[5.] To these may be added, the pain or anguish of sickness and bodily distemper. Though there are various degrees of pain, and that some sicknesses are less afflictive than others, yet none of them forbear to pierce the mind. The whole man is discomposed. He that is exercised with ‘strong pains upon his bed,’ cries out in the bitterness of his soul; and he that by insensible degrees languisheth, grows ordinarily peevish, and his mind bleeds by an inward wound, so that he ‘spends his days in sighing,’ and his years in mourning. And others there are who, being before acquainted with bodily pains, grow very impatient in sickness, and are able to bear nothing. And besides the present sense of pain, the expectation of death puts some into great commotion; the fears of it, for it is naturally dreadful, fills them with disquiet thoughts; and those that approach to the grave by slow steps, under consumption or languishing sicknesses, they are habituated to sadness, and can think of nothing cheerfully—except they have great assurance of salvation, and have well learned to die—because the coffin, grave, and winding-sheet are still presented to them. These, though they be very suitable objects for meditation, and, well improved, of great advantage for preparation to death, yet doth Satan thereby, when it is for his purpose, endeavour to keep men under grief, and to bereave them of their peace.
[6.] Satan takes an advantage of trouble from the miseries of others. Sympathy is a Christian grace; and to bear one another’s burdens, to mourn with those that mourn, shews us to be fellow-feeling members of the same body; for ‘if one member suffer, all the members suffer with it,’ [1 Cor. xii. 26.] Yet are some men naturally of so tender a constitution, that Satan overdrives them herein. Every common occasion will wound them. The usual effects of God’s ordinary providence on the poor, lame, or sick, are deeply laid to heart by them; and instead of being not unsensible of other men’s miseries, they are not sensible of anything else, neither do they enjoy their own mercies. And here, as Satan can every moment present them with objects of pity, ordinary or extraordinary, so upon a religious pretence of merciful consideration, they are made cruel to themselves, refusing their own peace, because other men are not at ease.
(3.) The third particular promised to be explained for the discovery of these discomposures of soul was this, that by a concurrence of these and such like occasions to such tempers, the hearts of men are disturbed, and their inward peace broken. This I shall evidence of these three things: 1. That these occasions meeting with such dispositions, do naturally raise great disturbances in their present working; 2. That they have a tendency to further trouble; 3. That Satan doth design, and hath it ordinarily in his power, to discompose the hearts of men hereby.
[1.] That these occasions meeting with such dispositions, do naturally raise great disturbances. This is evident from what hath been said already; for (1.) All these dispositions carry as much fire in their own bosoms, as is sufficient to burn up the standing corn of any man’s peace. What is anger, but an inward burning, a restless confusion of the spirits? sometime a frenzy, a distraction, a troubled sea full of rage, a wild beast let loose. Envy, that is a fretful peevishness, a vexatious repining, needing no other tormentors but its own furies, recoiling upon him that bred it, because it cannot wreak its spite upon its objects. An envious person is a self-murderer, by the verdict of Eliphaz: Job v. 2, ‘Wrath killeth the foolish man, and envy slayeth the foolish one.’ This is not barely to be understood of its provoking the judge of all the earth to send down its deserved destruction; but also, if not chiefly, of its own corroding temper, which by long continuance wastes the strength and consumes the body. Pride is a perpetual vexation, creating its troubles from its own fancy. Irregular covetings keep a man still upon the rack; they make a man like the Tantalus of the poets; they give a man a caninus appetitus, a strong appetite with excessive greediness, and restless pursuit, and constant dissatisfactions; he is ever gaping, and never enjoying. Impatience is a wearisome conflict with a burden which it can neither bear nor yet shake off; where all the fruit of the vain labour amounts to no better account than this, that the impatient makes his burden the greater, the bands that tie it on the stronger, and the strength that should bear it the weaker. Lastly, An excess of pity multiplies ‘wounds without cause.’ It hinders a man to be happy so long as there are any that are miserable. He is always, in reference to his quiet, at the mercy of other men. The afflicted can torment him at a distance; and, by a kind of magic, make him feel the torments that are inflicted upon his image. Who can deny but that men that are ridden by such vexatious dispositions must lead an unquiet life, and always be tossed with inward tempests? Especially, (2.) When we consider how fit the fore-mentioned occasions are to draw out these humours to their tumultuary extravagances. A lighted match and gunpowder are not more exactly suited to raise a shaking blast, than those occasions and tempers are to breed an inward annoyance. Some of these humours are so troublesome, that rather than they will want work, they will fight with their own shadows, and, by a perverseness of prejudicated fancy, will create their own troubles; and the best of them, which seem sometime to take truce and compose themselves to rest, while occasions are out of the way; yet they are quickly awakened, like sleeping dogs that are roused with the least noise. What work, then, may we expect they will make when they are summoned to give their appearance upon a solemn occasion? But (3.) If we should deal by instances, and bring upon the stage the effects that have been brought forth by these concurring causes, it will appear that they make disturbances in good earnest. Let us either view the furious fits that have been, like sudden flashes, soonest gone, or their more lasting impressions, and we shall find it true. As to violent fits raised by such occasions and dispositions, examples are infinite. What rages, outrages, madnesses, and extravagances have men run into! Some, upon provocations, have furiously acted savage cruelties, and for small matters have been carried to the most desperate revenges. Others have been brought to such violent commotions within themselves, that the frame of nature hath been thereby weakened and overthrown. As Sylla, who in a strong passion vomited choler till he died. Some in their fury have acted that which hath been matter of sorrow to them all their days. But, omitting the examples of heathens and wicked men, let us consider the wonderful transports of holy men. Moses, a man eminent beyond comparison in meekness, was so astonished with a sudden surprise of trouble at the sight of the golden calf, that he threw down the tables of the law, and brake them. Some indeed observe from thence a significancy of Israel’s breaking the law and forfeiting God’s protection as his peculiar people; but this is more to be ascribed to the designment of divine providence, that so ordered it, than to the intendment of Moses, who no doubt did not this from a sedate and calm deliberation, as purposing by this act to tell Israel so much; but was hurried by his grief, as not considering well what he did, to break them. Asa, a good man, when he was reproved by the prophet, instead of thankful acceptance of the reproof, grows angry, falls into a rage, and throws the prophet into prison. Elias, discomposed with Jezebel’s persecution, desires that God would take away his life. Jonah, in his anger, falls out with God, and justifies it when he hath done. Surely such fits as these proceeded from great inward combustion. Would wise, sober, holy men have said or done such things if they had not been transported beyond themselves? and though in such cases the fits are soon over, yet we observe that some are apt to fall into such fits often, and are so easily irritated, that, like the epileptic person possessed by the devil, upon every occasion, they are by him ‘cast into the fire or into the water,’ [Mat. xvii. 15,] and by the frequent return of their distemper are never at rest.
As to others, whose tempers are more apt to retain a troublesome impression, it is very obvious that their discomposures have as much in length and breadth as the other had in height. You may view Haman tormented under his secret discontent, which his pride and envy formed in him, for the want of Mordecai’s obeisance. The king’s favour, a great estate, high honour, and what else a man could wish to make him content, are all swallowed up in this gulf, and become nothing to him. You see Amnon, vexed and sick for his sister Tamar, waxing lean from day to day. You see Ahab, though a king, who had enough to satisfy his mind, in the same condition for Naboth’s vineyard. If you say these were wicked men, who rid their lusts without a bridle, and used the spur; look then upon better men and you will see too much. Rachel so grieves and mourns for want of children, that she professeth her life inconsistent with her disappointment: ‘Give me children, else I die,’ [Gen. xxx. 1.] Hannah upon the same occasion weeps and eats not, and prays in the bitterness of her soul, and the abundance of her complaint and grief. Jeremiah, being pressed with discouragements from the contradiction of evil men, calls himself ‘a man of strife and contention to the whole earth,’ Jer. xv. 10; his sorrows thence arising, had so imbittered his life, that he puts ‘a woe’ upon his birth: ‘Woe is me, my mother, that thou hast born me a man of strife.’ Paul had a noble courage under manifold afflictions; he could glory in the cross and rejoice in persecutions; nevertheless the greatness of his work, the froward perverseness and unsteadiness of professors, which put him under fears, jealousies, and new travail, the miseries of Christians, and the care he had for the concerns of the gospel—2 Cor. xi. 2; Gal. vi. 19—which was a constant load upon his mind, his heart,—like old Eli’s, trembling still for the ark of God, made him complain as one worn out by the troubles of his heart: 2 Cor. xi. 27, ‘In weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness. Besides those things that are without, that which cometh upon me daily, the care of all the churches. Who is weak, and I am not weak?’ &c. For the Jews he had great heaviness and continual sorrow in his heart; and for the Gentiles he had perpetual fears, Rom. ix. 2. Now though he had a great share of divine comforts intermixed, and a more than ordinary assistance of the Spirit to keep him from sinful discomposure of spirit, at least to such a height as it ordinarily prevails upon others, yet was he very sensible of his burden, and doubtless the devil laboured to improve these occasions to weary out his strength. For by these and such like things he frequently vexeth the righteous souls of the faithful ministers of the gospel from day to day; so that their hearts have no rest, and their hands grow often feeble, and they cry out, Oh the burden! oh the care! being ready to say, as Jeremiah, chap. xx. 7, ‘O Lord, thou hast deceived me, and I was deceived: I am a derision daily, every one mocketh me.’ Thus say they, Did we ever think to meet with such disappointments, such griefs, from the wilfulness, pride, weakness, ignorance, pettishness, inconstancy, negligence, and scandals of friends? and such hatred, contradictions, scorns, and injuries from enemies? Were we free, what calling would we not rather choose? what place would we not rather go to, where we might spend the remainder of our days in some rest and ease? Were it not better to work with our hands for a morsel of bread? for so might our sleep be sweet to us at night, and we should not see these sorrows. At this rate are good men sometime disturbed, and the anguish of their spirit makes their life a burden.
[2.] Yet is not this all the disturbance that the devil works upon our hearts by these things, though these are bad enough, but they have a tendency to further trouble. Discomposures of spirit, if they continue long, turn at last into troubles of conscience. Though there is no affinity betwixt simple discomposure of soul and troubles of conscience in their own nature—the objects of the former being things external, no way relating to the soul’s interest in God and salvation, which are the objects of the latter—yet the effects produced by the prevalency of these disturbances are a fit stock for the engrafting of doubts and questionings about our spiritual condition. As Saul’s father first troubled himself for the loss of his asses, and sent his son to seek them; but when he stayed long, he forgot his trouble, and took up a new grief for his son, whom he feared he had lost in pursuit of the asses; so is it sometime with men, who, after they have long vexed themselves for injuries or afflictions, &c., upon a serious consideration of the working and power of these passions, leave their former pursuit, and begin to bethink themselves in what a condition their souls are, that abound with so much murmuring, rage, pride, or impatience, and then the scene is altered, and they begin to fear they have lost their souls, and are now perplexed about their spiritual estate. To make this plain I will give some instances, and then add some reasons, which will evidence that it is so, and also how it comes to be so.
For instances, though I might produce a sufficient number to this purpose from those that have written of melancholy, yet I shall only insist upon two or three from Scripture.
Hezekiah, when God smote him with sickness, at first was discomposed upon the apprehension of death, that he should so soon be deprived of the ‘residue of his years, and behold man no more with the inhabitants of the world,’ as he himself expresseth it, Isa. xxxviii. 10; afterward his trouble grew greater, ‘He chattered as a crane or swallow, and mourned as a dove;’ he was in ‘great bitterness,’ ver. 17; and sadly oppressed therewith, ver. 14. That which thus distressed him was not simply the fear of death. We cannot imagine so pious a person would so very much disquiet himself upon that single account; but by the expressions which he let fall in his complainings, we may understand that some such thoughts as these did shake him: that he apprehended God was angry with him, that the present stroke signified so much to him, all circumstances considered—for he was yet in his strength, and Jerusalem in great distress, being at that time besieged by Sennacherib’s army,[325] and for him to be doomed to death by a sudden message at such a time, seemed to carry much in it—and that surely there was great provocation on his part; and it seems, upon search, he charged himself so deeply with his sinfulness, that his apprehensions were no less than that, if God should restore him, yet in the sense of his vileness he should never be able to look up; ‘I shall go softly all my years in the bitterness of my soul,’ ver. 15; which expression implies a supposition of his recovery, and a deep sense of iniquity, and accordingly when he was recovered, he takes notice chiefly of God’s love to his soul and the pardon of his sin, which evidently discover where the trouble pinched him: ‘Thou hast in love to my soul delivered it from the pit of corruption, for thou hast cast all my sins behind thy back,’ ver. 17.
Job’s troubles were very great, and his case extraordinary. Satan had maliciously stripped him of all outward comforts; this he bore with admirable patience: Job i. 21, ‘Naked came I out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return thither: the Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.’ The devil, seeing now himself defeated, obtains a new commission, wherein Job is wholly put into his hand—life only excepted, chap. ii. 9. He sets upon him again, and in his new encounter labours to bring upon him spiritual distresses, and accordingly improves his losses and sufferings to that end, as appears by his endeavours and the success; for as he tempted him by his wife to a desperate disregard of God that had so afflicted him, ‘Curse God and die,’ so he tempted him also by his friends to question the state of his soul and his integrity, and all from the consideration of his outward miseries. To that purpose are all their discourses. Eliphaz, chap. iv. 5-7, from his sufferings and his carriage under them, takes occasion to jeer his former piety, as being no other than feigned, ‘It is come upon thee, and thou faintest: is not this thy fear, thy confidence, thy hope, and the uprightness of thy ways?—that is, Is all thy religion come to this? and also concludes him to be wicked, ‘Who ever perished, being innocent? and where were the righteous cut off?’ Bildad, chap. viii. 6, 13, chargeth him with hypocrisy upon the same ground, and while he makes his defence, Zophar plainly gives him the lie, chap. xi. 3; and at this rate they go their round; and all this while Satan, whose design it was to afflict his conscience with the sense of divine wrath, secretly strikes in with these accusations, insomuch that though Job stoutly defended his integrity, yet he was wounded with inward distresses, and concluded that these dealings of God against him were no less than God’s severe observance of his iniquity; as is plain from his bemoaning himself in chap. x. 2, ‘I will say unto God, Do not condemn me: shew me wherefore thou contendest with me;’ ver. 16, 17, ‘Thou huntest me as a fierce lion, thou renewest thy witnesses against me,’ &c.
David was a man that was often exercised with sickness and troubles from enemies, and in all the instances almost that we meet with in the psalms of these his afflictions, we may observe the outward occasions of trouble brought him under the suspicion of God’s wrath and his iniquity; so that he was seldom sick, or persecuted, but this called on the disquiet of conscience, and brought his sin to remembrance; as Ps. vi., which was made on the occasion of his sickness, as appears from ver. 5, wherein he expresseth the vexation of his soul under the apprehension of God’s anger; all his other griefs running into this channel, as little brooks, losing themselves in a great river, change their name and nature. He that was at first only concerned for his sickness, is now wholly concerned with sorrow and smart under the fear and hazard of his soul’s condition; the like we may see in Ps. xxxviii. and many places more.