Part 2- Satan's Subtlety In Managing His Temptations, Where Several Stratagems Used By Him To Deceive The Christian Are Laid Down

3. Stratagem.  In his gradual approaches to the soul.  When he comes to tempt, he is modest, and asks but a little; he know that he may get that at many times, which he should be denied if he asked all at once.  A few are let into a city, when an army coming in a body would be shut out; and therefore that he may beget no suspicion, he presents may be a few general propositions, which do not discover the depth of his plot.  These like scouts go before, while his whole body lies hid as it were in some swamp at hand.  Thus he wriggled into Eve's bosom, whom he doth not, at first dash, bid take and eat.  No, he is more mannerly than do so.  This would have been so hideous, that as the fish with some sudden noise, by a stone cast into the river, is scared from the bait, so she would have been affrighted from holding parley with such a one.  No, he propounds a question which shall make way for this.  Hath God said? art [thou] not mistaken?  Could this be his meaning, whose bounty lets thee eat of the rest, to deny thee the best of all?  Thus he digs about and loosens the root of her faith, and then the tree falls the easier the next gust of temptation.  This is a dangerous policy indeed.  Many have yielded to go a mile with Satan, that never intended to go two; but when once on the way, they have been allured farther and farther, till at last they know not how to leave his company.   

 Thus Satan leads poor creatures down into the depths of sin by winding stairs, that let them not see the bottom whither they are going.  He first presents an object that occasions some thoughts; these set on fire the affections, and they fume up into the brain, and cloud the understanding, which being thus dis­abled, Satan now dares a little more declare himself, and boldly solicit the creature to that it even now have defied.  Many who at this day lie in open pro­faneness, never thought they should have rolled so far from their profession; but Satan beguiled them, poor souls, with their modest beginnings.  O Christian, give not place to Satan, no, not an inch, in his first motions.  He that is a beggar and a modest one with­out doors, will command the house if let in.  Yield at first, and thou givest away thy strength to resist him in the rest; when the hem is worn, the whole garment will ravel out, if it be not mended by timely repentance.

 Stratagem.  The fourth way, wherein Satan shows his subtlety in managing his temptations, is in his reserves.  A wise captain hath ever some fresh troops at hand, to fall in at a pinch when others are worsted.  Satan is seldom at a loss in this respect; when one temptation is beat back, he soon hath another to fill up the gap, and make good the line.

             Thus he tempts Christ to diffidence and distrust, by bidding him turn stones into bread, as if it were now time to carve for himself, being so long neglected of his Father, as to fast forty days, and no supplies heard of.  No sooner had Christ quenched this dart with these words, ‘It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God,’ Matt. 4:4, but he hath another on the string, which he let fly to him, tempting him to presumption.  ‘Then the devil taketh him up and setteth him on a pinnacle,’ and bids, ‘Cast thyself down headlong; for it is written, He shall give his angels charge concerning thee,’ &c., ver. 5, 6.  As if he had said, If thou hast such confidence on God and his Word, as thou pretendest, show it by casting thyself down, for thou hast a word between thee and the ground, if thou darest trust God.  And truly, though Christ had his answer ready, and was prepared to receive his charge on the right hand and on the left, being so completely armed that no temptation could come amiss, yet note we, [that] Satan's temptations on Christ were like the serpents motion on a rock, of which Solomon speaks, Prov. 30:19.  They make no impression, no dint at all; but on us they are as a serpent on sand, or dust, that leaves a print, when not in the heart yet in the fancy—colours that which is next door to it, and so the object there is ready to slip in, if great care be not observed.  Especially in this case when he doth thus change his hand, as when we have resisted one way, falls afresh in another, yea, plants his succeeding temptation upon our very resistance in the former.

             Now it requires some readiness in our postures, and skill at all our weapons, to make our defence; like a disputant, when he is put out of his road, and hath a new question started, or argument unusual brought, now he is tried to purpose.  And truly this is Satan's way when he tempts the Christian to neglect of [the] duties of God's worship (from his worldly occasions, the multitude of them, or necessity of fol­lowing them); and this takes not, then he is on the other side, and is drawing the Christian to the neglect of his worldly calling, out of a seeming zeal to promote his other in the worship of God.  Or first, he comes and labours to deaden the heart in duty, but the Christian too watchful for him there, then he is puffing of him up with an opinion of his enlargement in it, and ever he keep his sliest and most sublimated temptations for the last.

5. Stratagem.  In his politic retreats.  You shall have an enemy fly as [if] overcome, when it is on a design of overcoming.  This was Joshua's wile, by which he caught the men of Ai in a trap, Josh. 8.  We read not only of Satan's being cast out, but of the un­clean spirit going out voluntarily, yet with a purpose to come again, and bring worse company with him, Matt. 12:43.  Satan is not always beat back by the dint and power of conquering grace, but sometimes he draws off, and raiseth his own siege, the more handsomely to get the Christian out of his fastnesses and trenches, that so he may snap him on the plains, whom he cannot come at in his works and fortifi­cations.  Temptations send the saint to his castle, as the sight of the dog doth the coney to her burrow. Now the soul walks the rounds, stands upon its guard, dares not neglect duty, because the enemy is under its very walls, shutting in his temptations continually; but when Satan seems to give the soul over, and the Christian finds he is not haunted, with such motions as formerly, truly now he is prone to remit in his diligence, fail in his duty, and grow either unfrequent or formal therein; as the Romans, whose valour decayed for want of the Carthaginian troops to alarm them.  Let Satan tempt or not tempt, assault or retreat, keep thou in order, stand in a fighting posture, let his flight strengthen thy faith, but not weak­en thy care.  The Parthians do their enemy most hurt in their flight, shooting their darts as they run, and so may Satan do thee, if thy seeming victory makes thee secure.

Satan's Subtlety In Managing His Temptations, Where Several Stratagems Used By Him To Deceive The Christian Are Laid Down

 Second.  The second way wherein Satan shows his tempting subtlety, is in those stratagems he useth to deceive the Christian, managing his temptations, laying them in such a method and form, as shows his craft.

1. Stratagem.  He hangs out false colours, and comes up to the Christian in the disguise of a friend, so that the gates are opened to him, and his motions received with applause, before either be discovered.  Therefore he is said to ‘transform himself into an angel of light,’ II Cor. 11:14.  Of all plots it is most dangerous, when he appears in Samuel's mantle, and silvers his foul tongue with fair language.  Thus in point of error he corrupts some in their judgement, by commending his notions for special gospel-truths, and like a cunning chapman puts off his old ware (errors I mean that have lain long upon his hand), only turning them a little after the mode of the times, and they go for new light, under the skirt of Christian liberty.  He conveys in libertinism, by crying up the Spirit.  He decries and vilifies the Scripture, by mag­nifying faith.  He labours to undermine repentance, and blow up good works.  By bewailing the corruption of the church in its administrations, he draws unstable souls from it, and amuseth them, till at last they fall into a giddiness, and can see no church at all in being.  And he prevails no less on the hearts and lives of men by this wile, than on their judgements.  Under the notion of zeal, he kindles sometimes a dangerous flame of passion and wrath in the heart, which like a rash fire makes the Christian's spirit boil over into unchristian desires of, and prayers for, revenge where he should forgive.  Of this we have an instance of the disciples, Luke 9:54, where two holy men are desiring that ‘fire may come down from heaven.’  Little did they think from whence they had their coal that did so heat them, till Christ told them, ‘Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of,’ ver. 55.  Sometimes he pretends pity and natural affection, which in some cases may be good counsel, and all the while he de­sires to promote cowardice and sinful self-love, whereby the Christian may be brought to fly from his colours, shrink from the truth, or decline some ne­cessary duty of his calling.  This wile of his, when he got Peter to be his spokesman, saying, Master, pity thyself, Christ soon spied, and stopped his mouth with that sharp rebuke, ‘Get thee behind me, Satan.’ O what need have we to study the Scriptures, our hearts, and Satan's wiles, that we may not bid this enemy welcome, and all the while think it is Christ that is our guest!
2. Stratagem.  Is to get intelligence of the saint's affairs.  This is one great wheel in the politician's clock, to have spies in all places, by whom they are acquainted with the counsels and motions of their enemies, and [as] this gives them advantage to disappoint their designs, so also more safely to compass their own.  It is no hard matter for him to play this game well, that sees his enemies' hands.  David knew how the squares went at court, Jonathan's arrows carried him the news; and accordingly he removed his quarters, and was too hard for his great enemy Saul. Satan is the greatest intelligencer in the world; he makes it his business to inquire into the inclinations, thoughts, affections, purposes of the creature, that finding which humour abounds, he may apply himself accordingly,—[finding] which way the stream goes, that he may open the passage of temptation, and cut the channel to fall of the creature's affections, and not force it against the torrent of nature.  Now if we consider but the piercing apprehension of the angelic nature, how quick he is to take the scent which way the game goes, by a word dropped, the cast of an eye, or such a small matter—signal enough to give him the alarm; if we consider his experience in heart-anatomy, having inspected, and as it were dissected, so many in his long practice, whereby his knowledge is much perfected, as also his great diligence to add to both these, being as close a student as ever, considering the saints, and studying how he may do them a mischief, as we see in Job's case, whom he had so observed, that he was able to give an answer ex tempore to God, [as to] what Job's state and present posture was, and what might be the most probable means of obtaining his will of him; and besides all this, the correspondence that he hath with those in and about the Christian, from whom he learns much of his estate, as David [did] by Hushai in Absalom's counsel;—all these considered, it is almost impossible for the creature to stir out of the closet of his heart, but it will be known whither he inclines.  Some corrupt passion or other will bewray the soul to him, as they did [bewray] David to Saul, who told him where he might find him, in the wilderness of Engedi, I Sam. 24:4.  Thus will these give intelligence to Satan, and say [to him], If thou wouldst surprise such a one, he is gone that way, you will have him in the wood of worldly employments, over head and ears in the de­sires of this life.  See where another sits under a bower, delighting himself in this child, or that gift, endowment of mind, or the like; lay but the lime-twig there, and you shall soon have him in it.  Now Satan having thus intelligence, lets him alone to act his part.  He sure cannot be at a loss himself, when his scholars, the Jesuits I mean, have such agility of mind, to wreathe and cast themselves into any form becoming the persons they would seduce.  Is ambition the lust the heart favours?  O the pleasing proj­ects that he will put such upon!  How easily, having first blown them up with vain hopes, doth he draw them into horrid sins.  Thus Haman, that he may have a monopoly of his prince's favour, is hurried into that bloody plot, fatal at last to himself against the Jews.  Is uncleanness the lust after which the creature's eye wanders?  Now he will be the pander, to bring him and his minion together.  Thus he, finding Amnon sick of this disease, sends Jonadab, a deep-pated fellow, II Sam. 13.3, to put this fine device into his head of feigning himself sick, whereby his sister fell into his snare.