2 COR. II. 11.] AGAINST SATAN'S DEVICES. 51
cayed graces. The more saints are beaten with the hammer of afflic- tions, the more they are made the trumpets of God's praises, and the more are their graces revived and quickened. Adversity abases the loveliness of the world that might entice us ; it abates the lustiness of the flesh within, that might incite us to folly and vanity ; and it abets the spirit in his quarrel to the two former, which tends much to the reviving and recovering of decayed graces. Now, suppose afflictions and troubles attend the ways of holiness, yet seeing that they all work for the great profit and singular advantage of the saints, let no soul be so mad as to leave an afflicted way of holiness, to walk in a smooth path of wickedness.
Remedy (2). The second remedy against this device of Satan is, solemnly to consider, that all the afflictions that do befall the saints, do only reach their worser part ; they reach not, they hurt not, their noble part, their best part. All the arrows stick in the target, they reach not the conscience : 1 Peter iii. 13, ' And who shall harm you, if ye be followers of that which is good,' saith the apostle. That is, none shall harm you. They may thus and thus afflict you, but they shall never harm you.1
It was the speech of an heathen, whenas by the tyrant he was com- manded to be put into a mortar, and to be beaten to pieces with an iron pestle, he cries out to his persecutors, ' You do but beat the vessel, the case, the husk of Anaxarchus, you do not beat me/ His body was to him but as a case, a husk ; he counted his soul himself, which they could not reach. You are wise, and know how to apply it.
Socrates said of his enemies, ' They may kill me, but they cannot hurt me.' So afflictions may kill us, but they cannot hurt us ; they may take away my life, but they cannot take away my God, my Christ, my crown.
Remedy (3). The third remedy against this device of Satan is, seriously to consider, That the afflictions that do attend the saints in the ways of holiness, are but short and momentary. ' Sorrow may abide for a night, but joy comes in the morning,' Ps. xxx. 5. This short storm will end in an everlasting calm, this short night will end in a glorious day, that shall never have end.2 It is but a very short time between grace and glory, between our title to the crown and our wearing the crown, between our right to the heavenly inheritance and our possession of the heavenly inheritance. Fourteen thou- sand years to the Lord is but as one day. What is our life but a shadow, a bubble, a flo wer, a post, a span, a dream ? &c. Yea, so small a while doth the hand of the Lord rest upon us, that Luther can- not get diminutives enough to extenuate it, for he calls it a very little cross that we bear, to mx.gov fiix.gov. The prophet in Isaiah xxvi. 20, saith the indignation doth not (transire) pass, but (pertransire) over- pass. The sharpness, shortness, and suddenness of it is set forth b}^
1 The Christian soldier shall ever be master of the day. Mori fiosse, vinci non pos^c, said Cyprian to Cornelius ; he may suffer death, but never conquest.
2 There are none of God's afflicted ones that have not their lucida intervalla, intermis- sions, respites, and breathing whiles, under their short and momentary afflictions. When God's hand is on thy back, let thy hand be on thy mouth, for though the afflic- tion be sharp, it shall be but short.
52 PRECIOUS REMEDIES [2 COR. II. 11.
the travail of a woman, John xvi. 21. And that is a sweet scripture, ' For ye have need of patience, that after ye have done the will of God, ye might receive the promise.' ' For yet a little while, he that shall come will come, and will not tarry,' Heb. x. 36, 37. Tantillum tan- t ilium adhuc inisillum. A little, little, little while.1
When Athanasius's friends came to bewail him, because of his misery and banishment, he said, ' It is but a little cloud, and will quickly be gone.'2 It will be but as a day before God will give his attficted ones beauty for ashes, the oil of gladness for the spirit of heaviness ; before he will turn all your sighing into singing, all your lamentations into consolations, your sackcloth into silks, ashes into ointments, and your fasts into everlasting feasts, &c.
Remedy (4). The fourth remedy against this device of Satan, is seriously to consider, That the afflictions that do befall the saints are such as proceed from God's dearest love* ' As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten,' Rev. iii. 19. Saints, saith God, think not that I hate you, because I thus chide you. He that escapes re- prehension may suspect his adoption. God had one Son without corruption, but no son without correction. A gracious soul may look through the darkest cloud, and see a God smiling on him. We must look through the anger of his correction to the sweetness of his couutenance ; and as by the rainbow we see the beautiful image of the sun's light in the midst of a dark and waterish cloud.
When Munster lay sick, and his friends asked him how he did and how he felt himself, he pointed to his sores and ulcers, whereof he was full, and said, ' These are God's gems and jewels, wherewith he decketh his best friends, and to me they are more precious than all the gold and silver in the world.' A soul at first conversion is but rough cast ; but God by afflictions doth square and fit, and fashion it for that glory above, which doth speak them out to flow from precious love ; therefore the afflictions that do attend the people of God should be no bar to holiness, nor no motive to draw the soul to ways of wickedness. Remedy (.5). The fifth remedy against this device of Satan is, solemnly to consider, That it is our duty and glory not to measure afflictions by the smart but by the end. When Israel was dismissed out of Egypt, it was with gold and ear-rings, Exod. xi. 3 ; so the Jews were dismissed out of Babylon with gifts, jewels, and all necessary utensils, Ezrai. 7-11. Look more at the latter end of a Christian than the beginning of his affliction. Consider the patience of Job, and what end the Lord made with him. Look not upon Lazarus lying at Dives's door, but lying in Abraham's bosom. Look not to the beginning of Joseph, who was so far from his dream, that the sun and moon should reverence him, that for two years he was cast Avhere he could see neither sun, moon, nor stars ; but behold him at last made ruler over Egypt. Look not upon David, as there was but a step between him and death, nor as he was envied by some, and slighted and 1 'En yao fLiKpov oto» eVov. ' Nubecula est, cito transibit. — Athanasii/s.
;i Austin asketli, Si amatur quo modo infirmatur, If lie were beloved, how came be to be sick? So are wicked men apt to say, because they know not that corrections aro pledges of our adoption, and badges of our Sonship. God had one Sou without sin, but none without sorrow. — [Augustine on Rev. iii. 19. — G ]