Sacred Therapy, Book 2 · Chapter 30
CHAP. XXX.
Wherein are some mixed cases spoken of, whereunto the true convert is subject, and so may fall to doubt of his conversion or interest in Christ.
THere are, beside the cases whereof we have given some examples and instances, other cases also, which we may call mixed cases, the causes whereof are partly natural, partly spirituall, wherein the true convert may be afflicted with both bodily and spirituall distempers; melancholious humors abounding in the body, and Sathan, busie to stir himself in these distempers to the weakning the faith of the convert, may take advantage to vex the child of God.
2. These bodily distempers are common both to the unrenewed and to the regenerat: for, God hath not exeemed his children from diseases of the body; for, the righteous and the wise, and their works, are in the hand of God; no man knoweth either love or hatred by all that is before him: all things come alike to all, there is one event, (or accident which may befall) to the righteous and to the wicked, to the good and to the clean, and to the unclean; to him that sacrificeth, and to him that sacrificeth not; as is the good, so is the sinner, and he that sweareth, as he that feareth an oath, Eccles. 9. 1, 2. Saul the King of Israel in his melancholious fit, may (by the instigation of an unclean spirit, changing himself into an angel of light) fall on prophesieing in the midst of his house, while he is about to murther David, 1 Sam: 18. 10. and experience hath shewed, that some lying in grosse sins, who while they were themselves and in their wits, were found very rude and ignorant in maters of religion and things divine; but sometimes sudainly falling in a melancholious ex…asie and rapture, they could rehearse a number of passages of Scripture, and seemed to pray, and to bring a number of arguments in their praying, as if they had been wrestling with God for mercy, of which Scriptures or words of prayer, they had neither sense nor memory, when they came to themselves, after the melancholious extasie was over, which sit lasted sometimes an hour, sometimes two or thereby; all which time they neither did hear nor see the wittnesses sitting by, and beholding the spectacle. On the other hand, experience hath shewed how far Sathan may abuse and hath abused the phantasie of some holy persons, in the height of sharp feavers and frensies; and what speeches against God and their own souls, by his instigation they have uttered. We have an example in Iob, who in his hot feaver and painfull boils, like a man distracted, cryed out, that God was turned an enemy to him, that he did shoot all his arrows against him, whereupon in his distemper he cryed for death, and cursed the day of his birth most bitterly. Of which expressions when he is challenged by his uncharitable friends, and judged to be nothing but a wicked hypocrit, he excuseth himself, that when he spoke these words he was not himself, but in a roving distemper, Iob. 6. 26. Do ye imagine to reprove words, and the speeches of one that is desperat, which are as wind?
3. But our purpose here is not to discourse of melancholy in general, nor what may befall in common to the godly and the wicked in melancholious fits: for this doth require a larger Treatise, and the concurrence both of Physicians and Divines. We purpose only to speak to what the true convert is obnoxious unto; and when we speak of mixed cases, wherein both the distemper of the body and brain do concur with the temptation of Sathan, we do not take notice of any light distemper of body and mind, which suddainly cometh and is soon removed, or which the privat diligence of the child of God, in the use of the means may, and useth to overcome. Neither do we meddle with phrensies and madnesse, which so bereaveth the man of the use of common reason, that he cannot understand or make use of wholsome advice and counsell from the Scripture, or rightly conceive truth when it is told unto him (for in such a case the Physician only is to be called to deal with the diseased, not excluding the prayer of the Pastor and Christian friends for him) But we are to speak concerning more moderat distempers wherein the afflicted may lay forth his tentations, and propound the reasons which seem to fortifie his doubts and to dispute of them & receive reasonable answers to his objections, as they are offered unto him. And in a word, such a condition of the mans mind as maketh him ready to hear and follow the advice, both of the Physician and the Pastor, as his need requireth. Now it is not our, that the imagination of these who are of this midle sort of distemper, doth ordinarily fain to its self sad and terrible things, and being fired with melancholious humours and tentations of Sathan mixed therewith, useth to represent to its self Gods hot displeasure, death, condemnation and hell, as it were, before their eyes; so that it is no wonder, that for the the time they doubt whether they can possibly be in the state of grace. But in special, this seemeth most heavy unto them, that their conscience in the mean time doth write bitter things against them, and double upon them, the deserved sentence of condemnation, casting up the particular sins (possibly repented of, and pardoned) as meriting rejection from God. And here mainly is the stick.
2. In discerning and curing such cases, there is great need of wise circumspection: For, first, information must be had of the afflicted's condition so far as his friends and familiars can furnish. 2. The cure of his wound must be tenderly gone about, as the Chyrurgian useth to do, when he is to deal with the aple of a mans eye. 3. Whatsoever seem at the first, it shall be safest for the comforter of the afflicted, not to speak peremptorily of the mans state or condition, yea, nor to judge within themselves determinatly about him. 4. But it shall be sa…est to hear the afflicted patiently, to lay out his own condition more or lesse confusedly, in moe or fewer speeches, as he is able to expresse it. 5. What is further to be searched after, by prudent interrogations, let it be pumped up so far as conveniently may be. 6. So soon as his condition is clear to the Pastor, or friend who is about to help him, let the speaker unto him, recollect in few words his condition as he conceiveth it, and take up his doubt in a word as shortly as may be, that the afflicted may perceive, that his case is well taken up by the Pastor or Christian friend. For oft-times here is the cure marred, when the afflicted conceiveth that his case is not rightly apprehended, or what is spoken, is not spoken to purpose. 7. Whatsoever his case seem to be, Christian compassion must be shewed to the afflicted, and his affliction estimat no lesse then the afflicted conceiveth of it, but made possible for God to cure it. For even our Lord in the resurrection of Lazarus, groaned in his spirit, in compassion toward the mourning friends, before he gave them the full consolation. And surely, compassion doth well become a Physician: for, it is an addition to the affliction of the afflicted, when the beholder cometh to him, to think little of his pain. 8. Whether the afflicted seem to be a convert or not, let him be exhorted by his present exercise to humble himself before God, and confesse his original and actual sins to God, and flye to the grace of reconciliation, and remission of sins and consolation holden forth in the Gospel to every self-condemned sinner, through Jesus Christ our Lord; for, Christ is the end of the law for righteousnesse; when the conscience is burdened, and the rod is heavy, the curse of the law, and the rod of correction do drive the man to flye unto Christ and take his yoke upon him: And this course is wholsome and safe whatsoever be the afflicted mans estate, whether he be converted or not.
5. And as for that speciall stratageme of Sathan, whereby he beareth in the sentence of condemnation on the afflicted, and fiteth his phantasie with the continual ingemination, and inculcating of this fiery dart, crying over and over again blasphemous words, charging the afflicted with the sin thereof, and pronouncing sentence against him, saying, thou art condemned, thou art a reprobat, and such like; the afflicted man must be informed, 1. that such peremptory sentences are not from the Lords Spirit, speaking in the Scripture, but from the false accuser of the brethren; for, God pronounceth not condemnation, but remission of sin to every one that flyeth to Christ. 2. That he must put difference betwixt Sathans part in the sinfull suggestions and his own part in rejecting of them, abhorring them and grieving for them. 3. That he must put a great difference between his imagination (or phantasie) and his conscience, between the voice sounding in his phantasie, whether he will or not, and the sentence of his well informed conscience approving, or disallowing what is offered unto it to be chosen or refused▪ consented unto, or dis-assented from, by the conscience judging according to the rule of Gods Word: for, a sentence of words may be suggested to the phantasie, repeated and obtruded upon the phantasie a thousand times, which the conscience may and should refuse, and reject a thousand times. We know by experience, that a sentence of words may, by oft repeating in the ears of a parret and other birds, take such an impression on the phantasie of the bird, that it shall repeat vocally the words one by one and pronounce them disstinctly, as if that sentence had been the work of its own invention: So also we see, that by frequent repetition of any whistle or song, the phantasie of some birds may be so beaten and informed, that they shall chant the same song over and over again, and make it as if it were its own. Now phantasie and imagination being a thing common to man and beast, it is certain, that the phantasie of a man, may be wrought upon, and stamped with the like impression. And this much, as experience teacheth us, doth befall men: for when a certain song or toon is sung in our audience, and is often repeated, our phantasie before we be aware, useth to repeat and same song or toon, or quietly whisper the notes and measure of the song or toon: And after our judgment hath observed this work of the imagination, we can hardly stay our imagination or phantasie, while we are about other serious thoughts from its secret sowthing of the measures and notes of the song: for, phantasie will not be ruled by the laws of reason, more then the outward sense of seeing can be hindered from observation of what it seeth, whether pleasant or displeasant. What wonder is it then, that Sathan who hath great influence on mens imagination, doth make so deep impression on it by continual iteration, that the afflicted seems to himself to own those blasphemous suggestions as his own thoughts, and as the voice of his conscience, and yet they are indeed nothing but Sathans whistling, and false sentences pressed on the mans imagination? And put the case, that his deluded mind should take them for the justly deserved sentences of the conscience, yet are they only the voice of the conscience ill informed, not judging of the mater according to the rule of Gods Word, which …oth not impute Sathans suggestions to the soul afflicted by them, and mourning for them. And so much for solving of the doubts of the true convert concerning his state in grace and regeneration.