4. Another passion of the soul is fear, natural fear; for so you must understand me of all the passions of the soul, as they are considered simply and in their own nature. And, as it is with the other passions, so it is with this; it is made good or evil in its acts, as its principle and objects are; when this passion of the soul is good, then it springs from sense of the greatness, and goodness and majesty of God; also God himself is the object of this fear’—I will forewarn you,’ says Christ, ‘whom ye shall fear. Fear him that can destroy both body and soul in hell; yea, I say unto you, Fear him’ (Matt 5:28; Luke 7:5). But in all men this passion is not regulated and governed by these principles and objects, but is abused and turned, through the policy of Satan, quite into another channel. It is made to fear men (Num 14:9), to fear idols (2 Kings 17:7,38), to fear devils and witches, yea, it is made to fear all the foolish, ridiculous, and apish fables that every old woman or atheistical fortune teller has the face to drop before the soul. But fear is another passion of the soul.
Of grief.
5. Another passion of the soul is grief, and it, as those afore-named, acteth even according as it is governed. When holiness is lovely and beautiful to the soul, and when the name of Christ is more precious than life, then will the soul sit down and be afflicted, because men keep not God’s law. ‘I beheld the transgressors, and was grieved; because they kept not Thy word’ (Psa 119:158). So Christ; He looked round about with anger, ‘being grieved for the hardness of their hearts’ (Mark 3:5). But it is rarely seen that this passion of the soul is thus exercised. Almost everybody has other things for the spending of the heat of this passion upon. Men are grieved that they thrive no more in the world; grieved that they have no more carnal, sensual, and worldly honour; grieved that they are suffered no more to range in the lusts and vanities of this life; but all this is because the soul is unaquainted with God, sees no beauty in holiness, but is sensual, and wrapt up in clouds and thick darkness.
Of anger.
6. And lastly, There is anger, which is another passion of the soul; and that, as the rest, is extended by the soul, according to the nature of the principle by which it is acted, and from whence it flows. And, in a word, to speak nothing of the fierceness and power of this passion, it is then cursed when it breaketh out beyond the bounds that God hath set it, the which to be sure it doth, when it shall by its fierceness or irregular motion, run the soul into sin. ‘Be ye angry, and sin not’ (Eph 4:26), is the limitation wherewith God hath bounded this passion; and whatever is more than this, is a giving place to the devil. And one reason, among others, why the Lord doth so strictly set this bound, and these limits to anger, is, for that it is so furious a passion, and for that it will so quickly swell up the soul with sin, as they say a toad swells with its poison. Yea, it will in a moment so transport the spirit of a man, that he shall quickly forget himself, his God, his friend, and all good rule. But my business is not now to make a comment upon the passions of the soul, only to show you that there are such, and also which they are.
And now, from this description of the soul, what follows but to put you in mind what a noble, powerful, lively, sensible thing the soul is, that by the text is supposed may be lost, through the heedlessness, or carelessness, or slavish fear of him whose soul it is; and also to stir you up to that care of, and labour after, the salvation of your soul, as becomes the weight of the matter. If the soul were a trivial thing, or if a man, though he lost it, might yet himself be happy, it were another matter; but the loss of the soul is no small loss, nor can that man that has lost his soul, had he all the world, yea, the whole kingdom of heaven, in his own power be but in a most fearful and miserable condition. But of these things more in their place.
[THE GREATNESS OF THE SOUL.]
SECOND, Having thus given you a description of the soul, what it is, I shall, in the next place, show you the greatness of it.
[Of the greatness of the soul, when compared with the body.]
First, And the first thing that I shall take occasion to make this manifest by, will be by showing you the disproportion that is betwixt that and the body; and I shall do it in these following particulars:—