abhor.  Therefore be not overmuch troubled and dismayed with such kind of suggestions, at least if they please thee not, because they are not thy personal sins, for which thou shalt incur the wrath of God, or his displeasure:  contemn, neglect them, let them go as they come, strive not too violently, or trouble thyself too much, but as our Saviour said to Satan in like case, say thou, avoid Satan, I detest thee and them. Satanae est mala ingerere (saith Austin) nostrum non consentire:  as Satan labours to suggest, so must we strive not to give consent, and it will be sufficient:  the more anxious and solicitous thou art, the more perplexed, the more thou shalt otherwise be troubled and entangled.  Besides, they must know this, all so molested and distempered, that although these be most execrable and grievous sins, they are pardonable yet, through God’s mercy and goodness, they may be forgiven, if they be penitent and sorry for them.  Paul himself confesseth, Rom. xvii. 19.  “He did not the good he would do, but the evil which he would not do; ’tis not I, but sin that dwelleth in me.”  ’Tis not thou, but Satan’s suggestions, his craft and subtlety, his malice:  comfort thyself then if thou be penitent and grieved, or desirous to be so, these heinous sins shall not be laid to thy charge; God’s mercy is above all sins, which if thou do not finally contemn, without doubt thou shalt be saved. [6793]"No man sins against the Holy Ghost, but he that wilfully and finally renounceth Christ, and contemneth him and his word to the last, without which there is no salvation, from which grievous sin, God of his infinite mercy deliver us.”  Take hold of this to be thy comfort, and meditate withal on God’s word, labour to pray, to repent, to be renewed in mind, “keep thine heart with all diligence.”  Prov. iv. 13, resist the devil, and he will fly from thee, pour out thy soul unto the Lord with sorrowful Hannah, “pray continually,” as Paul enjoins, and as David did, Psalm i. “meditate on his law day and night.”

Yea, but this meditation is that mars all, and mistaken makes many men far worse, misconceiving all they read or hear, to their own overthrow; the more they search and read Scriptures, or divine treatises, the more they puzzle themselves, as a bird in a net, the more they are entangled and precipitated into this preposterous gulf:  “Many are called, but few are chosen,” Matt. xx. 16. and xxii. 14. with such like places of Scripture misinterpreted strike them with horror, they doubt presently whether they be of this number or no:  God’s eternal decree of predestination, absolute reprobation, and such fatal tables, they form to their own ruin, and impinge upon this rock of despair.  How shall they be assured of their salvation, by what signs?  “If the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and sinners appear?” 1 Pet. iv. 18.  Who knows, saith Solomon, whether he be elect?  This grinds their souls, how shall they discern they are not reprobates?