Dost thou profess the name of Christ, and dost thou pretend to be a man departing from iniquity? take heed lest thy departing from iniquity should be but for a time.  Some do depart from iniquity, as persons in wrangling fits depart from one another, to wit, for a time; but when the quarrel is over, by means of some intercessor they are reconciled again.  Oh, Satan is the intercessor between the soul and sin; and though the breach between these two may seem to be irreconcilable, yea, though the soul has sworn it will never more give countenance to so vile a thing as sin is, yet he can tell how to make up this difference, and to fetch them back to their vomit again, who, one would have thought, had quite escaped his sins and been gone. 2 Pet. 2:  18—­22.  Take heed, therefore, O professor, for there is danger of this, and the height of danger lies in it; and I think that Satan, to do this thing, makes use of those sins again to begin, this rejoinder, which he findeth most suitable to the temper and constitution of the sinner.  These are, as I may call them, the master-sins, they suit, they agree with the temper of the soul.  These, as the little end of the wedge, enter with ease, and so make way for those that come after, with which Satan knows he can rend the soul in pieces.  Wherefore,

To help this, take heed of parleying with thy sins again, when once thou hast departed from them:  sin has a smooth tongue; if thou hearken to its enchanting language, ten thousand to one but thou art entangled.  Take heed, therefore, of listening to the charms wherewith sin enchanteth the soul.  In this, be like the deaf adder; stop thine ear, plug it up to sin, and let it only be open to hear the words of God.

The unholy professor.

A professor that hath not forsaken his iniquity, is like one that comes out of the pest-house, among the whole, with his plague-sores running upon him.  This is the man that hath the breath of a dragon; he poisons the air round about him.  This is the man that slays his children, his kinsmen, his friend, and himself.  What shall I say?  A man that nameth the name of Christ, and that departeth not from iniquity, to whom may he be compared?  The Pharisees, for that they professed religion but walked not answerably thereto, unto what doth Christ compare them but to serpents and vipers; what does he call them but hypocrites, whited walls, painted sepulchres, fools, and blind, and tells them that they made men more the children of hell than they were before?  Matt. 23.  Wherefore, such a one cannot go out of the world by himself; for as he gave occasion of scandal when he was in the world, so is he the cause of the damnation of many.  The apostle did use to weep when he spake of these professors, such an offence he knew they were and would be in the world.  Acts 20:30; Phil. 3:18, 19.

These are the chief of the engines of Satan; with these he worketh wonders.  One Balaam, one Jeroboam, one Ahab, O how many fish such bring to Satan’s net.  These are the tares that he strives to sow among the wheat, for he knows they are mischief to it.  “Wherefore let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity.”