[5.] Fifthly, The reality of devils and their malignity hath been the opinion of heathens. For there is nothing more common among them than the belief of inferior deities, which they called δάιμονες or δαιμόνια, that is, devils; and notwithstanding that they supposed these to be mediators to the supreme gods, yet they learned to distinguish them into good and evil.164 The Platonists thought that the souls of tyrants after death became lemures and larvæ, that is, hurtful devils; and at last the name devil became of so bad a signification, that to say, ‘thou hast a devil,’ was reproach and not praise; but what these groped at in the dark, the Scripture doth fully determine, using the word devil only for a malignant spirit.
Of Satan’s cunning and craft in the general.—Several demonstrations proving Satan to be deceitful; and of the reasons why he makes use of his cunning.
We have taken a survey of our adversary’s strength, and this will open the way to a clearer discovery of his subtlety and craft, which is his great engine by which he works all his tyranny and cruelty in the world, to the ruin or prejudice of the souls of men; of which the apostle in 2 Cor. ii. 11 speaks, as a thing known by the common experience of all discerning persons. His way is to overreach and take advantages, and for this end he useth devices and stratagems, which is a thing so ordinary with him, that none can be ignorant of the truth of it: ‘We are not ignorant of his devices.’
This, before I come to the particulars, I shall prove and illustrate in the general, by the gradual procedure of these few following considerations:—
First, All the malice, power, cruelty, and diligence of which we have spoken, with all the advantages of multitude, order, and knowledge, by which these cruel qualifications are heightened—these are but his furniture and accomplishment which fit him for his subtle contrivances of delusion, and make him able to deceive; neither hath he any rise of his power and knowledge but in reference to deceit. In Eph. vi. 11, 12, which is a place wherein the apostle doth of purpose present Satan in his way of dealing with men, his whole practice is set forth under the term and notion of arts and wiles: ‘that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.’ This is the whole work of Satan, against which the furniture of that spiritual armour is requisite; and lest any should think that his power or wickedness are other distinct things in him, which are to be provided against by other means of help, he presently adds, that these are no otherwise used by him but in order to his wiles and cunning, and therefore not to be looked upon as distinct, though indeed to be considered in conjunction with his subtlety and cunning, as things that make his wiles the more dangerous and hazardous: ‘For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places;’ which words do but strengthen the apostle’s warning and caution about the forementioned wiles, which are therefore the more carefully to be observed and watched against, because his power is so great that he can contrive snares with the greatest skill and art imaginable; and his wickedness is so great, that we cannot expect either honesty or modesty should restrain him from making the vilest and most disingenuous proposals, nor from attesting a conveniency or goodness in his motions, with the highest confidence of most notorious lying.
2. Secondly, The subtlety that the Scriptures do attribute to sin, or to the heart, is mostly and chiefly intended to reflect upon Satan, as the author and contriver of these deceits. In Heb. iii. 13 there is mention of the ‘deceitfulness of sin,’ but it is evident that something else besides sin is intended, to which deceitfulness must be properly ascribed; for sin being, as most conclude, formally a privation, or if we should grant it a positive being, as some contend, yet seeing the highest notion we can arrive at this way, excluding but the figment of Flacius Illyricus, who seems to make original sin indistinct from the very essence of the soul, is but to call it an act.165 Deceitfulness cannot be properly attributed to it, but with reference to him who orders that act in a way of deceitfulness and delusion; which ultimately will bring it to Satan’s door. If here the deceitfulness of sin be devolved upon the subject, then it runs into the same sense with Jer. xvii. 9, ‘The heart is deceitful above all things.’ But why is the deceitfulness fixed upon the heart? The ground of that we have in the next words; it is deceitful, because it is wicked, ‘desperately wicked.’ But who then inflames and stirs up the heart to this wickedness? Is it not Satan? Who then is the proper author of deceit but he? It is true, indeed, that our hearts are proper fountains of sin, and so may be accused possibly in some cases where Satan cannot be justly blamed; yet if we consider deceitfulness as a companion of every sin, though our hearts be to be blamed for the sin, Satan will be found guilty of the deceitfulness. It may be said a man complies with those things which are intended for his delusion, and so improperly by his negligence may fall under blame of self-deception; but it is unimaginable that he can properly and formally intend to deceive himself. Deceit then, not being from sin nor ourselves properly, can find out no other parent for itself than Satan. Besides this, that these texts upon a rational inquiry do charge Satan with the deceitfulness of sin; they do over and above point at the known and constant way of Satan, working so commonly by delusion, that deceitfulness is a close companion of every sin. The deceitfulness of one sin is as much as the deceitfulness of every sin. Nay, further, that text of Jer. xvii. 9, shews this deceitfulness not to be an ordinary sleight, but the greatest of all deceits above measure, and of an unsearchable depth or mystery; ‘who can know it?’
3. Thirdly, All acts of sin, some way or other, come through Satan’s fingers. I do not say that all sin is Satan’s proper offspring, for we have a cursed stock of our own; and it may be said of us, as elsewhere of Satan, sometime we sin out of our own inclination and disposition; yet in every sin, whether it arise from us or the world, Satan blows the sparks and manageth all. As David said to the woman of Tekoah, ‘Is not the hand of Joab with thee in all this?’ [2 Sam. xiv. 19;] so may we say, Is not the hand of Satan with thee in every sin thou committest? This is so eminently true, that the Scripture indifferently ascribes the sin sometimes to us, sometimes to the devil. It was Peter’s sin to tempt Christ to decline suffering, yet Christ repelling it with this rebuke, ‘Get thee behind me, Satan,’ Mat. xvi. 23, doth plainly accuse both Peter and Satan. It is the personal sin of a man to be angry, yet in such acts he ‘gives place to the devil;’ both man and Satan concur in it, Eph. iv. 26. Paul’s ‘thorn in the flesh,’ 2 Cor. xii. 7, whatever sin it was, he calls ‘Satan’s messenger.’ He that submits not to God, doth in that comply with Satan; as, on the contrary, he that doth submit himself to God, doth resist the devil, James iv. 7.
Neither doth that expression of the apostle, James i. 14, ‘Every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lust,’ &c., give any contradiction to this. It is not the apostle’s design to exclude Satan, but to include man as justly culpable, notwithstanding Satan’s temptations; and that which he asserts is this, that there is sin and a temptation truly prevalent when there is the least consent of our lust or desire, and that it is that brings the blame upon us; so that his purpose is not to excuse Satan, or to deny him to have a hand in drawing or tempting us on to sin, but to shew that it is our own act that makes the sin to become ours.
4. Fourthly, Such is the constitution of the soul of man, that its sinning cannot be conceived without some deception or delusion;166 for, granting that the soul of man is made up of desires, and that the soul were nothing else but, as it were, one willing or lusting power diversified by several objects; and that this power or these faculties are depraved by the fall, and corrupted; and that man in every action doth consult with his desires; and that they have so great an influence upon him, that they are the law of the members, and give out their commands accordingly for obedience; yet still these three things are firm and unshaken principles:—
[1.] First, That desires cannot be set upon any object but as it is apprehended truly or apparently good. It is incompatible to a rational soul to desire evil as evil: Omne appetit bonum.
[2.] Secondly, The will doth not resolvedly embrace any object till the light of the understanding hath made out, some way or other, the goodness or conveniency of the object.167
[3.] Thirdly, There is no man that hath not a competent light for discovery of the goodness or evil of an object presented. Unregenerate men have, (1.) The light of nature. (2.) Some have an additional light from Scripture discovery. (3.) Some have yet more from common convictions, which beget sensible stirrings and awful impressions upon them. (4.) To those God sometime adds corrections and punishments, which are of force to make that light burn more clear, and to stir up care and caution in men for the due entertainment of these notices that God affords them. Regenerate men have all this light, and besides that, they have, (1.) The light of their own experience, of the vileness and odiousness of sin; they know what an evil and bitter thing it is. (2.) They have a more full discovery of God, which will make them abhor themselves in dust and ashes, Job xlii. 6; Isa. vi. 5. (3.) They have the advantage of a new heart, the law of the spirit of life, making them free from the law of sin and death. (4.) They have also the help and assistance of the Spirit, in its motions, suggestions, and teachings. (5.) They fortify themselves with the strongest resolutions not to give way to sin.
Notwithstanding all these, it is too true that both regenerate and unregenerate men do sin; the reason whereof cannot be given from any other account than what we have asserted—to wit, they are some way or other deluded or deceived; some curtain is drawn betwixt them and the light; some fallacy or other is put upon the understanding some way or other; the will is bribed or biassed; there is treachery in the case, for it is unimaginable that a man in any act of sin should offer a plain, open, and direct violence to his own nature and faculties; so that the whole business is here, evil is presented under the notion of good; and to make this out, some considerations of pleasure or profit do bribe the will, and give false light to the understanding. Hence is it, that in every act of sin, men, by compliance with Satan, are said to deceive, or to put tricks and fallacies upon themselves.168
5. Fifthly, All kinds of subtlety are in Scripture directly charged upon Satan, and in the highest degrees. Sometime under the notion of logical fallacies; those sleights which disputants, in arguing, put upon their antagonists. Of this import is that expression, 2 Cor. ii. 11, ‘We are not ignorant of his devices,’ where the word in the original is borrowed from the sophistical reasonings of disputants.169 Sometime it is expressed in the similitude of political deceits; as the Scripture gives him the title of a prince, so doth it mark out his policies in the management of his kingdom, Rev. xii. 7, expressly calling them deceits, and comparing him to a dragon or serpent for his subtlety. Sometime he is represented as a warrior: Rev. xii. 17, ‘The dragon was wroth, and went to make war,’ &c.; and here are his warlike stratagems pointed at. Mention is made, 2 Tim. ii. 26, of his snares, and the taking of men alive, or captive, directly alluding to warlike proceedings, [ἐζωγρήμενοι.] The subtle proceedings of arts and craft are charged on him and his instruments. Men are said to be enticed, James i., as fish or fowl, by a bait; others deluded, as by cheaters in false gaming: Eph. iv. 14, ‘By the sleight of men, and the cunning craft of those that lie in wait to deceive.’170 The overreaching of merchants or crafty tradesmen is alluded to in 2 Cor. ii. 11. All these sleights are in Satan, in their highest perfection and accomplishment. He can ‘transform himself into an angel of light,’ 2 Cor. xi. 14, where he hath an occasion for it; in a word, all ‘deceiveableness of unrighteousness is in him,’ 2 Thes. ii. 10. So that a general πανουργία, a dexterity and ability for all kind of subtle contrivances, is ascribed to him, 2 Cor. xi. 3, and that in his very first essay upon Eve, when the serpent deceived her ‘through subtlety;’ so that whatsoever malice can suggest, or wit and art contrive for delusion, or whatsoever diligence can practise, or cruelty execute, all that must be imagined to be in Satan.
6. Sixthly, All this might be further proved by instances. What temptation can be named wherein Satan hath not acted as a serpent? Who can imagine the cunning that Satan used with David in the matter of Uriah? How easily he got him to the roof of the house in order to the object to be presented to him! How he directs his eye, wrought upon his passions, suggested the thought, contrived the conveniences! What art must there be to bring a darkness into David’s mind, a forgetfulness of God’s law, a fearlessness of his displeasure, and a neglect of his own danger! Surely it was no small matter that could blind David’s eye, or besot his heart to so great a wickedness. But, above all instances, let us take into consideration that of Eve, in the first transgression, wherein many things may be observed; as (1.) That he chose the serpent for his instrument, wherein, though we are ignorant of the depth of his design, yet that he had a design in it of subtlety, in reference to what he was about to suggest, is plain from the text, ‘Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field.’ It had been needless and impertinent to have noted the serpent’s subtlety as Satan’s agent, if he had not chosen it upon that score, as advantageous for his purpose. (2.) He set upon the weaker vessel, the woman; and yet such, as once gained, he knew was likely enough to prevail with the man, which fell out accordingly. (3.) Some think he took the advantage of her husband’s absence, which is probable, if we consider that it is unlikely that Adam should not interpose in the discourse if he had been present. (4.) He took the advantage of the object. It appears she was within sight of the tree, ‘She saw that it was good for food, and pleasant to the eyes;’ thus he made the object plead for him. (5.) He falls not directly upon what he intended, lest that should have scared her off, but fetcheth a compass and enters upon the business by an inquiry of the affair, as if he intended not hurt. (6.) He so inquires of the matter— ‘Hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?’—as if he made a question of the reality of the command; and his words were so ordered that they might cast some doubt hereof into her mind. (7.) He, under a pretence of asserting God’s liberality, secretly undermines the threatening, as if he had said, ‘Is it possible that so bountiful a creator should deny the liberty of eating of any tree? To what purpose was it made, if it might not be tasted?’ (8.) When he finds that by these arts he had gained a little ground, and brought her to some land of questioning of the reality of the threatening, for she seems to extenuate it in saying, ‘lest we die,’ he grows more bold to speak out his mind, and plainly to annihilate the threatening, ‘Ye shall not die.’ This he durst not do, till he had gained in her mind a wavering suspicion, that possibly God was not in good earnest in that prohibition. (9.) Then he begins to urge the conveniency and excellency of the fruit, by equivocating upon the name of the tree, which he tells her could make them knowing as gods. (10.) He reflects upon God as prohibiting this out of envy and ill-will to them. (11.) In all this there is not a word of the danger, but impunity and advantage promised. (12.) This deadly advice he covers with a pretence of greater kindness and care than God had for them. See in this, as in a clear glass, Satan’s way of policy; after this rate he proceeds in all his temptations.
If any inquire why so mighty and potent a prince useth rather the fox’s skin than the lion’s paw, these reasons may satisfy:—
[1.] First, There is a necessity upon him so to do.171 He must use his craft, because he cannot compel; he must have God’s leave before he can overcome; he cannot winnow Peter before he sue out a commission, nor deceive Ahab till he get a licence; neither can he prevail against us without our own consent. The Scripture indeed useth some words that signify a force in tempting, as that he ‘put it into the heart of Judas,’ ‘filled the heart of Ananias,’ ‘provoked David,’ ‘rules in the hearts of the children of disobedience,’ and ‘leads them captive at his will,’ &c.; yet all these and the like expressions intend no more than this, that he useth forcible importunities, frames strong delusions, and joins sometime his power to his temptations; as sometime fowlers shew themselves to the birds they intend to ensnare, that so they may be affrighted into an awe and amazement, to give a better opportunity to spread their nets over them.
[2.] Secondly, If he could compel, yet his way of craft and subtlety is generally the most prevalent and successful. Force stirs up an opposition; it usually alarms to caution and avoidance, and frights to an utter averseness in any design; so that where force should gain its thousands, subtlety will gain its ten thousands.
[3.] Thirdly, His strength is not useless to him. For besides that it enables him to deceive with higher advantage than otherwise he could do, as hath been said, he hath times and occasions to shew his strength and cruelty, when his cunning hath prevailed so far as to give him possession. What was said of Pope Boniface, that he entered like a fox, and ruled like a lion, may be applied to him; he insinuates himself by subtlety as a fox or serpent, and then rules with rigour as a lion.
Of Satan’s deceits in particular.—What temptation is.—Of tempting to sin.—His first general rule.—The consideration of our condition.—His second rule.—Of providing suitable temptations.—In what cases he tempts us to things unsuitable to our inclinations.—His third rule.—The cautious proposal of the temptation, and the several ways thereof.—His fourth rule is to entice.—The way thereof in the general, by bringing a darkness upon the mind through lust.
Our next business is to inquire after these ways of deceit in particular; in which I shall first speak of such as are of more general and universal concernment—such are his temptations to sin, his deceits against duty, his cunning in promoting error, his attempts against the peace and comfort of the saints, &c.—and then I shall come to some ways of deceits that relate to cases more special.
As an introduction to the first, I shall speak a word of temptation in the general. This in its general notion is a trial or experiment made of a thing. The word that signifies to tempt, comes from a word that signifies to pierce, or bore through,172 implying such a trial as goes to the very heart and inwards of a thing. In this sense it is attributed to God, who is said to have tempted Abraham, and to put our faith upon trial; and sometime to Satan, who is said to have tempted Christ, though he could not expect to prevail. But though God and Satan do make these trials, yet is there a vast difference betwixt them, and that not only in their intentions—the one designing only a discovery to men of what is in them, and that for most holy ends; the other intending ruin and destruction—but also in the way of their proceedings.173 God by providence presents objects and occasions; Satan doth not only do that, but further inclineth and positively persuadeth to evil. Hence is it that temptations are distinguished into trials merely, and seducements; suitable to that of Tertullian, [De Orat.] Diabolus tentat, Deus probat, The devil tempts, God only tries. We speak of temptation as it is from Satan, and so it is described to be a drawing or moving men to sin under colour of some reason.174 By which we may observe that, in every such temptation, there is the object to which the temptation tends, the endeavour of Satan to incline our hearts and draw on our consent, and the instrument by which is some pretence of reason; not that a real and solid reason can be given for sin, but that Satan offers some considerations to us to prevail with us, which, if they do, we take them to be reasons. This may a little help us to understand Satan’s method in tempting to sin, &c., of which I am first to speak.
In temptations to sin, we may observe, Satan walks by four general rules:—
1. First, He considers and acquaints himself with the condition of every man, and for that end he studies man. God’s question concerning Job, ‘Hast thou considered my servant Job?’ Job i. 8, doth imply, not only his diligent inquiry into Job’s state—for the original expresseth it by Satan’s ‘putting his heart upon Job, or laying him to his heart’175—but that this is usual with Satan so to do; as if God had said, It is thy way to pry narrowly into every man: hast thou done this to Job? Hast thou considered him as thou usest to do? And indeed Satan owns this as his business and employment in his answer to God, ‘I come from going to and fro in the earth, from walking up and down in it.’ This cannot be properly said of him who is a spirit. Bodies go up and down, but not spirits; so that his meaning is, he had been at his work of inquiring and searching. And so Broughton translates it,176 from searching to and fro in the earth; as it is said of the eyes of God, that they ‘run to and fro,’ which intends his intelligence, search, and knowledge of things. It is such a going to and fro as that in Dan. xii. 4, which is plainly there expressed to be for the increase of knowledge.
The matter of his inquiry or particulars of his study are such as these: (1.) Man’s state; he considers and guesseth whether a man be regenerate or unregenerate. (2.) The degree of his state: if unregenerate, how near or far off he is the kingdom of God; if regenerate, he takes the compass of his knowledge, of his gifts, of his graces. (3.) He inquires into his constitution and temper; he observes what disposition he is of. (4.) His place, calling, and relation; his trade, employment, enjoyments, riches, or wants. (5.) His sex. (6.) His age, &c.
The way by which he knows these things is plain and easy. Most of these things are open to common observation; and what is intricate or dark, that he beats out, either by comparing us with ourselves, and considering a long tract of actions and carriage; or by comparing us with others, whose ways he had formerly noted and observed.
The end of this search is to give him light and instruction in point of advantage; hence he knows where to raise his batteries, and how to level his shot against us. This Christ plainly discovers to be the design of all his study, John xiv. 30, where he tells his disciples he expected yet another onset from Satan, and that near at hand; ‘for the prince of the world’ was then upon his motion, he was a-coming; but withal, he tells them of his security against his assaults, in that there was ‘nothing in Christ’ of advantage in any of these forementioned ways to foot a temptation upon. It appears, then, that he looks for such advantages, and that without these he hath little expectancy of prevailing.
2. Secondly, Satan having acquainted himself with our condition, makes it his next care to provide suitable temptations, and to strike in the right vein; for he loves to have his work easy and feasible, he loves not [to] go against the stream. Thus he considered Judas as a covetous person, and accordingly provided a temptation of gain for him. He did the like with Achan; and hence was it that he had the Sabeans so ready for the plunder of Job; he had observed them a people given to rapine and spoil; and accordingly, Job’s goods being propounded to them as a good and easy booty, he straightway prevailed with them. It was easy for him to draw Absalom into an open rebellion against his father; he had taken notice of his ambitious and aspiring humour, and of the grudges and dissatisfactions under which he laboured; so that, providing him a fit opportunity, he engaged him immediately. According to this rule, where he observes men of shallow heads and low parts, he the more freely imposeth upon them in things palpably absurd; where he takes notice of a fearful temper, there he tempts them with terrors and affrightful suggestions. He hath temptations proper for the sanguine complexion and for the melancholy; he hath his methods of dealing with the lustful and wanton, with the passionate and revengeful; he hath novelties at hand for the itching ear, and suggestions proper for those that are atheistically inclined.
Obj. To this may be objected, That experience tells us Satan doth not always walk in this road, nor confine himself to this rule: sometime he tempts to things which are cross to our tempers and inclinations, &c.
Ans. It is true he doth so; but yet the general rule is not prejudiced by this exception, especially if we consider,
[1.] First, That Satan being still under the commands and restraint of the Almighty, he cannot always tempt what he would, but according to a superior order and command. Of this nature I suppose was that temptation of which Paul complained so much; ‘he kept down his body,’ 1 Cor. ix. 27, upon this very design, that he might have it in subjection, and yet is he buffeted with a temptation which expected an advantage usually from the temper and frames of our bodies—for so much, I suppose, that phrase, ‘a thorn in the flesh,’ will unavoidably imply—though it still leave us at uncertainties what the temptation was in particular. Here Satan tempts at a disadvantage, and contrary to this rule; but then we must know that he was not the master of his own game—God expressly ordering such a temptation as was disagreeing with the apostle’s disposition, that it might the less prevail or hazard him, and yet be more available to keep him low, ‘lest he should be exalted above measure,’ which was God’s design in the matter.
[2.] Secondly, Sometime our temper alters; as the tempers of our bodies in a sickness may in a fit be so changed that they may desire at that time what they could not endure at another. A special occasion or concurrence of circumstances may alter for the time our constitution, and so an unusual temptation may at that time agree with this design.
[3.] Thirdly, Sometime by one temptation Satan intends but to lay the foundation of another; and then of purpose he begins with a strange suggestion, either to keep us at the gaze while he covertly doth something else against us, or to move us to a contrary extreme by an over-hasty rashness.
[4.] Fourthly, Sometime he tempts when his main design is only to trouble and disquiet us; and in such cases the most unnatural temptations, backed with a violent impetuousness, do his work the best.
3. Thirdly, Satan’s next work is the proposal of the temptation. In the two former he provided materials and laid the trains; in this he gives fire, by propounding his design; and this also he doth with caution these several ways:—
[1.] First, He makes the object speak for him, and in many he is scarce put to any further trouble: the object before them speaks Satan’s mind, and gains their consent immediately; yet is there no small cunning used in fitting the object and occasion, and bringing things about to answer the very nick of time which he takes to be advantageous for him.
[2.] Secondly, Sometime he appoints a proxy to speak for him; not that he is shamefaced in temptation, and not always at leisure for his own work, but this way he insinuates himself the more dangerously into our affections, and with less suspicion, using our friends, relations, or intimate acquaintance to intercede for a wicked design. He did not speak himself to Eve, but chose a serpent: he thought Eve would sooner prevail upon Adam than the serpent could. He tempted Job by the tongue of his wife, as if he had hoped that what so near a relation had counselled would easily be hearkened to. He tempted Christ to avoid suffering by Peter, under a pretence of highest love and care, ‘Master, spare thyself,’ [Mat. xvi. 23;] yet our Saviour forbears not to note Satan’s temptation closely twisted with Peter’s kindness. At this rate are we often tempted where we little suspect danger.
[3.] Thirdly, If he finds the two first ways unhopeful or unsuitable, then he injects the motion, and so plainly speaks to us inwardly himself, ‘Do this act, take this advantage for pleasure or profit,’ &c. He thought it not enough to tempt Judas by the object of gain, but he brake his mind in direct terms, and ‘put it into his heart,’ John xiii. 2. He did the like to Ananias, whose heart he filled with a large motion for that lie, and backed it with many considerations of the necessity and expediency of it, Acts v. 3. There is no question to be made of this. Dr Goodwin gives clear proofs of it, and so do several others.177 When we consider that thoughts are sometime cast upon the minds of men which are above their knowledge, and that they say and do things sometime which are far beyond any of their accomplishments and parts, and yet in the nature of it wicked, we must be forced to run so high as to charge it upon Satan. Saul’s prophesying, 1 Sam. xviii. 10, was by the influence of the evil spirit; and this—as Junius, Tirinus, and others interpret178—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.
[4.] 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 solicitation; when he urgeth the thing over and over, and gives no rest; when he joins with this an importunity of begging and entreating 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. xxi. 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 implies, in the judgment of some,179 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.
4. Fourthly, 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 it is expressed, James i. 14, ‘Every man is tempted, when he is drawn away and enticed.’180 I shall avoid here the variety of the apprehensions which some declare at large about the meaning of the words, satisfying myself with this, that the apostle points at those artifices of Satan by which he draws and allures the will of man to a compliance 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 knowledge 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. iv. 4, ‘The god of this world blinds the eyes of men,’ draws a curtain over this knowledge, 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 easy 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, it 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 erroneous, and making conclusions directly contrary, as Deut. xxix. 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 John i. 6; ‘We will not hearken unto thee, but will certainly do whatsoever thing goeth out of our own mouth,’ Jer. xlv. 16, 17; in which cases the συντήρησις, or principles of conscience, are quite overthrown. Some are hardened, and as to any application of their acts to this rule, quite dead and senseless. Though they rise not up against the light, yet are they willingly ignorant, without any consideration of what they are doing. Here the συνείδησις, 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. viii. 6. Nay, some are so far from this, that they presumptuously justify themselves, though they see their own blame and ruin 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 tolerable 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.
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 word, 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,’ Titus ii. 12; 1 Peter ii. 18; James iv. 5; Titus iii. 3; Gal. v. 17.
That Satan takes advantage of our own lusts, and so ploughs with our heifer, turning our own weapons against ourselves, is evident by the general vote of Scripture. The apostle James, chap. i. 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 lusts, Gal. v. 24. We are further told by John, 1 Epist. ii. 16, that all those snares that are in the world are only hazardous and prevailing by our lusts. More generally the apostle Peter speaks, 2 Peter i. 4; the whole bundle of actual sins that have ever been in the world came in at this door, ‘The corruption that is in the world is through lust.’ In the stirring up our lusts Satan useth no small art and subtlety, and ordinarily he worketh by some of these following ways:—
1. First, He useth his skill to dress up an object of lust that it may be taking and alluring. He doth not content himself with a simple proposal of the object, but doth as it were paint and varnish it, to make it seem beautiful and lovely. Besides all that wooing and importunity which he useth to the soul by private and unseen suggestions, he hath no doubt a care to gather together all possible concurring circumstances, by which the seeming goodness or conveniency of the object is much heightened and enlarged. We see those that have skill to work upon the humours of men place a great part of it in the right circumstantiating a motion, and in taking the tempers and inclinations of men at a right time. And they observe that the missing of the right season is the hazard of the design, even there where the object and inclination ordinarily are suitable. There is much in placing a picture in a right position, to give it its proper grace and lustre in the eyes of the beholders. When a man is out of humour he nauseates his usual delights, and grows sullen to things of frequent practice. It is likely Eve was not a stranger to the tree of knowledge before the temptation, but when the serpent suggests the goodness of the fruit, the fruit itself seems more beautiful and desirable, ‘good for food, and pleasant to the eyes,’ [Gen. ii. 9.] Though we are not able to find out the way of Satan’s beautifying an object that it may affect with more piercing and powerful delights, yet he that shall consider that not only prudence, in an advantageous management of things, adds an additional beauty to objects proposed, but also that art, by placing things in a right posture, may derive a radiancy and beam of beauty and light upon them, as an ordinary piece of glass may be so posited to the sunbeams that it may reflect a sparkling light as if it were a diamond,—he that shall consider this, I say, will not think it strange for the devil to use some arts of this kind for the adorning and setting off an object to the eye of our lusts.
2. Secondly, We have reason to suspect that he may have ways of deceit and imposture upon our senses. The deceits of the senses are so much noted, that some philosophers will scarce allow any credit to be given them; not that they are always deceitful, but that they are often so, and therefore always suspicious.181 The soul hath no intelligence but by the senses. It is then a business of easy belief, that Satan may not altogether slight this advantage, but that when he sees it fit for his purpose, he may impose upon us by the deception of our eyes and ears. We little know how oft our senses have disguised things to us. In a pleasing object, our eyes may be as a magnifying or multiplying glass. In the first temptation Satan seems to have wrought both upon the object and also upon the senses; she ‘saw it was good for food and pleasant.’ Who can question but that she saw the fruit before? But this was another kind of sight, of more power and attraction. An instance of Satan’s cunning in both the forementioned particulars we have from Austin, relating the story of his friend Alypius, who by the importunity of his acquaintance consented to go to the theatre, yet with a resolve not to open his eyes, lest the sight of these spectacles should entice his heart; but being there, the noise and sudden shouting of the multitude prevailed so far with him that he forgot his resolution; takes the liberty to see what occasioned the shouting, and once seeing, is now so inflamed with delight that he shouts as the rest do, and becomes a frequenter of the theatre as others.182 What was there to be seen and heard he knew before by the relation of others; but now being present, his eyes and ears were by Satan so heightened in their offices, that those bloody objects seemed pleasant beyond all that had been reported of them, and the lust of his heart drawn out by Satan’s cunning disposal of the object and senses.
3. Thirdly, There is no small enticement arising from the fitness and suitableness of occasion. An occasion exactly fitted is more than half a temptation. This often makes a thief, an adulterer, &c., where the acts of these sins have their rise from a sudden fit of humour, which occasion puts them in, rather than from design or premeditation. Cunningly contrived occasions are like the danger of a precipice. If a man be so foolish as to take up a stand there, a small push will throw him over, though a far greater might not harm him if he were upon a level. It is Satan’s cunning to draw a man within the reach of an occasion. All the resolves of Alypius were not safeguard to him, when once he was brought within hearing and sight of the temptation. If he had stayed at home, the hazard of Satan’s suggestions, though earnest, had not been so much as the hearing of his ears and sight of his eyes. In 2 Cor. ii. 11, Paul’s fears of Satan’s taking advantage against the Corinthians, did manifestly arise from the present posture of their church affairs: for if the excommunicated person should not be received again into the church, an ordinary push of temptation might either have renewed or confirmed their contentions, or precipitated183 them into an opinion of too much severity against an offending brother; and that their present frame made them more than ordinarily obnoxious to these snares, is evident from the apostle’s caution inserted here in this discourse, so abruptly, that any man may observe the necessity of the matter, and the earnestness of his affections did lead his pen.184 The souls of men have their general discrasias and disaffections, as our bodies have, from a lingering distemperature of the blood and humours; in which case, a small occasion, like a particular error of diet, &c., in a declining body, will easily form that inclination into particular acts of sin.
4. Fourthly, Satan hath yet a further reach in his enticements, by the power which he hath upon our fancies and imaginations. That he hath such a power was discovered before. This being then supposed, how serviceable it is for his end it is now to be considered. Our fancy is as a glass, which, with admirable celerity and quickness of motion, can present before us all kinds of objects; it can in a moment run from one end of the earth to the other; and besides this, it hath a power of creating objects, and casting them into what forms and shapes it pleaseth, all which our understanding cannot avoid the sight of. Now the power of imagination is acknowledged by all to be very great, not only as working upon a melancholy and distempered spirit, of which authors give us large accounts,185 but also upon minds more remote from such peremptory delusions; as may be daily observed in the prejudices and prepossessions of men, who by reason of the impressions of imagination, are not without difficulty drawn over to the acknowledgment of the truth of things, and the true understanding of matters; neither is the understanding only liable to a more than ordinary heat and rapture by it, but the will is also quickened and sharpened in its desires by this means. Hence is it, as one of the forecited authors observes,186 that fancy doth often more toward a persuasion by its insinuations than a cogent argument or rational demonstration.
This is no less a powerful instrument in Satan’s hand, than commonly and frequently made use of. Who amongst us doth not find and feel him dealing with us at this weapon? When he propounds an object to our lust, he doth not usually expose it naked under the hazard of dying out for want of prosecution, but presently calls in our fancy to his aid, and there raiseth a theatre, on which he acts before our minds the sin in all its ways and postures. If he put us upon revenge, or upon lusts of uncleanness, or covetousness, or ambition, we are sure, if we prevent it not, to have our imagination presenting these things to us as in lively pictures and resemblances, by which our desires may be inflamed and prepared for consent.
5. Fifthly, Sometime he shews his art in preparing and fitting our bodies to his designs, or in fitting temptations to our bodies and the inclinations thereof. The soul, though it be a noble being, yet is it limited by the body, and incommodated by the craziness and indispositions thereof, so that it can no more act strenuously or evenly to its principles in a disordered body, than it can rightly manage any member of it, in its natural motions, where the bones are disjointed. Hence sickness or other bodily weaknesses do alter the scene, and add another kind of bias to the soul than what it had before. This Satan takes notice of, and either follows his advantage of the present indisposition, or, if he hath some special design, endeavours to cast our body into such a disorder as may best suit his intention. Asa was more easily drawn to be overseen in peevishness and rash anger in his latter days, when his body grew diseased. Satan had his advantage against Solomon to draw him to idolatry when old age and uxoriousness had made him more ductile to the solicitations of his wives; ‘When Solomon was old, his wives turned away his heart,’ 1 Kings xi. 4. The devil, when he took upon him to foretell Job’s blaspheming God to his face, yet he attempted not the main design till he thought he had thoroughly prepared him for it, by the anguish and smart of a distempered body and mind; and though he failed in the great business of his boast, yet he left us an experiment in Job, that the likeliest way to prevail upon the mind in hideous and desperate temptations, is to mould the body to a suitable frame. He prevailed not against Job to cause him curse God, yet he prevailed far, ‘he cursed the day of his birth,’ and spake many things by the force of that distress, which he professeth himself ashamed of afterwards. The body then will be in danger, when it is disordered, to give a tincture to every action, as a distempered palate communicates a bitterness to everything it takes down.
6. Sixthly, Evil company is a general preparatory to all kinds of temptation. He enticeth strongly that way. For, (1.) Evil society doth insensibly dead the heart, and quench the heat of the affections to the things of God. It hath a kind of bewitching power to eat out the fear of the Lord in our hearts, and to take off the weight and power of religious duty. It not only stops our tongues, and retards them in speaking of good things, but influenceth the very heart, and poisons it into a kind of deadness and lethargy, so that our thoughts run low, and we begin to think that severe watchfulness of thoughts and the guard of our minds to be a needless and melancholy self-imposition. (2.) Example hath a strange insinuating force to enstamp a resemblance, and to beget imitation. Joseph, living where his ears were frequently beaten with oaths, finds it an easy thing, upon a feigned occasion, to swear by the life of Pharaoh, [Gen. xlii. 15]. Evil company is sin’s nursery and Satan’s academy, by which he trains up those whose knowledge and hopeful beginnings had made them shy of his temptations; and if he can prevail with men to take such companions, he will with a little labour presently bring them to any iniquity.
7. Seventhly, But his highest project in order to the enticing of men, is to engage their affections to a height and passionateness. The Scripture doth distinguish betwixt the ἐπιθυμίας and παθήματα, the affections and lusts, Gal. v. 24; clearly implying that the way to procure fixed desires and actual lustings, is to procure those passionate workings of the mind.
How powerful a part of his design this is, will appear from the nature of these passions: which are,
[1.] First, Violent motions of the heart; the very wings and sails of the soul, and every passion, in its own working, doth express a violence.187 Choler is an earnest rage; voluptuousness is nothing less; fear is a desperate hurry of the soul; ‘love strong as death; jealousy cruel as the grave;’ each of them striving which should excel in violence, so that it is a question yet undetermined which passion may challenge the superiority.
[2.] Secondly, Their fury is dangerous and unbridled; like so many wild horses let loose, hurrying their rider which way they please. They move not upon the command of reason, but oft prevent it in their sudden rise; neither do they take reason’s advice for their course proportionable to the occasion, for often their humour, rather than the matter of the provocation, gives them spurs; and when they have evaporated their heat, they cease, not as following the command of reason, but as weakened by their own violence.
[3.] Thirdly, They are not easily conquered; not only because they renew their strength and onset after a defeat, and, like so many hydra’s heads, spring up as fast as cut off; but they are ourselves—we can neither run from them, nor from the love of them.
[4.] Fourthly, And consequently highly advantageous in Satan’s design and enticement when they are driven up to a fury and passionateness; for besides their inward rage, which the Scripture calls burning, 1 Cor. vii. 9; Rom. i. 27, by which men are pricked and goaded on without rest or ease, to ‘make provisions for the flesh,’ and to enjoy or act what their unbridled violence will lead to in the execution of their desires, they carry all on before them, and engage the whole man with the highest eagerness ‘to fulfil every lust,’ Eph. ii. 3, to go up to the highest degrees, and with an unsatiable greediness to yield themselves ‘servants of iniquity unto iniquity,’ Rom. vi. 19.
That lust darkens the mind.—Evidences thereof.—The five ways by which it doth blind men: First, By preventing the exercise of reason.—The ways of that prevention: (1.) Secrecy in tempting; Satan’s subtlety therein; (2.) Surprisal; (3.) Gradual entanglements.
That Satan doth entice us by stirring up our lust, hath been discovered; it remains that I next speak to the second thing propounded, which was,
That by this power of lust he blinds and darkens our mind. That the lusts of men are the great principle upon which Satan proceeds in drawing on so great a blindness as we have spoken of, I shall briefly evince from these few observations:—
1. First, From the unreasonableness and absurdity of some actions in men otherwise sufficiently rational. He that considers the acts of Alexander, in murdering Calisthenes, for no other crime than defending the cause of the gods, and affirming that temples could not be built to a king without provoking a deity; and yet this so smoothed, if Quintus Curtius represent him right, that he seemed to flatter Alexander with an opinion of deification after his death;188 whosoever, I say, shall consider this cruelty, will condemn Alexander as blind and irrational in this matter; and yet no other cause can be assigned hereof, but that his lust after glory and honour darkened his reason. The like may be said of his killing Hephæstion’s physician, because he died. The brutal fury of that consul, that made a slave to be eaten up with lampreys, for no other fault than the breaking of a glass, can be ascribed to nothing else but the boiling over of his passion. A sadder instance of this we have in Theodosius senior, who, for an affront given to some of his officers in Thessalonica, commanded the destruction of the city, and the slaughter of the citizens to the number of seven thousand, without any distinction of nocent and innocent.189 This blind rage the historian notes as the fruit of violent and unbridled lust in a man otherwise just and gracious. Thousands of instances of this nature might be added. But,
2. Secondly, If we consider the known and visible hazards to life and estate, and, that which is more, to that part of them which is immortal; upon all which men do desperately adventure, upon no other ground or motive than the gratifications of their lusts,—we may easily conclude that there is a strange force and power in their passions to blind and besot them; and this, notwithstanding, is the common practice of all men, where grace, as the only eye-salve, doth not restore the sight. The heathens in all these practices of filthiness and folly, recorded Rom. i. 29, they had so far a discovery of the danger, if they had not imprisoned that truth and light in unrighteousness, ver. 18, that they knew the ‘judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death,’ ver. 32. Yet, notwithstanding, the vanity of their imaginations, influenced by lust, darkened their heart so much that they did ‘not only do these things,’ of so great vileness and unspeakable hazard, ‘but had pleasure in those that did them.’
3. Thirdly, The blinding power of lust is yet more remarkable, when we see men glorying in their shame, and mounting their triumphal chariots to expose themselves a spectacle to all, in that garb of deformity which their lusts have put them in. It is a blindness to do any act against the rules of reason, but it is a far greater blindness for men to pride themselves in them. What have the issues of most wars been, but burning of cities, devastations of flourishing kingdoms, spilling the blood of millions, besides all the famine and other miseries that follow; yet these actions, that better beseem tigers, lions, and savage brutes, than men of reason, are honoured with the great, triumphant names of virtue, manhood, courage, magnanimity, conquest, &c. If the power and humour of their lusts of vainglory and revenge had not quite muffled their understandings, these things would have been called by their proper names of murder, cruelty, robbery, &c.; and the actors of such tragedies, instead of triumphal arches and acclamations of praise, would have been buried under heaps of ignominy and perpetual disgraces, as prodigies of nature, monsters of men, and haters of mankind.
4. Fourthly, But there is yet one evidence more plain and convincing; when our lusts are up, though reason offer its aids to allay the storm, yet the wisest of men, otherwise composed and calm, are so far from taking the advantage of its guidance, that oftentimes they trample upon it and despise it; and as if lusts, by some secret incantation, had made them impenetrable, they are not capable of its light and conduct, and can make no more use of it than a blind man can do of a candle. To this purpose, let us observe the carriage of disputants. If men do any way publicly engage themselves in a contest of this nature, though truth can be but on the one side, yet both parties give arguments and answer objections with equal confidence of victory, and a contempt of the reasons and strength of each other’s discourses; and this proves so fatal to him that maintains the mistake or untruth, that not one of a thousand hath the benefit and advantage for the finding of truth, which free and unprejudiced bystanders may have; so true is that, Omne perit judicium cum res transit in affectum, When affections are engaged, judgment is darkened. It is a thing of common observation, that when men are discoursed into anger and heat, they presently grow absurd; are disabled for speaking or understanding reason, and are oft hurried to such inconveniences and miscarriages, that they are ashamed of themselves; when they cool, and the fit is over, Impedit ira animum, &c. To all this might be added the power of lust in persons voluptuous, who dedicate themselves to the pleasures of the flesh. Those that ‘serve divers lusts and pleasures,’ their slavish estate, their base drudgery, do clearly evince that lust unmans them, and puts out their eyes. Mark Antony by this means became a slave to Cleopatra; never did a poor captive strive more to obtain the good-will of his lord than he to please this woman, insomuch that, besotted with his lust, he seemed to want that common foresight of his danger, which the smallest measure of reason might have afforded to any, and so dallied himself into his ruin. From all these considerations and instances, it appears our lusts afford such vapours and mists that our reason is darkened by them, or rather they are like a dose of opium, that strongly stupifies and binds up the senses. But yet it remains that the various ways by which our lusts do blind us be particularly opened, and they are five. (1.) Our lusts blind us by preventing the use and exercise of reason. (2.) By perverting it. (3.) By withdrawing the mind from it. (4.) By disturbing it in its operation. And (5.) By a desperate precipitancy; all which I shall more fully explain.
I. First, Our lusts blind us by preventing and intercepting the exercise of light and reason; and Satan in this case useth these deceits:—
1. First, He endeavours so to stir up our lust as yet to conceal his design. Secrecy is one of his main engines. He doth not in this case shew his weapon before he strikes; and indeed his policy herein is great. For, [1.] By this means he takes us at unawares, secure, and unprepared for resistance. [2.] We are often ensnared without noise, and before our consideration of things can come in to rescue us. [3.] If he get not his whole design upon us this way, yet he oft makes a half victory. By this means he procures a half content or inclination to sin, before we discover that we are under a temptation; for when the foundation of a temptation is laid unespied, then we awaken with the sin in our hand, as sleeping men awake sometime with the word in their mouths. If any question, How can these things be? How can he steal a temptation upon us with such secrecy? I answer, he can do it these three ways:—
(1.) First, He sometimes after a careless manner, and as it were by the by, drops in a suggestion into our hearts, and that without noise or importunity, giving it as it were this charge, ‘Stir not up nor awaken him;’ and then he sits by to observe the issue, and to see if the tinder will take fire of itself. Thus many a motion thrown into our hearts, as it were accidentally, ere ever we are aware, begets a sudden flame.
(2.) Secondly, He sometimes fetcheth a compass, and makes a thing far different to be a preamble or introduction to his intended design. Thus by objects, employments, discourse, or company, that shew not any direct tendency to evil, doth he insensibly occasion pride, passion, or lust. How slyly and secretly doth he put us upon what he intends as a further snare! How unawares, while we think of no such thing, are we carried sometime upon the borders of sin, and into the enemy’s quarters! Satan in this acts like a fowler, who useth a stalking-horse, as if he were upon some other employment, when yet his design is the destruction of the bird.
(3.) Thirdly, Another way of secrecy is his raising a crowd of other thoughts in the mind, and while these are mixed and confusedly floating in the understanding or fancy, then doth he thrust in among them the intended suggestion; and then suffering the rest to vanish, he by little and little singles this out as a more special object of consideration, so that we cast a sudden glance upon this, and we are often taken with it before we consider the danger. In this Satan doth as soldiers, who take the advantage of a mist to make a nearer approach to their enemies, and to surprise them before discovery of the danger. This he doth with us while we are in a musing fit or a melancholy dream.
2. A second deceit for the preventing of a serious consideration is sudden surprisal. In the former he endeavoured to conceal the temptation while he is at work with us, but in this he shews the temptation plainly, only he sets upon us without giving of us warning of the onset; but then he backs it with all the violent importunity he can, and by this he hinders the recollecting of ourselves and the aid of reason. This course Satan only takes with those whose passions are apt to be very stirring and boisterous, or such as, being his slaves and vassals, are more subject to his commands. Thus a sudden provocation to an angry man gives him not time to consider, but carries him headlong. A surprise of occasion and opportunity is frequently a conquest to those that have any earnestness of hope, desire, or revenge. Surely David was taken at this advantage in the matter of Bathsheba. And here we may note that good men upon such a sudden motion do yield, without any blow or struggling, to that which at other times they could not be drawn to by many reasons.
3. Thirdly, Consideration is prevented by gradual entanglements. Satan so orders the matter that sin creeps on upon us as sleep, by insensible degrees. For this end sometimes he dissembles his strength, and sets upon us with lower temptations, and with less force than otherwise he could. He knows we are not moved to extremes, but by steps and habits; are not confirmed, but by gradual proceedings. To take too great strides may sometime prevail at present; but the suddenness and greatness of the alteration begetting a strangeness on the soul, may occasion after-thoughts and recoiling. Therefore he tempts first to thoughts, then to a delight in these thoughts, then to the continuation of them, then to resolve, and so on to practice. And in like manner, he tempts some to make bold with a small matter, which shall scarce come under the notion of wrong; then to a greater, and so gradually to higher things, and thus he insensibly brings on a thievish inclination and practice. For the same end sometimes he shews his skill in the management of occasions; he imperceptibly hooks men into sin by drawing them first to be bold with occasions; he tells them they may sit at the ale-house, and yet not be drunk; that they may keep familiarity, and yet not be lewd; that they may look upon a commodity, and yet not steal; and when the occasions are by this means made familiar to them, then he puts them on a step further, but by such slow motions that the progress is scarce discerned till they be in the snare.
Of Satan’s perverting our reason.—His second way of blinding.—The possibility of this, and the manner of accomplishing it directly, several ways; and indirectly, by the delights of sin, and by sophistical arguments; with an account of them.
II. Secondly, The second way by which Satan blinds us through the power of lust is by perverting and corrupting our reason, drawing it to approve of that which it first disapproved. That our lusts have such a power upon the understanding to make such an alteration, need not seem strange to those that shall consider that the Scripture, propounding the knowledge of the highest mysteries, doth positively require, as a necessary pre-requisite to these things, that we ‘lay aside all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness,’ James i. 20,—in these terms, noting the loathsome defilement of our lusts,—that so we may ‘receive the engrafted word;’ strongly implying that our lusts have a power to elude and evade the strongest reasons, and to hinder their entertainment: which our Saviour notes to have been also the cause of the Jews’ blindness, ‘How can ye believe, which receive honour one of another?’ John v. 44. Their lusts of honour stood in their light, and perverted their reason.
But because this may seem to some almost impossible, that lusts should turn our sun into darkness, I shall a little explain it.
The understanding doth usually, if practice of sin have not put out its light, at the first faithfully represent to our mind the nature of good and evil in matters of temptation and duty; yet its power in this case is only directive and suasive to the will, not absolutely imperative. The will must follow the understanding’s dictate, but is not under any necessity of following its first advice; it is the ultimum dictamen, the last dictate, that it is engaged to follow. However the will, in the case last mentioned, be dependent upon the understanding, yet the understanding doth also, quoad exercitium, depend upon the will, and as to the act of consideration, is under its command; so that after the understanding hath faithfully represented the evil of a sin, the will can command it to another consideration, and force it to new thoughts and consultations about it; in which case the will doth prompt the understanding, tells it what verdict it would have it to bring in, and so doth really solicit and beg for a compliance.
The understanding is ductile and capable of being bribed, and therefore suffers its right eye to be put out by the will, and as a false witness or a partial judge gives sentence as the will would have it; and thus, as one observes,190 the understanding and will are like Simeon and Levi, brethren in evil, mutually complying with and gratifying each other.
The possibility of lusts perverting our understanding being discovered, the way and manner how lust doth thus corrupt it, is needful to be opened.
Lust exerciseth this power under the management of Satan, directly and indirectly.
1. First, Our reason is directly perverted when it is so far wrought upon as to call that good, which is indeed plainly and apparently evil. So great a corruption is not common and ordinary, neither can the heart of man be easily drawn to go so palpably against clear light and evidence. It is therefore only in some cases and in some persons, either of weaker faculties or of extraordinary debauched principles, that Satan can work up lust to give so great a darkness. However, it is evident that Satan useth these deceits in this thing.
(1.) First, He strives, where the matter will bear it, to put the name of virtue or good upon actions and things that are not so. This temptation doth most appear in those things that are of a doubtful and disputable nature, or in those actions which in their appearance or pretensions may seem to be virtuous. Whatever sin is capable of any paint or varnish, that he takes the advantage of. Saul’s sacrificing was a great iniquity, and yet the pretence of the general goodness of the action, being in itself commanded, and the supposed necessity of Saul’s doing it, because Samuel came not, were considerations upon which his understanding warranted to him that undertaking. Paul’s persecution, though a real gratification of his envious lustings, by his blinded understanding was judged duty. What more common than for worldly-mindedness and covetousness to be called a faithful and dutiful care for the provision of our families! Lukewarmness is often justified under the notion of moderation and prudence; and anything that can but pretend any kindred to or resemblance of good, our lusts presently prevail for an approbation and vindication of it.
(2.) Secondly, Satan useth the advantage of extremes for the corrupting of our understandings. To this purpose he doth all he can to make such an extreme odious and displeasing, that so we may run upon the contrary as matter of duty. Many there are whose heads are so weak, that if they see the danger of one extreme, they never think themselves in safety till they fly to a contrary excess, and then they think the extreme they embrace needs no other justification than the apparent evil of what they have avoided. Satan knowing this, like the lapwing, makes the greatest noise when he is furthest from his nest, and in much seeming earnestness tempts us to something that is most cross to our temper or present inclination; or endeavours to render something so to us, not with any hopes to prevail with us there, but to make us run as far from it as we can into another snare, and also to make us believe that we have done well and avoided a temptation, when indeed we have but exchanged it.
(3.) Thirdly, He directly binds our understandings in sinful practices, by engaging us to corrupt opinions which lead to wicked or careless courses. Satan with great ease can put men upon sin, when once he hath prevailed with them to receive an error which directly leads to it. Corrupt principles do naturally corrupt practices, and both these may be observed to meet in those deluded ones whom the Scripture mentions, ‘that denied the only Lord God, and Jesus Christ, turning also the grace of God into lasciviousness,’ Jude 4; false teachers that brought in ‘damnable heresies,’ counted it ‘pleasure to riot,’ had ‘eyes full of adultery, and could not cease from sin,’ 2 Pet. ii. 1, 13, 14. With what confidence and security will sin be practised, when an opinion signs a warrant and pleads a justification for it!
(4.) Fourthly, In actions whose goodness or badness is principally discoverable by the ends upon which they are undertaken, it is no great difficulty for Satan to impose upon men a belief that they act by ends and respects which do not indeed move them at all; and in this case men are so blinded that they do not, or will not know or acknowledge they do evil. The matter of the action being warrantable, and the end being out of the reach of common discovery, they readily believe the best of themselves; and looking more at the warrantableness of the nature of the act in the general than at their grounds and intentions, they think not that they do evil. This was a fault which Christ observed in the disciples when they called for ‘fire from heaven upon the Samaritans,’ Luke ix. 55. The thing itself Elias had done before, and Christ might have done it then, but they wanted the spirit of Elias, and therefore Christ rejects their motion as unlawful in them, who considered not that a spirit of passion and revenge did altogether influence them; and instead of shewing a just displeasure against the Samaritans, he shews that Satan had blinded them by their lust, and that the thing they urged was so far from being good, that it was apparently evil, in that they were acted by ‘another spirit’ than they imagined. This way of deceit is very common. How often may we observe Christians pretending conscientious dissatisfactions about the actions of others, when the private spring that animates them is some secret grudge that lies at the bottom; and yet because the thing wherein they are dissatisfied may truly deserve blame, they are not apt to condemn themselves, but think they do well.