Chapter VII
More particularly, liow Satan ivories upon those three principles in us : first, on carnal reason.
SEEING therefore the exercise of his power lies in that darkness which is in us, let us more particularly see how able and powerful he is to work upon those several principles of carnal reason, guilt of conscience, jealousies and fears.
First, on carnal reason; on which he chiefly worketh in this sort of tempta tions, the strength whereof lies in false reasonings, wherein, if in anything, he hath the advantage.
1. First, his abilities to forge and invent false reasonings and arguments to overthrow our faith, are, as they must needs be conceived to be, exceed ing great: who for this knowledge is called dufaw, as well as Satan for his malice; and for his subtlety in outreaching us, a serpent: who when young, outwitted our first parents; he beguiled Eve through his subtlety, says the Apostle, 2 Cor. xi. 3, then when their reason was not depraved; but now he is grown that old serpent, Rev. xii. 9 : and we are become chil dren, apt to be tossed to and fro, Eph. iv. 14. He hath had time enough to improve his knowledge in; a student he is of five thousand years standing, that hath lost no time, but as he is said to accuse day and night, Rev. xii. 10, so is able to study both day and night ; and he hath made it his chief, if not whole study, to enable himself to tempt, and plead against us. It is his trade. Therefore as men are called lawyers or divines from their callings, so he the tempter and the accuser from his employment. And by this his long experience and observation he hath his vofaara, 2 Cor. ii. 11, his set and composed machinations; his ^Meiac, Eph. vi. 11, his methods of temp tations, which are studied and artificially moulded and ordered ; even such systems and methods of them as tutors and professors of arts and sciences have, and do read over again and again to their auditors. The Apostle calls them darts, ver. 16, and he hath a whole shop and armoury of them ready made and forged, which, for the acuteness and subtle sophistry that is in them, are called depths of Satan, Rev. ii. 24; which depths, if in any point, are most to be found in this : for he is more especially versed in this great question and dispute, Whether a man be the child of God or no ? more than in any other. All other controversies he hath had to deal in but in particu lar ages, as occasionally they were started; but this hath been the standing controversy of all ages, since God hath had any children on earth : with every one of whom, more or less, he hath at one time or another had solemn disputes about it; so as he knows all the advantages, windings, and turnings in this debate, all the objections and answers, and discussions in it. And as other controversies, the longer they are on foot, and the further they have been carried along, the more they are enlarged, improved, and grow more subtle; so must this needs also, especially in this latter knowing
CHAP. VII] A CHILD OF LIGHT WALKING IN DARKNESS
age of the world, and by reason also of that seeming near similitude which hypocrisy holds unto the truth and power of grace, which hath fazzled * and entangled this controversy. The objections and difficulties which a believer meets with in beating out a right judgment of his estate, are greater than in any controversy the world ever knew, and afford stranger knots, and require as acute distinctions to dissolve them as the school knows any; and indeed such as, did not the Holy Ghost sometimes cut, sometimes untie them for believers, by witnessing with our spirits that we are the sons of God, bare reason alone could never determine in it. Now Satan, through long experience and observation, hath all these at his fingers ends, and hath reduced them all to commonplaces long since. He hath still observed and laid up what answers have relieved the spirits of believers in such and such a doubt cast in by him, and then studies a further reply against the next time, or for the next believer he shall have to do with.
2. Secondly, as he hath thus thoroughly studied this controversy, and knows all the windings and false reasonings in it ; so withal, by his daily study ing and considering men, he knows how best to suit and make use of those reasonings, both to persons and seasons. It is the sole business of those evil
go up and down the earth. And spirits to study men; for this end they he hath commonplaces of men, and their several frames and temper of spirit, as well as of temptations ; he knows all the several ranks and classes of men in the state of grace ; and according to their ranks, with what sort of temp tations to encounter them. For men s temptations are various and mani fold, 1 Pet. i. 6 ; even as the gifts and operations of the Spirit are, 1 Cor. xii.
4, 5. Now, he having beaten out this controversy with all sorts, knows how to lay the dispute, how to order, and marshal, and apply objections, and wield his blows with most success and advantage. That as physicians, having observed the several workings of medicines of all sorts, upon several ages and constitutions, and what several issues and effects they have had, do therefore accordingly prescribe and apply several medicines according to the several and differing conditions of their patients, though sick of the same disease. Thus Satan, he by observation finding the hearts of some men an swering to some others, as face to face in water, as Solomon says ; and withal remembering what reasonings have always taken most with such a sort or strain of Christians, whose corruptions and whose graces were much alike unto those in this or that man he hath now to deal with ; accordingly he makes use and application of these reasonings again. The tempers of men s spirits we know are diverse, and so are capable of diversity of sugges tions. And again, the operations of grace, as of sin, are various in those several tempers. And God s dealings with and workings upon his children are as various as either. Some he humbleth much, some are led on with com fort ; some he works on with a sudden and marvellous light, as if the sun should rise on the sudden at midnight, and on others insensibly and by degrees, as when the dawning steals upon the day; some have had a false and counterfeit work before, some were never enlightened until savingly; and this variety affords rise and occasion for several temptations. So as what kind of work any other Christian hath had is apt to be made an excep tion to another that wants it. I was never thus humbled, says one ; nor I thus comforted, says another; I had a sudden violent work indeed, which came in like a spring-tide, but now the tide is fallen, and my first love abated, says a third; I had some workings and enlightenings heretofore, says an other, and I was deceived then, and I may be so now also : and so he hath
* Embarrassed. ED.
264 A CHILD OF LIGHT WALKING IN DARKNESS. [PART I. that vast task set him, to compare a counterfeit work with a true. Thus every several way of working lies open to several exceptions ; and as we say that every calling earthly hath its several and proper temptations, so the several ways and manners of effecting this calling heavenly have their several veins and currents of temptations. All which Satan knows, and hath often traced; and accordingly knows how to fit them to men, and to prosecute them the most advantageous way.
So in like manner he takes the compass of every man s knowledge, notions, and apprehensions; according unto which, as our knowledge is more or less, we are also capable of several temptations. Many reasonings and objections, which, like small hail-shot, could not reach or make any dint at all upon men of parts and knowledge, both because they by reason of their knowledge do soar high out of the gun-shot of them, and have also on the whole armour of God, as the apostle speaks, Eph. vi. that is, are in complete armour, abounding in all faith and knowledge, yet such reasonings may be fittest to level with at such as are more ignorant, and fly low, and have but some few broken pieces of that armour to defend some parts with. But on the con trary, those other of his great-shot, which he dischargeth on men of know ledge, they would clean fly over the others heads, and not come near such smaller vessels. All in Thyatira knew not Satan s depths, nor were capable of them, Kev. ii. 24. Thus the ignorance and the want of know ledge of the meaning of the Scriptures, and of the ways of grace chalked forth therein, how cloth Satan abuse, to the disquietment of many poor and good souls that want much knowledge, by putting false glosses upon them ! How many weak souls do stick in shallows, and are sometimes a long while terrified with gross mistakes, and like small birds are held long under with limed straws of frivolous objections, which great ones fly away with ! That great apostle, being a man of knowledge, was not easily taken with such chaff. We are not ignorant of his devices, says he, 2 Cor. ii. 1 1 ; and therefore Satan takes another course with him, and comes with down right blows, and falls a-buffeting him, 2 Cor. xii. 7. Thus doth Satan take measure of the bore, as I may so speak, of every man s understanding, and fits them with objections proportionable, in several sizes. And as the Apostle in his sermons prepared milk for babes, but strong meat for strong men, so doth Satan in his temptations apply and suit them to men s notions and appre hensions, still framing objections according to their reading. 3. Thirdly, he is able undiscernibly to communicate all his false reason ings, though never so spiritual, which he doth forge and invent, and that in such a manner as to deceive us by them, and to make them take with us.
(1.) First, he is able not only to put into the heart suggestions and soli citations unto sensual and worldly objects; such as that into Judas s heart, to betray his Master for money, John xiii. 2, and to tempt married couples severed to incontinency, 1 Cor. vii. 5 ; but also the most subtle and abstracted reasonings concerning things spiritual, which are utterly remote from sense, he can insinuate and impart according to the measure and capacity of men s apprehensions. Therefore we are said to wrestle with them about things heavenly, and our interest therein is often made the matter of con tention and the subject of the question. So that phrase, Eph. vi. 12, sv rug iKoveaviots, when it is said, We wrestle with spiritual wickednesses in hea venly, is rather to be understood of heavenly things than of heavenly places ; the word signifying rather supercelestial, in the highest heavens, whither, if rendered of places, the devils never came since their fall. And it being used elsewhere for heavenly things, as Heb. viii. 5, and the preposition sv, or in.
being likewise sometimes put to express the object-matter about which a thing is conversant, as Matt. xi. 6, Blessed is he that is not offended in me/ that is, with or about me, and for my sake, it may congruously be so here meant, as noting to us, that the price, the stake, about which we wrestle with Satan are not things worldly, as honours, riches, and the like, but things heavenly, which concern our souls and estates hereafter.
Now the contention being about heavenly things and spiritual blessings, it cannot be transacted but by reasonings suitable ; that is, spiritual false rea sonings, abstracted from sense and fancy. And in this respect they are termed spiritual wickednesses, because in such wickednesses they deal and trade in especially, or as much as in those that are sensual : as tempting to unbelief, despair, blasphemy against God, of which sort are all those tempta tions we have now in hand. And that he is able to convey and suggest such spiritual thoughts and reasonings of what sort soever, appeareth many ways: as by injecting blasphemous thoughts against God, such as do sometimes transcend the wit and capacity of the receiver of them ; and is manifest like wise by Saul s prophesying even from the immediate dictating and suggestion of an evil spirit, as is expressly said, 1 Sam. xviii. 10 ; in the like manner to which haply the Sibyls also prophesied.
But more evident it is in all those damnable heresies which have been broached in all ages, as in the primitive times among the Romans, the broachers whereof are made the emissaries of Satan ; therefore, Rom. xvi.
18, he having branded them, unto the Romans, that taught false doctrines among them, and having instructed them against them, he gives this en couragement about them, ver. 20, that God should tread down Satan under their feet shortly, having respect to Satan s work in those errors mentioned, ver. 18, Satan being the main author of them. Thus in the church of Thyatira, those cursed heretics who applauded themselves, and were admired by their followers for the depths and profoundness of their learning, shewn in those heresies they broached : depths, as they speak, Rev. ii. 24. But if they call them depths, says the Apostle, I will call them depths of Satan, depths of Satan, as they speak, for the devil was the master and the author and suggester of them. So, in after-times, apostasy is ascribed to spirits of error, that is, devils, which he foretelleth men should give heed unto, 1 Tim. iv. 1, and to the working of Satan, 2 Thess. ii. 9. It was he that sharpened their wits and pens. Now then, by the same reason, there is no reasoning about our estates, though never so spiritual, but he can suggest it, as well as he did those depths of the heresies to the broachers of them. So as Satan can not only make those false reasonings, which our own hearts forge, more specious and probable, and suggest further confirmations of them, which are enough to add unto this darkness ; but he is also able to put in new, which himself invents, of what kind soever they be.
(2.) Secondly, he is not simply able to suggest them, but to insinuate them in such a manner as to take with us and deceive us ; yea, and often to set them on with a deep impression. Therefore, in those places forementioned, it is not simply said that there should be spirits which shall suggest errors, but so suggest them as that men should give heed unto them. Thus, 1 Tim. iv. 1, and 2 Thess. ii., where the working of those very same spirits is set forth, ver. 9, it is not only said that they were sent as from God to delude, but with strong delusions ; such as should have a strength put into them to prevail, so as that men should believe them. So also, that lying spirit which God sent, and who persuaded Ahab by a lie in the mouths of his false prophets, commission was not simply given to him to suggest a lie,
266 A CHILD OF LIGHT WALKING IN DARKNESS. [PART I. but so as it should prevail with Ahab ; so 2 Chron. xviii. 21, And the Lord said, Thou shalt entice him, and thou shalt also prevail. And as he is thus able, when God gives leave, to delude wicked men s understandings with false reasonings in matters of heresy and false doctrine, by reason of that total darkness that is in them : so he is able, if G-od give leave, as some times he doth, to bring strong delusions upon the minds of God s children also, through false reasonings about their own estates, by reason of that darkness which in part remains in them ; by means of which he may work the same effects for a time, and in a certain degree, in a godly man, which in another, as was before observed. Thus the believing Galatians, especially some of them, were so far bewitched, as his word is, as for a time to assent to that great error in point of justification ; and this by reason of that folly and darkness which remained in them, as he intimates, when he says, O ye foolish Galatians, who hath beuritched you, that you should not obey the truth? Gal. iii. 1. And if in the very doctrine of justification itself believers were thus for a time deluded, which is rare, then much more may they, and ordinarily are they, misled in the application of faith, in the believ ing their own personal justification, which is the point in hand.
Only this is to be added here for caution s sake : that it is true that Satan cannot enforce an act of assent to any falsehood upon the understanding of any man. For how then should they all have been damned for believing that lie? 2 Thess. ii. 11, 12; which should not have been unless it were their own sin ; which is as true of all other temptations as that. Though Satan put the thought into Judas s heart, John xiii. 2, yet his own conscience owns it wholly as his own act, Matt, xxvii. 4, I have sinned, &c. Neither yet doth he so immediately concur to produce such an act of assent in us, as God doth when he worketh faith in us; for then God s power and assistance in working good should be no more than Satan s in working evil. Tentationis potest esse causa efficax, at non peccati; potest necessitare homines ad sentiendum tentationem, non ad consenliendum.
And yet the Scripture phrases go far in ascribing unto Satan herein, when it says of those that believed not the gospel, that the god of this world hath blinded their minds that believe not, 2 Cor. iv. 4 ; which notes out a superadded working of blindness unto their own natural blindness. As also when he says that the prince of the air is bsgy&v, that works effectually, &c., Eph. ii. 2. And also that of the Corinthians whilst unregenerate, who as then are said to be carried and led away after dumb idols, 1 Cor. xii. 2. All which phrases would seem to argue, not only a further power of working upon men s judgments than when one man doth endeavour to corrupt and persuade another man in a moral way, (because he suggesteth indiscernibly, and with more frequency and importunity, and holdeth the mind more to the object, and presenteth an army of confirmations at once, and is able so to marshal them as the mind can scarce resist ; and puts all these upon the spirit with a violent and imperious affirmation,) but further, also, they would seem to imply some kind of physical working, though not immediately on the spring of the clock, yet upon the wheels and weights of it I mean the passions in the body and the images in the fancy, though not upon the un derstanding immediately ; all which, what influence they have to sway the judgment and pervert it, experience shews.
4. Fourthly, he is further able to follow and continue his reasonings as occasion is, and to keep up the dispute, and hold out arguments with us, and out-reason us, by putting in new replies to our answers, and so to main tain and manage and carry along the dispute, and to come up with fresh
: which in this respect is called wrestling, Eph. vi. 12, We wrestle not with flesh and blood, but principalities and powers ; it being, as the supplies bodily wrestling, transacted by reiterated assaults, and attempts to overcome and get the victory ; he, as it were, going about to strike up our heels, as wrestlers do that is, to take away from under us those reasonings which supported us, by cavilling objections; which kind of spiritual wrestlings how often have we experience of in spiritual agonies
! In the hour of temptation believers find conflicts and bandyings of disputes, rationally carried along, and pertinent objections brought in against those answers which they secretly meditate of. In which cause, therefore, divines bid men not to dispute with that cunning sophister. Thus many, when death hath approached, have found that they have had their reasonings for their estates, and those evi dences they have had recourse unto, taken away and confuted as fast as they have thought of them.
And that Satan hath this dexterity and skill thus to manage such land of disputes with us, is further evident in the framing of heresies, wherein he assists the contrivers of them with pertinent considerations to back and con firm their notions, in their private meditations, studies, and contrivements. And indeed, if Satan were not able and skilful thus to oppose and reply, these kind of temptations which consist in disputes could not be managed ; for otherwise in them Satan disputed with us but as if one of us should reason with a dumb man that can hear, but his answers cannot be known, and so he knows no way what reply to make. Therefore surely Satan hath often some way, more or less, a guess and inkling what may be the answers of the heart again: which, were it otherwise, the glory also which God hath by the victory gotten over Satan in these temptations were much obscured, and Satan s confusion less ; for the victory of our faith in these disputes, and the resistance it makes, lies chiefly in those replies which are made, whereby it quencheth all his darts : whereof the devil, when he is once sensible and perceives it, he is confounded; for then, when he is once sensible and appre hensive that he is resisted, doth he fly from us, as the Apostle speaks, James iv. 7, and that of his own accord, as the expression there imports ; even as a foiled and disgraced soldier. And this we may see in his carriage in those his temptations of Christ, which were managed by mutual disputes, and wherein the foiling of Satan was by the answers out of Scripture which Christ gave; by which being confounded, he left him, as the text says, Matt. iv. 11, as out of pride, ashamed that he was foiled. So that Satan, some way or other, is able to guess at, and discerns the replies in our hearts to his objections, as well as to make and cast in objections,
268 A CHILD OF LIGHT WALKING IN DARKNESS. [PART L