178 CAUSES, WAYS, AND MEANS, ETC. [BOOK VI., PART II.
minds' acting towards them is here presented unto us ; compassion of their present state, and fear of their future ruin, we ought to be possessed with and acted by. But how few are they who are so framed and minded towards them, especially to such as by their enor- mous errors seem to be fallen into the fire of God's displeasure! Anger, wrath, fury, contempt, towards such persons, men think to be their duty; more contrivances there are usually how they may be temporally destroyed than how they may be eternally saved. But such men profess the truth as it were by chance. They never knew what it is to learn it aright, nor whence the knowledge of it is to be received, nor were ever under its power or conduct. Our proper work is to save such persons, what lies in us, " pulling them out of the fire." Duties of difficulty and danger unto ourselves may be re- quired hereunto. It is easier, if we had secular power with us, to thrust men into temporal fire for their errors than to free them from eternal fire by the truth. But if we were governed by compassion for their souls and fear of their ruin, as it is our duty to be, we would not decline any office of love required thereunto.
[3.] Hath God led us into the truth, hath he kept us from every false way? — it is evident that we have abundant cause of gratitude and fruitfulness. It is a condition more desperate than that of the most pernicious errors, to "hold the truth in unrighteousness;" and as good not know the Lord Jesus Christ as to be barren in the knowledge of him. It is not, we see, of ourselves, that we either know the truth, or love it, or abide in the profession of it. We have nothing of this kind but what we have received. Humility in ourselves, use- fulness towards others, and thanhfidness unto God, ought to be the effects of this consideration.
This is the first general cause of men's misapprehension of the mind and will of God as revealed in the Scripture. The revelation itself is plain, perspicuous, and full of light; but this "light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehendeth it not." The natural darkness and blindness which is in the minds of men, with the vanity and instability which they are attended with, causeth them to wrest the Scriptures unto their own destruction. And for this sort of men to complain, as they do horribly in the Papacy, of the obscurity of the Scripture, is all one as if a company of blind men should cry out of an eclipse of the sun when he shineth in his full strength and glory. How this darkness is removed and taken away by the effec- tual operation of the Holy Spirit in our illumination, I have else- where at large discoursed.
2. Corrupt affections prevalent in the minds of men do hinder them from a right understanding of the mind of God in the Scrip- ture; for hereby are they effectually inclined to wrest and pervert
CHAP. V.] CAUSES OF SPIRITUAL IGNORANCE. 1 79
the truth, or are filled with prejudices against it. This is the next cause of all ignorance and error, where we must seek for the parti- cular causes of them before proposed. The principal reason why the generality of men attain not a right understanding of the mind and will of God in the Scripture is, the corrupt affections that are pre- dominant in their own minds, whereby they are exposed unto all sorts of impressions and seductions from Satan and the agents for his kingdom and interest. So one apostle tells us that " unlearned and unstable men do wrest the Scripture, unto their own destruc- tion," 2 Pet. iii. 16; and another, that these unlearned and unsta- ble persons are " men of corrupt minds," 1 Tim. vi. 5 ; 2 Tim. iii. 8 ; — that is, such whose minds are peculiarly under the power of per- verse and corrupt affections: for these affections are ^iKy/iura ruv BiavoiZv, Eph. ii. 3, " the wills of the mind," such as carry it with an impetuous inclination towards their own satisfaction, and such as render it obstinate and perverse in its adherence thereunto. These are the root of that "fil thin ess and superfluity of naughtiness" which must be cast out before we can " receive with meekness the ingrafted word," James i. 21. Some few of them may be named: —
(1.) Pride, or carnal confidence in our own wisdom and ability of mind for all the ends of our duty towards God, and this in espe- cial of understanding his mind and will, either keeps the souls of men under the bondage of darkness and ignorance, or precipitates them into foolish apprehensions or pernicious errors. As spiritual pride is the worst sort of pride, so this is the worst degree of spiritual pride, namely, when men do not acknowledge God in these things as they ought, but lean unto their own understandings. This is that which ruined the Pharisees of old, that they could not understand the mind of God in any thing unto their advantage. It is the meek, the humble, the lowly in mind, those that are like little children, that God hath promised to teach. This is an eternal and unalterable law of God's appointment, that whoever will learn his mind and will as revealed in the Scripture must be humble and lowly, renouncing all trust and confidence in themselves. And whatever men of an- other frame do come to know, they know it not according to the mind of God, nor according to their own duty, nor unto their advantage. Whatever knowledge they may have, however conspicuous it may be made by their natural and acquired abilities, however it may be garnished with a mixture of secular literature, whatever contempt it may raise them unto of others, such as the Pharisees had of the people, whom they esteemed accursed because they knew not the law, yet they know nothing as they ought, nothing unto the glory of God, nothing to the spiritual advantage of their own souls. And wherein is their knowledge to be accounted of? Indeed, the knowledge of a