1. By making it his scourge to punish his enemies. If men will not fear God, they shall fear men ; yea, they shall be made a terror to themselves. And indeed it is a dreadful punishment for God to deliver a man up into the hands of his own fears. I think there is scarce a greater torment to be found in the world than for a man to be his own tormentor, and his mind made a rack and en- gine of torture to his body. We read in 2 Kings xvii. 25. that God sent lions among the people ; but certainly that is not so bad as for God to let loose our own fears upon us. No lion is so cruel as this passion, and therefore David esteemed it so great a deliverance to be delivered from all his fears, Psal. xxxiv. 4. It is a dreadful threatening which is recorded in Deut. xxviii. 65, 66, 67. against the disobedient and rebellious, " Thou shalt find no ease, neither " shall the sole of thy foot have rest, but the I^ord shall give thee " there a trembling heart, and failing of eyes, and sorrow of mind, " and thy life shall hang in doubt before thee, and thou shalt fear " day and night, and shalt have no assurance of thy life. In the " morning thou slialt say. Would God it were even ; and at even " thou shalt say. Would God it were morning, for the fear of thine " heart wherewith thou shalt fear, and for the sight of thine eyes *' which thou shalt see.'' When fear hath once seized the heart, you may see death's colours displayed in the face. What a dismal life do they live, who have neither any peace by day, nor rest by night, but wearisome days and nights are appointed them ! The days of such men are tiresome days ; they wish for the night, hoping it may give them a little rest ; but their fears go to bed with them, their hearts pant and meditate terror ; and then, Oh that it were day again ! ^
2. By fear God punisheth his enemies in hell : it is that JlagcUum Dei, terrible scourge of God, by which a great part of the tor- ment of the damned is inflicted on them. Divines use to make this tripartite distinction of hell-torments, and tell us, God punishes the wicked there partly by remembrance of what is past, viz. the mercies and means they once had, but are there irrecoverably lost ; partly by the sense of things present, even the wrath of God over- laying soul and body ; and partly by the fear of what is to come ; and sure this is not the least part of the misery of these wretched cast-aways. Oh that fearful * expectation of fiery indignation ! more and more of God's wrath still cominjr on, as the waves of the
• The mind, anxious about futurity, is in a calamitous state, and miserable before miseries come. Sen.
S56 A PRACTICL TREATISE OF FEAR
sea, thrusting forward one on another; yea, this is that which makes the devils tremble, James ii. 19. (poicanai, the word signifies such a noise as the roar of the sea, or the roaring of the waves when they break themselves against the rocks, and this is occasion- ed b}^ the fears which are continually held as a whip over them.
3. Providence makes use of the slavish fears and terrors of wick- ed men, to dissipate and scatter them, when they are combined, and confederated against the people of God ; by these have they been routed, and put to flight, M-hen there hath been no other visible power to do it : it is said Psalm Ixxviii. 55. God cast out the heathen before his people Israel ; and by what means were those mighty nations subdued? Not by the strength of multitudes of the Israelites, but by their own fears; for it is said, Josh. xxiv. 11, 12. " The Lord sent the hornet before them, which drave them '' out -f-.'" These hornets were the fears and terrors of their own guilty and presaging minds, which buzzed and swarmed in their own breasts, and stung them to the heart, worse than the swords of the Israelites could do. " :|: Theodoret relates a memorable story " of Sapores king of Persia, who had besieged many Christians in "the city Nisibis, aud put them to great straits, so that little hopes " of safety were left them ; but in the depth of their distress, God " sent an army of hornets, and gnats, among their enemies, which " got into the trunks of their elephants, and ears, and nostrils of " their horses; which so enraged them, that they brake their " harness, cast their riders, and put them all to the rout, by which " providence the Christians escaped." These hornets were terrible to them, but fears, which are hornets in a figure, are ten thousand times more terrible ; tliey will quell, and sink the very hearts of the stoutest men ; yea, they will quickly make those that in their pride and haughtiness, took themselves rather to be gods, and almighty powers, to know themselves to be but men, as it is, Psal. ix. 20. " Put them in fear, O Lord, that they may know them- " selves to be but men.'' One fright will scare them out of a thousand fond conceits and idle dreams.
3. The use of' religious fear .
If God can make such fruit to grow upon such a bramble as the siiiful, slavish fear of man is, what may we expect from religious
f Hornets, by a metaphor, signify sudden fear which was raised in their guilty minds by God. Lnvat. on the place.
i Sapores rex Percarum cum urbem Nisibin^ in qua crant Christianiy obsedisset ; ecmigue offligeret, ntagna vis crabonum et culicum repente venit, et in promxiscides cavas Elephant- orum consedit, complevitque aures equorum^ ita ut sessores cxcusserirU, et turbatos ordines in jugam converter int. Hist. lib. 2. cap. 30.
A PRACTICAL TREATISE OF FEAR 257
fear, a clioice root of his own Spirit's planting? The uses and benefits hereof are innumerable, and inestimable ; but I must con- tract, and will only instance in three special uses of it.
1. By this fear the people of God are excited to, and confirmed in the way of their duty. Eccles. xii. 13. ** Fear God, and keep ** his commandments."" It is, custos utrmsque tabulce, the keeper of both tables, because the duties of both tables are influenced by it. It is this fear of God that makes us have a due respect to all his commands, and it is as powerful to confirm us in, as it is to excite us to our duties. Jer. xxxii. 40. " I will put my fear into " their inwards, and they shall not depart from me." Look, as be that soweth doth not regard the winds, but goes on in his labour, whatever weather the face of heaven threatens ; so he that fears God, will be found in the way of his duty, let the aspect of the times be never so lowring and discouraging : and, truly, this is no small advantage, in times of frights and distractions. Slavish fear sets a man upon the devifs ground, religious fear upon God's ground : And, how vast an odds is there in the choice of our ground, when we are to endiwe agreatjight of affliction I