(1.) First, The same sins which our own natures would suggest to us, may also be injected by Satan. Sometimes we begin by the forward working of our own thoughts upon occasions and objects presented to us from without, or from the power of our own inclination, without the offer of external objects, and then Satan strikes in with it. Sometimes Satan begins with us, and by his injected motions endeavours to excite our inclinations; so that the same thing may be sometime from ourselves, and sometimes from Satan.
(2.) Secondly, There is no sin so vile, but our own heart might possibly produce it without Satan. Evil thoughts of the very worst kind, as of murders, adulteries, thefts, false witness, and blasphemies may, as Christ speaks, Mat. xv. 19, be produced naturally from our own hearts; for seminally all sins, the very greatest of all impieties, are there. So that from the greatness and vileness of the temptation we cannot absolutely conclude that it is from Satan, no more than from the commonness of the temptation, or its suitableness to our inclination, we can conclude infallibly that its first rise is from ourselves.
(3.) Thirdly, There are many cases wherein it is very difficult, if not altogether impossible, to determine whether our own heart or Satan gives the first life or breathing to a temptation. Who can determine, in most ordinary cases, when our thoughts are working upon objects presented to our senses, whether Satan or our own thoughts do run faster? Yea, when such thoughts are not the consequent of any former occasion, it is a work too hard for most men to determine which of the parents, father or mother, our own heart or Satan, is first in the fault. They are both forward enough, and usually join hand in hand with such readiness, that he must have a curious eye that can discover certainly to whom the first beginning is to be ascribed.
The difficulty is so great, that some have judged it altogether impossible to give any certain marks by which it may be determined when they are ours and when Satan’s.[366] And indeed the discoveries laid down by some are not sufficient for a certain determination; and so far I assent, that neither the suddenness of such thoughts—for the motions of our own lusts may be sudden—nor the horridness of the matter of them, are sufficient notes of distinction. That our own corrupt hearts may bring forth that which is unnatural and terrible, cannot be denied. Many of the sins of the heathens mentioned in Rom. i. were the violent productions of lust against natural principles; and to ascribe these to the devil, as to the first instigator, is more than any man hath warrant to do. Yet though it be confessed that in some cases it is impossible to distinguish, and that where a distinction may be made, these notes mentioned are not fully satisfactory, there may, I believe, be some cases wherein there is a possibility to discover when the motions are from Satan, and that by the addition of some remarkable circumstances to the fore-named marks of difference.
(4.) Fourthly, Though it be true, which some say,[367] that in most cases it is needless altogether to spend our time in disputing whether the motions of sin in our minds are firstly from ourselves or from Satan, our greatest business being rather to resist them than to difference them; yet there are special cases wherein it is very necessary to find out the true parent of a sinful motion, and these are when tender consciences are wounded and oppressed with violent and great temptations, as blasphemous thoughts, atheistical objections, &c. For here Satan in his furious molestations aims mainly at this, that such afflicted and tossed souls should take all these thoughts which are obtruded upon their imaginations, to be the issue of their own heart. As Joseph’s steward hid the cup in Benjamin’s sack, that it might be a ground of accusation against him, so doth the devil first oppress them with such thoughts, and then accuseth them of all that villainy and wickedness, the motions whereof he had with such importunity forced upon them; and so apt are the afflicted to comply with accusations against themselves, that they believe it is so, and from thence conclude that they are given up of God, hardened as Pharaoh, that they have sinned against the Holy Ghost, and finally that there is no hope of mercy for them. All this befalls them from their ignorance of Satan’s dealings, and here is their great need to distinguish Satan’s malice from their guilt.
(5.) Fifthly, Setting aside ordinary temptations, wherein it is neither so possible nor so material to busy ourselves to find out whether they are Satan’s or ours;—in extraordinary temptations, such as have been now instanced, we may discover if they proceed from Satan, though not simply from the matter of them, not from the suddenness and independency of them, yet from a due consideration of their nature and manner of proceeding, compared with the present temper and disposition of our heart. As,
[1.] First, When unusual temptations intrude upon us with a high impetuosity and violence, while our thoughts are otherwise concerned and taken up.[368] Temptations more agreeable to our inclination, though suddenly arising from objects and occasions presented, and gradually proceeding, after the manner of the working of natural passions, may throng in amidst our thoughts or actions that have no tendency that way, and yet we cannot so clearly accuse Satan for them; but when things that have not the encouragement of our affections are by a sudden violence enforced upon us, while we are otherwise concerned, we may justly suspect Satan’s hand to be in them.
[2.] Secondly, While such things are borne in upon us, against the actual loathing, strenuous reluctancy, and high complainings of the soul, when the mind is filled with horror and the body with trembling at the presence of such thoughts.[369] Sins that owe their first original to ourselves, may indeed be resisted upon their first rising up in our mind; and though a sanctified heart doth truly loathe them, yet they are not without some lower degree of tickling delight upon the affections; for the flesh in those cases presently riseth up with its lustings for the sinful motion; but when such unnatural temptations are from Satan, their first appearance to the mind is a horror without any sensible working of inclination towards them; and the greatness of the soul’s disquiet doth shew that it hath met with that which the affections look not on with any amicable compliance.
[3.] Thirdly, Our hearts may bring forth that which is unnatural in itself, and may give rise to a temptation that would be horrid to the thoughts of other men, but that it should of its own accord, without a tempter, on a sudden bring forth that which is directly contrary to its present light, reason, or inclination; as for a man to be haunted with thoughts of atheism, while he is under firm persuasions that there is a God; or of blasphemy, while he is under designs of honouring him, is as unimaginable as that our thoughts should of themselves contrive our death, while we are most solicitous for our life; or that our thoughts should soberly tell us it is night when we see the sun shine. Temptations that are contrary to the present state, posture, light, and disposition of the soul are Satan’s. They are so unnatural as to its present frame, that the production of them must be from some other agent.
[4.] Fourthly, Much more evident is it that such proceed from Satan, when they are of long continuance and constant trouble, when they so incessantly beat upon the mind, that it hath no rest from them, and yet is under grievous perplexities and anxieties of mind about them.