A treatise on comforting afflicted consciences - The Digital Puritan

AFFLICTED CONSCIENCES. 69with bodily eyes, that thereby it might provoke all men toa mortal and immortal hate and detestation of it ! Thesting is pointed with the keen unquenchable wrath of God ;the horror is heated with the very fire of hell ; and yetordinarily Satan takes care by his craft and industry thatthese never appear, until he thinks that in all probabilitythe sight of them will sink their souls into irrecoverablewoe.The not feeling then of their spiritual misery is so farfrom making thern not miserable, that it ministers occasionto the devil's malice, mightily to aggravate their miseryboth present and future.CHAP. III.Five other Reasons why a Sinner doth not always feel the Sting of Siu.2. ANOTnEK reason why many are not troubled in a courseof sin, though there be infinite cause, and a world of woe tocome, is because their consciences, by reason of surfeit insin, and being drunk with worldly delights as with sweetwine, are cast into a dead sleep, and there lulled still, andlocked fast in an imaginary paradise of golden dreams andtransitory fancies, by the charms and enchantments ofearthly pleasures. And if at any time any noise of terrorsound in tlieir ears from the Lord's trumpeters in theministry of the word, so that they begin to stir, then thedevil begins to bestir himself, and to rock them fast againwith his syren- songs in the cradle of security. Here, therefore,we may take notice of a fourfold conscience: (L)That which is both good and quiet, when it hath peace withGod and with itself; so that the happy soul may sweetlysing in its own bosom, " My beloved is mine and I am his."(2.) That which is neither good nor quiet, when it lies forlornunder the sense of God's wrath and full of horror initself, as that of Judas, 6cc. (3.) That which is good butnot quiet, when the pleased face of God doth shine upon itthrough the blood of Christ, and yet it feels not the comfortof that blessed reconciliation, as in many new converts,who being truly humbled for all sin, cast themselves uponthe Lord Jesus and his sure promises for spiritual andeternal life, and yet are not as yet sensible of any assurance.(4.) That which is quiet but not good, when it is as full ofsin as a toad of venom, as hell of darkness ; and all thoseinnumerable sins unrepented of, unpardoned, like so manymad ban-dogs and fell mastiffs, though asleep for thepresent, will in the evil day, especially of sickness, death.