Book I, Part 2, Chapter 9. Of the eighth Privilege of Virtue, viz. the inward Peace and Calm the Virtuous enjoy, and of the miserable Restlessness and Disturbance the Wicked feel within themselves

1. From this privilege just mentioned, which is the liberty of the sons of God, Hows another, nothing inferior to it, which is the inward peace and tranquillity they enjoy For the better un-

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derstanding whereof, it is to be observed, there are three sorts of peace, one with our neighbor, another with God, and the third with ourselves. Peace with our neighbors consists in such a friendly and civil correspondence with them, as banishes all design or desire of doing any man a prejudice. This peace David had when he says, " I was peaceable with those that hated peace, and when I spoke to them with meekness, they, without any reason, rose up against me ;" Ps. cxix. 7. St. Paul recommends this same peace to us, when he advises us to " use our utmost endeavors, as far as is possible, to live in peace with all men ;" Rom. xii. 18. The second peace, which is that with God, consists in the friendship and favor of God ; it is to be obtained by the means of justification, which reconciles man to God, and makes them both love one another without any disturbance or contradiction on either side. The apostle, speaking of this peace, says, " Since we are already justified by faith through Jesus Christ our Lord, who has procured us this grace, let us live in peace with God ;" Rom. v. 1. The last peace is that which a man has with himself; nor ought any one to wonder at this kind of peace, since we know very well, that there are in the very self-same man, two men so opposite to one another, as are the outward and the inward, the flesh and the spirit, the passions and reason. For the flesh and the passions are not only always at variance with the spirit, but besides disturb the whole man with their irregular appetites, and trouble his inward peace, which consists in tranquillity of mind.

§ 1. Of the inward Restlessness and Disquiet of the Wicked. — 2. Wicked men, and such as hearken to the persuasions of the flesh, are never free from such disturbances as these. For being, on the one hand, deprived of God's grace, which is the curb to keep their passions in awe, and on the other, their desires being so active and unruly, that they are scarce able to resist them in the least thing imaginable, it necessarily follows, that they must be carried away by an infinite number of opposite desires, some by that of honor, others of great employments, others of conversation and friendship, others of great and honorable titles, others of riches, others, again, of success in marriage, and others of recreations and pleasures. For this appetite is like a devouring fire that consumes whatever it catches hold of, or like a ravenous beast that is never satisfied, or like the leech that is perpetually thirsting after blood ; and which, as Solomon says, " has two daughters that are always crying out, More yet, more yet ;" Prov. xxx. 15. This leech is nothing but the insatiable desire of the heart, and her two children are necessity and concupiscence. The first of them seems to be a true thirst, but the last is only a false one, though they are both of them equally troublesome, notwithstanding our supposing one to be a real, the other but a pretended necessity. This is the reason why no wicked man, whether he be rich or poor, can ever enjoy content : for if he be poor, when want is continually disturbing his heart, and crying out, " More yet, more yet ;" whilst concupiscence never ceases to break the rich man's rest with the same noise. How then can man enjoy any ease that has two such importunate beggars always making a noise at his door, and craving many things he is not able to give them ? What trouble must a poor mother be in, who has ten or a dozen of children around her, continually crying for bread, if she has not a morsel to give them ? This is one of the greatest miseries the wicked endure : " They perish," says the psalmist, " with hunger and thirst, and their souls fail within them:" Ps. xxxvi. 5. For self-love, the cause of all these desires, having got so much power over them, and they placing all their happiness in earthly riches and pleasures, it is impossible they should not, with greediness, hunger and thirst after those things on which they imagine all their happiness depends. And because they cannot always obtain what they long for, being prevented by others more covetous and powerful, they disturb themselves like a fro ward child that longs for every thing it sees, and grows sullen if denied it. For as the obtaining of our wish is, according to the wise man, " the tree of life" (Ps. xiii. 12) ; so there is nothing in the world torments us worse, than to be disappointed of what we have a mind for. It is just like being ready to die for hunger, and having nothing to eat. But what is worst of all, the more they are hindered from obtaining their desires, the more they increase, and as they find they have less hopes left, they are more vexed and troubled ; so they are continually turned about like a wheel that is in perpetual motion.

3. This is the miserable condition our Saviour expresses so much to the life, by the parable of the prodigal son (Luke xv.), of whom he says, that, leaving his father's house, he travelled into a far country, and there squandered away his estate in riot and debauchery ; and when he had spent all, there happened to be a great famine in those parts, during which he was reduced to that extremity as to be obliged to look after swine ; and, what is still more, he was put to such straits as to desire to fill his belly with what the hogs themselves lived on, and yet nobody would give him even that. Could any one lay out the whole course of a wicked man's life, with all the miseries that attend it, in more lively colors than these ? Who can this prodigal son be, that leaves his father's house, but the unhappy sinner, who separates himself from Almighty God, gives himself over to .all sorts of vices and abuses all God's favors and mercies ? What is this country, where there is so great a famine, but this miserable world, where worldly men are so insatiable in their desires as never to be satisfied with what they have, but are perpetuallv 21 02 running up and down like ravenous wolves, still seeking after more? And what can you imagine is the employment of their whole lives, but feeding of hogs, that is, laboring how to content their own swinish appetites? If you are not convinced of this truth, observe a very young man, who is wholly intent on the world from morning till night, and you will see that all his business is, beast-like, to find out new wrays to please and delight some one or more of his senses, as the sight, the taste, the hearing, or the rest, as if he were one of Epicurus's followers, and not a disciple of Jesus Christ, as if he had nothing else to look after but a body like a beast, and as if he believed that sensual pleasures were his only end. Thus his whole entertainment is to run from place to place, here to-day, and there to-morrow, in pursuit of fresh delights for the indulging of his senses. What other end can he have in his gallantry, in his feasting and banqueting, in his soft beds, in his music, in his conversations, in his visits, in his walks, but to look after meat for this sort of swine ? You may give all this what name you please, call it grandeur or good breeding, if you will, but know that, in the language of God and of the gospel, it is nothing but feeding of swine ; because, as hogs love to be wallowing in the dirt and mire, so the hearts of such men love nothing but the filth of carnal pleasures.

4. But the greatest misery is, to see that the son of such a noble father, born to be fed with the bread of angels at God's own table, cannot satisfy his hunger with such vile food, so great is the scarcity of it ; because there being so many buyers of this commodity, they hinder one another, and so they all go away unsatisfied. My meaning is, that whilst so many are catching at it, there must need be much strife, as it is impossible for swine to feed under an oak, without grunting and biting one another to get a better share of the acorns that fall.

This is the dreadful hunger holy David describes, wThere he says, "They have wandered up and down in the wilderness in a dry place, hungering and thirsting, till they wrere just ready to drop down ;" Ps. cvi. 45. What can this extreme hunger and thirst be, but the inordinate desire of the things of this wTorld the wicked are inflamed with ? This appetite of theirs is such, that the more they give it, the greedier it grows, the more it drinks, the drier it is, and the more wTood they lay on, the more violent it burns. O unhappy creatures, what can be the cause of your being parched up with such a burning thirst as this, " but your having forsaken the fountain of living water, and running to drink out of broken cisterns, which can hold none V Jer. ii. 13. You have mistaken the stream of true happiness, and for this reason you run up and down, till you lose yourselves through wild and desert places, in search of the muddy pond and lakes of the perishable goods of this world, in hopes they will quench your thirst. This was cruel Holofernes's policy, when he besieged Bethulia ; for as soon as ever he sat clown before the city, he commanded his men to cut off all the pipes and channels that conveyed water to the town, so that the poor besieged had but a few little springs left, just by the walls, where they used to drink now and then by stealth, rather wetting their lips than quenching their thirst. Is not this your case, you, who are always seeking after pleasures, you, who are perpetually in pursuit of honor, and who are such friends to every thing that pleases the appetite, for having missed of the fountain of living waters ? What else do you but run to the little springs of creatures, that come in your way, and rather serve to wet your lips and increase your thirst than to quench it ? O unfortunate man ! " Why will you go into Egypt to drink troubled water?" Jer. ii. 18. What water can be more troubled than sensual pleasure, which is not to be drank without perceiving an ungrateful taste and smell ? For what worse smell than the stench of sin, and what more unpalatable than the remorse of conscience occasioned by it, which, as we are told, even by a philosopher, are both the inseparable companions of carnal pleasures ?

5. Besides, this appetite being blind, and unable to distinguish between what it can obtain and what it cannot, and the eagerness of desire making that appear very easy which is in itself most difficult, those things are often coveted that cannot be obtained; for there is nothing worth coveting, but what is much sought after and defended by many lovers. Now the appetite being deprived of what it longs for, being hungry and wanting whereon to feed, often stretching out its arms, and yet grasping nothing but the air, and using all endeavors without any success, therefore, it frets inwardly, wastes and consumes to see itself so far from what it desires. For those two chief faculties of our souls, the irascible and concupiscible, being so closely united together as never to be wanting to one another, it is certain that whatever the concupiscible is frustrated of its desire, the irascible comes in immediately to relieve it, raging and exposing itself to all accidents and dangers, that it may give the other satisfaction From this confusion of desires proceeds the inward disturbance we are now speaking of, which St. James calls a war when he says, From whence come wars and differences among you ? Come they not hence even of your lusts, that war in your members ? Yi lust and have not. Jam. iv. 1, 2. The natural contradiction that is between the flesh and spirit, and between the desires of each, has given the apostle a great deal of reason to call it a war.

6. There is still another thing of this nature much to be lamented, which is, that very often men obtain all that seemed to suffice to put them into the state of satisfaction they aimed at, and when they are in such a condition that, if they pleased, they might live happy, they then conceit they ought to aspire to some other honor, preferment, dignity, or the like, which if they fail of, they are more perplexed for the miss of that nothing they want, than pleased with the enjoyment of all they possess. Thus they pass their lives with this thorn perpetually pricking, or rather with this scourge continually chastising them, which palls all their happiness, and turns their pleasure into smoke and vapor. This is what I call nailing up the cannon, as enemies do in time of war ; for a little nail driven into the biggest piece of artillery is enough to make it unfit for service. The cannon is still as big and as sound as it was before, and yet such a little thing makes it lose all its force. God deals after the same manner with the wicked. They might see plainly, if they would but open their eyes, that joy of heart is a free gift of Almighty God, who bestows it on whom he pleases and when he pleases, without making any preparation beforehand as we do, and that he can take it away again whenever he thinks fit, only by nailing up the cannon, that is, by permitting some unhappy turn or change of their prosperity and fortune. And then this single misfortune, though unknown to any one, is sufficient to make them as uneasy and melancholy as if they had nothing in this world to live on, though, at the same time, they may be very rich and happy in all appearance. God himself tells us as much, when, speaking by the prophet Isaias, against the pride and power of the king of Assyria, he says, That he will weaken his greatest force, and put fire under his glory, for to burn it up (Isa. x. 6), to show us, that God can sink a vessel when it sails with the fairest wind, can weaken the greatest strength, and make a man miserable in the midst of his prosperity. The same is signified to us again in the book of Job (xxvi. 5), where it is said, The giants groan under the waters, to let us know that God has his deep places and his punishments for the great as well as for the little ones, though these seem to lie more open to the misfortunes and injuries of the world. But Solomon has expressed the same thing much plainer ; wrhen counting up all the notable miseries in the world, he reckons this one of the greatest of them : There is anothe? evil also, says he, which I have seen under the su?i, and which is common amongst men: a man to whom God has given wealth, riches and honor, so that he wanted nothing for his soul of all that he desireth, yet God giveth him not power to eat thereof, but a stranger eateth it; Eccl. vi. 1, 2. What does he mean by these words, God giveth him not power to eat thereof, but that he shall not enjoy even what is his own, nor take the satisfaction and pleasure which his possessions might give him, because God has ordained that his happiness shall be disturbed and ruined ? And here we are given to understand, that as true ■wisdom is not to be learned by dead letters, but that it is God who teaches it, so neither does true content depend on the goods of this world, but on God alone. -

7. But to come home to our subject, how unhappy must those poor creatures be who have nothing, if even those who enjoy all they can wish are so uneasy, because they do not enjoy God ! For the want of every one of these things is a particular hunger and thirst, that torments them, and a thorn that is perpetually pricking their hearts: what peace, what quiet is it possible for a soul to have, when all its thoughts and desires are continually so importunate and-rebellious ? The prophet says very well of such sort of people, " That the heart of the wicked is like a tempestuous sea, which is not to be calmed;" Isa. lvii. 20. And, indeed, what sea, what waves, or what winds can be more boisterous and stormy than the passions and desires of the wicked, which very often disturb not only the sea, but all the world? But there often start up contrary winds in this sea, which is another most violent sort of storm. For the same desires, like opposite winds, frequently resist one another, so that what pleases the flesh does not please honor, what honor loves, riches do not care for ; reputation does not covet that which is agreeable to wealth, nor does sloth or luxury desire what reputation does. So that by this means it often happens, that the wicked, whilst they desire all things, do not know what they would have, and so are ignorant what to take and what to leave, because their desires contradict one another , just as bad humors do in distempers which proceed from different causes, where the physicians are puzzled what remedy to prescribe, because that which is good for the expelling of one humor may be apt to nourish another. Such was the confusion of languages at Babel, and such was that, for the preventing of which the royal prophet prayed to God, saying, " Destroy, O Lord, and divide their tongues, because I have beheld iniquity and contradiction in the city;" Ps. liv. 10. What, therefore, can this division of tongues, this iniquity and this contradiction be, but the disturbance which different passions make in the hearts of worldly-minded men when they oppose one another, and one desires that which is against the inclination and desire of another ?

§ II. Of the inward Peace and Satisfaction good Men enjoy — 8. Thus you see what the condition of the wicked is, whilst, the just, on the contrary, because they know how with prudence to moderate their desires, how to mortify their passions, how to make God, and not the perishable goods of this life, the only object of their happiness, and the centre of their repose; how to aim at nothing but the acquiring of those eternal goods, which no one can deprive them of, how to be in perpetual war with self-love, with their own flesh, and with the whole train of their irregular appetites; and because, in fine, they know how to resign their will to God's, to conform theirs to his, and throw themselves entirely into his arms, are never molested by any such cares, so as to have their inward peace lost, or so much as interrupted.

This, amongst several others, is one of the chief rewards Almighty God promises to those who love him, as we may see almost every where in the Holy Scriptures. Holy David says, " Those that love thy law, O Lord, enjoy a perfect peace, and there is nothing that can make them fall ;" Ps. cxviii. 165. God himself says by the prophet Isaias, " I wish you had observed my commandments, your peace should have been like a river, and your justice like the waters of the sea ;" Isa. xlviii. 18. The reason of his calling this peace a river is, because it is able to extinguish the flames of our desires, to appease the burning heat of our lusts, to water the dry and barren veins of our hearts, and to comfort and refresh our souls. Solomon assures us of the same truth in a divine manner, though in a few words, saying, "When the ways of man are acceptable to God, he will force even his enemies to make peace with him ;" Prov. xvi. 7. What enemies are these, that are at war with man, but his own passions, and the evil inclinations of his flesh, which are perpetually fighting with the spirit ? The Almighty, therefore, says, that he will make the flesh and the spirit live peaceably together, when, by virtue of this grace and of good habits, the flesh, with all its desires, shall accustom itself to the works of the spirit, and by that means live quietly with it, whereas before it was in continual opposition. For though virtue, at the beginning, meets with a great deal of opposition from the passions, yet when it comes to its perfection, it acts with a deal of sweetness and ease, and with much less contradiction. It is this peace, in fine, wThich holy David, by another name, calls the enlarging of the heart, when he says, " Thou hast enlarged my steps under me, O Lord, and my feet have not failed me ;" Ps. xvii. 37. The prophet by these words intends to show, how different the way of the virtuous is from that of the wricked, because whilst the one walk with their hearts oppressed and straitened by continual fears, solicitudes and apprehensions, like a traveller that is going through a narrow path, with steep rocks and precipices on both sides of him, the others, on the contrary, walk with a deal of security and joy, like a man in a plain and open way, that is in no apprehension of falling. The just understand this better by the practice than by theory, as being sensible, by their own experience, and the alteration they find in their own hearts, of the vast difference there is between the time they employed in the service of the world, and what they spend now in the service of God ; for whilst they

THE SINNER S GUIDE r's GUIDE. 107 served in the world, they were on all occasions full of troubles, solicitudes, jealousies, fears and narrowness of heart; but now they have forsaken the world, and fixed their affections on eternal goods, and placed all their happiness and confidence in God, they are out of the reach of all these things, with hearts so open, so free, and so resigned to the will of God, that they are so often astonished at the change, and cannot think themselves the same they were before, or at least they imagine they have new hearts, because they find such changes in them. And we may with truth affirm, that they are, and are not, the same persons, for, though they be the same in nature, they are not the same as to grace, which works this change, though no man can be assured of it.

9. This is what God himself promised by his prophet Isaias, when he said, " When you shall go through the waters I will be with you, to save you from being drowned ; and if you walk in the very midst of fire, you shall not be burned, nor shall the flame so much as scorch you ;" Isa. xliii. 2. Now what are these waters but the rivers of tribulations we suffer in this life, and the deluge of innumerable miseries we meet with here every day ? And what is this fire but the heat of our flesh, which is the fiery furnace of Babylon, heated by Nabuchodonosor's servants, that is, by the devils, from whence the flames of inordinate passions and appetites are continually breaking out ? How can any man live in the midst of this fire and water, which the whole world is perpetually in danger of, without receiving hurt, and not be sensible, at the same time, that it was the presence of the Holy Ghost, and the assistance of God's grace, that preserved him ? This is the peace which, as the apostle says, exceeds all imagination (Philip, iv. 6), because it is so noble and so supernatural a gift of God, that it is impossible for man's weak understanding to conceive of itself, by what means a heart of flesh should come to enjoy such content, such quiet and such a calm, amidst the storms and tempests of the world.

10. But he who enjoys this favor acknowledges and praises the author of these wonders, crying out with the prophet, " Come and see the works of the Lord, and the miracles he has wrought upon the earth, making war cease to the very remotest parts of the earth. He has snapped the bow and broken the arms, and thrown the shield in the fire, saying, Throw down your arms, and live in peace and quiet, that so you may know, that I am the Lord, and will be exalted in heaven and in earth." Ps. xlv. 9, 103 11. This being so, what can there be in the world more rich, more delightful, and more desirable, than this rest, this repose, this effusion and extension of heart, and this most happy peace ?

11. But if you will go a little further, and would know from what cause this heavenly gift proceeds, I answer, it proceeds from all those other privileges and advantages of virtue we have before mentioned ; for as, in the chain of vice, the links are all one within another, so in the ladder of virtue they have all a dependence on, and connection with, one another, in such a manner, that the highest, as it produces most fruit, so it has most roots to spring from. And thus this happy peace, which is one of the twelve fruits of the Holy Ghost, takes its rise from those other privileges wTe have before spoken of, but particularly from virtue itself, whose inseparable companion it is. For as an outward reverence is naturally due to virtue, so is an inward tranquillity, being at the same time its effect and its reward. For since inward war, according to what we have already said, is begun by the pride and disturbance of the passions ; as soon as ever they are weakened by those virtues, whose duty it is to subdue them, the very occasions of these tumults and seditions are removed. And this is one of the three things, by means whereof we partake of the happiness of the kingdom of heaven, even here on earth. The apostle, speaking of them, says, " The kingdom of God is not meat and drink, but justice, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost" (Rom. xiv. 17.) ; where, by justice, according to the Hebrew way of speaking, is to be understood the very same virtue wTe are talking of; in which, together with these two admirable fruits, peace and joy in the Holy Ghost, consists the felicity which virtuous men enjoy, by anticipation, in this life. And to prove that this peace is an effect of virtue, the Almighty himself says expressly, by Isaias, " Peace shall be the work of justice and silence, and everlasting security the fruit of it ; my people shall sit in the beauty of peace, and in the tabernacles of confidence, and in a plentiful rest , Isa. xxxii. 17, 18. What he calls here silence, is nothing else but this same inward peace ; that is, the repose of the passions, which disturb the silence of the soul, by the perpetual clamors of their irregular lusts.

12. The second cause this peace proceeds from is, the liberty of the soul, and the dominion it has over the passions above spoken of. For just as when any country is brought under a foreign subjection, as soon as ever the inhabitants surrender themselves, there is a general peace immediately, and every one sits under his own fig-tree and under his own vine, without any fear of the enemy ; so after the passions of the soul, which are the causes of all its disquiets, are subjected to reason, there immediately follows in the soul an inward silence and peace, which makes it live free from all disturbances imaginable. So that man being now free from their tyranny, and, what is more, keeping them in subjection to him, there is nothing left to disturb the peace he enjoys, though, on the contrary, wThilst the passions had the rule and power, every thing was tossed up and down, and the w7hole man in general confusion and disorder.

13. The third cause of this peace is the greatness of these

THE SINNER spiritual consolations, that lull asleep all the affections of our appetites, which, during that time, are content with what the superior part of the soul is pleased to give them, because the concupiscible appetite, after having tasted how sovereignly sweet and delightful God is, makes him the object of all its wishes, and the irascible is quiet, because its companion is satisfied ; and the whole man enjoys an entire peace and happiness, on account of his tasting the sovereign good.

14. In the fourth place, this peace proceeds from the testimony and inward joy of a good conscience, which makes the soul of a just man easy and quiet, though it does not give him any perfect assurance, for fear of making him negligent, and putting him in danger of losing that holy fear which puts him forward.

15. Lastly, this peace proceeds from the confidence just men have in Almighty God. It is this particularly, that gives them the greatest joy and comfort imaginable, even amidst the miseries of this life, because it is the very anchor they trust to, that is to say, because they assure themselves, that they have God for their Father, their Deliverer, their Defender, and their Shield, under whose protection they live in peace and happiness, and have all the reason that can be to sing with the prophet, " I will lay me down and sleep in peace, because thou, O Lord, hast secured me in a particular manner, by the hope which I have in thy mercy ;" Ps. iv. It is from this hope, that the peace of the just springs, and in this they find a remedy for all their evils. How then can any man be troubled, who has so powerful a protector as his God ?