A SERMON Preached before THE KING AT WHITE HALL. On Sunday Nou. 17. 1667. BY RICHARD ALLESTREE, D. D. Chaplain then in Attendance. Published by His majesty's Command. LONDON, Printed by J. Flesher, for James Allestree at the Rose and Crown in Duck-lane, Anno Dam. 1667. S. JAMES IU. 7. Resist the Devil, and he will flee from you. THESE words are easily resolved into two parts: the first, a Duty; and the second, to encourage the performance, an assurance of an happy issue in the doing it. The 1. the Duty in these words, Resist the Devil; the happy issue in those other, he will flee from you. For the more practical and useful handling of these parts, I shall endeavour to do these three things. 1. View the Enemy we are to resist, the Devil; fee his Strengths, and what are his chief Engines, his main instruments of battery, whereby he shakes, and does endeavour to demolish the whole frame of Virtue in men's lives, shatters and throws down all Religious, holy Resolutions, and subjects men to himself and Sin. 2. See what we are to do in opposition to all this; and how and by what means we must resist. 3. Prove to them that do resist, the happy issue which the Text here promiseth. First of the first. Though no man can be tempted, (so as to be foiled by the temptation) but he that is drawn away by his own Lust, and enticed, James I. 14. and all the blandishments of this world, all the wiles and artifices of the Prince and God of it, the Devil, are not able to betray one into sin, till his own a ●er. 15. Lust conceive that sin, and bring it forth; Man must be taken first in his own nets, and fall into that pit himself hath digged, before he can become the Devil's prey: yet Satan hath so great an hand in this affair, that the Tempter is his name and office, Matt. IU. 3. and the war which is now before us is so purely his, that we are said to fight b Ephes. ●. 12. , not against flesh and blood, (those nests and fortresses of our own Lusts) but against Principalities and Powers, against the Rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickednesses in high places; that is, against the Enemy here in the Text, the Devil. Now to bring about his ends upon us he hath several means. The first that I shall name is Infidelity. With this he began in Paradise, and succeeded by it; for he had no sooner told the woman that she should c Gen. III. 6. not surely die, and so made her doubt of, not believe, and consequently not fear, that which God had threatened, but she took of the forbidden fruit, and she did eat, and gave it to her husband too, and he did eat. Now if a Serpent siding with her inclination could so quickly stagger and quite overthrow her Faith; if she, because she sees and likes a pleasing Object, can, in mere defiance of her own assured conviction, when the Revelation looked her in the face, and God himself was scarce gone out of sight, strait give credit to a Snake, that comes and confidently gives the lie to God her Maker, offers her no proof at all of what he says, but only flatters her desires with promises and expectations of she knows not what, a Gen. III. 4, 5. Ye shall not die, but ye shall be as Gods; if in spite of Knowledge she turn Infidel so soon and easily: 'tis no great wonder if that Serpent do, at this distance from Revelation, prevail on men, whose conversation being most with Sense, (their satisfactions also consequently gratifying of their Sense) they do not willingly assent to any thing but that which brings immediate evidence and attestation of the Senses, which the objects of our Faith do not, (especially if it give check to and restrain those satisfactions, as those do;) on such men, I say, that do not care, nor use, in things that are against their mind, to apply the Understanding close and strongly to reflect on those considerations which should move assent, and work belief. Considerations which I dare affirm, if with sincerity adverted to, (if there be no improbity within to trash their efficacy, no fensual inclination cherished that must hinder their admittance, as not being able to endure to lodge in the same breast with those persuasions,) would make Disbelief appear not only most imprudent, but a thing next to impossible. But in those that give themselves no leisure, have no will thus to advert, 'tis not strange if, through Satan's arts, in things of this remote kind they have only languid opinions, which sink quickly into doubts, and by degrees into flat Infidelity. S. Paul does fetch the rise of unbelief of Christianity from hence, TWO Cor. IV. 3, 4. If our Gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost; In whom the God of this world hath blinded their minds: that is, If the Christian Doctrine do not appear to be the truth of God to any, 'tis to obstinate persons only, whom the Devil hath besotted so with the advantages and pleasures of this world, that their affections to these will not let the other be admitted. For, That Carnal prejudice can cast a mist before the mind, or that a bright and glittering Temptation of this world may dazzle it so as that it cannot see that which is most illustriously visible, we have this demonstration. Those Works which Christ and his Apostles wrought, which made the whole World, that was Heathen then, so many Millions of such distant Nations as could never meet together to conspire an universal change in their Religions, made them yet agree to lay aside their dear Gods and their dearer Vices, and do that to embrace a Crucified Deity, a God put to a vile ignominious death, as one worse than the worst of men, and a Religion that was as much hated, counted as accursed as that God of it, He and his Doctrine crucified a like, and a Religion too that had as great severities in its Commands as in its Persecutions, that did itself enjoin as hard and cruel things to flesh and blood as they that hated it inflicted, the duties and the punishments equally seem executed on its followers, and a Religion, whose performances had no retributions here but fatal ones, no otherwise rewarded but with fire and faggot, and whose after-promises were most incredible: Those Works that could produce all this had certainly omnipotent conviction in them; sure we are there must be prodigy of Miracle either in the causes, or in the effect. And yet the Scribes and Pharisees are not wrought on by them. Their carnal Prejudices would not be removed, not by the Finger of God: the mean and despicable, and, as to all their worldly expectations and affections, the unsatisfying condition of our Saviour, had so clouded all his works, and their own pride so blinded them, that they could see no argument in Miracle. Now 'tis the Devil, that God of the World, that hath the power of its Glories, and the managery of its temptations, who, by raising these affections, dazzles so and blinds the minds of men, that they should not believe. S. Paul affirms it: and 'tis plain that Unbelief is no one's Interest but Satan's. For it is not Man's. Not the Virtuous man's certainly: He's concerned as much as Happiness amounts to, to believe there is a God, whose Cares and Providence watch over him, whose Ears and Arms are open to him, whose Bowels yearn for him, whose Blood did purchase him, whose everlasting Blessednesses do await him. 'Tis his Interest to trust that Virtue, which the World so scorns or pities, was yet worthy God should be incarnated to teach it, die to purify us into it, and will raise us up again to cro●n it. Neither is this Unbelief Man's real Interest, abstracting from these prejudices of Religion. For if it were Man's real Interest, than it were every man's wisest course to pursue that Interest. But if every man did so, and should persuade himself into Infidelity, and that Religion and a Deity were but dreams or artifices, and so arrive so far as to have no fear of God, nor sense of Honesty or Virtue, the whole world must needs return into the first confusions of its Chaos: Villainy and Rapine would have right. When those Mounds are thrown down, there is nothing that can hinder but that every man may lawfully break in upon and invade every thing. There is no fence to guard thy Coffers nor thy Bed, no nor thy very Breast: rather indeed there can be nothing thine. This is, 'tis true, Leviathan's state of Nature; and 'tis so indeed with the Leviathans of Sea and Land, the wild Beasts of the Deep and of the Desert. But to prevent the necessary and essential mischiefs of this state amongst us Men, He will have Nature to have taught us to make Pacts and Oaths: but if there's no such thing as Virtue or Religion, than there is no obligation to keep Pacts or Oaths. And why should he observe them that can safely break them? Here it is indeed that Doctrine ends; to this their Infidelity does tend. And therefore 'tis no Interest of States or Princes. This the Atheist will confess; Gods and Religions were invented for the mere necessities of Governors, who could not be secure without those higher Obligations, and these after-fears. And are they not kind. Subjects then who, by promoting Atheism, labour to break down that fence which themselves account necessary? Or are they not good rational Discoursers too, who labour to throw out a thing as false and vain, because 'tis necessary? So necessary sure, that they who weaken these bonds of Religion, quite dissolve those of Allegiance, all whose Sinews are made of those Sacred Ties, which if you untwist, the other Cords are burst as easily as threads of Cobweb. Nay these Doctrines lay Principles that justify Rebellion and King-killing. For if there's no such thing as Virtue or Religion, than those are no Crimes. And it is no wonder Treason hath been loved, when Blasphemy hath been so. They that hear men droll on God Almighty, raille their Maker, and buffoon with Him, will quickly learn to speak with little reverence of their Superiors. There's no Kingdom but the Devil's that can have support from Infidelity; 'tis the Interest of that indeed. His work goes more securely on, when there are no religious apprehensions to check it: allowed Vice cannot be at ease if it but think those things are true. It is the infinite concern of Wickedness, that the Laws of Virtue and Religion should be only Spiders webs, Snares for innocent and lesser flies, while venomous Spiders can pass safely through them, and the Wasps can burst them; are Entanglements only for the weak, the Phlegmatic and Hypochondriack: and that there should be no God that can bring them to an after-reckoning. They that flatter and betray, that hug, and then trip up, or that plot villainies and ruins under fair and godly vizards; must needs be unwilling to believe that there is one who a Jet. XVII. 1 tries the reins, and searches hearts, and that will render every one according to his works. The Drunkard, who nor must nor can keep the remembrance of his Cups, cannot endure to apprehend he must be called to an account of them. The man whose Lust prevents the Grave, that putrefies alive, and drops by piece-meal into rotten dust ere he return to earth, must needs be loath that there should be a Resurrection, to collect the scattered, the foul atoms of his Sin and his Disease, and show them at that dread Tribunal, before God, his Holy Angels, and Mankind. Such as these are the only men that are concerned against Religion. Here we see whose Interest such promote who promote Infidelity. And truly 'tis so much the Devil's Interest, that by those very measures that he weakens Faith, he strengthens every sort of Wickedness: by the steps and degrees of Infidelity men ascend towards the heights of Sin: and when they have surmounted all Religious apprehensions, than they are upon the Precipice of Vice. When the Floodgates are removed, the Torrent must break impetuously. For what is there that can hinder? Nothing certainly, if present Interest be not able: But 'tis plain that Thiefs, and Murderers, and Rebels, in fine, every one whom we call Sinners, do pursue that which they account their present Interest: that therefore, if there were no other, would not be sufficient, since the Devil does make use of that to work with under Infidelity. This indeed he batters, makes his spreading ruins with: therefore S. Paul calls him a Ephes. II. 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, the spirit that works in filiis diffidentiae, saith the Vulgar: in the unbelievers, so it bears: in filiis insuasibilitatis, in the men ●oh. III. 36. that will not be persuaded to believe. In these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they are his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, Possessed and agitated by him: 'tis he spirits what they do: their actions are his incitations and motions: In sum, as to wickedness, they are mere Demoniacs. This therefore is his chief and the first Engine. 2. The second Instrument by which he does demolish whatsoever hopes of Virtue we are built up to is Want of Employment: and in order to this, he hath so far prevailed on the opinions of the world, that they believe some states of men not only have no obligation to be busied, but to have no Calling is essential to their condition; which is made more eminent upon this account that they have no business. Wealth, how great soever, if with an employment or profession, makes a man only a more gentile Mechanic: But Riches and nothing to do make a Person of quality. As if God had made that state of men, far the most generous part of the whole kind, and best appointed for the noblest uses of the world, to serve no other ends but what the Grasshoppers and Locusts do, to sing and dance among the Plants and Branches, and devour the fruits; and Providence had furnished them with all advantages of plenty for no better purposes. Such persons think not only to reverse God's Curse, and In the sweat of others faces eat their bread, but reverse Nature too; for Job saith, a Job V. 7. Man is born to labour, as the sparks fly upwards; in his making hath a principle to which Activity is as essential as it is to fire to mount; from which nothing else but force can hinder it: As if man did do violence to his making when he did do nothing; and it were his hardest work and pressure, not to be employed; it were like making flame go downwards. I am sure, it is one of the busiest ways of doing Satan's work. Our Saviour in a Parable in the XII. Ch. of S. Matt. from the 43. v. saith, When the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he goeth through dry places, seeking rest, and findeth none: Ver. 44. Then he saith, I will return into my house from whence I came out; and when he is come, he findeth it empty, 45. swept, and garnished. Then goeth he, and taketh with himself seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there. Where, under the Similitude of a man cast out of his habitation, who, while he wanders through none but desert places seeking for a dwelling, he is sure to meet with none; but if he find an house that's empty, swept and garnished, he hath found out not a receptacle only, but an invitation, an house dressed on purpose to call in and to detain inhabitants: He signifies, that when a Temptation of the Devil is repelled, and himself, upon some working occasion, by a resolute act of holy courage thrown out of the heart; as he finds no rest in this condition, every place is desert to him, but the Heart of man is indeed Hell to him, for he calls it a Matt. VIII. 29. torment to be cast out thence, yea he accounts himself bound up in his eternal chains of b Luk. VIII. 31. darkness, when he is restrained from working and engaging man to sin; so, while he goeth to and fro, seeking an opportunity to put in somewhere, if he find that heart from which he was cast out, or any other heart, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, (so the word is,) idling, not employed or busied, (so it signifies,) such an heart is empty, swept, and garnished for him, 'tis a dwelling that's dressed properly to tempt the Devil, fitted to receive him and his forces too, prepared for him to garrison, and make a strong hold of, whence he cannot be removed; for he takes unto him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there. No doubt they are the Patron-Guardian spirits of the seven deadly sins, their Tutelary Devils. Some of those good qualities that are the attendants of Idleness you may find deciphered in the Scripture. S. Paul says, when people a I Ti●▪ V. 13. learn to be idle, they grow tattlers, busybodies, speaking things which they ought not. 'Tis strange that Idleness should make men and women busy-bodies, yet it does most certainly in other folk's affairs. Faction, than which nothing in the world can be more restless, is nursed by it. Where are States so censured, so new-modelled, as at certain of our Refectories, places that are made merely for men to spend their time in which they know not what to do with? At those Tables our Superiors are dissected; Calumny and Treason are the common, are indeed the more peculiar entertainments of the places. In fine, where persons have no other employment for their time but talking, and either have not so much Virtue as to find delight in talking good things, or not so much skill as to speak innocent recreation, there they talk of others, censure, and backbite, and scoff. This is indeed the only picquant conversation; Gall is sauce to all their entertainments: and that you may know these things proceed from that old Serpent, they do nothing else but hiss and bite. 'Tis the a Rom. ●I. 13. poison of Asps that is under their lips which gives relish to their discourses; 'tis the sting that makes them grateful, veni ne that they are condited with. More of the brood of this want of Employment you may find at Sodom; namely, Pride and Luxury: for saith Ezekiel, b Ezek. XVI. 49. This was the iniquity of Sodom; Pride, fullness of bread, and abundance of Idleness, was in her and in her daughters. And indeed the idle person could not possibly know how to pass his hours, if he had not Delicacies to sweeten some, Wine to lay some asleep, and the solicitous deckings of Pride to take up others: But the studious gorging of the inside, and the elaborate trim of the outside, help him well away with them. Good God that for so many hours my morning eyes should be lift up to nothing but a Looking-glass! that that thin Shadow of myself should be my Idol, be my God indeed, to which I pay all the devotions I perform! And when with so much care and time I have arrayed and marshaled myself, that I should spend as much more too in the complacencies of viewing this! with eager eyes and appetite surveying every part, as if I had set out, exposed them to myself alone, and only dressed a prospect for my own sight! and since Nature, to my grief, hath given me no eyes behind; that I should fetch reliefs from Art, and get vicarious sight, and set my back parts too before my face, that so I may enjoy the whole scene of myself! And why all this? for nothing but to serve vain Ostentation, or negotiate for Lust, to dress a Temptation, and start Concupiscence. And that the half of each day should be spent thus! the best part of a reasonable creature's and a Christian's life be laid out upon purposes so far from Christian or reasonable! And truly Luxury will easily eat the remainder up, that sure companion of Idleness. For when the Israelites were in the Wilderness, where they could not eat but by Miracle, and the Rock must give them drink; yet, having no employment, they made Feasls: a Exod. XXXII. ●▪ They sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play. Nor would eating to the uses of their nature serve them, but they must have entertainments for their wantonness. Had they been employed to get their bread, their labour would have made their morsels sweet: but since God, as the Wiseman says, sent them from Heaven bread prepared without their labour, they must have varieties to sweeten it; they require him to b Psal. LXXVIII. prepare a Table also in the wilderness, 19 and furnish them with choice. 25. And although they had the food of Angels, c Wised. XVI. 20, 21. able to content every man's delight, and agreeing to every taste, and serving to the appetite of the eater, it tempered itself to every man's liking, and what could they fancy more? the latitude of creatures, the whole Universe of Luxury could do nothing else; in every single morsel they had sorts, Variety, all choice; as if that Desert had been Paradise, that Wilderness the Garden of the Lord: Yet so coy is Idleness, so apt to nauseate, that they abhor the constancy of being pleased. And though they were not sated neither, a Exod. XVI. 18. he that gathered much had nothing over, only to his eating, God as well providing for their Health and Virtue, as necessity, and dieting their Temperance as he did their hunger: yet their very liking does grow loathsome to them. When their bodies were thus excellently well provided for, having no employment, nothing to take up their minds and entertain their Souls, they require b Psal. LXXVII. v. 18. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 meat for their Souls, meat not to serve the uses of their bodies, but to feed their fancies, their extravagant minds. Thus Idleness requires to be dieted. And all this but to pamper and feed high men's inclinations, so to make Temptations irresistible, and by consequence Vice necessary. It were easy to recount more of those ways by which the Devil does make use of men's want of Employment to debauch their lives, and ruin all the hopes of Virtue in them. S. Judas finds more of its effects at Sodom: a Ver. 7. They gave themselves over to Fornication, and went after other flesh, and are set forth for a● example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire. Indeed these are most certain consequents of not being employed: Quaeritur Aegysthus— is too known an instance: and b TWO Sam. XI. 1, 2. great, Holy David is another. But it's dire influence is sufficiently visible in that which it reigned down upon those Cities. Since it did fulfil the guilt of Sodom, and made Heaven furnish Hell for it, and God himself turn Executioner of fire and brimstone to revenge it; this shall serve to prove it is one of the Devil's Masterpieces. 3. Next succeed his c Ephes. VI 16. fiery darts, as S. Paul calls them, namely, Persecutions, or Calamities of any kind: which he manageth either by inflicting pressures; and he was so confident of the force of those, that he did tell God he would make d Job I. 11. Job curse him to his face with them: or if he find men in necessities and pressures, then by tempting them to get from under them by methods which he shall direct; and he had such assurance of the strength of this Temptation, that by it he tried our Saviour, to find out whether he were the e IV. Matt▪ 3. Son of God or no, believing none but he that was so would be able to resist it. Indeed the trials are severe which this Temptation does present, to draw men from their Duty, and to overcome their Constancy: whether it solicit by inflicting punishment, (as on the Mother and her Children, TWO Maccab. VII.) or by offering to withdraw it, if they will submit to their unlawful terms, (and so they tried her youngest son there, ver. 24.) or at leastwise by some feigned act, some ambiguous words or practices, will pretend compliance, (so they dealt with Eleazar, Chap. VI 21. whom they would have had to bring flesh of his own provision, such as he might use without offence, and so only seem to eat forbidden meat.) Each of which is as great a trial also, and to stand against them reckoned up amongst as vigorous acts of Faith, as those that held out in the greatest tortures persecuting malice could invent: Heb. XI. 37. They were stoned, sawn asunder, were tempted. Now to fetch an instance of the sad success of these, I shall not need to go so far as to those Persecutions of Antiochus: nor those of the primitive times of Christianity; when they had no other choices but these, to deliver up their Bible's or their Lives; either to sacrifice to Idols, or at least procure a Ticket which should certify that they had done it, or to be themselves an Holocaust, and give those Idols a Burnt-offering with their martyr-flames. Which made the Traditores, Lapsi, the Thurificati and the Libellatici to be so numerous. Through God's blessed mercy there is no use of such instances, as there is no fear of such a trial; 'tis not death to be a Christian now: For if the Son of man or Satan's self should come to try us at those rates, 'twere a great doubt whether the one or other would a Luke XVIII. 8. find Faith upon the earth; whether they would sacrifice a life to our Religion, who are not content to sacrifice a little interest or pleasure to it; whether they are likely to b Heb. XII. 4. resist unto blood fight against sin, who will not resist to tears nor sober resolutions. Alas! what Religion should we be of, if God should raise a Diocletian, come to tempt us with the fiery trial? Martyrs as we are to nothing but our Passions and our Lusts! Nor shall I produce more known and near experiences, when, by reason of such storms of Persecution, men ma●e shipwreck, if not of their Faith, yet of good Conscience. When by order or permissions of Providence they were brought to such a straight, that either they must let go their possessions or their honesty, acting against Principles, and conscience of Duty; I shall not remember, how, when God did shake his angry hand thus over them, they fled to the Devil's kindness, and made Hell their refuge, to save them from their Father's rod: how they grew so Atheistical, as to believe a Perjury or other crime greater security, that would preserve their selves and their condition better than all God had promised; were such infidels, that they did rather trust their being here to the commission of a sin, then to the Providence and the Engagements of the Almighty. For indeed what need I instance in these greater cases, where the trial was so sharp, as not to offer any easier choice than this, either to part with Conscience or with all they had? God knows, we find less Interests will do: The Devil by no more than this, driving the Gadarens swine into the Sea, was able to drive Christ out of their coasts. You have the story VIII. Matt. from the 28 ver. A legion of those evil spirits did possess two men; and finding Christ would cast them out, and by that Miracle so far show forth his power, that in probability the whole Country would believe on him, they fall upon this project to prevent it; they besought him, if he would cast them out, to suffer them to go into an herd of swine there feeding; hoping by destroying them to incense the owners against Christ: and, to try them, he permitted this. The possessed swine ran violently down into the Lake, and perished. Now a man would think the virulency of these Devils, which were so destructive when they were at liberty and not restrained, would have endeared the mercy that had cast them out of the poor men, and came to dispossess the Country of them; and that their astonishment at so great a Miracle would possess them all with reverence and belief of him; and that they would therefore seize and possess him also, and not let the mercy go: But, on the contrary, the whole City and Country came out to meet Jesus, and, in consideration of the loss of their swine, desire him to depart out of their coasts. Lo here an equal enemy to Christ and all his Miracles, that was indeed too hard for them. The Senate of Hell had no project to keep out Religion like to this, to make Religion thwart an Interest. Rather no Christianity then lose an Earthly satisfaction by it: Rather have the swine than Christ himself. 4. But if he chance to fail in this Assault, (as by our Saviour he was beaten off) he hath yet a Reserve, in which he places his last, strongest confidence; with which he ventured to charge Christ, when it is probable he knew He was the Son of God. a IV. Mar● 8, 9 He takes him up into an high mountain, and shows him all the Kingdoms of the earth in the twinkling of an eye, and the glory of them, and says, All these things will I give thee. He thought it was impossible for such a prospect not to make impression on the appetite, raise some desire, or stir one Covetous or Ambitious thought: which if it could but do, he made no scruple then to clog the Gift with such conditions as that there, All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me. 'Tis said indeed, the a Eph. V. 5. Covetous man is an Idolater: and here we see the God he does do homage to, and worship. The Devil does require, that those whom he gives wealth to, (now 'tis he that gives it to the Covetous, to all indeed that get it with injustice or with greediness;) he requires, I say, that these should pay all their Religion to Himself: and the Ambitious, in however high a place he sets them, must fall down to him. And truly these two dispositions can give worship to no other God but such an one as is b Revel. X. 11. Abaddon, the Destroyer of Mankind. For all the great Commotions of the world, all those Convulsions that tear Provinces and Empires, all Seditions and Rebellions, with those armies of iniquities that attend them, and that wage their designs, which are upheld by legions of villainies as well as men, all the Disturbances of States and Church, are but attempts of Covetous and Ambitious spirits, men that are unsatisfied with their condition, and desire a change, and care not how they compass it: they can charge through seas of blood and sin, over the face of men and Conscience, to get out of that condition, which they therefore are not well content with, because something they like better beckons their ambitious and their covetous desires. Would you see what one of these will venture at? When Christ our Saviour was to be betrayed, when a Person of the Godhead was to be delivered up and crucified, the Devil had no passion to employ on that design so fit as the desire of getting money; and when that desire was once entertained, we see he enters a John XIII. 2, 27. really in person, and possesses such a soul; and when he is there, he designs no farther but to warm and stir that passion: 'tis sufficient fruit of his possession, he hath done enough in such an heart wherein he dwells, if he but keep alive that desire of money: for he knows that will make the man adventure upon any guilt; for it made Judas undertake to betray Christ. And as for the other passion which the Devil did design the glories of his prospect to give fire to, though he could not stir it in our Saviour, yet he knew it vanquished him himself when he was Angel. What height is there which Ambition will not fly at, since it made this Spirit aim at an equality with the b Isa. XIV. 14. Most High? Heaven itself was not sufficient to content him, while there was a God above him in it. And since this affection peopled Hell with Devils, 'tis no wonder if it people Earth with Miseries and Vices. 5. The remaining Trial with which Satan did assault our Saviour, when he tempted him with a IV. Matt. 4. Scripture and God's Promises, and sought to ruin him with his own Privileges: with that also 6. His being a lying spirit in the mouth of all the Prophets; by which long ago he did destroy an Ahab, in the I Kings XXII. 22. But since by sad experience we know, he ruin'd the best King, purest Church, and most flourishing State, by the same stratagem. But these, with those other which S. Paul does call his b Eph. VI 11. wiles, I must omit; sufficient hath been said already to enforce the necessity of resisting, which is the Duty, and the next considerable. Resist the Devil: that is, do not you consent to his Temptations: for there is no more required of us, but this only, not to be willing to be c TWO Tim. II. 26. taken, and led captive by him. For let him suggest, incite, assault and storm us, no impression can be made upon us till we yield, and till we give consent no hurt is done. It is not here as in our other wars: In those no resolution can secure the victory, but notwithstanding all resistance possible, we may be vanquished; yea, sometime men are overpressed and die with conquering, and the Victor only gains a Monument, is but buried in the heaps of his slain Trophies. But in these wars with the Devil, whosoever is unwilling to be vanquished, never can be: for he must first give consent to it, and will the ruin: for men do not sin against their wills. Only here we must distinguish betwixt Will, and then Velleity and Woulding. For let no man think when he commits deliberate iniquity with averseness and reluctancy of mind, allows not what he does, but does the evil that he would not, what he hates that he does; that this is not to be imputed to the Will, that in this case he is not willing, but here the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak, and yields through mere infirmity: For, on the contrary, the Devil finds the flesh so strong in this case, that with it alone he does assault the mind, and breaks through its reluctancies and aversations, bears down all its resolutions, triumphs over all that does pretend to God or Virtue in him. Where 'tis thus, let no man flatter or persuade himself he does what he would not, when it is plain he does impetuously will the doing it. Let him not think that he allows not, but hates that which he does; when it is certain, in that moment that he does commit, not to allow that which he does resolve and pitch upon and choose, to hate what with complacency he acts, or to do that unwillingly which he is wrought on by his own concupiscence to do, and by his inward incitations, by the mutiny of his own affections, which the Devil raises, and when it is the mere height and prevalency of his appetite that does make him do it, (as it must be where there is reluctancy before he do it, his desires and affections there are evidently too strong for him,) or at last, to hate the doing that which 'tis his too much love to that makes him do; are all impossibilities, the s●me things as to will against the will, desire against appetite. But do but keep thyself sincerely and in truth from being willing, and thou must be safe: For God expects no more but that we should not voluntarily yield to our undoing. He hath furnished us with his own complete armour for no farther uses of a war, but to encourage us to stand. a Eph. VI 11. Take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the Devil: 13. and again, Put ye on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. There is no need to do more than this, not to be willing and consent to fall; for no man can be beaten down but he that will fall. It were very easy for me to prescribe you how to fortify against those Engines of the Devil's battery which I produced to you. But that I may not stay upon particulars, directing those whom he prevails upon through want of employment to find out honest occasions not to be idle; (and here it is the most unhappy thing in the whole world, for any man to be necessitated to be vicio as by his having nothing else to do, and because, while the world accounts it a Pedantic thing to be brought up by rules and under discipline, he cannot learn how to employ himself to his advantage) to pass by these, I say, the universal strength against this enemy is Faith. a I Pet. ● 9 Your adversary the Devil, like a roaring Lion, goeth up and down seeking whom he may devour; whom resist steadfast in the Faith. And that not only as it frustrates all that he attempts by means of Infidelity, but it also b Eph. VI 16. quenches all his fiery darts; whatsoever bright Temptation he presents to draw us from our Duty, or whatever fiery trial he makes use of to affright and martyr with. For the man whose Faith does give him c Heb. XI. 1. evidence and eyesight of those blessed Promises eye hath not seen, and gives d 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Heb. XI. 1 substance, present solid being to his after hopes, and, whose heart hath swallowed down those happy expectations which have never entered in the heart of man to comprehend; what is there that can tempt or fright him from his station? To make all that which Satan gave the prospect of prevail on such a Soul, the Kingdoms of the earth must outvie God's Kingdom, and their Gauds outshine his Glory, and the twinkling of an eye seem longer than Eternity: for nothing less than these will serve his turn, all these are in his expectations. Or what can fright the man whose heart is set above the sphere of terrors? who knows calamity, how great soever, can inflict but a more sudden and more glorious blessedness upon him; and the most despiteful cruel usage can but persecute him into Heaven. 'Tis easy to demonstrate that a Faith and expectation of the things on earth, built upon weaker grounds than any man may have for his belief of things above, hath charged much greater hazards, overcome more difficulties than the Devil does assault us with. For sure none is so sceptical, but he will grant that we have firmer grounds to think there is another world in Heaven, than Columbus (if he were the first Discoverer) had to think there was another Earth; and that there are far richer hopes laid up there in that other world, for those that do deny themselves the sinful profits and the jollities of this, and force them from their inclinations, than those Seamen could expect who first adventured with him thither. For they could not think to gain much for themselves, but only to take seisin of the Land (if any such there were) for others covetous cruelty; cold get little else but only richer graves, and to lie buried in their yellow earth. Nor are we assaulted in our voyage with such hazards, as they knew they must encounter with; the path of Virtue and the way to Heaven is not so beset with difficulties as theirs was; when they must cut it out themselves through an unknown new world of Ocean, where they could see nothing else but swelling gaping Death, from an abyss of which they were but weakly guarded, and removed few inches only: and as if the dangerousest shipwrecks were on shore, they found a Land more savage and more monstrous than that Sea. Yet all this they vanquished for such slender hopes, and upon so uncertain a belief. A weak Faith therefore can do mighty works; greater than any that we stand in need of to encounter with our enemy: It can remove these mountains too; the golden ones that Covetousness and Ambition do cast up; yea more, it can remove the Devil also, for if you resist him steadfast in the faith, he flies, which is the happy Issue, and my last part. Resist the Devil, and he will fly from you. And yet it cannot be denied but that sometimes when the messenger of Satan comes to buffet, though S. Paul resist him with the strength of Prayer, (which when Moses managed he was able to prevail on God himself, and the Lord articled with him, that he might be a Deut. IX. 14. let alone,) yet he could not beat off this assailant, TWO Cor. XII. 7, 8, 9 When God, either for prevention, as 'twas there, v. 7. or for exercising or illustrating of Graces, or some other of his blessed ends, gives a man up to the assaults of Satan, he is often pleased to continue the temptation long; but in that case he does never fail to send assistences and aids enough against it. My grace is sufficient for thee, saith he to S. Paul there. And when he will have us tempted for his uses, (if we be not failing to ourselves) he does prevent our being overcome; so that there is no danger on those Trials from their stay. But yet it must not be denied but that the Devil does prevail sometimes by importunacy, and by continuance of Temptation; so that Resistance is not always a Repulse, at least not such an one as to make him draw off and fly. It is not strange to find him siding with a natural inclination, with the bent of Constitution, still presenting Objects, laying Opportunities, throwing in Examples, and all sorts of invitation, always pressing so, that when a man hath struggled long he does grow weary of the service, not enduring to be thus upon his guard perpetually, watching a weak heart which strong inclinations, busy Devils do lay siege to; and so growing slack and careless, he is presently surprised: or else, despairing that he shall be always able to hold out, lays hold upon a tempting opportunity, and yields; by the most unreasonable and basest cowardice that can be, yields, for fear of yielding; lest he should not hold out, he will not, but gives up; and puts himself into that very mischief which he would avoid, merely for fear of coming into it. For which fear there is no reason neither: for 'tis not here as in our other Sieges, where, if it be close, continuance must reduce men to necessity of yielding, strengths and ammunitions will decay, provisions fail, and, if the Enemy cannot, their own hunger will break through their walls, make avenues for conquest, time alone will take them; but in these Spiritual Sieges, one Repulse enables for another, and the more we have resisted, the Temptation is not only so much slatter, and more weak and baffled, but the inward man is stronger; Victory does give new forces, and is sure to get in fresh and still sufficient supplies. For a Jam. IU. 6. God giveth more grace, saith S. Ja●es: and, b Matt. XXV. 29. they shall have abundance, saith our Saviour. So that where the Devil after several repulses still comes on with fresh assaults, we may be sure he does discern there is some treacherous inclination that sides with him: and although the man refuse himself the satisfaction of the sin, he sees he hath a mind to it, his refusals are but saint, not hearty; though he seem afraid to come within the quarters of the Vice, he keeps, it may be, correspondence with the incentives to it, entertains the opportunities, plays with the objects, or at best he does not fortify against him. Now this gives the Tempter hopes, and invites his assaults, and does expose the person to be taken by him. But where he sees he is resisted heartily, his offers are received with an abhorrency, discerns men are in earnest, watch to avoid all opportunities and occasions, and prepare, and fortify, and arm against him, there he will not stay to be the triumph of their Virtue. We may know this by his Agents, those that work under the Devil, whom he hath instructed in the mysteries of waging his Temptations. Where they are not like to speed; (and as to this they have discerning spirits,) they avoid, and hate, and come not near, but study spite and mischief only there. The intemperate men are most uneasy with a person whom they are not able to engage in the debauch; the rudeness and brutality of their excesses are not so offensive to the sober man, as his stayed Virtue is to them; they do not more avoid the crude egestions, shameful spewings of their overtaken fellows riot, than they do the shame and the reproach that such a man's strict conversation casts on them, which does in earnest make them look more foul and nasty to themselves. In fine, every sinner shuns the company of those whom he believes Religious in earnest; 'tis an awe and check to them; they are afraid, and out at it, as their Great Master also is, who when he is resisted must be overcome: and as they that are beaten have their own fears also for their enemies, which are sure to charge close, put to flight, chase and pursue them; so it seems he also is afraid of a sincere and hearty Christian, for he flies him: so he did from Christ, IU. Matt. ver. 11. and so the Text assures, If you resist him, he will fly from you. And now, although we all did once renounce the Devil and his works, were listed Soldiers against him, took a Sacrament upon it, and our Souls, the immortality of life or misery, depend upon our being true and faithful to ourselves and oaths, or otherwise; nor is there more required of us but resolution and fidelity, only not to be consenting to our Enemy's conquest of us, not to will captivity and servitude. Yet as if, in mere defiance of our vows and interests, we not only willed the ruin, but would fight for it, we may find, in stead of this resisting of the Devil, most men do a Acts VII. 51. resist the Holy Ghost; quench not the b Ephe●. VI 16. fiery darts of Satan, but the c I Thess. V. 19 Spirit and his flames, by which he would enkindle love of God and Virtue in them. If he take advantage of some warm occasion to inflame their courage against former folly's, heat them into resolutions of a change; as soon as that occasion goes off, they put out those flames, and choke these heats until they die. If he come in his soft whispers, speak close to the heart, suggest, and call them to those joys of which himself is earnest; to all these they shut their ears, can hear no whispers, are not sensible of any sounds of things at such a distance, sounds to which they give no more regard, then to things of the same extravagance with the Music of the Spheres. Nay, if he come with his more active methods, as the Angels came to Lot, send mercy to allure and d Gen. ●IX. 16. take them by the hand, as they did, to invite and lead them out of Sodom; if that will not, judgements then to thrust them out, as they did also, come with fire and brimstone to affright them; they not only, like the men of Sodom, do attempt a b Ver. 4, 9 violence and rape upon those very Angels, but they really debauch the mercies, and profane the judgements, having blinded their own eyes, that they might see no hand of God in either: using thus unkindly all his blessed methods of reclaiming them, till they have c Ephes. ●. 30. grieved him so that he forsake and leave them utterly. As if they had not heard that when the Holy Spirit is thus forced away, the evil spirit takes his place, I Sam. XVI. 14. As if they knew not that to those who close their eyes and stop their ears against the Holy Spirit's motions, till they are grown dull of hearing and blind to them, God does send a spirit of slumber, that they should not see nor hear; and that for this dire reason, that they may not be converted, nor be saved. a Isa. VI 9 Matt. XIII. 14, 15. Five times he affirms it in the Scripture. Yea, once more, in words of a sad Emphasis, TWO Thes. II. 12, 13. He sends them strong delusions Joh. XII. 40. Act. XXVII. 26. Rom. XI. 8▪ that they may believe a lie, that they all may be damned who believe not the truth, but have pleasure in unrighteousness: and that, because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. Blessed God Is it so easy for such sinners to believe and be converted, that thyself shouldst interpose to hinder it, and hide the possibilities of mercy from their eyes, that they may never see them, nor recover! What can then become of those for whom God does contrive that they shall not escape? when instead of those bowels that did make him b Ezek. XXXIII. 11. swear he would not have the sinner die, but would have him return and live, he puts on so much indignation at such sinners, as to take an order they shall not repent, and take an order that they shall be damned. And yet all this is only to those men, who, being dull of hearing the suggestions of the Spirit, and not willing to give entertainment to his holy motions, grieve him so, that they repel and drive him quite away; and so by consequence only make way for the Devil: Whereas there are others that directly call him, force him to them, ravish and invade occasions to serve him. Some there are that study how to disbelieve, and with great labour and contrivance work out arguments and motives to persuade themselves to Atheism: Others practise, discipline, and exercise themselves to be engaged in Vice. Some dress so as to lay baits, snares, to entrap Temptation, that they may be sure it may not pass them: Others feed high, to invite, and entertain the Tempter, do all that is possible to make him come, and to assure him that he must prevail, when they have made it most impossible for themselves to stand and to resist. Some there are indeed whom he does not overcome so easily, but is put to compound with them, takes them upon Articles: for when he would engage them to a sin to which he sees they have great inclinations, with some fears, he is fain to persuade them to repent when they have done; to lay hold upon the present opportunity, and not let the satisfaction escape them, but be forry after, and amend. For where these resolutions of Repentance usher in transgression, there we may be sure it is the Devil that suggests those resolutions. But if he can get admittance once thus, by prevailing with a person to receive him upon purposes of after-Penitence; he is sure to prosper still in his attempts upon the same condition: for Repentance will wash out another sin, if he commit it; and so on. And it is evident that by this very train he does draw most men on through the whole course of sin and life: for never do they, till they see themselves at the last stage, begin repenting. When they are to grapple with Death's forces, than they are to set upon resisting of the Devil: and when they are grown so weak that their whole soul must be employed to muster all its spirits, all their strength, but to beat off one little spot of phlegm, that does besiege the avenues of breath, the parts of life, and sally at it, and assault it, once, again, and a third, many times, and yet with all the fury of its might cannot break through, nor beat off that little clot of spittle; when it is thus, yet then are they to a Eph. VI 12. wrestle with, and conquer Principalities and Powers, all the Rulers of the utter darkness b TWO Cor. X. 4, 5. , pull down the strong holds of sin within, cast down imaginations, and every high thing that did exalt itself against the knowledge of God, and bring into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ; and with those feeble hands that they are scarcely able to lift up in a short wish, or prayer, they must do all this, resist the Devil, and take Heaven by force. Now sure to put it off to such a fatal season is a purpose of a desperate concern. In God's Name let us set upon the doing it while there is something left of Principle and vigour in us, ere we have so grieved God's Spirit, that he do resolve to leave us utterly, and before the Devil have so broke us to his yoke, that we become content and pleased to do his drudgery. We deceive ourselves if we think to do it with more ease when Constitution is grown weaker; as if then Temptations would not be so strong: for the Habits will be then confirmed, Vice grown Heroical, and we wholly in the a Act. XXVI. 18. power of Satan, dead and senseless under it, not so much as stirring to get out. But if we strive before he have us in his clutches, we have an enemy that can vanquish none but those who consent to, and comply and confederate with him, those that will be overcome: so that if we resist, he must be conquered; and Temptation must be conquered too, for He will fly, and then by consequence must cease to trouble and molest us. This is the sure way to be rid of Temptations, to put to flight the great Artificer and Prince of them, subdue and overcome Him and ourselves: To b Rev. III. 21. him that over cometh thus Christ will grant to sit with him on his Throne, as He also overcame, and sat down with his Father on his Throne. To which, etc. FINIS.