-- CHAPTER IV: What is come both to the strivings of natural conscience against sin, and the conflic
as by the contrary desires sent out after them, and with them, by the will.
8. Lust may be most furious, and commit most outrages, when the natural conscience is strongest, and most up in arms, and makes the stoutest opposition, as in those who sin against the light of conscience, and against the Holy Ghost. When conscience is most loud and clamorous, their lusts yet rage most and go against it.
Conscience and lust may be both up together in an unregenerate man; but now, on the contrary, in one regenerate, so much as grace is up, so much lust must needs be down; as in two scales, by how much the one is up the other is depressed. And therefore, when grace is kept up, and a man walks in the Spirit, he fulfils not the lusts of the flesh, that is, falls not into outward acts of sin: Gal. 5:16, 'This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh.'
And the reason which the apostle gives is this, because grace and corruption are opposite as two contraries: ver. 17, 'For the flesh lusteth against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other; so that ye cannot do the things that ye would.' They lust one against another. And therefore when grace is in its heat and courage, and the army of it kept in its array, those impressions which it makes prevail, and must needs do so.
CHAPTER IV:
What is come both to the strivings of natural conscience against sin, and the conflict of grace against it in a regenerate man.
To find out the true difference between them, we must consider the cause and ground of the quarrel, and the weapons with which it is managed Though all these things, and many more, be true, yet that we may come more narrowly to search out the immediate and fundamental difference between the combat of grace against sin, and that which only natural conscience maintains against it, I will first shew what is common to both.
1. This must be yielded and granted as common to both, that not grace only, but natural conscience also, when the pulse thereof beats strongly, may and doth cause a commotion and a combustion against an act of sin in the whole man. The whole man may be disquieted, disturbed, and moved against it. For a passion of fear, a passion of horror (which kind of storms conscience can raise about sin), we find in other things do move and make impression upon the whole man, and cause a quelling, a recoiling, and a faltering to be in the whole heart, when a man is about to do a thing. And such a disturbance may conscience raise in the whole man, when a man is about to commit some kind of sin, as in the case of murder, and the like, when horror seizeth upon the whole man.
2. And natural conscience may create this disturbance in the will as well as in other faculties. It may cause a great unwillingness to commit a sin; not only a remissness, but a displicence and reluctancy, and heart-rising against it, so as the man shall not sin with a full consent of will. Thus Darius was displeased with himself for the injustice and wrong which he did to Daniel: Dan. 6:14, 'Then the king, when he heard these words, was sore displeased with himself, and set his heart on Daniel to deliver him; and he laboured till the going down of the sun to deliver him.' Thus Herod was exceeding sorrowful, and grieved that he should put so holy a man as John the Baptist to death: Mat. 14:9, 'And the king was sorry: nevertheless for the oath's sake, and them which sat with him at meat, he commanded it to be given her.' And grief hath always a
renisus voluntatis, a resistance of the will to accompany it. For when the understanding is strong against a thing, it doth cause some stand in the will, and a bearing of it back more or less, that a man cannot be so fully willing as else he would. There is no sin which any man commits, but some inconveniences present themselves, and they will take somewhat off from the will's eagerness.
3. This commotion which conscience makes shall be intense and gnat; it will strike up the drum, especially when conscience is awakened, and cause as great an alarm, as great an uproar, clamour, and noise, and hurley burley, as grace shall do.
4. Conscience will not only alarm the man before, but also in some measure in the very act itself, and while it is doing, so as the impression which is made upon the whole man, and on the will, shall not be worn out, but continue in the commission of the act. So as all the will is not overcome by the sin and the pleasure of it, but bears off, and is grieved, and abates something of that full delight which would otherwise be in it, and which, if his will was wholly and altogether in the sin, he might find. Thus it was in Herod, who when he gave command for the above-mentioned murder, was exceeding sorrowful. So as these are not to be assigned as the exact differences of this combat, for that there may be a conviction in the whole man against sin both in an unregenerate and a holy soul.
In what then shall be put the true difference?
1. The ground of the quarrel against sin is to be considered. As it is not dying which makes a martyr, but the cause, so not every resistance against sin argues grace, but the ground and cause of it.
Now what is the cause of this war in a gracious heart, you shall know best if you search into the thoughts and consultations of the leaders, for they set the armies on fighting. Observe diligently, therefore, what thoughts run through thy understanding, and what apprehensions they are which thou hast about sin that cause this ado in thy heart. Observe whether thy first thoughts be of the evil of sin
in itself, the foolishness, the heinousness, the contrariety of it to God's holiness and his law; the unkindness which is in it to God and Christ, the injury and wrong that is in it to God, who is so good, both in himself and to thee. Observe whether thy quarrel against sin begins principally upon such thoughts as these; or is the original of thy being angry with sin, the inconveniences which attend upon it in this world or in that which is to come? Do the threatenings annexed to the law and the wrath of God as offended, only occasion this commotion? Then though this opposition to sin be in the whole man, yet it is not the combat of grace.
2. As the ground of the quarrel is thus narrowly to be searched into, so the weapons also with which they fight. The motives and arguments which are used by the leaders to stir up the heart against sin are to be considered. Motives drawn from self, and proportioned to self, are the weapons which strike and pierce through the whole man; and though the whole man be moved against sin, yet when it fights but with such weapons, I may say the weapons of its warfare are carnal, which awakens and rouses self in a man, and then that stirs and moves the whole army.
3. This commotion in unregenerate men is maintained wholly by logical disputes, and arguments, and motives to work the heart against sin, and while the pleading lasts, the heart is exasperated a little, but no longer; it is only while the combatants are in the field.
But the heart-rising, and opposition of a godly man, though it be whetted and sharpened by such arguments, yet it hath a farther principle, and that is, a natural inbred anticipation, an innate, habitual contrariety and enmity, which works in the man at the first view of a sin; as a commotion is wrought in a lamb at the sight of a wolf, or in a lion at the crowing of a cock, and is natural and real.
And therefore it is quick and up when a man is taken on the sudden, and before he musters up thoughts or arguments, his heart riseth at the first view of the sin. Yea, and therefore sometimes when motives drawn from heaven and hell, and many such considerations, would not have been effectual to keep a man from a sin, yet then this
inward antipathy withholds him, Christ backing it in the heart; so that a man can say, I cannot do it, not so much because of such and such considerations, but because I cannot, for my renewed nature will not let me. As a man loves out of sympathy beyond what reason suggests, so he hates out of antipathy too. There is a seed within which cannot sin, a seed from Christ which hath an enmity to sin, the seed of the serpent: 1 John 3:9, 'Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for his seed remaineth in him: and he cannot sin, because he is born of God.' Gal. 5:17, 'For the flesh lusteth against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would.' And we have an instance in Joseph, who, by reason of grace in his heart, could not do that sin to which he was tempted: Gen. 39:9, 'There is none greater in this house than I; neither hath he kept back anything from me but thee, because thou art his wife: how then can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God?' There is a seed within that cannot sin. And thus Paul asserts of himself and others regenerate: 2
Cor. 13:8, 'For we can do nothing against the truth, but for the truth.'
I cannot do such a holy duty, is the voice of nature, but I cannot sin is the voice of a divine nature in a man; I must not sin for these or these reasons, is the voice of reason and conscience; I must not sin works in the heart of a natural man; but the holy nature's I cannot sin, acts in one regenerate. It is the voice of the new nature in him, like to what was in Esther, when she said to Ahasuerus, Esther 8:6, 'For how can I endure to see the evil that shall come unto my people? or how can I endure to see the destruction of my kindred?' A στόργη, an innate pious affection wrought in her this cannot, a not being able to bear it. A man may have many reasons not to murder his enemy, because he must not do it; but a man cannot kill his child, he cannot find in his heart to do it, for a father's nature withholds him. And it is said of the regenerate part, that it cannot sin, as of the sun, yet it cannot mingle with darkness, as of the fire, that it cannot but resist water, as God cannot lie; so his image remaining, such cannot sin.
4. In an unregenerate man terrors of conscience, and impressions of wrath, and the smart of sin felt in the conscience, or the
inconveniences by which a man hath been hurt, or with which he is threatened in his thoughts, those fight against the pleasures of sin in him. But in a godly man delight in the law, and in God, and communion with him, and the impression of the sweetness which he hath tasted therein, fights against and countervails the pleasures of sin. And therefore Paul, speaking of this combat, puts it upon delighting in the law: Rom. 7:21, 22, 'I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me. For I delight in the law of God, after the inward man.' And so Solomon says that knowledge, when it is pleasant to a man, keeps him from evil: Prov. 2:10, 11,
'When wisdom entereth into thine heart, and knowledge is pleasant unto thy soul, discretion shall preserve thee, understanding shall keep thee.' When the holy man is tempted to sin, his having recourse to thoughts of God, and of his love, and his own duty, and what communion he hath had with God, bring a fresh present delight, which fights against the delights of sin, and so puts the heart out of taste that it cannot relish it.
5. Conscience works this commotion in unregenerate men by the way of fear, but grace works it by the way of hatred against sin.
Accordingly Paul says of himself, Rom. 7:15, 'For that which I do, I allow not: for what I would that do I not; but what I hate that do I.'
And there is a real and sensible difference between fear of sin and hatred of it. And you will discern it if you have recourse to the temptation in which you have been when fear seized on you, and to that temptation when hatred of sin rose in you; you will find that both fear and hatred stir the whole man, but differently. If a man hath on a sudden a sword drawn with the point bent toward him, this stirs up fear, and that causeth a commotion in the whole man to avoid it; but bring the same man to a place where so many toads are, and this causeth a commotion in the whole man to eschew them; but the commotion is different from the other, for it is out of an inward loathing and abhorrency which he hath of them. Now, thus differently affected are natural men and godly men about sin when presented to them. Men whose consciences are not enlightened, or have not been scared, they can handle the sword when in the velvet
scabbard, but when conscience presents death in the point of it, and draws it out of the scabbard, this causeth fear, and that fear raiseth an inward perturbation in the whole man. But now such a fear is not all the cause of that reluctancy which a godly man finds in his heart against sin, but there is an inward dislike and loathing, and irreconcileable hatred. He hates sin, and would always do so, and carefully avoid it, though the consequent misery, and torment, and hurt which it doth, could be separated from it. As though a man thinks and knows that the toad cannot sting him to death, nay, that it cannot any way hurt him, if the poison could possibly be taken out, yet he would hate it out of an antipathy. The lion is moved at the crowing of a cook, and yet the cock cannot hurt him; yet he is moved and shudders at it, because he hates the noise. Or, to express it by another similitude, a child sees a fired coal, there is a commotion of fear when his little finger shall but come near it; but if it be brought to a toad, there is a commotion of hatred. Thus, whilst conscience views fire in the coal, the flames of hell in the sin, when any strong temptation carries on the heart to it, there is a commotion of fear in and near the acting of the sin, but this is differing from the commotion of loathing and hatred which a godly man hath. For fear is but a passion, and soon over, and the conviction of sin raised by it is as transitory, and the combat against sin, therefore, ceases as soon as the fear is blown over. But hatred is constant, and though it works more stilly and calmly, yet more strongly, and is more lasting; and such is the conviction of regenerate men. Hatred works against all or any having to do with sin, against all dealings with it of what kind soever, so as not to touch it, nor so much as to see it, as a man cannot endure, not only to handle, but not to look on a toad. But a man who is but afraid of a coal can endure to see it, though he cannot bear to carry it in his hands; and thus unregenerate men can roll sin in their thoughts, view it with pleasure in their unclean fancies, and act it in imagination, though their conscience works against the outward acting of it. And when the fire is gone out of it, then they can bear to touch it. When the sense and smart of sin is out of their consciences, then they can freely and boldly defile themselves with it. As familiarity with the most savage wild beasts, as bears and tigers, will
take away the fear of them, though at first a man was afraid, so a man by degrees, wearing off the fears and horrors of his conscience, grows bold with those sins at which he first trembled; after a while he is familiar with them, but where there is a hatred of sin in the heart this familiarity increaseth hatred, and therefore a man's spirit in the end riseth most against those sins into which he oftenest falls.
6. And hence, sixthly (which will afford another difference, or at least help us to discern the former), natural conscience will cause a conviction in the heart against sins which a man's own self is to commit, and the guilt whereof will redound to his person, because self-love stirs up fear, and that stirs the man. But grace will work as great an heart-rising and commotion against the sins of others, the guilt whereof will not redound to him. For sense of guilt is from conscience of a man's own, not of another's sin, though indeed conscience, out of pride, or because of the reflection which it makes, that the sin becomes his, if he doth not tell the man of it, may make a man reprove another for sin. But grace riseth against sin in others, and is afraid lest another should offend, swear, blaspheme, &c. He is afraid of oaths in others as well as of blasphemous thoughts in himself, and he loathes them as much. He is one who fears an oath:
Eccles. 9:2, 'All things come alike to all: there is one event to the righteous, and to the wicked; to the good, and to the clean, and to the unclean; to him that sacrificeth, and to him that sacrificeth not: as is the good, so is the sinner; and he that sweareth, as he that feareth an oath.' An oath startles him as if a piece of ordnance were let off behind him. Thus Job feared the sin of his sons as well as his own:
Job 1:5, 'And it was so, when the days of their feasting were gone about, that Job sent and sanctified them, and rose up early in the morning, and offered burnt-offerings according to the number of them all: for Job said, It may be that my sons have sinned, and cursed God in their hearts. Thus did Job continually.' Thus Lot's righteous soul was vexed at the abominable sins of Sodom: 2 Peter
2:7, 8, 'And delivered just Lot, vexed with the filthy conversation of the wicked: for that righteous man dwelling among them, in seeing and hearing, vexed his righteous soul from day to day with their