By drawing them to affect ignorance, and to neglect, slight, and despise the means of knowledge. Ignorance is the mother of mistake, the cause of trouble, error, and of terror ; it is the highway to hell, and it makes a man both a prisoner and a slave to the devil at once.3 Ig- Qorance unmans a man ; it makes a man a beast, yea, makes him more miserable than the beast that perisheth.4 There are none so easily nor so frequently taken in Satan's snares as ignorant souls. They arc easily drawn to dance with the devil all day, and to dream of supping with Christ at night, &c.
1 Humility is conservatrix virtutum, said Bernard, that which keeps all graces together.
1 The humble soul is like the violet, which grows low, hangs the head downwards, and hides itself with its own leaves ; and were it not that tho fragrant smell of his many virtues discovered him to the world, he would choose to live and die in his self-content- ing seen rv. 8 Ilosea iv. (i, Mat. xxii. 29.
4 Ignorants have this advantage, id mitius ardeant, they have a cooler hell.
2 Cor. II. 11.] against satan's devices. 137
Now the remedies against this device are these :
Remedy (1). The first remedy against this device of Satan is, seriously to consider, That an ignorant heart is an evil heart. * Without know- ledge the mind is not good/ Prov. xix. 2. As an ignorant heart is a naughty heart, it is a heart in the dark ; and no good can come into a dark heart, but it must pass through the understanding : ' And if the eye be dark, all the body is dark,' Mat. vi. 22. A leprous head and a leprous heart are inseparable companions. Ignorant hearts are so evil that they let fly on all hands, and spare not to spit their venom in the very face of God, as Pharaoh did when thick darkness was upon him.1
Remedy (2). The second remedy against this device of Satan is, to consider, That ignorance is the deformity of the sold. As blindness is the deformity of the face, so is ignorance the deformity of the soul. As the want of fleshly eyes spoils the beauty of the face, so the want of spiritual eyes spoils the beauty of the soul. A man without knowledge is as a workman without his hands, as a painter without his eyes, as a traveller without his legs, or as a ship without sails, or a bird without wings, or like a body without a soul.
Remedy (3). The third remedy against this device of Satan is, solemnly to consider, That ignorance makes men the objects of God's hatred and wroth. ' It is a people that do err in their hearts, and have not known my ways. Wherefore I sware in my wrath, they should never enter into my rest/ Heb. iii. 10, 11. ' My people are a people of no understanding, therefore he that made them will have no mercy on them,' Isa. xxvii. 11. Christ hath said, ' That he will come in flaming fire, to render vengeance on them that know not Go^/ 2 Thes. i. 8. Ignorance will end in vengeance. When you see a poor blind man here, you do not loathe him, nor hate him, but you pity him. Oh ! but soul-blindness makes you abominable in the sight of God. God hath sworn that ignorant persons shall never come into heaven. Heaven itself would be a hell to ignorant souls.2
' My people are destroyed for want of knowledge ; because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will reject thee,' Hosea, iv. 6 ; ["1NDXDX, cut off J.
Chilo, one of the seven sages, being asked what God had done, answered, 'He exalted humble men, and suppressed proud ignorant fools.3
Remedy (4). The fourth remedy against this device of Satan is, to consider, That ignorance is a sin that leads to all sins. All sins are seminal ly in ignorance. 'You do err, not knowing the Scriptures,' Mat. xxii. 29. It puts men upon hating and persecuting the saints. ' They shall hate you, and put you out of the synagogues : yea, the time cometh, that whosoever killeth you will think that he doth God service. And these things will they do unto you, because they have not known the Father, nor me/ John xvi. 2, 3. Paul thanks his ignorance for all his cruelties to Christians. ' I was a blasphemer, and a persecutor, and injurious : but I obtained mercy, because I did it
1 Ignorat sane improbus omnis, saith Aristotle.
2 They must needs err that know not God's ways, yet cannot they wander so wide as to miss of hell.
• 3 Rome saith, ignorance is the mother of devotion, hut the Scripture saith, it is the mother of destruction.
138 PRECIOUS REMEDIES [2 COR II 11.
ignorantly,' I Tim. i. 13.1 It was ignorance that put the Jews upcn crucifying Chrisl : ' Father, forgive them,' saith Christ of his murderers,
' for tiny know not what they do,' Luke xxiii. 34 : 'for if the princes of this world had known, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory,' 1 Cor. ii. <S.2 Sin at first was the cause of ignorance, but now ignorance is the cause of all sin. ' Swearing, and lying, and killing, and stealing, and whoring abound,' saith the prophet, 'because there is no knowledge of God in the land.' There are none so frequent, and so impudent in the ways of sin, as ignorant souls ; they care not, nor mind not what they do, nor what they say against God, Christ, heaven, holiness, and their own souls. 'Our tongues are our own, who shall control us ? They are corrupt, and speak wickedly concerning oppres- sion : they speak loftily. They set their mouth against the heavens ; and their tongue walketh through the earth. Have all the workers of iniquity no knowledge? who eat up my people as they eat bread, and call not upon the Lord ?'3 4
1 It seems right to note that the apostle does not allege his ignorance, for which he was responsible, as the ground of the 'mercy' shewn him, but only as the source and explanation of his sin and violence The clause, ' but I obtained mercy,' is parenthetic, and it is of importance to note this. — G.
2 Aristotle makes ignorance the mother of all the misrule in the world. 8 Ps. xiv. 4; lxxiii. 8, 9.
4 They did like CEdipus, who killed his father Laius, king of Thebes, and thought he killed his enemy. [Euripides, Phoen. '69. — G.]
2 COK. II. 11. J AGAINST SATAN'S DEVICES. 139
TOUCHING FIVE MORE OF SATAN'S DEVICES,
Whereby he keepeth poor souls from believing in Christ, from receiving of Christ, from embracing of Christ, from resting, leaning, or relying upon Christ, for everlasting happiness and blessedness, according to the gospel ; and remedies against these devices.