CHAPTER XVII.

_Of Satan’s subtlety in urging that of Ps. xci. 11, 12, to Christ.—Of his imitating the Spirit of God in various ways of teaching.—Of his pretending Scripture to further temptation.—The reasons of such pretendings, and the ends to which he doth abuse it.—Of Satan’s unfaithfulness in managing of scriptures.—Cautions against that deceit.—The ways by which it may be discovered._

The ways of Satan, hitherto insisted on, to engage Christ in this act of presumption, were secret insinuations and underhand contrivances: but that which he openly and expressly urged to this purpose, was an argument drawn from the promise of God, though sadly abused and misrepresented, ‘He shall give his angels charge concerning thee,’ &c. This we are next to consider, in which, as cited by him, we may easily see, (1.) That Satan affected an imitation of Christ, in the way of his resistance. Christ had urged Scripture before, and now Satan endeavours to manage the same weapon against him. (2.) It is observable that Scripture is the weapon that Satan doth desire to wield against him. In his other ways of dealing he was shy, and did but lay them in Christ’s way, offering only the occasion, and leaving him to take them up; but in this he is more confident, and industriously pleads it, as a thing which he could better stand to and more confidently avouch. (3.) The care of his subtlety herein, lay in the misrepresentation and abuse of it, as may be seen in these particulars: [1.] In that he urged this promise to promote a sinful thing, contrary to the general end of all Scripture, which was therefore written ‘that we sin not.’ [2.] But more especially in his clipping and mutilating of it. He industriously leaves out that part of it which doth limit and confine the promise of protection to lawful undertakings, such as this was not, and renders it as a general promise of absolute safety, be the action what it will. It is a citation from Ps. xci. 11, 12, which there runs thus, ‘He shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways.’ These last words, ‘in all thy ways,’ which doth direct to a true understanding of God’s intention in that promise, he deceitfully leaves out, as if they were needless and unnecessary parts of the promise, when indeed they were on purpose put there by the Spirit of God, to give a description of those persons and actions, unto whom, in such cases, the accomplishment of the promise might be expected; for albeit the word in the original, which is translated ‘ways’—דרכים—doth signify any kind of way or action in the general, yet in this place it doth not; for then God were engaged to an absolute protection of men, not only when they unnecessarily thrust themselves into dangers, but in the most abominably sinful actions whatsoever; which would have been a direct contradiction to those many scriptures wherein God threatens to withdraw his hand and leave sinners to the danger of their iniquities; but it is evident that the sense of it is no more than this, ‘God is with you, while you are with him.’ We have a paraphrase of this text, to this purpose, in Prov. iii. 23, ‘Then shalt thou walk in thy way safely, and thy foot shall not stumble:’ where the condition of this safety, pointed to in the word ‘then,’ which leads the promise, is expressly mentioned in the foregoing verses, ‘My son, let them’—that is, the precepts of wisdom—‘not depart from thine eyes.... Then’—not upon other terms—‘shalt thou walk in thy way safely.’ The ways then in this promise, cited by Satan, are the ways of duty, or the ways of our lawful callings. The fallacy of Satan in this dealing with Scripture is obvious, and Christ might have given this answer, as Bernard hath it, That God promiseth to keep him in his ways, but not in self-created dangers, for that was not his way, but his ruin; or if a way, it was Satan’s way, but not his.[428] (3.) To these two, some add another abuse, in a subtle concealment of the following verse in Ps. xci., ‘Thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder.’ This concerned Satan, whose cruelty and poisonous deceits were fitly represented by the lion and the adder, and there the promise is also explained to have a respect to Satan’s temptations—that is, God would so manage his protection, that his children should not be led into a snare.

Hence observe, _Obs._ 13. _That Satan sometimes imitates the Spirit of God by an officious pretence of teaching the mind of God to men._

This our adversary doth not always appear in one shape. Sometime he acts as a lion or dragon, in ways of cruelty and fierceness; sometimes as a filthy swine, in temptations to bestial uncleanness and sensual lusts; sometime he puts on the garb of holiness, and makes as if he were not a spiritual adversary, but a spiritual friend and counsellor. That this is frequent with him, the apostle tells us: 2 Cor. xi. 14, ‘Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light.’ Angels of light are those blessed spirits sent forth to minister for the good of the elect, whose ministry God useth not only for our preservation from bodily hurts, but also for prevention of sin and furtherance of duty. Satan, as wicked as he is, doth counterfeit that employment, and takes upon him to give advice for our good, pretending to teach us in the truth, or to direct and further us in our endeavours.[429]

That he designs an imitation of God and his Spirit, may be discovered by expressing a great many particulars of God’s ways and appointments, wherein Satan, as God’s ape, partly out of mockery and scorn, partly upon other grounds of advantage to his intendments, doth counterfeit the current coin of the Lord’s establishments by a very close imitation. But I shall here confine myself to the point of teaching and instruction, wherein how he proceeds, we shall the better understand by considering how many ways God hath of old, and now still doth use in declaring his mind to his people. The sum of all we have, Heb. i. 12. Heretofore he signified his mind in ‘divers manners’ by the prophets, and ‘in these last days by his Son,’ in all which we shall trace the steps of Satan.

(1.) First, _God revealed himself sometime by voice_; as to Abraham, Moses, and others. The devil hath dared to imitate this. There want not instances of it; in the temptation, which is now under explanation, he did so; and his confessing Christ, ‘I know thee who thou art,’ [Mat. i. 24,] &c., doth shew that he is ready enough to do it at any time for advantage. Sprenger tells us a story of the devil’s preaching to a congregation in the habit and likeness of a priest, wherein he reproved sin, and urged truth, and seemed no way culpable for false doctrine; but I suspect this for a fabulous tale. However, it is undeniable that he sometime hath appeared to men with godly exhortations in his mouth, of living justly, and doing no man wrong, &c.,[430] except we resolve to discredit all history, and the narrations of persons, and some such are known to some in this auditory, who solemnly affirm they have met with such dealing from him.

(2.) Secondly, _God hath sometime revealed himself to men in ecstasies and trances_; such as was that of Paul: Acts xxii. 17, ‘I was in an ecstasy or trance,’ γενέσθαι με ἐν ἐκστάσει. This also hath the devil imitated. Mohammed made this advantage of his disease, the epilepsy or falling-sickness, pretending that at such times he was in an ecstasy, and had converse with the angel Gabriel. But what he only in knavery pretended, others have really felt. The stories of Familists and deluded Quakers are full of such things. They frequently have fallen down and have lain as in a swoon, and when they have awaked, told wonderful stories of what they have heard and seen.

(3.) Thirdly, _Visions and dreams were usual things in the Old Testament, and famous ways of divine revelation_; but Satan was not behind in this matter. His instruments had their visions too. In Ezek.