Chapter 7

More particularly, how Satan works upon those three principles in us: first, on carnal reason.

Seeing therefore the exercise of his power lies in that darkness which is in us, let us more particularly see how able and powerful he is to work upon those several principles of carnal reason, guilt of conscience, jealousies, and fears.

First on carnal reason, on which he chiefly works in this sort of temptations, the strength whereof lies in false reasonings, wherein, if in anything, he has the advantage.

First, his abilities to forge and invent false reasonings and arguments to overthrow our faith are (as they must needs be conceived to be) exceedingly great: who for his knowledge is called 'the wise one,' as well as Satan for his malice, and for his subtlety in outwitting us, a serpent — who when young, outwitted our first parents: 'he beguiled Eve through his subtlety,' says the apostle (2 Corinthians 11:3), then, when their reason was not depraved; but now he is grown that old serpent (Revelation 17:9), and we have become children, apt to be tossed to and fro (Ephesians 4:14). He has had time enough to improve his knowledge in; a student he is of 5,000 years' standing that has lost no time, but as he is said to accuse day and night (Revelation 12:10), so is able to study both day and night. And he has made it his chief, if not whole study, to enable himself to tempt and plead against us. It is his trade; therefore as men are called lawyers or divines from their calling, so he is called the tempter and the accuser from his employment. And by this his long experience and observation he has his set and composed machinations (2 Corinthians 2:11), his methods of temptations (Ephesians 6:11) which are studied and artificially molded and ordered — even such systems and methods of them as tutors and professors of arts and sciences have, and do read over again and again to their students. The apostle calls them darts (verse 16), and he has a whole shop and armory of them ready made and forged, which for the acuteness and subtle sophistry that is in them, are called 'depths of Satan' (Revelation 2:24). Which depths, if in any point, are most to be found in this; for he is more especially versed in this great question and dispute whether a man be the child of God or no, more than in any other. All other controversies he has had to deal in only in particular ages as they were occasionally started, but this has been the standing controversy of all ages since God has had any children on earth; with every one of whom more or less, he has at one time or another had solemn disputes about it. So that he knows all the advantages, windings, and turnings in this debate; all the objections, answers, and discussions in it. And as other controversies — the longer they are on foot and the further they have been carried along, the more they are enlarged, improved, and grow more subtle — so must this also, especially in this latter knowing age of the world; and by reason also of that seemingly close similarity which hypocrisy holds to the truth and power of grace (which has puzzled and entangled this controversy). The objections and difficulties which a believer meets with in beating out a right judgment of his estate are greater than in any controversy the world ever knew, and afford stranger knots, and require as acute distinctions to dissolve them as the scholastics know any. And indeed such that, did not the Holy Ghost sometimes cut, sometimes untie them for believers by witnessing with our spirits that we are the sons of God, bare reason alone could never determine in it. Now Satan through long experience and observation has all these at his fingers' ends, and has reduced them all to common places long since. He has still observed and laid up what answers have relieved the spirits of believers in such and such a doubt cast in by him, and then studies a further reply against the next time, or for the next believer he shall have to deal with.

Secondly, as he has thus thoroughly studied this controversy and knows all the windings and false reasonings in it: so withal, by his daily studying and considering men, he knows how best to suit and make use of those reasonings, both to persons and seasons. It is the sole business of those evil spirits to study men; for this end they go up and down the earth. And he has common places of men and their several frames and temper of spirit, as well as of temptations. He knows all the several ranks and classes of men in the state of grace, and according to their ranks, with what sort of temptations to encounter them. For men's temptations are various and manifold (1 Peter 2:6), even as the gifts and operations of the Spirit are (1 Corinthians 12:4-5). Now he having beaten out this controversy with all sorts, knows how to lay the dispute, how to order and marshal and apply objections and wield his blows with most success and advantage. That as physicians, having observed the several workings of medicines of all sorts upon several ages and constitutions, and what several issues and effects they have had, do therefore accordingly prescribe and apply several medicines according to the several and differing conditions of their patients though sick of the same disease: thus Satan, by observation finding the hearts of some men answering to some others even as face to face in water (as Solomon says), and more alike, and withal remembering what reasonings have always taken most with such a sort or strain of Christians whose corruptions and graces were much alike to those in this or that man he has now to deal with — accordingly he makes use and application of these reasonings again. 1. The temper of men's spirits we know is diverse, and so is capable of diversity of suggestions. Men of melancholy and jealous spirits he plies with reasonings and suggestions that will most take with their spirits. And again 2, the operations of graces, as of sin, are various in those several tempers. And 3, God's dealings with and workings upon his children are as various as either: some he humbles much, some are led on with comfort; some he works on with a sudden and marvelous light, as if the sun should rise on a sudden at midnight; and on others insensibly and by degrees, as when the dawning steals upon the day. Some have had a false and counterfeit work before; some were never enlightened until savingly. And this variety affords rise and occasion for several temptations. So that what kind of work any other Christian has had is apt to be made an exception to another that lacks it. 'I was never thus humbled,' says one; 'nor I thus comforted,' says another; 'I had a sudden violent work indeed which came in like a spring tide, but now the tide is fallen and my first love abated,' says a third; 'I had some workings and enlightenings heretofore,' says another, 'and I was deceived then and I may be so now also.' And so he has that vast task set him, to compare a counterfeit work with a true. Thus every several way of working lies open to several exceptions. And as we say that every earthly calling has its several and proper temptations, so the several ways and manner of effecting this heavenly calling have their several veins and currents of temptations. All which Satan knows and has often traced, and accordingly knows how to fit them to men and to prosecute them the most advantageous way. So in like manner he takes the compass of every man's knowledge, notions, and apprehensions, according to which, as our knowledge is more or less, we are also capable of several temptations. Many reasonings and objections which, like small hailshot, could not reach or make any dent at all upon men of parts and knowledge who soar high out of the gunshot of them — and who have on the whole armor of God, as the apostle speaks (Ephesians 6), are in complete armor, abounding in all faith and knowledge — yet are fittest to level against such as are more ignorant and fly low, and have but some few broken pieces of that armor to defend some parts with. But on the contrary, those other of his great shot which he discharges on men of knowledge would be shot clean over the others' heads and not come near such smaller vessels. All in Thyatira knew not Satan's depths, nor were capable of them (Revelation 2:24). Thus ignorance and want of knowledge of the meaning of the Scriptures and of the ways of grace chalked forth therein — how does Satan abuse this to the disquietment of many poor and good souls that lack much knowledge, by putting false glosses on them! How many weak souls do stick in shallows, and are sometimes a long while troubled with gross mistakes! And like small birds, are held long under with limed straws of frivolous objections, which great ones fly away with. Saint Paul, being a man of knowledge, was not easily taken with such chaff: 'We are not ignorant of his devices,' says he (2 Corinthians 2:11); and therefore Satan takes another course with him, and comes with downright blows, and falls to buffeting him (2 Corinthians 12). Thus does Satan take measure of the bore (as I may so speak) of every man's understanding and fits them with objections proportionable, of several sizes. And as the apostle in his sermons prepared milk for babes but strong meat for strong men, so does Satan in his temptations apply and suit them to men's notions and apprehensions, still framing objections according to their reading.

Thirdly, he is able indiscernably to communicate all his false reasonings (though never so spiritual) which he does forge and invent, and that in such a manner as to deceive us by them and to make them take with us.

First, he is able not only to put into the heart suggestions and solicitations to sensual and worldly objects — such as that into Judas' heart, to betray his master for money (John 13:2) and to tempt married couples separated to incontinency (1 Corinthians 7:5) — but also the most subtle and abstracted reasonings concerning things spiritual, which are utterly remote from sense, he can insinuate and impart according to the measure and capacity of men's apprehensions. Therefore we are said to wrestle with them about heavenly things, and our interest therein is often made the matter of the contention and the subject of the question. So that phrase (Ephesians 6:12) 'we wrestle with spiritual wickednesses in heavenly things' is rather to be understood of 'heavenly things' than of 'heavenly places' — the word signifying rather supracelestial, in the highest heavens, where (if rendered of places) the devils never came since their fall. And it being used elsewhere for 'heavenly things' (as Hebrews 8:5), and the preposition 'in' being likewise sometimes put to express the object matter about which a thing is conversant (as Matthew 11:6: 'blessed is he that is not offended in me,' that is, with or about me and for my sake), it may congruously be so here meant, noting to us that the prize about which we wrestle with Satan, the stake, is not things worldly as honors, riches, and the like, but things heavenly which concern our souls and estates hereafter. Now the contention being about heavenly things and spiritual blessings, it cannot be transacted but by reasonings suitable — that is, spiritual false reasonings abstracted from sense and fancy. And in this respect they are termed 'spiritual wickednesses,' because in such wickednesses they deal and trade especially, or as much as in those that are sensual, as tempting to unbelief, despair, blasphemy against God, of which sort are all those temptations we have now in hand. And that he is able to convey and suggest such spiritual thoughts and reasonings of what sort soever, appears many ways: as by injecting blasphemous thoughts against God such as do sometimes transcend the wit and capacity of the receiver of them. And is manifest likewise by Saul's prophesying even from the immediate dictating and suggestion of an evil spirit, as is expressly said (1 Samuel 18:10), in like manner to which perhaps the Sibyls also prophesied. But more evidently it is in all those damnable heresies which have been broached in all ages: as in the primitive times among the Romans, the broachers whereof are made the emissaries of Satan. Therefore (Romans 16) Paul, having branded them to the Romans who taught false doctrines among them, and having instructed them against them, he gives this encouragement about them (verse 20): that God should tread down Satan under their feet shortly, having respect to Satan's work in those errors mentioned (verse 16), Satan being the main author of them. Thus in the church of Thyatira, those cursed heretics who applauded themselves and were admired by their followers for the depths and profoundness of the learning shown in those heresies they broached — 'depths as they speak' (Revelation 2:24) — but if they call them depths, says the apostle, 'I will call them depths of Satan,' for the devil was the master and author and suggester of them. So in after times, apostasy is ascribed to 'spirits of error,' that is, devils, which he foretells men should give heed to (1 Timothy 4:1); and 'in the working of Satan' (2 Thessalonians 2:9) it was he that sharpened their wits and pens. Now then by the same reason there is no reasoning about our estates, though never so spiritual, but he can suggest it as well as he did those depths of heresies to the broachers of them. So that Satan cannot only make those false reasonings which our own hearts forge more specious and probable, and suggest further confirmations of them which are enough to add to this darkness, but he is also able to put in new ones which he himself invents, of what kind soever they be.

Secondly, he is not simply able to suggest them, but to insinuate them in such a manner as to take with us and deceive us — yes, and often to set them on with a deep impression. Therefore in those places aforementioned, it is not simply said that there should be spirits which should suggest errors, but so suggest them as that men should give heed to them (1 Timothy 4:1). And 2 Thessalonians 2 (where the working of those very same spirits is set forth, verse 9) it is not only said that they were sent as from God to delude, but with 'strong delusions' — such as should have a strength put into them to prevail, so that men should believe them. So also that lying spirit which God sent, who persuaded Ahab by a lie in the mouths of his false prophets: commission is not simply given to him to suggest a lie, but so as it should prevail with Ahab — so 2 Chronicles 18:21: 'And the Lord said, You shall entice him, and you shall also prevail.' And as he is thus able (when God gives leave) to delude wicked men's understandings with false reasonings in matters of heresy and false doctrine, by reason of that total darkness that is in them: so he is able (if God gives leave, as sometimes he does) to bring strong delusions upon the minds of God's children also, through false reasonings about their own estates, by reason of that darkness which in part remains in them. By means of which he may work the same effects for a time and in a certain degree in a godly man which in another, as was before observed. Thus the believing Galatians, especially some of them, were so far 'bewitched' (as his word is) as for a time to assent to that great error in point of justification. And this by reason of that folly and darkness which remained in them, as he intimates when he says: 'O you foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you that you should not obey the truth?' (Galatians 3:1). And if in the very doctrine of justification itself, believers were thus for a time deluded (which is rare), then much more may they, and ordinarily are they, misled in the application of faith — in believing their own personal justification — which is the point in hand. Only this is to be added here for caution's sake: that it is true that Satan cannot enforce an act of assent to any falsehood upon the understanding of any man. For how then should they have all been condemned for believing a lie (2 Thessalonians 2:11-12), which should not have been unless it were their own sin — which is as true of all other temptations as that. Though Satan put the thought into Judas' heart (John 13:2), yet his own conscience owns it wholly as his own act (Matthew 27:4): 'I have sinned,' etc. Neither yet does he immediately concur to produce such an act of assent in us as God does when he works faith in us, for then God's power and assistance in working good should be no more than Satan's in working evil. And yet the Scripture phrases go far in ascribing to Satan herein, when it says of those that believed not the gospel, that 'the god of this world has blinded their minds that believe not' (2 Corinthians 4), which notes a superadded working of blindness to their own natural blindness. As also when he says that 'the prince of the air' who 'works effectually' etc. (Ephesians 2:2). And also that of the Corinthians while unregenerate, who then are said to be 'carried and led away after dumb idols' (1 Corinthians 12:2). All which phrases would seem to argue not only a further power of working on men's judgments than when one man does endeavor to corrupt and persuade another man in a moral way (because he suggests indiscernably and with more frequency and importunity, and holds the mind more to the object, and presents an army of confirmations at once, and is able so to marshal them that the mind can scarce resist, and puts all these upon the spirit with a violent and imperious affirmation) — but further also would seem to imply some kind of physical working, though not immediately on the spring of the clock, yet upon the wheels and weights of it (I mean the passions in the body and the images in the fancy, though not upon the understanding immediately), all which, what influence they have to sway the judgment and pervert it, experience shows.

Fourthly, he is further able to follow and continue his reasonings as occasion is, and to keep up the dispute and hold out arguments with us, and outreason us, by putting in new replies to our answers, and so to maintain and manage and carry along the dispute, and to come up with fresh supplies. Which in this respect is called 'wrestling' (Ephesians 6:12): 'We wrestle not with flesh and blood, but with principalities and powers' — it being (as the bodily wrestling) transacted by reiterated assaults and attempts to overcome and get the victory; he as it were going about to trip up our heels, as wrestlers do — that is, to take away from under us those reasonings which supported us, by caviling objections. Which kind of spiritual wrestlings, how often have we experience of in spiritual agonies! In the hour of temptation, believers find conflicts and bandings of disputes rationally carried along, and pertinent objections brought in against those answers which they secretly meditate of. In which case therefore divines bid men not to dispute with that cunning sophist. Thus many, when death has approached, have found that they have had their reasonings for their estates and those evidences they have had recourse to, taken away and confuted as fast as they have thought of them. And that Satan has this dexterity and skill thus to manage such kind of disputes with us is further evident in the framing of heresies, wherein he assists the contrivers of them with pertinent considerations to back and confirm their notions in their private meditations, studies, and contrivements. And indeed if Satan were not able and skillful thus to oppose and reply, these kind of temptations which consist in disputes could not be managed. For otherwise, Satan in them would dispute with us but as if one of us should reason with a deaf man that can hear, but his answers cannot be known, and so we know no way what reply to make. Therefore surely Satan has some way, more or less a guess and inkling, often what may be the answers of the heart again. Which were it otherwise, the glory also which God has by the victory gotten over Satan in these temptations would be much obscured, and Satan's confusion less. For the victory of our faith in these disputes and the resistance it makes lies chiefly in those replies which are made, whereby it quenches all his darts — whereof the devil, when he is once sensible and perceives it, he is confounded. For then, when he is once sensible and apprehensive that he is resisted, does he flee from us, as the apostle speaks (James 4:7), and that of his own accord, as the expression there implies — even as a foiled and disgraced soldier. And this we may see in his carriage in those his temptations of Christ, which were managed by mutual disputes; and the foiling of Satan was by the answers out of Scripture which Christ gave, by which being confounded, he left him (as the text says, Matthew 4:11) as out of pride, ashamed that he was foiled. So that Satan some way or other is able to guess at and discerns the replies in our hearts to his objections, as well as to make and cast in objections.

More specifically: how Satan works upon those three principles in us — first, on carnal reason.

Since the exercise of his power lies in the darkness within us, let us look more closely at how powerfully he is able to work upon those specific principles: carnal reason, guilt of conscience, and jealousies and fears.

First, he works on carnal reason — on which he chiefly operates in this kind of temptation, since its strength lies in false reasoning, and in this, if anywhere, he has the advantage.

His ability to forge and invent false reasoning and arguments to overthrow our faith is — as one would expect — exceedingly great. For his knowledge he is called 'the wise one,' as well as Satan for his malice; and for his skill in outsmarting us, a serpent — who even in his youth outwitted our first parents: 'he deceived Eve through his cunning,' says the apostle (2 Corinthians 11:3), and that when their reason was not yet corrupted. Now he is that old serpent (Revelation 17:9), and we have become as children, easily tossed back and forth (Ephesians 4:14). He has had time enough to sharpen his knowledge — a student of five thousand years' standing who has lost not a moment, for as he is said to accuse day and night (Revelation 12:10), so he is able to study day and night. He has made it his chief, if not his entire, study to equip himself for tempting and arguing against us. It is his trade; just as people are called lawyers or ministers from their calling, so he is called the tempter and the accuser from his work. Through long experience and observation he has developed set and carefully composed strategies (2 Corinthians 2:11), methods of temptation (Ephesians 6:11) that are studied and artfully constructed — entire systems and methods, like the curriculum of a professor who reads through his material again and again with students. The apostle calls them darts (verse 16), and Satan has a whole workshop and arsenal of them ready-made and forged. For the sharpness and subtle sophistication within them, they are called 'the deep things of Satan' (Revelation 2:24). And nowhere are those depths more to be found than here, for he is more thoroughly versed in this great question — whether a person is a child of God or not — than in any other. Every other controversy he has only dealt with in particular ages as it occasionally arose, but this has been the standing controversy of every age since God has had children on earth — and with every one of them, more or less, at one time or another he has had a formal dispute on this very point. He therefore knows all the advantages, twists, and turns of this debate — every objection, answer, and line of reasoning in it. And as other controversies grow more enlarged and subtle the longer they run and the further they develop, so must this one — especially in this more educated age of the world, and also because of the seemingly close resemblance that hypocrisy bears to true grace, which has tangled and complicated this controversy. The objections and difficulties a believer faces in reaching a sound judgment of his own standing are greater than in any other controversy in the world, presenting stranger knots and requiring distinctions as sharp as any the scholastics have known to untie them. Indeed, they are such that if the Holy Spirit did not sometimes cut and sometimes untie them for believers by witnessing with our spirits that we are sons of God, bare reason alone could never settle the matter. Satan through long experience has all of this at his fingertips and has long since organized it all into ready categories. He notes what answers have brought relief to the spirits of believers in each particular doubt he has cast in, and then studies a further reply for the next time — or for the next believer he will have to deal with.

Second, as Satan has thoroughly studied this controversy and knows all its twists and false arguments, he also — by his daily study of people — knows how best to tailor and deploy those arguments to specific individuals and specific moments. The sole occupation of those evil spirits is to study people; that is why they go up and down through the earth. He keeps files on people and their various temperaments and states of spirit, just as he does on temptations. He knows all the various ranks and conditions of people in the state of grace, and which kind of temptation best fits each rank. For people's temptations are varied and many (1 Peter 2:6), just as the gifts and operations of the Spirit are (1 Corinthians 12:4-5). Having worked through this controversy with every kind of person, he knows how to set up the dispute, how to arrange and deploy objections, and how to land his blows with the most impact. Just as physicians, having observed how various medicines work on different ages and constitutions and what effects they produce, prescribe and apply specific remedies suited to each patient's condition even if they share the same disease — so Satan, by observation finding that the hearts of some people mirror others as face to face in water (as Solomon says), recalls what arguments have most reliably taken hold with a type of Christian whose corruptions and graces much resemble those of the person he is now dealing with, and applies those same arguments again. 1. People's temperaments differ, and different suggestions suit different temperaments. Those with melancholy and suspicious spirits he targets with arguments and suggestions that will most penetrate their particular frame of mind. 2. The operations of graces, like those of sin, also vary across different temperaments. 3. And God's dealings with and work upon His children are as varied as any of this: some He humbles deeply; some He leads along with comfort; some He works on with a sudden and striking light, as if the sun were to rise all at once at midnight; others He works on gradually and imperceptibly, as the dawn slowly overtakes the night. Some have had a false or counterfeit work before; others were never enlightened until savingly. This variety opens room for various temptations. Whatever kind of work another Christian has experienced becomes a potential objection to someone who lacks it. 'I was never humbled like that,' says one; 'nor I ever comforted like that,' says another; 'I had a sudden, powerful work that came in like a spring tide, but now the tide has gone out and my first love has cooled,' says a third; 'I had some stirrings and enlightenings before,' says another, 'and I was deceived then, so perhaps I am being deceived now too.' And he is given the enormous task of comparing a counterfeit work with a true one. Every different path to faith lies open to a different set of objections. As we say that every earthly calling has its characteristic temptations, so the various ways of entering into this heavenly calling each have their own currents of temptation. All of this Satan knows and has traced repeatedly, and he knows how to fit temptations to each person and press them with the most damaging effect. In the same way he takes the measure of every person's knowledge, understanding, and way of thinking — for according to how much or how little we know, we are vulnerable to different temptations. Many arguments and objections that are like small pellets — unable to reach or dent people of depth and knowledge who rise above them, and who have on the whole armor of God, abounding in all faith and knowledge — are exactly right for those who are more ignorant and remain close to the ground, and who have only a few broken pieces of that armor to protect themselves with. Conversely, his heavy artillery, which he fires against people of knowledge, would fly over the heads of those others and not come near such smaller targets. Not everyone in Thyatira was capable of comprehending Satan's deep things, nor were they intended to (Revelation 2:24). Consider how ignorance and lack of knowledge of the Scriptures and the ways of grace laid out therein gives Satan the opportunity to trouble many poor and sincere souls with false readings of Scripture. How many weak souls get stuck in the shallows and are sometimes long troubled by crude mistakes! Like small birds, they are kept down for a long time by the sticky straws of trivial objections that larger ones simply fly away with. Paul, being a man of knowledge, was not easily caught by such chaff: 'We are not ignorant of his devices,' he says (2 Corinthians 2:11). Therefore Satan takes a different approach with him and comes at him with direct, heavy blows — falling to buffeting him (2 Corinthians 12). So Satan takes careful measure of every person's understanding and fits objections to them of proportionate size. As the apostle prepared milk for infants and solid food for the mature in his sermons, so Satan in his temptations suits and shapes them to each person's knowledge and way of thinking, always framing objections according to their understanding.

Third, he is able to convey all his false reasoning — however spiritual — invisibly, in such a way as to deceive us and make it land on us.

First, he is able not only to plant in the heart solicitations toward sensual and worldly things — such as the suggestion he put into Judas' heart to betray his master for money (John 13:2), or his tempting separated married couples toward immorality (1 Corinthians 7:5) — but also to insinuate and impart the most subtle and abstract reasoning about spiritual things that are entirely beyond the senses, suited to each person's level of understanding. We are therefore said to wrestle with them about heavenly things, with our claim to those things often being the very matter in contention. The phrase in Ephesians 6:12 — 'we wrestle with spiritual wickednesses in heavenly things' — is better understood as referring to 'heavenly things' rather than 'heavenly places,' since the word means something above the celestial, the highest heavens, which (if taken as places) the devils never entered after their fall. Since the word is used elsewhere for 'heavenly things' (as in Hebrews 8:5), and the preposition 'in' is also sometimes used to express the object or subject matter of something (as in Matthew 11:6: 'blessed is he who is not offended in Me,' meaning with Me or on account of Me), it may rightly be taken that way here — pointing us to the fact that what we are wrestling with Satan over is not worldly things like honors and riches, but heavenly things that concern our souls and eternal standing. Since the contest is about heavenly and spiritual blessings, it can only be carried out through reasoning that fits the subject — that is, spiritual false reasoning abstracted from sense and imagination. In this respect they are called 'spiritual wickednesses,' because in such wickedness they deal and trade — as much as in sensual temptations — including tempting to unbelief, despair, and blasphemy against God, all of which are the kinds of temptations we are presently addressing. That he is able to convey and suggest spiritual thoughts and reasoning of any kind is demonstrated in many ways: he injects blasphemous thoughts against God that sometimes exceed the mental capacity of the person receiving them. It is also shown by Saul's prophesying under the immediate dictating of an evil spirit, as is expressly stated in 1 Samuel 18:10 — in a manner perhaps similar to how the Sibyls also prophesied. Most evidently it is seen in all the damnable heresies broached throughout the ages — in primitive times among the Romans, whose promoters are identified as agents of Satan. Therefore in Romans 16, having branded those who taught false doctrine among them and having instructed the church against them, Paul gives this encouragement (verse 20): that God would soon crush Satan under their feet — looking back to Satan's work in those errors just mentioned (verse 16), since Satan was their primary author. In the church of Thyatira, those cursed heretics who were admired by their followers for the supposed depth and profundity of their heresies — 'depths as they call them' (Revelation 2:24) — if they call them depths, says the apostle, 'I will call them depths of Satan,' for the devil was the master and author who suggested them. In later times, apostasy is attributed to 'deceiving spirits' — that is, devils — whom Paul foretells that people would follow (1 Timothy 4:1). And 'in the working of Satan' (2 Thessalonians 2:9) it was he who sharpened their minds and pens. By the same logic, there is no reasoning about our standing before God, however spiritual, that Satan cannot suggest — just as he did those deep heresies to those who promoted them. So Satan can not only make the false reasonings our own hearts forge more plausible and convincing, and add further confirmations to deepen the darkness — he can also inject entirely new ones of his own invention, of whatever kind he chooses.

Second, he is not merely able to suggest those false arguments — he is able to insinuate them in such a way that they take hold of us and deceive us, and often to press them on us with deep force. In the passages already cited, it is not simply said that there would be spirits who would suggest errors, but that they would suggest them in such a way that people would give heed to them (1 Timothy 4:1). In 2 Thessalonians 2, where the working of those very spirits is described (verse 9), it is not only said that they were sent to delude, but with 'strong delusions' — with enough force put into them to prevail, so that people would actually believe them. Similarly, the lying spirit sent to persuade Ahab through the mouths of his false prophets was given not merely a commission to suggest a lie, but to do so in such a way that it would prevail with Ahab — as 2 Chronicles 18:21 says: 'And the Lord said, You shall persuade him, and you shall also prevail.' Just as he is able (when God permits) to delude the understanding of wicked people with false reasoning about heresy and false doctrine — by reason of the total darkness in them — so he is able (when God permits, as He sometimes does) to bring strong delusions upon the minds of God's own children through false reasoning about their standing, by reason of the darkness that partly remains in them. Through this he can produce in a godly person for a time and to a certain degree the same effects he produces in others, as was noted earlier. The believing Galatians, at least some of them, were so thoroughly 'bewitched' — as Paul calls it — as to assent for a time to a grave error regarding justification. This happened because of the folly and darkness remaining in them, as Paul implies when he says: 'O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you that you should not obey the truth?' (Galatians 3:1). If believers could be temporarily deluded even in the very doctrine of justification (which is unusual), then all the more may they — and ordinarily are they — misled in the personal application of faith, in believing their own justification — which is precisely the matter we are discussing. One caution must be added here: it is true that Satan cannot force an act of genuine assent to falsehood upon anyone's understanding. If he could, those who believed a lie would not have been condemned for it (2 Thessalonians 2:11-12), which would not be just unless it were their own sin — and this principle holds for all other temptations as well. Though Satan put the thought into Judas' heart (John 13:2), Judas' own conscience owns it entirely as his own act (Matthew 27:4): 'I have sinned,' and so on. Nor does Satan immediately and directly produce the act of assent in us the way God produces faith in us — if that were so, God's power in working good would be no greater than Satan's in working evil. And yet the scriptural language goes quite far in attributing things to Satan in this area. Of those who did not believe the gospel it says that 'the god of this world has blinded the minds of those who believe not' (2 Corinthians 4) — pointing to a working of blindness added on top of their natural blindness. So also the 'prince of the power of the air, who works powerfully' and so on (Ephesians 2:2). And the Corinthians while unregenerate are said to have been 'carried and led away after dumb idols' (1 Corinthians 12:2). All of these phrases seem to point to more than the influence one person can have over another through ordinary moral persuasion. He suggests invisibly and with greater frequency and persistence; he holds the mind fixed on the object; he presents a whole army of confirmations at once, arrayed so forcefully that the mind can scarcely resist; and he presses all of this on the spirit with a violent and commanding insistence. Beyond this, the language also seems to imply some kind of physical working — not directly on the mainspring of the clock, so to speak, but on its wheels and weights — meaning the passions in the body and the images in the imagination, rather than on the understanding directly. Experience shows how powerfully those things can sway and corrupt the judgment.

Fourth, he is further able to follow up and sustain his arguments as occasions arise — keeping the dispute going, pressing his case, countering our answers with new replies, and bringing forward fresh arguments. This is why it is called 'wrestling' in Ephesians 6:12: 'We wrestle not with flesh and blood, but with principalities and powers' — like physical wrestling, it involves repeated attacks and attempts to gain the victory. He is, so to speak, trying to knock our feet out from under us — that is, to take away the reasoning that holds us up, by countering it with fresh objections. How often we experience such spiritual wrestling in times of spiritual conflict! In hours of temptation, believers find ongoing disputes carried out by a rational opponent who brings forward pertinent objections against every answer they inwardly consider. This is why ministers advise against arguing with this cunning sophist. Many people, when death has drawn near, have found the reasoning they relied on for their standing — and the evidences they turned to — taken away and countered as fast as they could form them. That Satan has this skill in managing such disputes is further seen in the framing of heresies, where he assists their promoters with pertinent considerations to reinforce their ideas in their private reflection and study. If Satan were not able and skilled at opposing and replying in this way, these temptations — which consist of debates — could not be carried out. Otherwise, Satan would be disputing with us like someone arguing with a deaf person who can hear the argument but whose answers cannot be known — so that no reply can be formed. Therefore Satan must have some means — more or less a sense and impression of what the heart may be answering back. If this were otherwise, the glory God receives through the victory won over Satan in these temptations would be greatly dimmed, and Satan's defeat less complete. For the victory of faith in these disputes — and the resistance it puts up — consists chiefly in the replies that are made, by which faith quenches all his darts. When Satan once perceives that he has been resisted, he flees from us, as the apostle says in James 4:7, and does so of his own accord, as the language there implies — like a soldier who has been beaten and is ashamed. We can see this in Satan's conduct during his temptation of Christ, which proceeded through mutual exchange, and where Satan was overcome by the answers from Scripture that Christ gave. Being confounded, he left Christ — as the text says in Matthew 4:11 — as one too proud to endure defeat. Satan therefore has some way of perceiving the replies forming in our hearts to his objections, just as he has the ability to form and cast in those objections.