but I daily drink poison, yet I shall escape.' Such is the mad reasoning of vain souls. David, Peter, &c. sinned once foully and fearfully, they tasted poison once, and were sick to death; but I taste it daily, and yet shall not taste of eternal death. Remember, sirs! The day is at hand, when stli-flatterers will be found self-deceivers, yea, self-murderers.'

Rem. 3. Seriously consider, that though God has not disinherited his people for their sins, yet he hath severely punished them for their sins.* David sins, and God breaks his bones for his sin, Ps. li. 8. Make me to hear joy and gladness, that the bones which thou hast broken may rejoice. And because thou hast done this, the sword shall not depart from thy house, to the day of thy death. Though God will not utterly take from them his loving kindness, nor suffer his faithfulness to fail, nor break his covenant, nor alter the thing that is gone out of his mouth, yet will he visit their transgression with a rod, and their iniquity with stripes,' Ps. Ixxxix. 30-35. The scripture abounds with instances of this kind; this is a truth so well known, among all that know any thing of truth, that to

*Josephus reports, that not long after the Jews had crucified Christ on the cross, so many of them were condemned to be crucified, that there were not places enough for crosses, nor crosses enough for the bodies that were to be hung thereon.

cite more scriptures to prove it, would be to light a candle to see the sun at noon.

The Jews have a proverb, That there is no punishment comes upon Israel, in which there is not one ounce of the golden calf.' Meaning that, that was so great a sin, that in every plague God remembered it; it had influence in every trouble that befell them. Every man's heart may say to him in his sufferings, as the heart of Apollodorus in the kettle, I have been the cause of this.' God is most angry when he shews no anger. God keep me from this mercy, this kind of mercy is worse than all other kinds of misery. One writing to a sick friend, hath this expression, 'I account it a part of unhappiness not to know adversity, I judge you to be miserable, because you have not been miserable.' It is a mercy that our affliction is not an execution, but a correction: he that hath deserved hanging may be glad to escape with a whipping. God's corrections are our instructions, his lashes our lessons, his scourges our schoolmasters, his chastisements our advertisements; and to note this, both the Hebrews and Greeks, express chastening and teaching by one and the same word, because the latter is the true end of the former, according to that in the proverb, Smart makes wit, and vexation gives understanding?' whence Luther fitly calls affliction, The Christian man's divinity.' So saith Job, (chap. xxxiii. 16-19.) God speaketh once, yea, twice, yet

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man perceiveth it not, in a dream, in a vision of the night, when deep sleep falleth upon men, in slumberings upon the bed; then he openeth the ears of men, and sealeth their instruction, that he may withdraw man from his purpose, and hide pride from man: he keepeth back his soul from the pit, and his life from perishing by the sword, When Satan shall tell thee of other men's sins to draw thee to sin, do thou think of their sufferings, to keep thee from sin! Lay thy hand upon thy heart and say, 'Oh my soul! if thou sinnest with David, thou must suffer with David,' &c.

Rem. 4. Solemnly consider, that there are but two main ends of God's recording of the falls of his saints.

And the one is, 'To keep those from fainting, sinking, and despair, under the burden of their sins, who fall through weakness and infirmity.' And the other is, That their falls may be as land-marks, to warn others that stand to take heed lest they fall.'* It never entered into the heart of God to record his children's sins, that others might be encouraged to sin, but that they might be warned to look to their standings, and to hang the faster upon the skirts of Christ, and avoid all occasions of temptations, that may

I have known a good man, said Bernard, who when he had heard of any that had committed some notorious sin, was wont to say with himself, " He fell to-day, I may fall to-morrow."

occasion them to fall, as others have fallen, when they have been left by Christ. There is nothing in the world that can so notoriously cross the grand end of God's recording the sins of his saints, than for any from thence to take encouragement to sin; and wherever you find such a soul, you may write him Christless, graceless, a soul cast off by God, a soul that Satan hath by the hand, and the eternal God knows whither he will lead him.

CHAPTER V.

The fifth Device that Satan hath to draw the soul to sin, is,

BY presenting God to the soul, as one made up of all mercy: Oh! saith Satan, you need not make such a matter of sin, you need not be so fearful of it, nor so unwillling to commit it, for God is a God of mercy, a God full of mercy, a God that delights in mercy, a God that is ready to shew mercy, a God that is never weary of shewing mercy, a God more prone to pardon his people, than to punish them; and therefore he will not take advantage against the soul; and why then, saith Satan, should you make such a

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matter of sin?-The remedies against this device of Satan, are these:

Remedy 1. Seriously consider, that it is the surest judgment in the world, to be left to sin upon any pretence whatsoever. Oh! unhappy man; when God leaveth thee to thyself, and doth not resist thee in thy sins; wo! wo! to him at whose sins God doth wink:* when God lets the way to hell be a smooth and pleasant way, then it is hell on this side hell, and a dreadful sign of God's indignation against a man; a token of his rejection, and that God doth not intend good unto him: that is a sad word, Ephraim is joined to idols, let him alone, he will not be admonished, he is incorrigible, he hath made a match with mischief, and he shall have his belly full of it; he falls with open eyes, let him fall at his own peril.' And that is a terrible saying, So I gave them up unto their own hearts lusts, and they walked in their own counsels, Ps. lxxxi. 12. A soul given up to sin, is a soul ripe for hell, and posting to destruction. Ah, Lord! this mercy I humbly beg, that whatever thou givest me up to, thou wilt not give me up to the ways of my own heart; if thou wilt give me up to be afflicted, or tempt

"It is a human thing to fall into sin, a devilish to persevere therein, and an angelical, or supernatural, to rise from it."