1. And that choice part of mankind, the first-fruits and excellency of the rest, which we call the church, more than others; which appears by con- sideration both of the head, the body, and members of the church. For the head Christ, he took our flesh as it was subject to misery after the faU, and was, in regard of that which he endured, both in life and death, a man of sorrows.
2. Yoxih.ebody, the church, it may say from the first to the last, as it is, Ps. cxxix. 1, * From my youth up they have afflicted me.' The church be- gan in blood, hath grown up by blood, and shall end in blood, as it was redeemed by blood.
8. For the members, they are aU predestinated to a conformity to Christ their head, as in grace and glory, so in abasement, Rom. viii. 29. Neither is it a wonder for those that are bom soldiers to meet with conflicts, for travellers to meet with hard usage, for seamen to meet with storms, for strangers in a strange country, especially amongst their enemies, to meet with strange entertainment.
A Christian is a man of another world, and here from home, which he
* ' Hath,' in C.
THE soul's conflict. 133
would forget, if lie were not exercised here, and would take his passage for his country. But though all Christians agree and meet in this, that ' through many afflictions we must enter into heaven,' Acts xiv. 22, yet according to the diversity of place, parts, and grace, there is a different cup measured to every one.
Use. And therefore it is but a plea of the flesh, to except against the cross, ' never was poor creature distressed as I am.' This is but self-love, for was it not the case both of head, body, and members, as we see here in David a principal member ? when he was brought to this case, thus to reason the matter with himself, ' Whj art thou cast down, 0 my soul ? and why art thou disquieted within me ? '
Obs. 2. From the frame of David's spirit under these troubles, we may observe, that as the case is thus with all God's people, to be exercised with troubles, they are sensible of them oftentimes, even to castinrj doivn and dis- couraging. And the reason is (1), they are flesh and blood, subject to the same passions, and made of the same mould, subject to the same impressions from without as other men. And (2) their natm'e is upheld with the same supports and refreshings as others, the withdrawing and want of which affecteth them. And (3) besides those troubles they sufier in common with other men, by reason* of their new advancement and their new disposition they have in and from Christ their head, they are more sensible in a pecu- liar manner of those troubles that any way touch upon that blessed con- dition, from a new life they have in and from Christ ; which will better appear if we come more particularly to a discovery of the more special causes of this distemper, some of which are, 1. Without us. 2. Some within us.
Chapter IE. — Of Discouragements from without.
I. Outward causes of discouragement.
1. God himself: who sometimes withdraws the beams of his countenance from his children, whereupon the soul even of the strongest Christian is disquieted ; when together with the cross, God himself seems to be an enemy unto them. The child of God, when he seeth that his troubles are mixed with God's displeasure, and perhaps his conscience teUs him that God hath a just quarrel against him, because he hath not renewed his peace with his God, then this anger of God puts a sting into all other troubles, and adds to the disquiet. There were some ingredients of this divine temptation, as we call it, in holy David at this time ; though most properly a divine tempta- tion be, when God appears unto us as an enemy, without any special guilt of any particular sin, as in Job's case.
And no marvel if Christians be from hence disquieted, whenas the Son of God himself, having always enjoyed the sweet commvmion with his Father, and now feeling an estrangement, that he might be a curse for us, com- plained in all his torments of nothing else, but * My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me ? Matt, xxvii. 46. It is with the godly in this case as with vapours drawn up by the sun, which, when the extracting force of the sun leaves them, fall down again to the earth from whence they are drawn. So when the soul, raised up and upheld by the beams of his countenance, is left of God, it presently begins to sink. "We see when the body of the sun is partly hid from us, for totally it cannot, in an eclipse by the body of the moon, that there is a drooping in the whole frame of nature; * ' By reason,' added in B.
134 ■ THE soul's conflict.
so it is in the soul, wlien there is anything that comes between God's gracious countenance and it.
2. Besides, if we look down to inferior causes, the soul is oft cast do'\vn by Satan, who is all for casting down, and for disquieting. For being a cursed spirit, cast and tumbled down himself from heaven, where he is never to come again, [he] is hereupon full of disquiet, carrying a hell about himself; whereupon all that he labours for is to cast down and disquiet others, that theymay be, as much as he can procure, in the same cursed condition with himself. He was not ashamed to set upon Christ himself with this tempta- tion of casting down, and thinks Christ's members never low enough, till he can bring them as low as himself.