tion, Achitophel to comply with treason, Lucian to revile Christ and deride religion; easily will these, and a world of the like temptations, be let into the heart, if pride of wit stand at the door and turn the lock. Whence is it that men spend their precious abilities in frothy studies, in compliments, forms and garbs of salute, satires, libels, abuses, profanations of God's word, scorn of the simplicity and power of godliness, with infinite the like vanities, but because their hearts are taken up with a foolish creature, and not with God and his fear? If the heart be set on ambition, tempt Korah to desperate rebellion, Absalom to unnatural treason, Balaam to curse the church, Diotrephes to contemn the apostles and their doctrine, Julian to apostasy, Arius to heresy, the Apostles themselves to emulation and strife; easily will one lust let in these, and a thousand more. What else is it that makes men to flatter profaneness, to adore golden beasts, to admire glistering abominations, to betray the truth of the Gospel, to smother and dissemble the strictness and purity of the ways of God, to strike at the sins of men with the scabbard, and not with the sword; to work upon the fancies of men more than their consciences; to palliate vice, to daub with untempered mortar, to walk in a neutrality and adiaphorism between God and Baal, to make the souls of men and the glory of God subordinate to their lusts and risings; but the vast and unbounded gulf of ambition and vain glory? The like may be said of several other lusts: but I proceed, Sect. 71.-Secondly, A heart set on any lust, is unfit to withstand temptation, because temptations are commonly edged with promises or threatenings. Now if a man's heart be set on God, there can no promises be made of any such good as the heart cares for, or which might be likely to overpoise and sway to the temptation, which the heart hath not already. Spiritual promises the Devil will make few; or if he do, such a heart knows that evil is not the way to good: if he make promises of earthly things, such promises the heart hath already from one who can better make them'. Neither can he promise any thing which was not more mine before, than his: for either that which he promiseth, is convenient for me, and so is manna, food for my nature; or else 1 Tim. iv. 8. inconvenient, and then it is quails, food for my lust. If the former, God hath taught me to call it mine already, "Give us our bread," and not to go to the Devil's market to fetch it: if the other, though God should suffer the Devil to give it, yet he sends a curse into our mouths along with it. And as such a heart neglects any promises the Devil can make, so is it as heedless of any of his threatenings; because if God be on our side, neither "principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, can ever separate from him :" "Stronger is he that is with us, than he that is with the world." It is the business of our calling, to fight against spiritual wickednesses, and to resist the Devil. But when the heart is set on any creature, and hath not God to rest upon; when a man attributes his wine and oil to his lovers, and not to God; his credit, wealth, subsistency to the favours of men, and not to the all-sufficiency of God; then hath the Devil an easy way to win a man to any sin, or withdraw him from any good, by pointing his temptations with promises or threatenings, fitted to the things which the heart is set on. Let the Devil promise Balaam honour and preferment, on which his ambitious heart was set, and he will rise early, run and ride, and change natures with his ass, and be more senseless of God's fury than the dumb creature, that he may curse God's own people. Let the Devil promise thirty pieces of silver to Judas, whose heart ran upon covetousness, and there is no more scruple; the bargain of treason is presently concluded. Let the Devil tempt Micah's Levite with a little better reward than the beggarly stipend which he had before, theft and idolatry are swallowed down both together, and the man is easily won to be a snare and seminary of spiritual uncleanness to a whole tribe. On the other side, let Satan threaten Jeroboam with the loss of his kingdom, if he go up to Jerusalem, and serve God in the way of his own worship; and that is argument enough to draw him, and all his successors, to notorious and Egyptian idolatry: and the reason was, because their hearts were more set upon their own counsels, than upon the worship or truth of God. Let the Devil, by the edicts and ministers of Jeroboam, "lay snares in Mizpah, and spread nets upon Tabor;" that is, use laws, ■ Hos. v. 1. t menaces, subtilties to keep the people from the city of God, and to confine them to regal and state idolatry; presently the people tremble at the injunction of the king, and walk willingly after the commandment. Let Nebuchadnezzar " erect his prodigious idol, and, upon pain of a fiery furnace, require all to worship it; and all people, nations, and languages are presently upon their faces. Let the Devil threaten Demas with persecution; and presently he forsakes the fellowship of the apostles, and embraceth this present world. And as it was heretofore, so it is still. Sect. 72.-If a man's heart be not set on God, and taught to rest upon his providence, to answer all Satan's promises with his all-sufficiency to reward us, and all his threatenings with his all-sufficiency to protect us; how easily will promises beguile, and threatenings deter unstable and earthly minds! Let the Devil tell one man, All this will I give thee, if thou wilt speak in a cause to pervert judgment;' how quickly will men create subtilties, and coin evasions, to rob a man and his house, even a man and his inheritance! Let him say to another, I will do whatsoever thou sayest unto me, if thou wilt dissemble thy conscience, divide thy heart, comply with both sides, keep down the power of godliness, persecute zeal, set up will-worship and superstitions; how quickly shall such a man's religion be disguised, and sincerity, if it were possible, put to shame! If to another, 'Thou shalt, by such a time, purchase such a lordship, out such a neighbour, swallow up such a prodigal, if thou enhance thy rents, enlarge thy fines, set unreasonable rates upon thy farms;' how quickly will men grind the faces of the poor, and purchase ungodly possessions with the blood of their tenants! If to another, 'Beware of laying open thy conscience, of being too faithful in thy calling, too scrupulous in thy office, lest thou purchase the disfavour of the world, lest the times cloud over thee, and frown upon thee, lest thou be scourged with persecuted names, and make thyself obnoxious to spies and censures;' how will men be ready to start back, to shrink from their wonted forwardness, to abate their former zeal, to couple in with, and connive at, the corruptions of the age; in one word, to tremble when Ephraim speaks, and not when God speaks! So hard is it, when the heart is wedded to earthly things, and they are gotten into a man's bosom, to bear the assaults of any temptation. Sect. 73.-Lastly; This comes from the just and secret wrath of God, giving men over to the deceitfulness of sin, and to the hardness of their own hearts, to believe the lies and allurements of Satan, because they rejected the counsel of God, and the love of his truth before. In the influences of the sun, we may observe, that the deeper they work, the stronger they work; the beams nearer the centre meeting in a sharper point, do consolidate and harden the very element : so the creatures, by the justice of God, when they meet in a man's centre, reach as far as his heart,-do there mightily work to the deceiving and hardening of it. The eye, nor any other outward sense, can find no more in the creature, than is really there; it is the heart which misconceives things, and attributes that deity and worth to them, which the senses could not discover. If men then could keep these things from their spirits, they should ever conceive of them according to their own narrow being; and so keep their hearts from that hardness, which the creatures, destitute of God's blessing, do there beget, and so work in the soul a disposition suitable to Satan's temptations. Sect. 74.-Secondly; A heart set upon any lust, is unfit likewise to bear any affliction. The young man, whose heart was upon his riches, could not endure to hear of selling all, and entering upon a poor and persecuted profession. First, lusts are choice and dainty, they make the heart very delicate, and nice of any assaults. Secondly, They are very wilful, and set upon their own ends; therefore they are expressed by the name of concupiscence, and θελήματα τῆς σαρκὸς, "the will of the flesh ";" and wilfulness is the ground of impatience. Thirdly, They are natural, and move strongly to their own point; they are a body, and our very members; no marvel then if they be sensible of pain from afflictions, which are contrary to nature. The stronger the water runs, the more will it roar and foam upon any opposition. is like a furious beast, enraged with the affliction, the chain Lust * 2 Thes. ii. 9. 22. J Mark x. 22. e that binds it. Fourthly, Lusts are very wise, after a fleshy and sensual manner; and worldly wisdom is impatient of any stoppage or prevention of any affliction that crusheth and disappoints it: therefore the apostle doth herein principally note the opposition between heavenly and carnal wisdom, that the one is meek, peaceable, and gentle; the other, devilish and full of strife. Fifthly, Lusts are proud, especially those that arise from abundance of the creature: and pride, being set upon by any affliction, makes the heart break forth into impatience, debates, and stoutness against God: a proud heart grows harder by afflictions, as metals or clay, after they have passed through the furnace. It is said of Pharaoh, that he did not set his heart to the judgments of God, but exalted himself against his people: pride grew stronger by affliction. Besides, h pride in earthly things swallows up the very expectation of affliction; and therefore must needs leave the heart unprepared against them. Sixthly, Lusts are rooted in self-love; and therefore when Christ will have a man forsake his lusts, he directs him to deny himself. Now the very essence of afflictions is, to be grievous and adverse to a man's self. Seventhly, Lusts are contentious, armed things, and their menmity is against God; and therefore utterly unfit to " accept of the punishment of sin, and to bear the indignation of the Lord, or to submit unto any afflictions. Eighthly, Lusts Presist the truth, set up themselves against the Word; and thereby utterly disable men to bear afflictions: for the Word sanctifies, and lightens all afflictions; the Word shews God's moderation and intention in them, an issue out of them, the " benefits which will come from them, the supplies of strength and abilities to bear them, they promises of a more abundant and exceeding weight of glory, in compa 1 |