DIRECTIONS AGAINST SCANDAL TAKEN, OR AN APTNESS TO RECEIVE HURT, BY
THE WORDS OR DEEDS OF OTHERS.
It was not only an admonition, but a prophecy of Christ, when he said,
"Woe to the world because of offences! It must be that offences come."
And, "Blessed is he that is not offended or scandalized in me." He
foreknew that the errors and misdoings of some, would be the snare and
ruin of many others; and that, when "damnable heresies arise, many
will follow their pernicious ways, by reason of whom the way of truth
shall be evil spoken of," 2 Pet. i. 2. Like men in the dark, where if
one catch a fall, he that comes next him falls upon him.
There are four sorts of persons that use to be scandalized or hurt by
the sins of others.
1. Malignant enemies of Christ and godliness, who are partly hardened
in their malice, and partly rejoiced at the dishonour of religion, and
insult over those that give the offence, or take occasion by it to
blaspheme or persecute.
2. Some that are more equal, and hopeful, and in greater possibility
of conversion, who are stopped by it in their desires, and purposes,
and attempts of a godly life.
3. Unsound professors, or hypocrites, who are turned by scandals from
the way of godliness, which they seemed to walk in.
4. Weak christians, who are troubled and hindered in their way of
piety, or else drawn into some particular error or sin, though they
fall not off.
So that the effects of scandal may be reduced to these two: I. The
perverting of men's judgments, to dislike religion, and think hardly
either of the doctrine or practice of Christianity. II. The
imboldening of men to commit particular sins, or to omit particular
duties; or at least the troubling and hindering them in the
performance: against which, I shall first give you distinctly some
meditative directions, and then some practical directions against them
both together.
I. _Direct._ I. Consider what an evident sign it is of a very
blind or malicious soul, to be so apt to pick quarrels with God and
godliness, because of the sins of other men.
Love thinketh not ill of those we love: ill will and malice are still
ready to impute whatever is amiss to those whom they hate. Enmity is
contentious and slanderous; and will make a crime of virtue itself,
and from any topic fetch matter of reproach. There is no witness
seemeth incredible to it, who speaketh any thing that is evil of those
they hate. An argument _a baculo ad verbera_ is sufficient. Thus
did the heathens by the primitive christians; and will you do thus by
God? Will you terrify your own consciences, when they shall awake, and
find such an ugly serpent in your bosom, as malice and enmity against
your Maker and Redeemer? It is the nature of the devil, even his
principal sin. And will you not only wear his livery, but bear his
image, to prove that he is your father? and by community of natures,
to prove that you must also have a communion with him in condemnation
and punishment? And doth not so visible a mark of devilism upon your
souls, affright you, and make you ready to run away from yourselves?
Nothing but devilish malice can charge that upon God or godliness,
which is done by sinners against his laws. Would you use a friend
thus? If a murder were done, or a slander raised of you, or your house
were fired, or your goods stolen, would you suspect your friend of it?
or any one that you honoured, loved, or thought well of? You would not
certainly, but rather your enemy, or some lewd and dissolute persons
that were most likely to be guilty. You are blinded by malice, if you
see not how evident a proof of your devilish malice this is, to be
ready, when men that profess religion do any thing amiss, to think the
worse of godliness or religion for it! The cause of this suspicion is
lodged in your own hearts.
_Direct._ II. Remember that this was the first temptation, by
which the devil overthrew mankind, to persuade them to think ill of
God, as if he had been false to his word, and had envied them their
felicity. "Ye shall not surely die: for God doth know that in the day
ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as
gods, knowing good and evil," Gen. iii. 4, 5. And will you not be
warned by the calamity of all the world, to take heed of thinking ill
of God, and of his word, and of believing the devil's reports against
him?
_Direct._ III. Consider that to think ill of God, is to think him
to be a devil; and to think ill of godliness, is to take it to be
wickedness: and can man be guilty of a more devilish crime? Nay, is it
not worse than the devil that tempteth you to it can commit. To be God
is to be good, even the infinite, eternal, perfect good, in whom is no
evil, nor none can be. To be a devil, is to be evil, even the chief
that do evil, and would draw others so to do. It is not an ugly shape
in which a painter doth represent the devil, which showeth us his
ugliness indeed: an enemy of godliness is liker to him than that
picture: it is his sinfulness against God, which is his true
deformity. Therefore to suspect God to be evil, is to suspect him to
be the devil, so horrid a blasphemy doth this sin partake of. And if
godliness be bad, then he that is the author and end of it cannot be
good.
_Direct._ IV. Consider what horrible blindness it is to impute
men's faults to God, who is the greatest adversary to sin in all the
world, and who will most severely punish it, and to godliness, which
is perfectly its contrary. There is no angel in heaven so little to be
suspected to be the friend of sin as God. Creatures are mutable in
themselves; angels have the innocent imperfection of creatures; saints
on earth have a culpable imperfection through the remainder of sin. If
you had only suspected these, you might have had some pretence for it;
but to quarrel with God or godliness, is madder than to think that
light is the cause of darkness.
_Direct._ V. And think what extremity of injury and injustice
this is to God, to blame him or his laws for those sins of men which
are committed against him and his laws. Who is it that sin is
committed against but God? Is it not he that made the laws, which it
is the transgression of? Are not those laws, think you, strict enough
against it? Is it not their strictness which such as you dislike? Were
they laws that would give you leave to be worldly, sensual, and proud,
you would never quarrel with them; and yet you charge men's sins on
these laws, because they are so strict against them. Do you impute sin
to God, because he will judge men for it to hell-fire, and cast them
for ever out of his glorious presence into misery? O cursed impudence!
How righteous is God in condemning such malicious souls! Tell us if
you can, would you have had God to have forbidden sin more strictly?
or condemned it more severely? or punished it more terribly? If you
would, you pray for greater vengeance than hell upon yourselves! Woe
to you, when he executeth but so much as he hath already threatened!
Shall the crime of rebels be imputed to the king, against whom they
rebel? If a thief shall rob you, or a servant deceive you, or a son
despise you, is he just that will so much increase your injury, as to
lay the blame of all upon yourselves? You will say, It is not God that
we are offended with. But if it be at a holy life, it is at God; for
what is godliness, but the loving, and serving, and obeying God? If
you say, that it is not godliness neither; why then do you distaste or
speak against a godly life on this occasion? If you say, It is these
hypocrites only that we dislike: what do you dislike them for? Is it
for their virtue or their vices? If it be for their sins, why then do
you not speak and do more against sin, in yourselves and others? We
will concur with you to the utmost in opposing sin wherever it be
found. If it be their hypocrisy that you blame, persuade yourselves
and other men to be sincerely godly. How would you have hypocrisy
avoided? By an open profession to serve the devil? or by sincerity in
serving God? If the latter, why then do you think evil of the most
serious obedience to God? Alas! all christian countries are too full
of hypocrites. Every one that is baptized, and professeth
Christianity, is a saint or a hypocrite! All drunken, covetous,
ambitious, sensual, unclean christians, are hypocrites, and not
christians indeed. And these hypocrites can quietly live a worldly,
fleshly life, and never lament their own hypocrisy, nor their
perfidious violating their baptismal vow. But if one that seemeth
diligent for his soul, prove a hypocrite, or fall into any scandalous
sin, here they presently make an outcry; not to call the man from his
sin, but to make a godly, diligent life seem odious to all, by telling
men, These are your godly men. It is godliness that they quarrel with,
while they pretend only to find fault with sin. Why else do not you
find fault with the same sin equally in all? or, at least, persuade
men by such examples to be less sinful, and more watchful, and not to
be less religious and more loose? Tell me truly of any one that is
more against sin than God, or any thing more contrary to it than
godliness and true religion, or any men that do more against it than
the most religious, and then I will join with you in preferring those.
Till then, remember how you condemn yourselves, when you condemn them
that are better than yourselves.
_Direct._ VI. Think what a foolish, audacious thing it is to set
yourselves against your God and Judge. Will you accuse him of evil,
because men do evil? Are you fit to judge him? Are guilty worms either
wise or just enough for such an attempt, or strong enough to bear it
out? What do you but set your faces against heaven, and profess
rebellion against God, when you blame his laws and government, and
think the obeying and serving him to be evil?
_Direct._ VII. Consider what cruelty it is to yourselves, to turn
the faults of others to your ruin, which should be your warning to
avoid the like. If another man sin, will you not only do so too, but
be the more averse to repentance and reformation? Will you cut your
throat, because another cut his finger, or did so before you? Why
should you do yourselves such mischief?
_Direct._ VIII. Remember that this was the design of the devil in
tempting religious people to sin, not only to destroy them, but to
undo you and others by their falls. If he can make you think the worse
of religion, he hath his design and will; he hath killed many at a
blow. Yea, perhaps the sinner may repent, and be forgiven, when you
that are driven from repentance and godliness by the scandal, may be
damned. And will you so far gratify the devil, in the wilful
destruction of yourselves? Sin is contagious; and this is your
catching of the infection, if it prevail to drive you further from
God. And thus this plague devoureth multitudes.
_Direct._ IX. He that will think ill of godliness for men's sins,
shall never want occasion of such offence, nor such temptations to fly
from God. If you are so foolish or malignant, as to pick quarrels with
God and godliness for men's faults, (which nothing but God and
godliness can reform,) you may set up your standard of defiance
against heaven, and see what you will get by it in the end. For God
will not remove all occasion of your scandal. There ever have been and
will be hypocrites in the church on earth. Noah's ark had a Ham;
Abraham's family had an Ishmael, and Isaac's an Esau, and David's an
Absalom, and Christ's a Judas. The falls of good men are cited in
Scripture, to admonish you to take heed. Noah, Lot, David, Joseph's
brethren, &c. have left a mark behind them where they fell, that you
may take a safer way. If you will make all such the occasion of your
malignity, you turn your medicine into your poison, and choose hell
because some others choose it, or because some stumbled in the way to
heaven.
* * * * *
And for those who are imboldened in sin, because they see their
superiors or religious men commit it, or read that David, Noah, Peter,
&c. fell, let them consider,
_Direct._ I. That it is rule, and not example, that you must
chiefly live by. Do the laws of God by which you must be judged, allow
of sin? If they do, then fear it not.
_Direct._ II. Is not the example of Christ much better than a
sinner's? If you will follow examples, follow the best, even that
which was given you purposely to imitate. The greatest and most
learned man is fallible, and the most religious is not wholly free
from sin: sincerity writeth after a perfect copy, though it cannot
reach it.
_Direct._ III. Consider that sin is not the better, but the
worse, for being committed by a religious, a great, or a learned man.
Their place, their knowledge, and profession aggravateth it. And shall
that imbolden you which God most hateth?
_Direct._ IV. And consider that when he that falleth by a
surprise, doth rise again by repentance, and is pardoned, those that
are hereby imboldened to sin deliberately and impenitently, shall be
condemned. You may sin with David or Peter when you will, but you
cannot rise with them by true repentance, without that grace which you
wilfully resist and forfeit.
_Direct._ V. Lastly, Consider that the best men, and the
greatest, are the most dangerous tempters, when they mislead us. A
David was a stronger temptation to Bathsheba, than another man could
have been. A Peter might sooner mislead Barnabas, and others, into a
sinful dissimulation and separation, than another could have done.
Therefore do not think that where your danger is greatest, your
venturousness should be most.
_Practical Directions against Offence and Hurt by others._
_Direct._ I. Lay well your foundation, and understand the nature
and reasons of religion; and then you will be so far from disliking it
for the errors and falls of others, that it will be written upon your
minds, as with a beam of the sun, That there can be no reason against
obeying God, and against the careful securing of our salvation. This
will be the first and undoubted principle, which nothing in the world
can make you question. Whatever scandals, persecutions, or sufferings
may attend a holy life, you will still be past doubt that there is no
other way; no other eligible, no other tolerable, no other rational,
or that will lead to happiness. Whatever falls out in the world, if
the most great, or learned, or religious fall away, it will not make
you question, Whether a man be a living creature, nor whether the sun
be light, nor whether two and two be four. No more should it make you
question, Whether God be better than the creature, heaven than earth,
or a life of holiness than a life of sin. You will say as Peter,
"Lord, whither should we go? thou hast the words of eternal life,"
John vi. 68. Whatever scandals are given, or whatever befall the
church, or if all the disciples of Christ forsake him, this remaineth
as sure as that the earth is under us, that there is no other way than
holiness, for a wise man once to take into his thoughts.
_Direct._ II. Get once a sincere love to God and a holy life, and
then no scandals will make you jealous of it, nor think of looking any
other way. It is want of true and hearty love, that maketh you so
easily taken off.
_Direct._ III. To this end, know religion by experience; and this
will put you past all doubt of his goodness. He that never tasted
sugar, may be persuaded by argument that it is not sweet, or may think
it bitter when he seeth another spit it out; and he that knoweth
godliness but by looking on, or hearsay, may thus be drawn to think it
bad; but so will not he that hath truly tried it: I mean not only to
try what it is to hear, and read, and pray; but what it is to be
humble, holy, and heavenly, both in heart and life.
_Direct._ IV. When you see any man sin, be sure you do that duty
which it calls you to. Every fall that you see of others doth call you
to see the odiousness of sin (as you will do when you see a drunkard
spewing, or a thief at the whipping-post). And it calleth you to
search for and lament the root of such sin in yourselves, and to set
your watch more strictly upon such a warning; and it calls you to
compassionate the sinner, and if you have hope and opportunity to
endeavour his recovery. If you will conscionably do this duty which is
your own, you will be the less in danger of hurt by scandal. It is
duty that must help to prevent infection.
_Direct._ V. Be watchful among all men, high and low, learned or
unlearned, good and bad. Venture not blindly upon the singular opinion
of any men whatsoever; nor into any new unproved way. Remember that
all men are a temptation to others; and therefore be armed and watch
against such temptation. Know well what it is, that is the peculiar
temptation, which the quality of those that you have to do with,
layeth before you. Spend no day or hour in any company, good or bad,
without a wise and careful vigilancy.
_Direct._ VI. Be as little as you can in scandalous and tempting
company. Presume not to touch pitch, and promise yourselves to escape
defilement. Especially fly from two sorts of scandals. First, The
discourses and societies of heretical or schismatical men, who speak
perverse things to draw away disciples after them, Acts xx. 30. Those
that presume to run into such snares, and think their own
understanding and stability are sufficient to preserve them, do show
by their pride that they are near a fall, 1 Cor. x. Secondly, The
company of sensual persons, at stage-plays, gaming, inordinate plays,
and wanton dalliance. For this is to bring your tinder and gunpowder
to the fire; and the less you fear it, the greater is your danger.
_Direct._ VII. Look more at the good that is in others, than at
their faults and falls. The fly that will fall on none but the galled,
ulcerous place, doth feed accordingly. Is a professor of religion
covetous, drunk, or other ways scandalous? Remember that it is his
covetousness or drunkenness that is bad. Reprove that, and fly from
it, and spare not; but religion is good; let that therefore be
commended and imitated. Leave the carrion to dogs and crows to feast
upon; but do you choose out the things that are commendable, and mind,
and mention, and imitate those.
_Direct._ VIII. Lastly, Think and speak as much against the sin
and danger of taking scandal, as against the sin and danger of giving
it. When others cry out, These are your religious people, do you cry
out as much against their malignity and madness, who will dislike or
reproach religion for men's sins; which is to blame the law-makers or
laws, because they are broken; or to fall out with health, because
many that once were in health fall sick; or to find fault with eating,
because some are lean; or with clothing, because some are cold. Open
to yourselves and others, what a wicked and perilous thing this is, to
fall out with godliness, because some are ungodly that seem godly.
Many cry out against scandal, that never think what a heinous sin it
is to be scandalized, or to suffer men's sins to be a scandal to you;
and to be the worse, because that others are so bad. No one must
differ from them in an opinion, or a fashion of apparel, or in a mode
or form of worship, but some are presently scandalized; not knowing
that it is a greater sin in them to be scandalized, than in the other
by such means (supposing them to be faulty) to give them the occasion.
Do you know what it is to be scandalized or offended in the Scripture
sense? It is not merely to be displeased, or to dislike another's
actions (as is before said); but it is to be drawn into some sin, or
hindered from some duty, or stopped in the course of religion, or to
think the worse of truth, or duty, or a godly life, because of other
men's words or actions: and do you think him a good christian, and a
faithful or constant friend to godliness, who is so easily brought to
quarrel with it? or is so easily turned from it, or hindered in it?
Some peevish, childish persons are like sick stomachs, that no meat
can please; you cannot dress it so curiously, but they complain that
it is naught, or this aileth it, or that aileth it, when the fault is
in themselves; or like children, or sick persons, that can scarce be
touched but they are hurt: do you think that this sickliness or
curiosity in religion is a credit to you? This is not the tenderness
of conscience which God requireth, to be easily hurt by other men's
differences or faults. As it is the shame of many ladies and
gentlewomen, to be so curious and troublesomely neat, that no servant
knoweth how to please them; so is it in religion a sign of your
childish folly, and worse, to be guilty of such proud curiosity, that
none can please you who are not exactly of your mind and way. All men
must follow your humours in gestures, fashions, opinions, formalities,
and modes, or else you are troubled, and offended, and scandalized; as
if all the world were made to please and humour you! or you were wise
enough, and great and good enough, to be the rule of all about you!
Desire and spare not, that yourselves and all men should please God as
exactly as is possible. But if the want of that exactness in doubtful
things, or a difference in things disputable and doubtful among true
christians, do thereupon abate or hinder your love or estimation of
your brethren, or communion with them, or any other christian duty, or
tempt you into censoriousness or contempt of your brethren, or to
schism, persecution, or any other sin; it is you that are the great
offenders, and you that are like to be the sufferers; and have cause
to lament that sinful aptness to be thus scandalized.