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and that he is a rewarder of them who diligently seek him; or that you will derive any profit from praying to him; and is not that blasphemy? Therefore, casting off fear, and restraining prayer, are joined together by Job. Ah! sinner, thy heart and life

have been little better than a constant seat and course of blasphemy. And thou too, O believer, from whom better things might be expected, didst thou never fret thyself because of evil doers? Wast thou never envious against the workers of iniquity, because they were not in trouble, like other men, and had every thing which their heart could wish, while thou wert destitute, afflicted and tormented? Didst thou never say, Verily, I have cleansed my heart in vain, and washed my hands in innocency; for all the day long have I been plagued, and chastened every morning?" That was blasphemy. At another time, when thou wast left to walk in darkness, and thy soul refused to be comforted; when thou rememberedst God, and wast troubled! when thou peevishly saidst, "Will the Lord cast off for ever, and will he be favourable no more! Is his mercy clean gone for ever? Doth his promise fail for evermore?" This, to give a soft name to such hard thoughts of God, this, Christian, is thine infirmity. No; there is not one of us, saints or sinners, who can lay his hand upon his heart, and safely say, "I am pure from sin." Better be inge nuous, as the apostle Paul was. Before his conversion, he thought as well of himself as any of us can do of ourselves; he was, as touching the righteousness which is of the law, blameless; but when grace enlightened his understanding, he saw, and he confessed, that he had been a blasphemer.

I. I shall inquire into the causes and occasions of blasphemous thoughts. The general causes are, First, the corruption of our nature.

This has the seed of every sin: and there is no thought so absurd and impious, which it is not ready to entertain. How little must they be acquainted with themselves, or how much better hearts must they have than ours, or indeed than David's, or Jeremiah's, or Paul's; I say, what good hearts, or what bad eyes, must they have, who assert that human nature lost nothing of its innocence and perfection by the fall; that they are as pure, and as well inclined, as Adam, when he first came out of the hands of his Creator; that good thoughts are as natural to them as evil; and that it is not more difficult for them to keep their minds fixed on God, than to think on the world and vanity! How should we envy them their attainments, and be mortified that we are so much beneath them, if the word of God, and the experience of the best men in all ages, did not assure us, that such attainments are impossible, and that the whole world lies in wickedness! On these grounds we said, that blasphemous thoughts proceeded from the depravity of our nature. This of itself is a fruitful source, and is abundantly sufficient to account for all the blasphemy that ever was, or will be, uttered or conceived.

The suggestions of Satan are another cause of blasphemous thoughts.

He suggests and stirs them up; and when natural depravity and satanical injections meet, what dreadful effects do they produce! Thus with respect to our first parents, the serpent said to the woman, "Ye shall not surely die; for God doth know, that in the

day that ye eat thereof your eyes shall be opened; and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil." Here he labours to accuse God to Eve; and to excite her to think, that the Lord forbad them to eat of that tree, only because he envied them the happiness that would be its immediate effect. So he tried Job. He despaired of making God think evil of Job, and therefore he strove to make Job have an evil thought of God. But though he failed in his attempts upon him, yet he succeeded with his wife, who advised her husband to curse God, and die. Some have thought that this was the thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan sent to buffet him, by which the Apostle was so greatly distressed. This however is certain, that blasphemous thoughts are among the fiery darts of the wicked one, which he often hurls with infernal fury, and which pierce so deeply, and stick so fast, that the poison of them drinks up the very spirits. Indeed, when we consider the malice and subtlety of this old serpent, and the cruelty and power of this roaring lion, what may we not fear? Very thankful we ought to be for the whole armour of God; and very deficient we are in the duty which we owe to ourselves, if, with such information of Satan's devices, we be not sober and vigilant, and do not "watch unto prayer." But, besides these two general causes of blasphemous thoughts, we shall mention one more; The righteous permission of God.

I mean, leaving men to themselves, or to the temptations of the devil, as a judgment upon them for former impieties. As to the wicked, he thus punishes sin with sin; as the Apostle informs us, that as the Gentiles did not like to retain God in their knowledge,

he gave them over to a reprobate mind. With regard to the saints he thus humbles them, and convinces them of their weakness and wickedness. He lets them see what they would be if God were to leave them; and he checks their pride, that they may not be exalted above measure. The Lord may therefore suffer the enemy to stir up such shocking thoughts in them, in order to show them, that with all their pretensions to grace and holiness, there is much pollution still at the bottom, which only wants a suitable temptation to bring it up into view; and a humbling exercise it has proved to many of God's people, who were ready to think themselves much holier, and more spiritual, than upon trial appeared. "What!" said they, when they heard others complain of blasphemous thoughts, "what! feel a disrespectful thought of God! No; I never will. I defy all the devils in hell to make me think in the least degree dishonourably of my Creator, my Benefactor, my all." Yet those very persons have been so left by God, and so beset by the wicked one, as to think, to speak, and to act; disrespectfully with regard to God. Who can wonder that when the Lord looks upon such, they should go out and weep bitterly? These are the general causes of blasphemous thoughts. But, besides these, there are some of a more special nature, which ought not to be omitted.

These are partly our great ignorance; at least the weakness and imperfection of our knowledge in spiritual things. So Christ told the Sadducees, who held that blasphemous opinion, that there was no resurrection. "Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God." They are partly the effect

of the hardness and great infidelity of our hearts; when, although we have some knowledge of God, yet we receive it not in the love of it. In this case we may be justly left to think otherwise: and expect to have Christ upbraid us, and say," O fools, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken." Blasphemous thoughts are sometimes occasioned by curiously prying into the hidden things of God; as the inhabitants of Bethshemesh would rashly look into the ark. When we neglect plain truth and duty, and busy ourselves about the explication of mysteries which we ought rather reverently to adore, when we aim at being wise above what is written, we may be suffered to forget, or to deny, what he that runs may read; and so, while boasting of our wisdom, may fall into the greatest absurdities.

The profaneness of men's lives very frequently leads them to unworthy conceptions of God. Their opinions are soon conformable to their actions; and it is not unusual for sinners to flee to blasphemous thoughts, in order to support them in a blasphemous practice.

Quenching the Spirit is another cause of this evil. When he excites serious thoughts in their minds, and men do all that they can to suppress them, it is just that they should be troubled with suggestions from the wicked one, which they cannot so easily resist. Thus as the Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul, an evil spirit troubled him. Apostacy from religion, or declensions in it, may be also enumerated among the causes of this evil. "This know," says Paul, in his second Epistle to Timothy, "that in the last days perilous times shall come; for men shall be lovers of

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