A treatise on comforting afflicted consciences - The Digital Puritan

16 INSTRUCTIONS FOR COMFORTINGpersuaded would have caused many covetous v?orldlings tohave laid violent hands upon themselves ; for instance,Ahithophel, only because the glory of his state wisdom wasobscured and overtopped at the council board, saddled hisass, gat him home, put his household in order, and hangedhimself. The only cause of his fainting in the day of disgraceand non-acceptation was his false and rotten heart inmatters of religion. While the crown sat with security andsafety upon David's head, he walked with him as a companionunto the house of God. But when the wind began toblow a little another way, and upon Absalom's side, like atrue timeserver, he follows the blast, and turns his sailsaccording to the weather ; and therefore his hollow heart,having made the arm of flesh his anchor, and a vanishingblaze of honour his chiefest blessedness, shrinks at the veryfirst sight and suspicion of a tempest, and sinks this miserableman into a sea of horror. Now, on the contrary, whatwas the cause that Job's heart was not crushed in piecesunder the bitter concurrence of such a world of crosses, ofwhich any one severally was sufiicient to have made a manextremely miserable 1 The true reason of his patient resolutionamid so many pressures v/as the spiritual riches hehad hoarded up in the time of his happiness ; amongstwhich the divinest and dearest jewel lay nearest unto hieheart, as a counterpoison to the venom and sting of thedevil's deadliest malice ; 1 mean a sound and strong faithin Jesus Christ, " the Lamb slain from the beginning of theworld," which now began to shine the fairest in the darkestmidnight of his miseries, and sweetly to dart out manyheavenly sparks of comfort, and such glorious ejaculationsas these : "Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him"(chap, xiii, 15) ; and that, chap, xix, 23, et seq., ** Oh thatmy words were now written ! oh that they were printed ina book ! That they were graven with an iron pen and leadin the rock for ever. For I know that my Redeemer liveth,"&c. There were two cutting and cruel circumstanceslargely insinuated, chap, xxix and xxx, which did keenlysharpen the edge and mightily aggravate the weight of Job'smiseries. The one was this, he had been happy. Now, asthat man's happiness is holden the greatest who hath beenin a m.iserable condition, for he tasteth the double sweet, ofremembering his forepast misery and enjoying his presentfelicity ; so, on the contrary, it is accounted the greatestmisery to have been happy. The other was that whichmost nettles a generous nature, he being a man of so greathonour and worth, whose rare and incomparable wisdomeven the princes and nobles adored, with a secret and silent