Works of John Bunyan – The Greatness of The Soul, And Unspeakableness 0f the Loss Thereof; What Shall A Man Give In Exchange For His Soul.51

 

They cannot sit down by the loss.

(3.) All that he who has lost himself can do is sit down by the loss. Do I say, He can do this? Oh! if that could be, it would be to such, a mercy; I must therefore here correct myself—That they cannot do; for to sit down by the loss implies a patient enduring; but there will be no such grace as patience in hell with him that has lost himself; here, we will also want a bottom for patience—to wit, the providence of God; for the providence of God, though never so dismal, is a bottom for patience to the afflicted; but men go not to hell by providence but by sin. Now sin being the cause, other effects are wrought; for they that go to hell, and that there miserably perish, shall never say it was God by His providence that brought them hither, and so shall not have that on which to lean and stay themselves.

They shall justify God, and lay the fault upon themselves, concluding that it was sin with which their souls did voluntarily work—yea, which their souls did suck in as sweet milk—that is the cause of this torment. Now this will work in another manner, and will produce quite another thing than patience, or a patient enduring of their torment; for their seeing that they are not only lost, but have lost themselves, and that against the ordinary means that of God was provided to prevent that loss; yea, when they shall see what a base thing sin is, how that it is the very worst of things, and that which also makes all things evil, and that for the sake of that, they have lost themselves, this will make them fret, and, gnash, and gnaw with anger themselves; this will set all the passions of the soul, save love, for that I think will be stark dead, all in a rage, all in a self-tormenting fire. You know there is nothing that will sooner put a man into and manage his anger against himself than a complete conviction in his conscience that, by his own only folly, and against caution, counsel, and reason to the contrary, he has brought himself into extreme distress and misery. But how much more will it make this fire burn when he shall see all this come upon him for a toy, for a bauble, for a thing that is worse than nothing!

Why, this is the case with him who has lost himself; and therefore he cannot sit down by the loss, cannot be quiet under the sense of his loss. For sharply and wonderful piercingly, considering the loss of himself, and the cause thereof, which is sin, he falls to tearing of himself in pieces with thoughts as hot as the coals of juniper, and to gnashing upon himself for this; also, the Divine wisdom and justice of God helpeth this self-tormentor in his self-tormenting work, by holding the justice of the law against which he has offended, and the unreasonableness of such offense, continually before his face. 

For if, to an enlightened man who is in the door of hope, the sight of all past evil practices will work in him 'vexation of spirit,' to see what fools we were, (Eccl 1:14); how can it but be to them that go to hell a vexation only to understand the report, the report that God did give them of sin, of His grace, of hell, and of everlasting damnation, and yet that they should be such fools to go thither? (Isa 28:19). But to pursue this head no further, I will now come to the next thing.