Tempt. XIV. But one of the strongest temptations of Satan is, by making their sin exceeding pleasant to them, for the gain, or honour, or fleshly satisfaction; and so increasing the violence of their sensual appetite and lust, and making them so much in love with their sin, that they cannot leave it. Like the thirst of a man in a burning fever, which makes him cry for cold drink, though it would kill him; the fury of the appetite conquering reason. So we see many drunkards, fornicators, worldlings, that are so deeply in love with their sin, that come on it what will, they will have it, though they have hell with it.
Direct. XIV. Against this temptation I desire you to read what I have said after, chap. iv. part 7, chap. iii. direct. 6, 8. Oh that poor sinners knew what it is that they so much love! Is the pleasing of the flesh so sweet a thing to you? and are you so indifferent to God, and holy things? Are these less amiable? Do you foresee what both will be at last? Will your sin seem better than Christ, and grace, and heaven, when you are dying? O be not so in love with damning folly, and the pleasure of a beast, as for it to despise the heavenly wisdom and delights!
Tempt. XV. Another great temptation is, the prosperity of the wicked in this life; and the reproach and suffering which usually falls upon the godly. If God did strike every notorious sinner dead in that place, as soon as he had sinned, or struck him blind, or dumb, or lame, or inflicted presently some such judgment, then many would fear him, and forbear their sin; but when they see no men prosper so much as the most ungodly, and that they are the persecutors of the holy seed, and that sentence against an evil work is not speedily executed, then are their hearts set in them to do evil, Eccles. viii. 11.
Direct. XV. But alas, how short is the prosperity of the wicked! Read Psal. lxxiii. and xxxvii. Delay is no forgiveness: they stay but till the assize: and will that tempt you to do as they? How unthankfully do sinners deal with God! If he should kill you and plague you, that would not please you: and yet if he forbear you, you are imboldened by it in your sin. Thus his patience is turned against him; but the stroke will be the heavier when it falls. Dost thou think those men will always flourish? Will they always domineer and revel? Will they always dwell in the houses where they now dwell, and possess those lands, and be honoured and served as now they are? Oh how quickly and how dreadfully will the case be changed with them! Oh could you but foresee now what faces they will have, and what heavy hearts, and with what bitter exclamations they will at last cry out against themselves for all their folly, and wish that they had never been deceived by prosperity, but rather had the portion of a Lazarus! If you saw how they are but fatted for the slaughter, and in what a dolorous misery their wealth, and sport, and honours will leave them, you would lament their case, and think so great a destruction were soon enough, and not desire to be partners in their lot.
Tempt. XVI. Another temptation is, their own prosperity: they think God, when he prospereth them, is not so angry with them as preachers tell them: and it is a very hard thing in health and prosperity, to lay to heart either sin or threatenings, and to have such serious, lively thoughts of the life to come, as men that are wakened by adversity have; and specially men that are familiar with death. Prosperity is the greatest temptation to security, and delaying repentance, and putting off preparation for eternity. Overcome prosperity, and you overcome your greatest snare.
Direct. XVI. Go into the sanctuary, yea, go into the church-yard, and see the end; and judge by those skulls, and bones, and dust, if you cannot judge by the fore-warnings of God, what prosperity is.[43] Judge by the experience of all the world. Doth it not leave them all in sorrow at last? Woe to the man that hath his portion in this life! O miserable health, and wealth, and honour, which procureth the death, and shame, and utter destruction of the soul! Was not he in as prosperous a case as you, Luke xvi. that quickly cried out in vain for a drop of water to cool his tongue? There is none of you so senseless as not to know that you must die. And must you die? must you certainly die? and shall that day be no better prepared for? Shall present prosperity make you forget it, and live as if you must live here for ever? Do you make so great difference between that which is, and that which will be, as to make as great a matter of it as others when it comes, and to make no more of it when it is but coming? O man, what is an inch of hasty time? How quickly is it gone! Thou art going hence apace, and almost gone! Doth God give thee the mercy of a few days or years of health to make all thy preparations in for eternity, and doth this mercy turn to thy deceit, and dost thou turn it so much contrary to the ends for which it was given thee? Wilt thou surfeit on mercy, and destroy thy soul with it? Sense feeleth and perceiveth what now is, but thou hast reason to foresee what will be? Wilt thou play in harvest, and forget the winter?
Tempt. XVII. Another great temptation to hinder conversion is, the example and countenance of great ones that are ungodly. When landlords and men in power are sensual, and enemies to a holy life, and speak reproachfully of it, their inferiors, by the reverence which they bear to worldly wealth and greatness, are easily drawn to say as they: also, when men reputed learned and wise are of another mind: and especially when subtle enemies speak that reproach against it, which they cannot answer.
Direct. XVII. To this I spake in the end of the first part of this chapter. No man is so great and wise as God. See whether he say as they do in his word. The greatest that provoke him can no more save themselves from his vengeance, than the poorest beggars. What work made he with a Pharaoh! and got himself a name by his hard-heartedness and impenitency! He can send worms to eat an arrogant Herod, when the people cry him up as a god! Where are now the Cæsars and Alexanders of the world? The rulers and Pharisees believed not in Christ, John vii. 48; wilt not thou therefore believe in him? The governor of the country condemned him to die; and wilt thou condemn him? "The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and his anointed, saying, Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us," Psal. ii. 2, 3; wilt thou therefore join in the conspiracy? When "he that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh; the Lord shall have them in derision—He will break them with an iron rod, and dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel, unless they be wise, and kiss the Son, and serve the Lord with fear, before his wrath be kindled and they perish," Psal. ii. 4, 9-12. If thy landlord, or great ones, shall be thy god, and be honoured and obeyed before God and against him, trust to them, and call on them in the hour of thy distress, and take such a salvation as they can give thee. Teach not God what choice to make, and whom to reveal his mysteries to: he chooseth not always the learned scribe, nor the mighty man. Christ himself saith, Matt. xi. 25, "I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them to babes: even so, Father; for so it seemeth good in thy sight!" If this reason satisfy you not, follow them, and speed as they. If they are greater and wiser than God, let them be your gods.[44] 1 Cor. i. 26-28, "You see your calling, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called: but God hath chosen the foolish things of the world, to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world, to confound the things that are mighty; and base things of the world, and the things that are despised, hath God chosen, and things that are not, to bring to nought things that are." It is another kind of greatness, honour, and wisdom which God bestoweth on the poorest saints, than the world can give. Worldlings will shortly be aweary of their portion. In your baptism you renounced the world with its pomps and vanity; and now do you deify what you then defied?
Tempt. XVIII. Another temptation is to draw on the sinner into such a custom in sin, and long neglect of the means of his recovery, till his heart is utterly hardened.
Direct. XVIII. Against this, read after, chap. iv. part 2, against hardness of heart.