Satan, even from himself, besides the working of our own lust, doth
do us wonderful injury, and hits our souls with many a fiery dart,
that we think comes either from ourselves or from heaven and God
himself.
Satan diligently waiteth to come in at the door, if Careless has
left it a little ajar.
There is nothing that Satan more desires than to get good men in his
sieve to sift them as wheat, that if possible he may leave them
nothing but bran; no grace, but the very husk and shell of religion.
So long as we retain the simplicity of the word, we have Satan at
the end of the staff; for unless we give way to a doubt about that,
about the truth and simplicity of it, he gets no ground upon us. In
time of temptation, it is our wisdom and duty to keep close to the
word that prohibits and forbids the sin; and not to reason with
Satan, of how far our outward and worldly privileges go, especially
of those privileges that border upon the temptation, as Eve here
did: "We may eat of all but one." By this she goeth to the outside
of her liberty, and sees herself upon the brink of the danger.
Christ might have told the tempter, when he assaulted him, that he
could have made stones bread, and that he could have descended from
the pinnacle of the temple, as afterwards he did; but that would
have admitted of other questions; wherefore he chooseth to lay aside
such needless and unwarrantable reasonings, and resisteth him with a
direct word of God, most pertinent to quash the tempter and also to
preserve himself in the way. To go to the outside of privileges,
especially when tempted of the devil, is often if not always very
dangerous and hazardous.
As long as the devil is alive there is danger; and though a strong
Christian may lie too hard for, and may overcome him in one thing,
he may be too hard for, yea, and may overcome the Christian two for
one afterwards. Thus he served David, and thus he served Peter, and
thus he in our day has served many more. The strongest are weak, the
wisest are fools, when suffered to be sifted as wheat in Satan's
sieve; yea, and have often been so proved, to the wounding of their
great hearts and the dishonor of religion.
It is usual with the devil in his temptings of poor creatures, to
put a good and bad together, that by show of the good the tempted
might be drawn to do that which in truth is evil. Thus he served
Saul; he spared the best of the herd and flock, under pretence of
sacrificing to God, and so transgressed the plain command. But this
the apostle said was dangerous, and therefore censureth such as in a
state of condemnation. Thus he served Adam; he put the desirableness
of sight and a plain transgression of God's law together, that by
the loveliness of the one they might the easier be brought to do the
other. O, poor Eve, do we wonder at thy folly? Doubtless we had done
as bad with half the argument of thy temptation.
Satan by tempting one may chiefly intend the destruction of another.
By tempting the wife, he may aim at the destruction of the husband;
by tempting the father, he may design the dsstruction of his
children; and by tempting the king, he may design the ruin of his
subjects, even as in the case of David: "Satan stood up against
Israel, and provoked David to number the people." He had a mind to
destroy seventy thousand, therefore he tempted David to sin.
I have sent you here enclosed a drop of that honey that I have taken
out of the carcass of a lion. I have eaten thereof myself, and am
much refreshed thereby. Temptations, when we meet them at first, are
as the lion that roared upon Samson; but if we overcome them, the
next time we see them we shall find a nest of honey within them.