CHAPTER XV.
Self-murder another of his designs in this temptation.—How he tempts to self-murder directly, and upon what advantage he urgeth it.—How he tempts to it indirectly, and the ways thereof.—Of necessary preservatives against this temptation.
We have seen and considered the main end of Satan in this temptation. Let us further consider whether this was the sole end that he propounded to himself. We have little reason to think that he would confine himself to one, when the thing itself doth so clearly suggest another, which might possibly have followed. In most cases, the ends of the devil are manifold. We may therefore easily suppose—and several have noted it[412]—that the devil, that great murderer, had herein a secret design against the life of Christ, and that he tempted him here indirectly to self-murder. And indeed, supposing that Christ had attempted to fly in the air, and had failed in the enterprise, what else could have followed but death and ruin? Hence let us note,
Obs. 9. That Satan seeks the ruin of our bodies as well as of our souls, and tempts men often to self-murder. That the devil goes about seeking how he may destroy men, by putting them upon attempts against their own lives, is evident, not only from the experience and confessions of such as have suffered under Satan’s suggestions to that end—and it is a temptation more common than we think of, because most men are unwilling to lay open themselves to others in this matter—but also from those many sad instances of men over whom Satan so far prevails, that they execute upon themselves this design by destroying themselves. Yet by the way we may note, that such thoughts are often in the minds of men where Satan is not industriously designing their destruction; for he often casts in such thoughts, not only to try how men take with them, but to affright and disquiet them; and it is usual with men of sad and melancholy tempers to mistake their own fears of such a temptation, for Satan’s endeavours against them, when indeed their fear and trouble lest they should be so tempted, makes them think they are tempted indeed.
Satan drives on the design of self-murder two ways:—
1. First, Directly, when in plain terms he urgeth men to destroy themselves. This because it is directly repugnant to the law of nature, which vehemently urgeth them to self-preservation, he cannot effect but by the help of some advantages; yet some ways and methods by experience he hath found to be so available to such an unnatural resolve, that he frequently puts them in practice. As, (1.) first, He works upon the discontents of men, and improves the disquiet of their minds, upon the occasion of any loss, vexation, disappointment, or disgrace, to as great a height as he can, and when their lives are made bitter to them, and they are sufficiently prepared by the uneasiness of their condition, then he propounds death as the only remedy to set them at quiet; wherein, besides his officiousness to provide them with instruments of cruelty and opportunity for their use, he follows them with arguments drawn from the sense of their present condition; the great intendment whereof is to aggravate their smart, and to make their burden seem intolerable, and then self-ruin is but a natural consequence. We may see enough of this in the discontents of good men, and that they naturally work this way. Job speaks the general apprehensions of men in trouble, chap. iii. 20, 21, ‘The bitter in soul value not life; they long for death, and dig for it more than for hid treasures; they rejoice exceedingly, and are glad when they can find the grave.’ Jonah in his discontent prefers death before life: ‘It is better for me to die than to live,’ [chap. iv. 3.] Elias doth the like; and Job seems impatient for it. All this is from the power and working of this temptation, though God held their hand that it did not fully prevail. In Ahithophel the ground of discontent was more a fancied than a real disgrace; his counsel was rejected—which was in itself no great dishonour—and this works up such a perplexing resentment in his mind, that Satan prevails with him to hang himself very deliberately.
(2.) Secondly, He most frequently draws on men to destroy themselves by terrors and despairing troubles of conscience. These, as they afford greater disquiet and distress of mind than other kind of discontentments, so doth he more prevail by them; for a wounded spirit is above ordinary strength, and hard to bear; only it may seem strange that those who so experimentally feel how ‘fearful a thing it is to fall into the hands of the living God,’ [Heb. x. 31,] should entertain such a temptation as, to their apprehensions and knowledge, will certainly plunge them into the very ocean of everlasting vengeance. This no doubt Satan finds to be no small obstruction to his design; but here he useth his skill to open a way for them that would outrun their lives on the one hand, as he labours to pursue them with sense of wrath and indignation on the other hand. To this purpose he tells them, [1.] That all the hell they are to meet with is in their consciences, and that death will free them from all, or at least that death will give a present ease, and that till the resurrection they shall be in quiet. Those that are willing to receive these apprehensions may easily be prevailed with to hasten their own death, seeing they have already fixed this conclusion with themselves, that there is no hope nor pardon for them, that they are reprobates and cut off; for their thoughts can meditate nothing but the terrors of such conclusions. [2.] He sometimes endeavours to persuade them, that by executing this revenge upon themselves, they may make some kind of satisfaction and amends for the sins they have committed; which though most false, yet it is a wonder how far such ungrounded surmises may possess the minds of the desperate. That Judas might have some such thought when he destroyed himself, is conjectured by some;[413] but that must be but a conjecture, seeing none can pretend to know his thoughts; but we may speak with greater freedom of those who have declared the working of such apprehensions upon their minds. [3.] A more plausible pretext he useth when he endeavours to persuade them that they may kill themselves, and yet go to heaven for all that. To this purpose the subtle adversary is not backward to tell them what have been the charitable expressions of some men who have supposed a possibility of repentance inter pontem et fontem, as we say, betwixt the stroke or halter and the death. Capel is so apprehensive of the mischievous improvement of this charity, for an encouragement to self-murder, that he with great earnestness cautions all ministers against such liberal expressions.[414] I have known some, and heard of others, that have been so possessed with this imagination of being saved, notwithstanding that having purposed to destroy themselves—though God prevented them that they did it not—they have first by prayer recommended themselves to God, and so prepared themselves to die. [4.] Sometime, though such afflicted ones have no such persuasion but that from death they go immediately to hell, yet are they pushed forward by a certain fearful curiosity of knowing the worst. At that rate did Spira express himself, when he desired to be freed of his life that he might know the utmost of those torments which he feared; as if the affrightments of his fearful expectations were worse than the real feeling of them. [5.] But most of all doth he prevail against that objection of greater misery after death, by running men up to a desperate distraction in their terrors. Their present anguish is made insupportable, so that they hasten out of life, without care or consideration of what shall follow.
(3.) Thirdly, He tempts men directly to destroy themselves from a principle of heroic boldness and seeming fortitude of mind—a thing very common among the Romans, who impatient of injuries, and from pride of heart, not willing to subject themselves to affronts, chose rather to tear their own bowels than to live to see themselves abused. Lucretia being forced by Tarquinius, and not willing to outlive her disgrace, stabbed herself. Cato, not being able to endure the victory of Cæsar, puts an end to his days. Innumerable instances of this kind histories do everywhere afford. These, though they consulted their own passions, and knew of nothing that prompted them but their own generosity or magnanimity, yet were they not without a tempter to such cruel actions. Satan undoubtedly pleased himself by exercising his cruelty upon them so easily, by the help of such a humour, which passed among these blind heathens for the highest proof of virtue and fortitude. To this height it came, insomuch that we find Seneca highly applauding Cato[415] for procuring his liberty by his own death; and setting forth that fact as the most delightful spectacle to the gods. Though indeed, as Augustine notes,[416] it is not fortitude but weakness, and a clear evidence of impatience, which cannot bear other men’s insolencies or their own hardships. And if we examine the matter to the bottom, though there be audacity in it to undertake their own death, yet is this led on by no better principles than pride, impatience, and despair: which may the better be discovered if we consider such kind of attempts as they arise from more ignoble and base occasions. Paterculus tells us of a Tuscan soothsayer, who being carried to prison with his friend Fulvius Flaccus, and despairing of pardon, desperately runs his head against the prison door and dashed out his brains; and yet this man was moved to attempt his destruction upon the same general principles by which Cato destroyed himself.
(4.) Fourthly, It is also sufficiently known that Satan by the force of custom in several countries, doth as it were necessitate men to cut off their own lives. In some barbarous places, at the death of the husband, the wife, in a brutal affection of the praise of love and loyalty, casts herself to be devoured by the same flame in which the dead body of her husband is consumed.[417] And there are found in other places customs of self-destruction for the avoiding the tedious inconveniences of old age, where it is usual for old persons with joy to prepare their own funeral pile, and to make a quick despatch of their lives, and rather to die at once than by piecemeal, as Seneca expresseth it.[418] Calanus, an Indian philosopher, being dysenterical, obtained leave of Alexander to burn himself for more quick despatch.
(5.) Fifthly, There is yet another way by which men are tempted sometime, though rarely, to hasten themselves out of the world, and that is by a pretence of an earnest and impatient desire of happiness to come. That longings for such enjoyments do become the best of saints, and is indeed their excellency, cannot be denied; but to make such a preposterous haste must be a cheat of Satan. That there is a possibility of this, may appear in the story of Cleombrotus, mentioned also by Augustine, who reading Plato’s ‘Phædo, of the Immortality of the Soul,’ that he might hasten thither, threw himself headlong from a wall, and died.[419] Now, though it be hard to find such an instance among Christians, yet we have reason to believe that where Satan perceives such a temptation may take place, he will not be wanting in the prosecution. And if we may conjecture Augustine’s thoughts by that question which he propounds—viz., Whether it be lawful for a man to kill himself for the avoiding of sin, which he solidly confutes,[420] we may conclude that such thoughts were the usual temptations of good men in his time, and the rather because in the close of that chapter he applies that discourse particularly to the servants of Christ, that they should not think their lives a burden. Non itaque vobis, O fideles Christi, sit tœdio vita vestra.
2. Secondly, Satan promotes the design of self-murder, not only directly, as we have heard, but also by some indirect ways he undermines the life of man. That is, when he doth not formally say to them, Destroy yourselves, but tempts them to such things as he knows will let in upon death. This way of subtle malice I shall explain under these heads:—
(1.) First, Upon highest pretexts of zeal for Gods glory, he sometimes lays a snare for our lives. I cannot believe but Satan had a hand in that forwardness of ancient Christians, who by an open profession of their faith before persecuting judicatures, did as it were court a martyrdom; and I have the same persuasion of the painful earnestness of many holy preachers, who lavish out their strength in a prodigality of pains for the good of souls, which, like a thief in the candle, wastes them immediately; whereas a better husbanded strength might be truly more advantageous, as continuing the light the longer; and yet so sincere are their ends, so pleasant is their work, that they seldom observe, as they ought, that Satan, when he can do no better, is glad of the opportunity to destroy them with their own weapon; and therefore in this case they may expect he will do all he can to heighten and forward their zeal, not only by adding all the fuel he can to their inward propensity of laboriousness, but also by outward encouragement of the declared acceptations and expectations of their hearers.[421]
(2.) Secondly, Upon baser pretences of the full enjoyment of sensual pleasures and carnal delights, he doth unawares push men forward to death and dangers. Thus the voluptuous, the glutton, the drunkard, dig their own graves, and invite death to cut them off before they have lived out half their time. While Satan tempts men to such excesses of riot, he labours not only the destruction of the soul, but also of the body; not only that they be miserable, but that they may be so with all expedition.
(3.) Thirdly, Besides all these, he hath other subtle ways of contriving the death of men, by putting them upon ways and actions that are attended with hazard. Thus he sought the death of Christ, not directly but indirectly, by urging him to an action which he thought would unavoidably bring him to death, for a fall from so great a precipice would easily have bereaved any man of life. And sometimes when men are besotted with enthusiastical delusions, he can more easily beguile them with such stratagems. That instance of Stuker[422] is famous, who cut off his brother’s head upon a foolish persuasion that God would magnify his great power in giving him life again. If Satan can befool such bewitched slaves into such absurd and unreasonable apprehensions in regard of others, what hinders but that he may so far impose upon them, that they may be willing to practise upon themselves? I remember something to this purpose, of one whom the devil had well-nigh prevailed with to make a hole in his breast, which of necessity must have let out his life, upon a pretended promise of giving him eternal life, and was accordingly forced to take up a knife and to carry it to his throat.[423] In anno 1647, in Yorkshire, a company of people were seduced to sacrifice certain creatures to God, among the rest they sacrificed their aged mother, persuading her she should rise the third day, and for this they were executed at York.
Applic. This may awaken all to be aware of this temptation. Some are sadly concerned in it. Many are the complaints which some of us have met withal about it in private, and the apprehensions of such hazards are sadly disquieting. Through such fears thousands of God’s dear children have passed, and many, too many, have been overcome by this weapon. Those of us that have not yet known temptations of this nature, do not know how soon we may be assaulted in this kind. It is necessary for all to stand upon their guard, and for that end it behoves us to have at hand these defences against it:—
[1.] First, It is useful to consider that this is one of Satan’s great plots; and when we meet with it clothed with never so many pretexts, enforced with never so many seeming necessities, yet must we look upon it as the counsel of an enemy, who certainly intends us no kindness, let him pretend what he will; and therefore may we be sure it will be our sad inconvenience and disadvantage.
[2.] Secondly, It must be fixed in our minds that the thing in itself is a high iniquity, a most grievous provocation. No instance of self-murder, properly such, can be met withal in Scripture, as practised by any holy person. The command is directly against it, ‘Thou shalt not kill.’ If we may not murder another, as Austin argues, we may not murder ourselves; for he that kills himself kills no other than a man; nay, we may much less lay hand upon our own life.[424] It is a greater violation of the law of nature and of love. Every man is nearest to himself; and his love to himself is the pattern of his love to another. Self-murder must then be a sin of higher aggravations by far than the murder of another person. And the wiser heathens were far from countenancing any such cruelty. If Plato had thought it best, for an immediate enjoyment of immortality, which is the highest pretence of self-murder imaginable, to make an end of life violently, he would certainly have practised it himself, or recommended it to others, but he is so far from this, that he speaks against it as a great wickedness.
[3.] Thirdly, It is necessary that men keep in mind the danger that follows such an act. Death brings God’s unalterable mittimus, and seals up the condition of every man, so that in the same posture he comes to judgment, it puts an end to all hopes and endeavours. Suppose then such tempted creatures to have fears and terrors as great as you can imagine them to be, yet there is a possibility that they may be deceived in them, that their case is not so bad as they fear, or if it be bad enough at present, that it may be better afterwards; for many that have in their anguish resolved against themselves, have been prevented of the execution of their resolves, and have lived to see the Lord and his salvation. And who is able to determine that secret, that their name is not in the book of life? Who can say he is certainly excluded out of God’s decree? What madness is it then to rush into certain ruin, when our fears that distress us may be but mistakes! It is not so certain that men shall be damned, because of what they feel or fear at present, as it may be if they destroy themselves.
[4.] Fourthly, To prevent occasions to this temptation, it must be our care not to give way to discontents for outward things, nor to distressing fears, such as are despairing and hopeless, for our spiritual estate; or if we have a burden either way upon our mind, we must avoid as much as may be impatient fretfulness, ‘lest Satan get advantage of us.’ Discontented moods and casting away hope are sad occasions for this temptation. If we find ourselves thus burdened, we must look to it betimes, and not suffer it to go too far. And if this temptation come, we must take heed we keep not the devil’s counsel, but discover the matter to some that are wise and faithful, able to advise and pray for us; remembering still that if only outward things trouble us, we have a better way of ease and remedy, by submitting to a chastising providence. If spiritual troubles move this way, we should not run from him, but rather resolve to perish at his foot as humble suppliants for mercy and pardon.
[5.] Fifthly, The temptation must also be opposed with fasting and prayer. If this be sincerely practised, it will go away at last.
[6.] Sixthly, Something may also be said for caution against unnecessary thrusting ourselves, while under such temptations, into places of danger, or into a converse with instruments of death. This may be too great a daring of the temptation, and in the consequence a mischief. Yet on the other hand, we must not be so cowardly as to be afraid of such places and things, unto which our callings and lawful employments do engage us; not to dare to go over a bridge, or to walk by a river or a pit, if it be our necessary way, is but to give an advantage to Satan to keep us under continual affrightments; and therefore I subscribe to Capel’s advice, ‘We must abide by it, and fight it out by faith; we must not fly the way, the place, the employment, but go on and look to God, and at last we shall make Satan fly.’[425]
Obj. But if some object to this, that their weakness is great, and their fears are strong, and Satan never idle, and that therefore they have little ground to expect an escape, I shall desire they would consider seriously the instance of Christ in this particular. When he was upon the pinnacle of the temple, a small push might have overthrown him, and yet it was not in Satan’s power to do it himself, though he tempted Christ to cast himself down: which may sufficiently satisfy us, that there is a sure hedge of providence about us, and that Satan cannot do us the least hurt by pushing us into a pit or river, or any such danger.