So great a subtlety is in this manner of dealing, that those who affect the name of great politicians in the world have learned from Satan to shew greatest respects and a most friendly countenance to those whom they most hate and intend to ruin. Thus our Richard the Third of England constantly dealt with those for whose blood he lay in wait; and the precepts of Machiavel are fitted to this, that it is wisdom ‘to hug those whom we desire to destroy.’ Ehud’s present made way for his dagger, [Judges iii. 22.] Joab’s sword could not so well have despatched its errand upon Abner, if he had not ushered it in with a kiss, [2 Sam. xx. 9.]
Applic. This should make us most suspect those temptations that offer us most kindness and advantage, and such as are most gratifying to our humours and desires. For can it be imagined in good earnest that Satan intends us a real good? Can the gifts of enemies pass for courtesies and favours with any,[387] but such as are bewitched into a blockish madness? Satan is more to be feared when he flatters than when he rageth; and though such offers may be looked upon by some as more benign, and less odious temptations, as some kind of familiar spirits are more kindly treated by some, under the notion of white devils, yet may we say of them, as Cornelius Agrippa speaks of some unlawful arts and ways of Thurgia,[388] Eò sunt pernitiosiora, qùo imperitis diviniora, They have the greatest danger that pretend the highest friendship. Thus much for the rise of the temptation.
CHAPTER IX.
A particular consideration of the matter of the first temptation, what Satan aimed at in bidding him turn stones into bread.—Of Satan’s moving us to things good or lawful.—The end of such a motion.—How to know whether such motions are from Satan or the Spirit.—What to do in case they be from Satan.—Of his various aims in one temptation.—What they are, and of his policy therein.—Of his artificial contrivement of motions to make one thing infer another.
Next follows the temptation itself, ‘Command that these stones be made bread.’ There is no great difficulty in the words. The Greek indeed hath a remarkable suitableness to the supposition, on which Satan insists, taking Christ to be the Son of God. It is very pertinently spoken, ‘Say or speak’—εἶπε—that these stones be made bread; for if God speak, it must be done.
It is not worth the while to insist upon so small a variety of expression as is betwixt this evangelist, who hath it ‘these stones,’ and Luke, who speaks it in the singular number, ‘this stone;’ for besides that, as some suppose, this expression of Luke might, for anything that appears to the contrary, be Satan’s lowering his request to one stone, when Christ had denied to turn many into bread upon his first asking; this one stone in Luke, taken collectively for the whole heap, will signify as much as these stones in Matthew; or the phrase ‘these stones,’ in Matthew, by an imitation of a common Hebraism, may be no more but one of these stones, or this stone, as it is in Luke; as it is said, Jephthah was buried in the cities of Gilead, that is, in one of the cities.[389]
The thing urged was the turning or changing the form of a creature, which is a work truly miraculous and wonderful, and such as had neither been unsuited to the power of Christ, nor unlawful in itself. It is from hence justly questioned where the sting of this suggestion lay, or in what point was the temptation couched.
(1.) First, It was not in the unlawfulness or sinfulness of the thing mentioned. For Christ did as much as would amount to all this when he turned water into wine, and when he fed multitudes by a miraculous multiplication of a few loaves and fishes.
(2.) Secondly, It was not unsuitable to his condition, as hungry; for so it seemed a duty to provide for himself, and which Satan took for granted.