Secondly, We come to the persons that managed the temptation, the wicked : ' The wicked have laid a snare for me.'
Doct. It is the property of a wicked heart to plot and lay snares for the mischief and ruin of others, especially God's people. David saith here, ' The wicked have laid snares for me,'
1. It is a deliberate, voluntary sin ; and the more will and advised- ness in any sin, the greater it is. Laying of snares is not a thing done in passion, but in cool blood ; there is art and cunning in it, and the heart dwelleth long upon it. The will sets the wit a-work, to weave the net and frame the device. Involuntarium minuit de ratione peccati — when a thing is involuntary it lesseneth sin ; a man may be overtaken with a fault, Gal. vi. 1. But when he studieth it, it is much the worse. God's children are surprised through unwariness, and made to stumble in a fit of temptation ; but when men's wits are bended to project and plot sin, it is not an infirmity but an iniquity : Prov. vi. 14, ' Frowardness is in his heart ; he deviseth mischief con- tinually, he soweth discord.' It is the description of a naughty heart ; so the prophet, Micah ii. 1, 'Woe to them that devise iniquity, and work evil upon their beds : when the morning is light, they practise it, because it is in the power of their hands.' Their wickedness is pre- meditated, then woe to them.
2. It is a sign that evil is connatural to them, when they are plotting,
132 SERMONS uroN PSALM cxix. [Ser, CXX.
as poison is to a spider ; they are always \vorkin<; it, never out of their way by night and by day, their hearts rnn upon it: Prov. iv. 16, ' Whenever ihey are abroad, they sleep not unless they have done mischief, and their sleep is taken away unless they cause some to fall.' Then when others cannot rest, they examine themselves. Ps. iv. 4, ' Commune with your hearts upon your beds.' When our reins should instruct us, and suggest wholesome thoughts to us, Ps. xvi. 7; or when we should direct our prayer to God in the morning, Ps. v. 3, then they employ their thoughts and musings on evil. The apostle maketh it to be their disposition that are given up by God to ii reprobate sense, to be ' inventors of evil things/ Rom. i. 30.
3. They that plot evil, they are of the devil's trade, whose work it is to hurt and mischief those who are broken loose from him ; it is his business to lay snares : 2 Tim. ii. 20, ' And that they may recover themselves out of the snare of the devil, who are taken captive by him at his will.' When Judas plotteth against Christ, the devil entereth into him. So Acts xiii. 10, it is said to Elymas the sorcerer, ' 0 thou full of all subtlety and mischief, the child of the devil.' They are like the devil in tlieir hatred of God and the truth, and the persecution of the church, and like him for subtlety and politic contrivance. Bloody designs and inventions are the venom and poison of the old serpent sunk into men's hearts; there are both cruelty and lying: John viii. 44, ' Ye are of 3'our father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do : he was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him : when he speaketli a lie, he speaketli of his own ; for he is a liar, and the father of it.'
4. It is a sin contrary to the love of God and man, against double light and double obligations, from both the tables : grace and natui'e €ondemneth it. It is against God, for if we did love him, we would love his image; the saints that are so near and dear to him, they are ' his jewels,' j\Ial. iii. 17 ; they cost him dear ; he gave an infinito price ibr them, the blood of Christ : they are the apple of his eye ; to strike at them is to strike at God himself. And it is against man ; if I'easons of givace do not restrain such, yet reasons of nature should. To plot mischief against one that is of the same nature with us, natural light will teach us we should do as we would be done by. Oh ! what a cruel creature is man to man, when God lets him alone to the sway of his own heart and natural fierceness !
5. It is contrary to the gentleness and simplicity of the Christian religion. Christian religion is a simple and harmless thing : Phil. ii. 15, ' That ye be holy and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation;' 2 Cor. 1. 12, ' This is our rejoicing, that in simplicity and godly sincerity we have bad our conversation in the world.' It is a sign men have drunk in a false religion when their spirits are efferated, and grow monsters in wickedness. Men addicted to false worship are subtle and cruel ; subtle, for where there is real worth theie is no dissimulation ; they carry things open and fair; they have a God and conscience to bear them out, and this is worth all the world ; and if things do not suit to their minds, they can tarry God's leisure, without base and creeping acts, and underhand designs and machinations 5