First God gives Commission to Satan without which his hand would be sealed up under an impossibility of reaching it out against any Secondly Opportunities and occasions do depend upon his Providence without which nothing comes to pass Neither we nor any thing else do or can move without him Thirdly The Spirit oversees the Temptation as to Measure and Continuance The length and breadth of it is ordered by him Fourthly The issue and consequences of every Temptation are at his appointment The ways of its working for our Exercise Humiliation or Conviction or for any other good and advantage whatsoever they all belong to his determination So that it is not improper to assert that God and Satan do concur in the same temptation though the ways of proceeding with the aims and intentions of both be directly different and contrary Hence is it that the Temptation of David 1 Sam. 24. 1. and 1 Chron. 21. 1. are upon several regards attributed both to God and Satan This note is of use to remove those harsh Interpretations which poor tempted Christians meet withal commonly from such as have not touched their burdens with the least of their Fingers Men are apt in these cases to judg First The Ways of Religion as being ways at least in the more serious and rigid practice of them of intolerable hazard and perplexity and only upon an Observation That those who most addict themselves to a true and strict observance of Duty and Command usually complain of Temptations and express sometimes their fears and distress of heart about them This is your Reading your Praying and Hearing Such Preaching say they leads men to dispair and perpetual disquiet And upon the whole they conclude it dangerous to be religious above the common rate of those that prosecute it in a slow and careless indifferency Secondly The like Severity of Censure do they use in reference to the Spiritual State of the tempted as if they were Vessels of his hatred and such as were by him given up to the power of this Wild Boar of the Forrest to devour and tear All kind of distresses are obnoxious to the worst of misjudgings from malevolent minds The Sufferings of Christ produced this censorious Scoff Let God deliver him if he will have him Davids troubles easily induced his Adversaries to conclude that God had forsaken him and that there was none to deliver him But in troubles of this nature where especially there are frightful complaining against themselves men are more easily drawn out to be peremptory in their uncharitable determinations concerning them Because the trouble it self is somewhat rare and apt to beget hideous Impressions and withall the vent which the afflicted parties give by their bemoaning of their Estate in hope to ease themselves thereby is but taken as a Testimony against themselves and the undoubted Ecchoes of their real feelings Thirdly Their Sins are upon this Ground misjudged and heightned Vnusual Troubles with common Apprehâ—nsion argue unusual Sins The Viper upon Paul's hand made the Barbarians confident he was a Man of more than ordinary Guilt and Wickedness David's Sickness was enough to give his Enemies occasion to surmise that it was the punishment of some great Transgression An evil disease
say they cleaveth to him Those that were overwhelmed by the Fall of the Tower of Sileo and those whose Blood Pilate mixed with their Sacrifices were judged greatest Sinners But in inward Temptations this misjudging confidence is every way more heightned and those that are most molested are supposed to have given more way to Satan Fourthly Temptations are also misjudged to be worse than they are They are indeed things to be trembled at but they are not properly of an astonishing amazing or dispairing consideration as men areapt to think that view the workings of them at a distance Against all those unrighteous surmises the poor afflicted Servants of Christ may have relief from this truth in hand That the Holy Spirit of God hath a hand in Temptations and therefore it is impossible that every where they should be of such a Signification Were they in themselves no way serviceable to God's Glory in the Gracious Exercise of his Children the Spirit of Wisdom and Holiness would not at all have a hand in them If under Satan's Assaults you meet with those that by such a harshness of Censure would aggravate your troubles and so grieve those whom God hath sadned you may boldly appeal from them to him that judgeth righteously And indeed if men would but consider in the saddest case of this nature either 1. The End of the Lord in permitting Temptations which if seen would give an high justification of his dealing and force men to applaud and magnify his Wisdom rather than to censure it Or 2. If they could but see the secret ways of God's Support How he acts his part in holding them by the hand in counterworking of Satan and confounding him under the exercise of his highest malice and also in the ways of his preservation and deliverance Or 3. If the harmlesness of Temptations when their sting is taken out were but weighted men would change their minds as readily as the Barbarians did when they saw the Viper not effect that mischief they supposed upon Paul And would see cause to stand amazed at the contrivances of so much Power and Wisdom as can turn these to quite other ends and uses than what they of themselves seem to threaten This Consideration will further express its usefulness in comforting us under Temptations It might have been Paul's great discouragement that in his answer before Nero no man stood with him But this was his support that God was with him The like encouragement we have under all Assaults of Satan that we are not left to our selves but the Spirit of God is with us and that he concerns himself on a design to over-see and over-rule his work and to put a check upon him when there is need So that he cannot tempt as he will nor when he will nor in what he would nor as long as he would but that in all cases we may rely upon the great Master-contriver for relief help mitigation or deliverance as there is need In that the Evangelists do not say that Christ cast himself upon a Temptation neither did go to undertake it till he was led to it we note That whatever may be the advantage of a Temptation by the Spirits ordering of it or what security from danger we may promise to our selves upon that account yet must we not run upon Temptations though we must submit when we are fairly led into them The reasons of this truth are these First There is so much of the nature of evil in Temptations that they are to be avoided if possible Good they may accidentally be that is beyond their proper nature and tendency by the over-ruling hand of God but being in their own natural constitution evil 't is inconsistent with humane nature to desire them as such Secondly To run upon them would be a dangerous tempting of God that is making a bold and presumptuous trial without call whether he will put forth his power to rescue us or not Now he that runs upon a Temptation hath no promise to be delivered out of it And besides runs upon so desperate a provocation that in all probability he shall miscarry in it as a just punishment of his rashness But Enquiry may be made When do men run uncalled and unwarrantably upon Temptation I Answer many ways As First When men engage themselves in Sin and apparent Wickedness in the Works of the Flesh For it can never be imagined that the Holy God should ever by his Spirit call any to such things as his Soul abhors Secondly When men run upon the visible and apparent occasions and causes of Sin This is like a man's going to the Pest-house thus do they that though they design not to be actors in evil yet will give their Company and Countenance to Persons actually engagaged in evil Thirdly When men unnecessarily without the conduct either of command or urging an unavoidable Providence do put themselves though not upon visible and certain opportunities yet upon dangerous and hazardous occasions and snares Peter had no errand in the High-Priest's Hall his curiosity led him thither he might easily have foreseen a probable Snare but confidently putting himself forward where his danger was more than his business he ran upon the Temptation and accordingly fell The like did Dinah when she made a needless Vagary to see the Daughters of the Land where she met with her Sin and Shame Neither do they otherwise who dare adventure themselves in Families whilst yet they are free and may otherwise dispose of themselves where they see Snares and Temptations will be laid before them The Case indeed is otherwise to those that are under the necessary engagement of relation natural or voluntary if it be antecedent to the hazard to live in such places or callings they have a greater promise of preservation than others can lay claim to Fourthly Those run upon Temptation that adventure apparently beyond their strength and put themselves upon actions good or harmless disproportionably to their abilities The Apostle gives the instance in Marriage-Abstinence 1 Cor. 7. 5. which he cautions may not be undertaken at a careless adventure for fear of a Temptation and by this may we judg other things of like nature Fifthly They are also guilty that design an adventure unto the utmost bounds of lawful Liberty Those that have a mind to try conclusions how near they may make their approaches to Sin and yet keep off from the defilement such as would divide a hair betwixt good and evil have at best but a hair's breadth betwixt them and Sin But how easily are they brought over that Like a man that walks upon the utmost Verge of a River's brink oft-times meets with hollow ground and a dangerous slip before he is aware Sixthly Those also may be reckoned in the number of such as rush upon their danger who go abroad without their weapons and forget in the midst of dayly dangers the means
David gives in his experience to confirm this Truth he never met with outward Troubles but he had also inward Temptations with them as Fretting Disquiet sad Apprehensions of Gods Wrath Hast Distrust Fear c. As the relation of his several straits do testify And besides these the generality of God's Children find it so outward Afflictions seldom pass alone when they have frightings without they have fears within usually seldom have they a Sickness or meet with a sad Providence but they have Satan busy with their Souls molesting their Peace or endeavouring to ensnare them Thus their Feet are never in the Stocks but the Iron enters into their Soul And for this reason is it that outward Afflictions and Troubles are called Temptations in Scripture because Temptations usually accompany them and they are indeed the Solemn Seasons that Satan desires to improve for that end and for that is it that Luke expresseth that which we translate a time of Temptation by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies an occasion or opportunity of Temptation The Temptations that Satan drives on upon the advantage of an Afflicted Estate are these First To drive men upon Impatient outbreakings against God as the Israelites in the Wilderness turn upon Moses with this Hast thou brought us into the Wilderness to slay us To this tended Job's Temptation by his Wife Curse God and die as 't is in our Translation which cannot in any wise admit of the excuse that Beza makes for her as if she gave wholsome advice to die blessing of God because he reproves her sharply as having spoken foolishly and wickedly but at best 't is an Ironical Scoff at Jobs Integrity Dost thou bless God while thou art killed by his displeasure if it be not a direct suggestion of revengeful despite At such times Men are too apt to entertain cruel thoughts of God and sadly reflective upon his Mercy or Justice Secondly In this posture of Affliction he strives to put them upon direful conclusious against themselves as if God called solemnly their Sin to remembrance and that they are forsaken of God and marked out for destruction the pledg and earnest whereof they take these troubles to be We way observe that David's Afflictions awakened his Conscience to object guilt and miscarriage so that he is as earnest to deprecate the marking and remembrance of his Sin as he is to pray against his troubles For this see Psal 25. 6 7. Thirdly He pusheth them usually upon contempt of Religion and abandoning the ways of God We are too apt to blame Religion for all our Troubles and as we expect that our owning the ways of God should secure us from outward Affliction so when we find it otherwise we are too forward to say we have washed our hands in vain c. Fourthly The Sin of Distrust is another evil that he drives at he would have Men conclude that God cannot or will not deliver Can God prepare a Table in the Wilderness said the Israelites by the power of Temptation when they were distressed Fifthly Another Evil aimed at in such a case is to put us upon indirect Courses and ways to escape from our Troubles Saul went to the Witch of Endor when God answered him not Distresses naturally prompt such things and a little Temptation makes us comply as is noted by the wise Mens desire Give me not poverty lest I put out my Hand and Steal Distresses of Poverty put men upon Theft and unlawful ways The Reasons of Satans tempting the Afflicted are these First That outward Afflictions are a load and burthen this gives a probability that his designs may the better take place 'T is easy to overthrow those that are bowed down to break those that are bruised to master those that are weary and weak-handed Secondly An Afflicted Estate is a Temptation of it self and naturally dictates evil things It is half of his design brought to his hand it affords variety of matter for a Temptation to work on Thirdly Such a Condition strongly backs a Temptation and furnisheth many Arguments for a prevalency for Troubles are serious things they speak to the Heart and what they speak they speak fiercely they represent things otherwise than common discovery can do and for the most part they shew an Ingenuity in multiplying Fears and aggravating Hazard and ascertaining suspected Events so that Satan can scarce desire a fairer Hit than what these offer him Fourthly They also give him the advantage of darkness for to such their way is hid and God hath hedged them in they neither know where they are whether their trouble by a chastisement of Sin or for Tryal or for prevention of miscarriage or to make way for more comfortable manifestations and as little know they how to behave themselves in their Trouble or how and when to get out of it In such groping uncertainties 't is scarce possible but they should be put wrong Fifthly An Afflicted condition brings on weakness and Indisposition to duty it makes the hands weak and the Knees feeble This made Job to faint this dryed up Davids Strength The first Assault of an Affliction doth stound the Soul and put it into such a confusion that hope turns back and Faith is to seek and every Grace so out of order that a man shall be unable to do any thing of duty in a comfortable manner Sixthly In this case Men are apt to conclude their Prayers are not heard I cry in the day time and thou hearest not says David Hath the Lord forgotten to be Gracious And with such seeming probability is this urged upon us by Affliction that Job professeth he could not believe his own Sence and Knowledg in such a case If I had called and he had answered me yet would I not believe that he had hearkened unto my Voice Seventhly Afflictions strongly fix Guilt upon us and represent God Searching out our Iniquities and Enquiring after our Sin Eightly They Imbitter the Spirit and beget Impressions upon the mind of very hard thoughts of God Ninthly They violently push Men on to speak unadvisedly there is such a swelling Ferment of the old leaven of Impatience and Distrust in the Mind that 't is matter of pain and difficulty to be silent their belly is as Wine that hath no vent It is ready to burst like New Bottles and they are weary with forbearing and cannot stay and must speak let come on them what will All these advantages doth an Afflicted Condition bring to Satan and who can think that he who is so Studious of our ruine will be willing to miss so fair an opportunity First This must teach us to have a watchful Eye over Affliction though at all times we must expect Satans Stratagems yet in Troubles especially prepare for them according to the wise Mans advice in a day of adversity consider Secondly Seeing Satan takes advantage of the sharp humours of Impatience and
to instigate and provoke or if we consider what Furniture Tools Means and Instruments are requisite and what it may cost to bring all things together into fit order and method or if we think of the various ways and manners of temptation That some are mediate some immediate some inward some outward some moveable some fixed and solemn some inticements to Evil some affrightments from Duty others invasions of our peace and joy or lastly if we call to mind what Study what Art what fetches and contrivanees the Devil is sometimes put upon we shall easily see that it keeps him doing and that he eats not the bread of Idleness that hath that Imployment to follow Secondly Satan gives up himself unto it is wholly in it he walks to and fro goes about seeking advantages of this nature compasseth Sea and Land to Proselite men to his Slavery useth all means upon all men at all times with all diligence Hence was it that Latimer in his homely way of speaking called him a busy Bishop in his Diocess and excited the sluggish to learn laboriousness of the Devil Thirdly He takes a delight in it not only from a natural propensity which his fall put upon him whereby he cannot but tempt as an evil Tree cannot but bring forth evil Fruits But also from the power of an habit acquired by long exercise which is accompanied with some kind of pleasure and further whatever pleasure may be supposed to arise from revengeful Pride or companionship in evil he hath of that in full measure pressed down and running over Fourthly All other things in Satan or in his indeavours have either a subserviency or some way or other a reference and respect to Temptation His Power Wisdom Malice and other infernal Qualifications render him able to tempt his Labour and Diligence in other things are but the work of one that prepares Materials and Occasions his other business of accusing afrighting destroying tormenting are but the ends and improvements of tempting Fifthly He cares not how it goes on so that it go on as a Man that designs to be rich cares not how he gets it which shews that tempting in general is his design Of this we have many Instances as 1. he stick not to lie and dissemble he will tell them of the Kingdoms of the World and the Glory of them and a thousand fair promises which he never intends 2. He will tempt for a small matter if he can but gain a little or but molest us yet he will be doing 3. He will not give over for a foil or disappointment 4. He is not ashamed to tempt contradictory things he tempted Christ against the work of Redemption Master spare thy self He tempted Judas to further it in betraying him 5. Any Temptation that he sees will hold he takes up with hence is it that he tempts not the Jews now to Idolatry because he hath them fast in another snare being strongly led to an opposition and contempt of Christ 6. He will sometime tempt where he hath not probability to prevail even against hope Thus he tempted Christ and Paul The use of the Observation is this If it be his business to tempt it must be our work to resist First To resist is a labour 't is not an idle formality consisting in words of defyance or a few ridiculous Crossings and sprinklings of Holy Water or spitting at the name of him as Ignorant People are wont to do Secondly We must give up our selves to this work always fighting and opposing Thirdly It will be necessary to make use of all helps as Prayer Fasting the Counsel and Support of Holy and Experienced Men. Fourthly We must also cast off all hinderances whatsoever in us is apt to take fire or give advantage must be laid off as Pride which doth prognosticate a fall and Security which betrays the best or Presumption which provokes God to leave those of highest attainments Secondly In this general Introduction we may cast our Eye upon the way and manner of the Assault when 't is said the Tempter came unto him we are unavoidably forced to suppose another manner of coming than that whereby he tempted him for forty days together And when we call to mind that at his coming here mentioned he carried Christ to the Temple and from thence to a high Mountain and there propounded himself an Object of Worship we can imagine no less than that Satan here came visibly to him but in what shape or manner of Appearance it is altogether uncertain though 't is most probable it was not in the form of a Brute but in some lustre of Majesty or Glory as an Angel because a deformed or base appearance had been unsuitable to the Boast of giving the Kingdoms of the World or to his desire that Christ should fall down and worship him Hence we may observe That Satan sometimes tempts in a visible Appearance and by Voice First The possibility of this is evident from the Apparitions of Angels Satan is still an Angel and there is nothing of a natural Incapacity in him as to an outward Appearance to our Eyes and Sences more than in glorify'd Spirits Secondly In the first Temptation he did no less when he used the Serpent as a Trune to speak through and an Instrument to act by In possessions he speaks audibly and evidenceth a real presence Thirdly undoubted Instances may be given of Satans tempting and molesting visibly I deny not but there are a great many Idle-Stories of this kind and a number of ridiculous Figments but it would be unreasonable and highly prejudicial to the truth of History and the common Faith of mankind to refuse credit to the serious Accounts of sober Men because of some foolish and unwarrantable Fâ—bles What is related of Luther and his several Troubles from Satan this way is evident in the Story of his Life Cyrillus tells us of one Eusebius Disciple of Hierom who when he was dying cryed out of the Devils appearing to him The like is storyed of St. Martin and others and of these you may read more collected by Mr. Clark If we would enquire into the reasons of Satans appearing thus we cannot more fitly pitch upon any other than these First Either he thinks a great affrightment necessary in some cases and for that end appears or Secondly He sees his appearance needful to give a greater Evidence and certainty to the reality of the pleasures of Sin which he promiseth that is the common ground of his appearing in the ways and designs of Witchcraft Thirdly Or in the height of rage when he perceives other ways not available and when he hath to do with Persons not ignorant of his devices where he sees he hath no need of a Visor or covert ways of dealing then he sticks not if permitted to tempt or molest openly This must teach us not to wonder at such Temptations much less to judg those that may be
is in this manner of dealing that those who affect the name of great Politicians in the World have learned from Satan to shew greatest respects and a most friendly countenance to those whom they most hate and intend to ruine Thus our Richard the Third of England constantly dealt with those for whose Blood he lay in wait and the precepts of Machiavil are fitted to this that t is Wisdom to hug those whom we desire to destroy Ehud's Present made way for his Dagger Joab's Sword could not so well have dispatched its errand upon Abner if he had not ushered it in with a Kiss This should make us most suspect those Temptations that offer us most kindness and advantage and such as are most gratifying to our Humours and Desires For can it be imagined in good earnest that Satan intends us a real good Can the Gifts of Enemies pass for Courtesies and Favours with any but such as are bewitched into a blockish madness Satan is more to be feared when he flatters than when he regeth and though such offers may be looked upon by some as more benign and less odious Temptations as some kind of Familiar Spirits are more kindly treated by some under the notion of white Devils yet may we say of them as Corâ—elius Agrippa speaks of some unlawful Arts and ways of Thurgia eò sunt pernitiosiora qùo imperitis diviniora They have the greatest danger that pretend the highest Friendship Thus much for the Rise of the Temptation CHAP. IX A particular consideration of the matter of the first Temptation what Satan aimed at in bidding him turn Stones into Bread Of Satans moving us to things good or lawfull The end of such a Motion How to know whether such Motions are from Satan or the Spirit What to do in case they be from Satan Of his various aims in one Temptation What they are and of his Policy therein Of his Artificial contrivement of Motions to make one thing infer another NExt follows the Temptation it self Command that these Stones be made Bread There is no great difficulty in the words The Greek indeed hath a remarkable suitableness to the Supposition on which Satan insists taking Christ to be the Son of God 't is very pertinently spoken Say or Speak that these Stones be made Bread for if God speak it must be done T is not worth the while to insist upon so small a variety of expression as is betwixt this Evangelist who hath it these Stones and Luke who speaks it in the singular Number this Stone for besides that as some suppose this Expression of Luke might for any thing that appears to the contrary be Satans lowering his request to one Stone when Christ had denyed to turn many into Bread upon his first asking this one Stone in Luke taken collectively for the whole heap will signify as much as these Stones in Matthew or the phrase these Stones in Matthew by an imitation of a common Hebraism may be no more but one of these Stones or this Stone as it is in Luke as 't is said Jepthah was buried in the Cities of Gilead that is in one of the Cities The thing urged was the turning or changing the form of a Creature which is a work truely miraculous and wonderful and such as had neither bee unsuited to the power of Christ nor unlawful in it self 'T is from hence justly questioned where the sting of this suggestion lay or in what point was the temptation couched First It was not in the unlawfulness or sinfulness of the thing mentioned For Christ did as much as would amount to all this when he turned Water into Wine and when he fed Multitudes by a miraculous multiplication of a few Loaves and Fishes Secondly It was not unsuitable to his condition as hungry for so it seemed a Duty to provide for himself and which Satan took for granted Thirdly Neither seemed it any derogation to his Power and Divine Nature but rather an advantage and fit opportunity to give a full proof of it to the stopping of Satans Mouth for ever Notwithstanding these there was Poyson and Malignity enough in the suggestion and under these Green Leaves of plausible pretences lay hid many Snakes For 1. By this was he secretly tempted to admit of a doubting of the truth of the divine Testimony lately declaring him to be the Son of God 2. As also further to question his Fathers Providence and Love 3. and unnecessarily to run out of the ordinary way of supply and to betake himself to indirect means or extraordinary courses 4. And all this to the abuse and undervaluing of his power in prostituting it to Satans direction or perswasion and the Devil had gained a considerable advantage if he could have prevailed with him to do such a thing by his instigation 5. It may be he further thought this might entice to an high esteem of himself and so make way for a vain ostentation of his power and Interest in God All or most of these seem to be the design that the Devil was driving forward Several things are hence observable That where Satan doth not judge it his present Interest to suggest to us things in their own nature sinful he will move us to things good in themselves in hopes thereby to lead us into evil This way of tempting is from a more refined Policy than down-right motions to Sin and doubtless 't is less suspected and consequently more taking The Evils that Satan would introduce by this Method are such as these First Sometime when he tempts us to that which is Good it is that he might affright us from it his approbation is enough to put a discredit and disgraceful suspition upon any thing Such a design had he when he gave testimony for Christ That he was the Son of God or for the Apostles that they were the Servants of the most high God It was not his intention to honour him or them by bearing them witness but to bring them under Suspition and Trouble Secondly There are a great many ways to miscarry in a lawful Action either by propounding bad ends or by failures in the manner of performance or by a misimprovement of the whole These miscarriages and the possibility and probability of them Satan carries in his mind yet doth he not at first propound them but moving us unto the thing he hath an expectation that we will slide into them of our selves or be inclined by some sutable touchâ—â— of suggestion upon our minds together with the tendency or improveableness of the thing or Action to such evils as are properly consequent to it Satan did not here tempt Christ to these sinful ends directly but to an Action which he hoped might insensibly produce them Thirdly Another Evil hereby aimed at is the hindrance of a greater Good not only as a diversion to turn us off a better or more profitable occasion but also as an
imply any doubting seeing that that is usually expressive of the greatest certainty and assurance as in the speech of Lamech If Cain shall be avenged seven-fold that is as certainly he shall be avenged so Satan might use it to this Sense If or seeing thou art the Son of God Now whereas it may seem strange that he should set upon Christ if he knew who he was I have answered that before and shall here only add that though Satan did believe Christ to be the Son of God yet so strongly did the power of Malice work in him that he would have had him to have doubted that he was not so From all this we have this Observation That the great design of Satan is to weaken the Assurance and Hopes of the Children of God in their Adoption This is the Master-piece of his design the very Center in which most of his Devices meet we may say of him as Esau said of Jacob is he not rightly called Jacob a supplanter he first stole away our Birth-right at the Creation and now he seeks to take away our blessing in Christ the Redeemer The reasons of this undertaking I shall not here insist on 't is sufficiently obvious that the greatest perplexity and sorrow ariseth to the Children of God from hence and that a troop of other Spiritual evils as Impatience Fury Blasphemy and many more doth follow it at the Heels besides all that inability for Service and at last plain neglect of all Duty All I shall further do at this time shall be to shew in a few particulars from Satans carriage to Christ in this Temptation how and after what manner he doth manage that design in which note First That 't is his design to sever us from the Promise and to weaken our Faith in that when Eve was tempted this was that he aimed at that she should question the good earnest of the prohibition Hath God said so Was he real in that command that you should not Eat at all c. the like he doth to Christ Is it true or can it be so as that Voice declared that thou art the Son of God Secondly Though this be his design yet his way to come to it is not at first to deny it but to question and enquire yet after such a manner as may imply and withal suggest a doubting or suspition that it is not so he doth not come to Christ thus Thou art not the Son of God or that Voice that gave thee that Testimony was but a lye or a delusion but he rather proceeds by questioning which might seem to grant that he was so yet withal might possibly beget a doubt in his mind Thirdly Next he more plainly suggests something that may seem to argue the contrary for thus he aggravates Christ's present condition of want Can it be that God would leave thee to these oppressing straits if thou wert his Son At this rate he deals with us improving the failure of outward means of help the permission of Temptation the want of Comfort the continuance of Affliction notwithstanding Prayers c. as probabilities that we belong not to God Fourthly After this he urgeth Christ to a sinful miscarriage to distrust Providence and to rely no longer on the Care of his Father if Christ had been prevailed with in this he would have made use of it as an Argument to prove that he was not the Son of God indeed 'T is usual in his disputings with us about adoption to put us upon something which may be as an Argument out of our own Mouths against us Christ might have answered him in this as the Man answered Joah If I should do so then thou thy self wouldst set thy self against me Fifthly When at last he hath gradually ascended to that Confidence as to deny our Adoption then at a very great disadvantage he puts us upon the proof in which he puts by the ordinary evidences and insists on extraordinary proofs as necessary The Servants of the Lord that are under this exercise do find that in this case the ordinary evidences of Repentance Mortification Love to the Brethren c. do nothing for them Satan puts their Spirit upon clamouring for higher evidences nothing will serve except they may view the Records of Eternity and read their Names enrolled in the everlasting Decrees or except God will speak from Heaven in an extraordinary way to testify of them as Thomas resolved that no less should satisfy his doubt than the feeling and seeing of the print of the Nails To this purpose some stand upon no less than a Miracle for proof of Son-ship Of which we have two Instances of later years the one Mrs. Honywood the other Mrs. Sarah Wight who in their distresses for their Souls were tempted by Satan to make an hasty Experiment the one by throwing a Venice Glass the other by throwing a Cup against the Wall with this or the like expression If I must be saved then let not this Glass break a desperate Temptation their manner of desiring satisfaction is so provoking that it cannot be expected God will give an answer by it but rather the contrary and if he should not condescend as he is not bound though he strangely preserved the Cup and Glass forementioned from breaking what a dangerous conclusion would Satan draw from it Of this nature and design was that proposal of Satans to Christ Command that these Stones be made Bread that is do it as a proof of thy Son-ship By this we must learn this skill not too easily to give up our hopes or to be Prodigal of our Interest in Christ so as to part with it slenderly If Satan would chiefly rob us of this we may learn thence to put a price upon these Jewels and to account that precious and of singular concernment which he useth so much cunning to bereave us of Many of the Lords Servants may justly blame themselves for their lavish unthriftiness in this matter who as if it were a necessary piece of humility or modesty will readily conclude against themselves that they are not God's Children that they are not yet converted c. Thus at unawares they give up to Satan without a stroke all that he seeks for But you will say Must all Men be confident of Adoption No I mean not so yet all Men must be wary how they cast away their hopes particularly First Though it be a dangerous arrogancy for a sinful wicked Creature to bear himself up in a belief that he is converted and actually instated into the Adoption of Sons yet 't is as dangerous on the other hand for that Man to cast off all hope and to say he is reprobated and such an one as cannot expect Pardon and Grace Secondly Those that are converted though they may and ought to humble themselves deeply for their sinful miscarriage and sincerely acknowledg that they deserve not to be called his Children yet must
may have Impulses from Satan upon pretences of Zeal as the Disciples had when they called for Fire from Heaven In these Impulses Satan doth not so act the Heart of Man as the Spirit of God doth whose Commands in this case are irresistible but he only works by altering the disposition of our Bodies in a Natural way and then having sitted us all he can for an Impression he endeavours to set it on by strong perswasions Some memorable instances of these Impulses might profitably illustrate this Math. Parisiensis takes notice of a Boy in Anno. 1213. of whom also Fuller makes mention who after some loss which the Christians had received in the War against the Turks went up and down Singing this Rithme Jesus Lord Redeem our Loss Restore to us thy Holy Cross And by this means he gathered a Multitude of Boys together who could not by the severest Menaces of their Parents be hindred from following him to their own ruine Another instance of a strange Impulse we have in Josephus one Jesus the Son of Ananus about four years before the Destruction of Jerusalem at the Feast of Tabernacles begins to cry out Woe Woe to the East and West to Man and Woman c. And could by no means be restrained Night or Day and when his Flesh was beaten off his Bones he begged no pity nor ease but still continued his usual crying Seventhly God doth also by his Spirit teach his People in bringing things to their remembrance Satan also in imitation of this can put into the Minds of Men with great readiness and dexterity Promises or Sentences of Scripture insomuch that they conclude that all such actings are from the Spirit of God who as they conclude set such a Scripture upon their Heart thus dealt Satan with Christ he urgeth the Promise upon him wherein upon the matter he doth as much as when he secretly suggests such things to the Heart without an audible Voice In this way of craft Satan doth very much resemble the true work of the Spirit 1. In the readiness and quickness of suggesting 2. In seeming exact suiting Scripture suggested with the present occasion and 3. In the earnestness of his urging it upon the Fancies of Men. Yet when all this is done they that shall seriously consider all ends Matter and Circumstances will easily observe it is but the cunning work of a Tempter and not from the Holy Spirit Observe also That whatever be the various ways of Satans imitation yet the matter which he works and practiseth upon is still Scripture to this he confines himself First Because the Scriptures are generally among Christians received as the undoubted Oracles of God the Rule of our Lives and Duties and the Grounds of our hope It would be a vain and bootless labour to impose upon those that retain this belief the sayings of the Turkish Alcoran the Precepts of Heathen Philosophers or any other thing that may carry a visible estrangement from or contradiction to Scripture he could not then possibly pretend to a Divine Instruction nor could he so transform himself into an Angel of Light but by using this covert of Divine Command Promise or Discovery he can more easily beget a belief that God hath said it and that there is neither Sin nor Danger in the thing propounded but Duty and Advantage to be expected and this is the very thing that makes way for an easy entertainment of such delusions Poor Creatures believe that is all from God and that they are acted by his Spirit and that with such confidence that they contemn and decry those as ignorant of Divine Mysteries and of the Power of God who are not so besotted as themselves Secondly The Scriptures have a Glorious irresistible Majesty in them peculiar to themselves which cannot be found in all that Art or Eloquence can contribute to other Authors 'T is not Play-Book Language nor Scraps of Romances that Satan can effect these cheats withal and therefore we may observe that in the highest delusions Men have had pretences of Scripture and their strong perswasions of extraordinary discoveries have striken Men into a reverence of their profession because of the Scripture Words and Phrases with which their boldest follies are woven up for let but Men enquire into the reason of the prevalency of Familism of old upon so vast a number of People as were carried away with it and they shall find that the great Artifice lay in the Words they used a language abstracted from Scripture to signify such conceits as the Scripture never intended Hence were their expressions always high soaring and relating to a more excellent and mystical interpretation of those Divine Writings This may be observed in David George Hen. Nicholas and others who usually talk of being consubstantiated with God taken up into his Love of the Angelical Life and a great deal more of the same kind The Ranters at first had the like Language and the Quakers after them affected such a câ—nting Expression And we may be the more certain of the truth of this observation that such a kind of speaking which borrows its Majesty from the Stile of the Scripture is of moment to Satans design because we find the Scripture it self gives particular notice of it the false Teachers in 2 Pet. 2. 18. are discribed among other things by their swelling words of Vanity which the Syriack rendrs to be a proud and lofty way of speaking the original signifies no less they were words swelled like Bladders though being pricked they be found to be empty Sounds and no Substance There are indeed swelling words of Atheistical contempt of those who as the Psalmist speaks set their Mouths against Heaven but this passage of Peter as also the like in Jude ver 16. signify big Swoln words from high pretensions and fancies of knowing the mind of God more perfectly for they that use them pretend themselves Prophets of God ver 1. and as to their height in profession are compared to Clouds highly soaring and in 2 Cor. 11. 14. they are said to be transformed into the Apostles of Christ and to the Garb of the Ministers of Righteousness And that which is more this particular design of Satan is noted as the rise of all No marvel for Satan himself is transformed into an Angel of Light Having seen the reasons why Satan chuseth Scripture as his Tool to work by I shall next shew to what base designs he makes it subserve First He useth this Artifice to beget and propagate erronious Doctrines Hence no opinion is so vile but pretends to Scripture as its Patron The Arrians pretend Scripture against the Divinity of Christ The Socinians Pelagians Papists yea and those that pretend to Inspirations for their Rule and disclaim the binding force of those antiquated declarations of the Saints conditions as they call them yet conform all their sayings to the Scripture expression and endeavour to prove their mistakes
the high flown straines of it Montanus as vile as he was had the confidence to call himself the Comforter Novatus and his Brother would be no less than Moses and Aaron The Gnosticks called themselves the Illuminati The Swinkfieildians assumed the title of the Confessors of the Glory of Christ The Family of Love had their Evangelium Regni the Gospel of the Kingdom The Fratricelli distinguished themselves from others by the term Spiritual Muntzer asserted That all of his Opinion were Gods Elect and that all the Children of their Religion were to be called the Children of God and that all others were ungodly and designed to Damnation H. Nicholas affirms That there was no knowledg of Christ nor Scripture but in his Family To this purpose most of them speak that forsake the wayes of Truth and though these swellings are but wind and vapour yet those heights are very serviceable to the Devils purposes who by this means confirms those whom he hath already Conquered and then fits them out with the greater confidence to allure others and Men are apt enough to be drawn by fair shews and confident boastings But I proceed The third Stratagem of Satan for promoting Errour is to astonish Men with strange Language and affected expressions It was an old device of Satan to coyn an unintelligible gibberish as the proper vehicle of strange Enthusiasticks Doctrine and this he artificially suits to his pretended Mysteries without this his rare Discoveries would be too flat and dull to gain upon any Man of competent understanding For if these Dotages were cloathed in plain words they would either appear to be direct non-sence or ridiculous folly It concerns him when he hath any feats of Delusion in hand to set them off with a canting speech as juglers use their hard words of Ailif Casyl Zaze Presto Millat c. to put their ignorant Admirers into a belief of some unknown power by which they do their Wonders And this is in some sort necessary extraordinary matters are above expression and such wild expressions put Men into an expectation of things sublime This knack Satan hath constantly used Montanus had his strange Speeches And all along downward to our times we may observe That Errour hath had this gaudy dress the Familists especially abound with it you may read whole Books full of such a kind of speaking as the Book called Theologia Germanica or German Divinity the Books of Jacob Behmen The bright Morning Star c. Neither are the Papists free one of late hath taken the paines to shew them this and other follies among them you may find such talk as this of being beclosed in the mid-head of God and in his meek-head of being substantially united to God of being oned to God as also of the abstractedness of Life of passive Vnions of the Deiform fund of the Soul of a state of introversion of a Super-essential life a state of nothingness c. Just like the raveings of H. Nicholas David George and others who confidently discourse of being godded with God of being consubstantiated with the Deity and of Gods being manned with them I have oft considered what reason might be given for the takeingness of such expressions and have been forced to satisfie my self with these First Many mistake the knowledge of words for the knowledge of things And well may poor ignorant Men believe they have attained no man knows what by this device when among Learned Men the Knowledg of words is esteemed so great a pitch of Learning and they nourish a great many Controversies that are only verbal Secondly Some are pleased to be accounted Vnderstanders by others and rest in such high words as a badge of Knowledge Thirdly Some are delighted with such an hard Language upon an hope That it will lead them to the knowledg of the things at last they think strange expressions are a sign of deep Mysteries I knew one that set himself to the reading of Jacob Behmens Books though at present he confessed he was scarce able to make common sense of three lines together upon a secret enticement that he had from the Language to come to some excellent discovery by much pains and reading Fourthly Some that have their Fancies heated have by this means broken confused impressions of strange things in their imaginations and conceive themselves to know things beyond what common Language can express as if with Paul rapt up into the third Heaven they hear and see Wonders unutterable But what reason soever prevails with Men to take up such a way of speaking Satan makes them believe that it containes a rich Mine or Treasury not of common Truths but of extraordinary Profundities Fourthly In stead of Argument to confirm an Errour sometimes we have only bold Assertions that it is Truth and a confident condemning the contrary as an Errour urging the danger of Mens rejecting it backed with threatning of Hell and Damnation and all this in the words of Scripture To be sure they are right and all other Men are wrong This kind of confidence and fierceness hath been still the complexion of any remarkable way of Delusion for that commonly confines their Charity to their own Party which is a great token of an Errour not only may you observe in such extraordinary Proclamations of Wrath against those that will not believe them a practice used by the Mad Fanaticks of Munster who as our Quakers were wont to do go up and down the streets crying Wo wo Repent repent come out of Babylon the heavy Wrath of God the Axe is laid to the root of the Tree But in their more setled Teaching they pronounce all to be Antichrist and of the carnal Church that do oppose them Take for this H. Nicholas his words all Knowledg besides his is but witchery and blindness and all other Teachers and Learners are a false Christianity and the Devils Synagogue a nest of Devils and wicked Spirits a false Being the Antichrist the Kingdom of Hell the Majesty of the Devil c. This piece of Art not only our Quakers to whom nothing is more familiar than to say to any opposer Thou art Damn'd thou art in the Gall of bitterness the Lake of fire and brimstone is prepared for thee c. but also the Papists commonly practise who shut all out of Heaven that are not of their Church and when they would affright any from Protestanism they make not nice to tell him That there is no possibility of Salvation but in their way The Reasons of this Policy are these 1 The Heart is apt to be startled with threatnings and moved by commands especially those that are of a more tender and frightful Spirit and though they know nothing by themselves yet these beget fears which may secretly betray Reason and make Men leave the right way because of affrightment 2 The confidence of the Assertors of such things hath also its prevalency for Men are apt to think that
they would not speak so if they were not very certain and had not real experience of what they said and thus are Men threaped out of their own Perswasions 3 The native Majesty of Scripture in a business of so great hazard adds an unexpressible force to such threatnings and though being misapplyed they are no more Scripture Threatnings yet because God hath spoken his displeasure in those words Men are apt to revere them as Men cannot avoid to fear a Serpent or Toad though they know the Sting and Poyson were taken out because Nature did furnish them with a Sting or Venom Fifthly 'T is an usual trick of Satan to derive a credit and honour to Errour from the excellencies supposed or real of the Persons that more eminently appear for it So that it fetcheth no small strength from the qualities of those that propagate it The Vulgar that do not usually dive deep into the Natures of Things content themselves with the most Superficial Arguments and are sooner won to a good conceit of any Opinion by the respects they carry to the Author than by the strongest Demonstration The excellencies that usually move them are either their gifts or their holiness If the Seedsmen of an Errour be Learned or Eloquent and Affectionate in his speaking Men are apt to subscribe to any thing he shall say from a blind devotional admiration of the Parts wherewith he is endowed And often where there is no Learning or where Learning is decryed as savouring too much of Man if there be Natural fluency of speech with a sufficient measure of confidence it raiseth them so much the higher in the esteem of the common sort who therefore judge him to be immediately taught of God and divinely furnished with gifts At this point began the Divisions of the Church of Corinth they had several Officers severally gifted some were taken with one Mans gift others with another Mans some are for Paul as being profound and nervous in his Discourses others for Apollo as Eloquent a third sort were for Cephas as suppose an Affectionate Preacher thus upon personal respects were they divided into Parties And if these several Teachers were of different Opinions their adherents imbraced them upon an affectionate conceit of their Excellencies And generally Satan hath wrought much by such considerations as these This he urgeth against Christ himself when he set up the wisdom and learning of the Rulers and Pharisees as an argument of Truth in their way of rejecting such a Messias Joh. 7. 48. Have any of the Rulers or of the Pharisees believed on him There is no insinuation more frequent than this these are learned excellent able Men and therefore what they say or teach is not to be disbelieved and though this be but Argumentum stultum a foolish Argument yet some that would be accounted wise do make very great use of it The crack of Learned Doctors among the Papists is one Topick of perswasion to Popery and so to other Errours as appears by this That all Errours abound with large declamations of the praises of their Founders and Teachers and the most illiterate Errours usually magnifie the excellent inspirements and gifts of utterance of their Leaders But the other excellency of Holiness in the Teachers of Errour is more generally and more advantagiously improved by Satan to perswade Men that all is true Doctrine which such Men profess Of this Delusion Christ forewarned us They shall come in Sheeps cloathing that is under the mask of seeming holiness at least at first notwithstanding beware of them Math. 7. 15. Those complained of by Paul 2 Cor. 11. 15. though they were Satans Ministers yet that they and their Doctrine might be more plausibly entertained they were transformed as the Ministers of Righteousness this cunning we may espie in Hereticks of all ages The Scribes and Pharisees used a pretence of Sanctity as a main piece of Art to draw others to their way their Alms Fastings long Prayers strict Observations c. were all designed as a Net to catch the Multitude withal The lying Doctrines of Antichrist were foretold by Paul to have their success from this stratagem all that Idolatry and Heathenism which he is to introduce must be and hath been through the hypocrisie of a painted holiness and where he intends most to play the Dragon he there most artificially counterfeits the innocency and simplicity of the Lamb. Arch-hereticks have been Arch-pretenders to Sanctity And such pretences have great influence upon Men for Holiness and Truth are so near of kin that they will not readily believe that it can be a false Doctrine which an holy Man Teacheth they think that God that hath given a Teacher Holiness will not deny him Truth Nay this is an easie and plausible measure which they have for Truth and Errour To enquire into the intricacies and depths of a Disputation is too burdensome and difficult for ordinary Men and therefore they satisfie themselves with this consideration which hath little toyl in it and as little certainly That surely God will not leave holy Men to a delusion It would be endless to give all the instances that are at hand in this Matter I shall only add a few things of Satans method in managing this Argument as First When he hath a Design of common or prevailing Delusion he mainly endeavours to corrupt some person of a more strict serious and religious carriage to be the Captain and Ring-leader such Men were Pelagius Arrius Socinus c. He mainly endeavours to have fit instruments If he be upon that design of blemishing Religion and to bring Truth into a dis-esteem then as one observes he perswades such into the Ministry as he fore-sees are likely to be idle careless prophane and scandalous or doth endeavour to promote such Ministers into more conspicuous places and provokes them to miscarriage that so their Example may be an Objection against Truth while in the mean time he is willing that the Opposers of Truth should continue their smooth carriage and then he puts a Two-edged Sword into the hands of the unstable can that be Truth where there is so much Wickedness and can this be Errour where there is so much Holiness Secondly in Prosecution of this Design he usually puts Men upon some more than ordinary strictness that the pretence of holiness may be the more augmented in this case a course of ordinary Sanctity is not enough they must be above the common Practice some singular Additions of severity and exactness above what is written are commonly affected to make them the more remarkable Christ notes this in the Pharisees concerning all their Devotions and the wayes of expressing them their Phylacteries spoken of Mat. 23. 5. as some think were not intended by that Text of Deut. 6. 8. but only that they should remember the Law and endeavour not to forget it as they do that tye a thred or such like thing about their Finger