A treatise on comforting afflicted consciences - The Digital Puritan

144 INSTRUCTIONS FOR COMFORTING(though I know Satan manageth that and all other advantageswith all the malice and cunning he can possibly, tothe overthrow of souls) is the principal ground ; the prime,but pestilent occasion : I say ignorance, which though itbe not perhaps so much talked of, taxed, and taken to heartas others, yet is a loud crying sin of the kingdom. For it isa most incredible thing, and of infinite amazement, howuniversally it reigns in this glorious noontide of the gospel ;and therefore must needs provoke God mightily, and hastenthe " removing of our candlestick." And in the mean time,besides many more, and that dreadful doom at last (2Thes. i,7, 8) it brings upon most (more is the pity and shame, especiallyso glorious beams of a blessed ministry shiningabout us) these two special mischiefs ; which at this time 1only mention, because they serve fitliest for illustration ofthe point. First, ignorant people sticking fast in his clutches,stand all at the devil's mercy and devotion to do with themwhat he will ; even as a poor helpless lamb in the paw ofa lion, or a silly wren in the ravenous claw of a kite ; toslash and mangle their woTul souls at his pleasure, with acursed variety of innumerable sins ; they, in the mean time,which is the perfection of their misery, neither fearing norfeeling any hurt at all, by reason of the hellish mists andmiserable lethargy of spiiitual blindness, which makes themsightless and senseless. Secondly, when times of sorrowcome upon them, when melancholy and old age grows on,and they say unto the world upon which they have doatedall their life long, I have no pleasure in thee ;when losses,crosses, and heavy accidents befal them ; when hideousinjections, temptations to self-murder, despair, &c. pressthem full sore, and they thereupon begin to cast about seriously,and to conceive with great terror and anxiety ofspirit %vhat is likely to become of them in the other world ;then, in such extremity, and forced by necessity, they arewont to have recourse to ministers for ease and help ; and,alas ! then we are at our wits' end, and in much perplexityhow to deal, and what to do with them. For upon the firstentrance into a discovery of their spiritual state, we see evidently,with grief of heart, that their ignorance hath betrayedthem to the devil, and now in the evil day exposedthem to merciless cruelty and cunning ; even as if a manshould commit a ship without sails, rudder, pilot, 6cc. tothe rage and roaring of the tempestuous devouring sea ;or put a poor weak naked man into the field against an implacablemighty adversary, completely armed from top totoe. We tell them truly, that the true way to comfort isto repent and believe. But for the first, by reason of the