Plea 2. But my nature is soft and tender, my constitution more weak and subject to the impressions of fear tiian others : some that have robust bodies, and hardy stout minds, may better grapple with such difficulties than I can, who by constitution and education, am altogether unfit to grapple with those torments, that I have not pa- tience enough to hear related ; my heart faints and dies within me, if I do but read, or hear of the barbarous usages of the martyrs, and therefore I may well be excused for my fears and faint-heartedness, when the case is like to be my own.
Answer 1. It is a great mistake to think that the mere strength of natural constitution, can carry any one through such sufferings for Christ, or that natural tenderness and weakness divinely assist- ed, cannot bear the heaviest burden that ever G6d laid upon the shoulders of any sufferer for Christ. Our suffering and bearing abilities are not from nature, but from grace. We find men of strong bodies and resolute daring minds, have fainted in the time of trial. Dr. Pendleton, in our own story, was a man of a robust and massy body, and a resolute daring mind ; yet when he came to the trial, he utterly fainted and fell off. On the other side, what poor feeble bodies have sustained the greatest torments, and out of weakness have been made strong ! Heb. xi. 34. The virgin Eulalia, of Emerita in Portugal, was young and tender, but twelve
A PRACTICAL TREATISE OF FEAR. 315
years old, and with much indulgence and tenderness brought up in an honourable family, being a person of considerable quality ; yet how courageously did she sustain the most cruel torments for Christ! When the judge fawned upon her with this tempting lan- guage, " Why wilt thou kill thyself, so young a flower, and so " near those honourable marriages and great dowries thou mightest " enjoy ?" Instead of returning a retracting or double answer, Eulalia threw down the idol, and spurned abroad with her feet the heap of incense prepared for the censers ; and when the executioner came to her, she entertained him with this language : * " Go to, ** thou hangman, burn, cut, mangle thou these earthly members ; " it is an easy matter to break a brittle substance, but the inward " mind thou shalt not hurt.'"* And when one joint was pulled from another, she said, " Behold what a pleasure it is for them, oh " Christ ! that remember thy triumphant victories, to attain unto " those high dignities."" So that our constitutional strength is not to be made the measure of our passive fortitude : God can make the feeblest and tenderest persons stand, when strong bodies, and blustering, resolute, and daring minds faint and fall.
2. Are our bodies so weak, and hearts so tender, that we can bear no suffering for Christ ? Then we are no way fit to be his followers. Christianity is a warfare, and Christians must endure hardships, 2 Tim. ii. 3. Delicacy and tenderness is as odd a sight in a Christian, as it is in a soldier ; and we cannot be Chrisf s dis- ciples, except we deliberate the terms, and having considered well what it is like to cost us, do resolve, in the strength of God, to run the hazard of all with him and for him. It is in vain to talk of a religion that we think not worthy the suffering and enduring any great matter for.
3. And if indeed, reader, thy constitution be so delicate and tender, that thou art not able to bear the thoughts of torments for Christ, how is it that thou art not more terrified Avith the torments of hell, which all they that deny Christ on earth must feel and bear eternally ? Oh, what is the wrath of man, in comparison with the wrath of God ? but as the bite of a flea to the rendings of a lion. This is the consideration propounded by Christ, in Matth. x. 28. " Fear not them who kill the body, but are not able to kill the " soul ; but rather fear him who is able to destroy both soul and " body in hell." The infinite and insupportable wrath of the great and terrible God, should make our souls shrink and shake at the thoughts of it, rather than the sufferings of the flesh, which ara but for a moment.
4. Know that the wisdom and tenderness of thy Father will pro-
Acts and Mon. V. I . p. 1 20.
S16 A PRACTICAL TREATISE OF FEAR.
portion the burden thou must bear to thy back that must bear it ; he will debate in measure, and not overload thy feeble shoul- ders : thou shalt find those things easy in trial, that now seem in- supportable in the terrible prospect ; a way of escape or support will certainly be opened, that thou mayest be able to bear it.
Pka 3. But others plead the sad experiences they have had of their o\mi feebleness and weakness in former trials and exercises of an inferior nature, in which their faith and patience hath failed them : and how can they imagine they shall ever be able to stand in the fiercest and most fiery trial ? If we have run with the foot- men, and they have wearied us in the land of peace, how shall we then contend with horses in the swellings of Jordan, Jer. xii. 5.
Ansrcer 1. AVe are strong or weak in all our trials, be they great or small, according to the assisting grace we receive from above ; if he leave us in a common and light trial to our own strength, it will be our over-match, and if he assist us in great and extraordi- nary trials, we shall be more than conquerors. At one time Abra- ham could offer up his only son to God with his own hand ; at another time he is so afraid of his life, that he acts very unsuitably to the character of a believer, and was shamefully rebuked for it by Abimelech. At one time David could say. Though an host en- camp against mc, I will not fear ; at another time he feigns himself mad, and acted beneath himself, both as a man, and as a man en- riched with so much faith and experience. At one time Peter is afraid to be interrogated by a maid; at another time he could boldly confront the whole council, and omu Christ and his truths to their faces. In extraordinary trials we may warrantably expect extraordinary assistances, and bv them we shall be carried through the greatest, how often soever we have failed in smaller trials.
2. The design and end of God's giving us experience of our own weakness in lesser troubles, is not to discourage and daunt us against we come to greater, (which is the use Satan here makes of it,) but to take us off from self-confidence and self-dependence ; to make us see our own weakness, that we may more heartily and humbly betake ourselves to him in the way of faith and fervent supplication.