When I have been laden with sin, and pestered with several temptations, and in a very sad manner, then have I had the trial of the virtue of Christ’s blood, with trial of the virtue of other things; and I have found that when tears would not do, prayers would not do, repentings and all other things could not reach my heart, O then one touch, one drop, one shining of the virtue of the blood, of that blood that was let out with a spear, it hath in such a blessed manner delivered me, that it hath made me to marvel.  O, methinks it hath come with such life, such power, with such irresistible and marvellous glory, that it wipes off all the slurs, silences all the outcries, and quenches all the fiery darts and all the flames of hell-fire, that are begotten by the charges of the law, Satan, and doubtful remembrances of my sinful life.

There are three things that do usually afflict the soul that is earnestly looking after Jesus Christ.

1.  Dreadful accusations from Satan. 2.  Grievous, defiling, and infectious thoughts. 3.  A strange readiness in our nature to fall in with both.  By the first, of these, the heart is made continually to tremble.  Hence his temptations are compared to the roaring of a lion.  For as the lion by roaring killeth the heart of his prey, so doth Satan kill the spirit of those that hearken to him; for when he tempteth, especially by way of accusation, he doth to us as Rabshakeh did to the Jews; he speaks to us in our own language.  He speaks our sin at every word; our guilty conscience knows it.  He speaks our death at every word; our doubting conscience feels it.

2.  Besides this, there do now arise even in the heart such defiling and soul-infectious thoughts, as put the tempted to his wit’s end, For now it seems to the soul that the very flood-gates of the flesh are opened, and that to sin there is no stop at all; now the air seems to be covered with darkness, and the man is as if he was changed into the nature of a devil.  Now, if ignorance and unbelief prevail, he concludeth that he is a reprobate, made to be taken and destroyed.

3.  Now also he feeleth in him a readiness to fall in with every temptation—­a readiness, I say, continually present.  Romans 7:21.  This throws all down.  Now despair begins to swallow him up; now he can neither pray, nor read, nor hear, nor meditate on God, but fire and smoke continually burst forth of the heart against him; now sin and great confusion puts forth itself in all.  Yea, and the more the sinner desireth to do a duty sincerely, the further off he always finds himself; for by how much the soul struggleth under these distresses, by so much the more doth Satan put forth himself to resist, still infusing more poison, that if possible it might never struggle more, for stragglings are also as poison to Satan.