Chapter 7. General Rules for Mortification

General rules, without which no lust will be mortified. No mortification unless a man be a believer. Dangers of attempting mortification of sin by unregenerate persons. The duty of unconverted persons, as to this business of mortification, considered. The vanity of the Papists' attempts, and rules for mortification, thence discovered.

The ways and means whereby a soul may proceed to the mortification of any particular lust and sin, which Satan takes advantage by, to disquiet and weaken him, comes next under consideration.

Now there are some general considerations to be premised, concerning some principles and foundations of this work, without which no man in the world, be he never so much raised by convictions, and resolved for the mortification of any sin, can attain thereunto.

General rules and principles, without which no sin will be ever mortified, are these:

1. Unless a man be a believer, that is, one that is truly ingrafted into Christ, he can never mortify any one sin; I do not say, unless he know himself to be so, but unless indeed he be so. Mortification is the work of believers (Romans 8:13): If you through the Spirit, etc. You believers, to whom there is no condemnation (verse 1). They alone are exhorted to it (Colossians 3:5): Mortify therefore your members that are upon the earth. Who should mortify? You who are risen with Christ (verse 1), whose life is hid with Christ in God (verse 3), who shall appear with him in glory (verse 4). An unregenerate man may do something like it, but the work itself, so as it may be acceptable with God, he can never perform. You know what a picture of it is drawn in some of the philosophers — Seneca, Cicero, Epictetus; what affectionate discourses they have of contempt of the world, and self, of regulating and conquering all exorbitant affections and passions. The lives of most of them manifested, that their maxims differed as much from true mortification, as the sun painted on a sign-post, from the sun in the firmament. They had neither light nor heat. There is no death of sin, without the death of Christ. You know what attempts there are made after it by the Papists, in their vows, penances, and satisfactions; I dare say of them (I mean as many of them as act upon the principles of their church, as they call it,) what Paul says of Israel in point of righteousness (Romans 9:31, 32): They have followed after mortification, but they have not attained to it; wherefore? because they seek it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law. The same is the state and condition of all among ourselves, who in obedience to their convictions, and awakened consciences, do attempt a relinquishment of sin; they follow after it, but they do not attain it.

It is true, it is, and it will be required of every person whatever, that hears the law or Gospel preached, that he mortify sin; it is his duty, but it is not his immediate duty. It is his duty to do it, but to do it in God's way. If you require your servant to pay so much money for you in such a place, but first to go and take it up in another; it is his duty to pay the money appointed, and you will blame him if he do it not; yet it was not his immediate duty; he was first to take it up, according to your direction. So it is in this case; sin is to be mortified, but something is to be done in the first place to enable us thereunto.

I have proved, that it is the Spirit alone that can mortify sin; he is promised to do it, and all other means without him are empty and vain. How shall he then mortify sin, that has not the Spirit? A man may easier see without eyes, speak without a tongue, than truly mortify one sin without the Spirit. Now how is he attained? It is the Spirit of Christ; and (as the Apostle says,) if we have not the Spirit of Christ, we are none of his (Romans 8:9). So, if we are Christ's, have an interest in him, we have the Spirit, and so alone have power for mortification. This the Apostle discourses at large (Romans 8:8): So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God — this is the inference and conclusion he makes of his foregoing discourse about our natural state and condition, and the enmity we have unto God and his law therein. But what is our deliverance from this condition (verse 9)? But you are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you: you believers, that have the Spirit of Christ, you are not in the flesh. There is no way of deliverance from the state and condition of being in the flesh, but by the Spirit of Christ. And what if this Spirit of Christ be in you? why then you are mortified (verse 10): the body is dead because of sin, or unto it; mortification is carried on; the new man is quickened to righteousness. All attempts then for mortification of any lust, without an interest in Christ, are vain. But poor creatures! they labor in the fire, and their work consumes. When the Spirit of Christ comes to this work, he will be as refiner's fire, and as fuller's soap, and he will purge men as gold and silver (Malachi 3:3), take away their dross and tin, their filth and blood (Isaiah 4:3). But men must be gold and silver in the bottom, or else refining will do them no good. The prophet gives us the sad issue of wicked men's utmost attempts for mortification, by what means soever that God affords them (Jeremiah 6:29, 30): The bellows are burnt, and the lead is consumed of the fire, the founder melts in vain, reprobate silver shall men call them, because the Lord has rejected them — and what is the reason hereof? (verse 28): They were brass and iron when they were put into the furnace. Men may refine brass and iron long enough before they will be good silver.

I say then, mortification is not the present business of unregenerate men. God calls them not to it as yet. Conversion is their work. The conversion of the whole soul, not the mortification of this or that particular lust. You would laugh at a man, that you should see setting up a great fabric, and never take any care for a foundation; especially if you should see him so foolish, as that having a thousand experiences, that what he built one day, fell down another, he would yet continue in the same course. So it is with convinced persons; though they plainly see that what ground they get against sin one day, they lose another, yet they will go on in the same road still, without inquiring where the destructive flaw in their progress lies. When the Jews upon the conviction of their sin were cut to the heart (Acts 2:37), and cried out what shall we do? what does Peter direct them to? Does he bid them go and mortify their pride, wrath, malice, cruelty, and the like? No, he knew that was not their present work, but he calls them to conversion and faith in Christ in general (verse 38). Let the soul be first thoroughly converted, and then looking on him whom they had pierced, humiliation and mortification will ensue. Thus when John came to preach repentance and conversion, he said, The axe is now laid to the root of the tree (Matthew 3:10). The Pharisees had been laying heavy burdens, imposing tedious duties, and rigid means of mortification, in fastings, washings, and the like, all in vain. And our Savior tells us what is to be done in this case; says he, Do men gather grapes from thorns (Matthew 7:16)? But suppose a thorn be well pruned and cut, and have pains taken with him? Yet he will never bear figs (verses 17, 18). It cannot be but every tree will bring forth fruit according to its own kind. What is then to be done, he tells us (Matthew 12:33): Make the tree good, and his fruit will be good: the root must be dealt with, the nature of the tree changed, or no good fruit will be brought forth.

This is that I aim at: unless a man be regenerate, unless he be a believer, all attempts that he can make for mortification, be they never so specious and promising, all means he can use, let him follow them with never so much diligence, earnestness, watchfulness and contention of mind and spirit, are to no purpose; in vain shall he use many remedies, he shall not be healed. There are sundry desperate evils attending an endeavor in convinced persons that are no more but so, to perform this duty.

First, the mind and soul is taken up about that which is not the man's proper business, and so he is diverted from that which is so. God lays hold by his word and judgments on some sin in him, galls his conscience, disquiets his heart, deprives him of his rest; now other diversions will not serve his turn: he must apply himself to the work before him. The business in hand being to awake the whole man unto a consideration of the state and condition wherein he is, that he might be brought home to God; instead hereof, he sets himself to mortify the sin that galls him; which is a pure issue of self-love, to be freed from his trouble; and not at all to the work he is called unto; and so is diverted from it. Thus God tells us of Ephraim, when he spread his net upon them, and brought them down as the fowls of heaven, and chastised them (Hosea 7:12): they return, but not to the most High — they set themselves to a relinquishment of sin, but not in that manner by universal conversion as God called for it. Thus are men diverted from coming unto God, by the most glorious ways that they can fix upon to come to him by. And this is one of the most common deceits whereby men ruin their own souls.

Secondly, this duty being a thing good in itself, in its proper place, a duty evidencing sincerity, bringing home peace to the conscience; a man finding himself really engaged in it, his mind and heart set against this or that sin, with purpose and resolution to have no more to do with it, he is ready to conclude, that his state and condition is good, and so to delude his own soul.

(1.) When his conscience has been made sick with sin, and he could find no rest, when he should go to the great physician of souls, and get healing in his blood; the man by this engagement against sin, pacifies and quiets his conscience, and sits down without going to Christ at all. Ah! how many poor souls are thus deluded to eternity! When Ephraim saw his sickness, he sent to King Jareb (Hosea 5:13), which kept him off from God. The whole bundle of the Popish religion is made up of designs and contrivances to pacify conscience without Christ; all described by the Apostle (Romans 10:4).

(2.) By this means men satisfy themselves that their state and condition is good, seeing they do that which is a work good in itself, and they do not do it to be seen. They know they would have the work done in sincerity, and so are hardened in a kind of self-righteousness.

(3.) When a man has thus for a season been deluded, and has deceived his own soul, and finds in a long course of life, that indeed his sin is not mortified, or if he has changed one, he has gotten another; he begins at length to think, that all contending is in vain, he shall never be able to prevail. He is making a dam against water that increases on him. Hereupon he gives over, as one despairing of any success, and yields up himself to the power of sin, and that habit of formality that he has gotten.

And this is the usual issue with persons attempting the mortification of sin without an interest in Christ first obtained. It deludes them, hardens them, destroys them. And therefore we see that there are not usually more vile and desperate sinners in the world, than such as having by conviction been put on this course, have found it fruitless, and deserted it without a discovery of Christ. I say then that mortification is the work of believers, and believers only. To kill sin is the work of living men; where men are dead, (as all unbelievers, the best of them are dead,) sin is alive, and will live.

2. It is the work of faith; the peculiar work of faith; now if there be a work to be done that will be effected by one only instrument, it is the greatest madness for any to attempt the doing of it, that has not that instrument. Now it is faith that purifies the heart (Acts 15:9); or as Peter speaks, we purify our souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit (1 Peter 1:22). And without it, it will not be done.

What has been spoken, I suppose is sufficient to make good my first general rule: Be sure to get an interest in Christ, if you intend to mortify any sin, without it it will never be done.

Objection: What then would you have unregenerate men, that are convinced of the evil of sin do? Shall they cease striving against sin, live dissolutely, give their lusts their swing, and be as bad as the worst of men? This were a way to set the whole world into confusion, to bring all things into darkness, to set open the floodgates of lust, and lay the reins upon the necks of men to rush into all sin with delight and greediness, like the horse into the battle.

Answer: 1. God forbid! It is to be looked on as a great issue of the wisdom, goodness, and love of God, that by manifold ways and means he is pleased to restrain the sons of men from running forth into that compass of excess and riot, which the depravedness of their nature would carry them out unto with violence. By what way soever this is done, it is an issue of the care, kindness, and goodness of God, without which the whole earth would be a hell of sin and confusion.

2. There is a peculiar convincing power in the word, which God is often pleased to put forth to the wounding, amazing, and in some sort humbling of sinners, though they are never converted. And the word is to be preached, though it has this end, yet not with this end. Let then the word be preached, and the sins of men rebuked, lust will be restrained, and some oppositions will be made against sin, though that be not the effect aimed at.

3. Though this be the work of the word and Spirit, and it be good in itself, yet it is not profitable nor available as to the main end in them in whom it is wrought; they are still in the gall of bitterness, and under the power of darkness.

4. Let men know it is their duty, but in its proper place; I take not men from mortification, but put them upon conversion. He that shall call a man from mending a hole in the wall of his house, to quench a fire that is consuming the whole building, is not his enemy. Poor soul! it is not your sore finger but your hectic fever that you are to apply yourself to the consideration of. You set yourself against a particular sin, and do not consider that you are nothing but sin.

Let me add this to them who are preachers of the word, or intend through the good hand of God that employment. It is their duty to plead with men about their sins, to lay load on particular sins, but always remember, that it be done with that which is the proper end of law and Gospel. That is, that they make use of the sin they speak against, to the discovery of the state and condition wherein the sinner is. Otherwise, they may work men to formality and hypocrisy, but little of the true end of preaching the Gospel will be brought about. It will not avail, to beat a man off from his drunkenness, into a sober formality. A skillful master of the assemblies lays his axe at the root, drives still at the heart. To inveigh against particular sins of ignorant unregenerate persons (such as the land is full of) is a good work: but though it may be done with great efficacy, vigor and success, if this be all the effect of it, that they are set upon the most sedulous endeavors of mortifying their sins preached down, all that is done, is but like the beating of an enemy in an open field, and driving him into an impregnable castle, not to be prevailed against. Get you at any time a sinner at the advantage, on the account of any one sin whatever, have you anything to take hold of him by, bring it to his state and condition, drive it up to the head, and there deal with him; to break men off from particular sins, and not to break their hearts, is to deprive ourselves of advantages of dealing with them.

And herein is the Roman mortification grievously at fault; they drive all sorts of persons to it, without the least consideration whether they have a principle for it or not. They are so far from calling on men to believe, that they may be able to mortify their lusts, that they call men to mortification instead of believing. The truth is, they neither know what it is to believe, nor what mortification itself intends. Faith with them is but a general assent to the doctrine taught in their church: and mortification the betaking of a man by a vow to some certain course of life, wherein he denies himself something of the use of the things of this world, not without a considerable compensation. Such men know neither the scriptures, nor the power of God. Their boasting of their mortification, is but their glorying in their shame. Some casuists among ourselves, who overlooking the necessity of regeneration, do avowedly give this for a direction to all sorts of persons, that complain of any sin or lust, that they should vow against it, at least for a season, a month or so, seem to have a scant measure of light in the mystery of the Gospel. They bid men vow to abstain from their sin for a season. This commonly makes their lust more impetuous. Perhaps with great perplexity they keep their word: perhaps not, which increases their guilt and torment. Is their sin at all mortified hereby? Do they find a conquest over it? Is their condition changed, though they attain a relinquishment of it? Are they not still in the gall of bitterness? Is not this to put men to make brick, if not without straw, (which is worse,) without strength? What promise has any unregenerate man to encourage him in this work? What assistance for the performance of it? Can sin be killed without an interest in the death of Christ, or mortified without the Spirit? If such directions should prevail to change men's lives, as seldom they do, yet they never reach to the change of their hearts or conditions. They may make men self-justiciaries or hypocrites, not Christians. It grieves me oftentimes to see poor souls, that have a zeal for God, and a desire of eternal welfare, kept, by such directors and directions, under a hard, burdensome, outside worship and service of God, with many specious endeavors for mortification, in an utter ignorance of the righteousness of Christ, and unacquaintedness with his Spirit, all their days. If ever God shine into their hearts, to give them the knowledge of his glory in the face of his Son Jesus Christ, they will see the folly of their present way.

The positive description of mortification of a particular sin. Its several parts and degrees. 1. The habitual weakening of its root and principle. The power of lust to tempt. Differences in that power depending on the person and the time. 2. Constant fighting against sin. The components of that fighting are examined. 3. Success against sin. The sum of this discussion.

What it means positively to mortify a sin — which will prepare the way for specific directions — must now be considered.

The mortification of a lust consists in three things.

1. A habitual weakening of it. Every lust is a depraved habit or disposition that continually inclines the heart toward evil. Hence the description of a person with no truly mortified lust (Genesis 6:5): 'Every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.' Such a person always lives under the power of a strong bent and inclination toward sin. The reason a natural man is not always, perpetually, chasing some one lust day and night is that he has many to serve, each demanding satisfaction. He is driven with great variety, but always in the direction of self-satisfaction.

Consider the lust or disorder whose mortification is being sought: in itself it is a strong, deeply rooted, habitual inclination of will and affections toward some particular sin — always stirring up imaginations, thoughts, and schemes about its object. Hence people are said to have their hearts set on evil (Romans 13:14): the bent of their spirits leans toward it, always planning to gratify the flesh. A sinful and depraved habit — in this as in many other respects — differs from all natural or moral habits. Natural and moral habits incline the soul gently and agreeably with its nature, but sinful habits drive with violence and force. Hence lusts are said to wage war against the soul (1 Peter 2:11), to rebel and rise up in arms with the full force of military resistance (Romans 7:23), and to lead captive — capturing by conquest. All these are images of great violence and forcefulness.

I could show at length from the description in Romans 7 how lust darkens the mind, extinguishes convictions, dethrones reason, interrupts the power and effect of any consideration that might check it, and breaks through everything into a flame. But that is not my present purpose. The first step in mortification, then, is weakening this habit of sin or lust so that it does not rise up, conceive, erupt, provoke, entice, and disturb with that violence, intensity, and frequency it naturally has (James 1:14-15).

I want to give one caution here: although every lust by its very nature equally and universally inclines and drives toward sin, this must be qualified in two ways:

1. One lust, or the same lust in one person, may receive many accidental improvements, intensifications, and reinforcements that give it a life, power, and force far exceeding another lust or the same lust of the same type in another person. When a lust aligns with a person's natural constitution and temperament, his way of life, and the opportunities before him — or when Satan has found a convenient handle by which to manage it, as he has a thousand ways of doing — that lust grows violent and powerful beyond others, or beyond the same lust in another person. The vapors from it darken the mind so that, though a person still knows the same things as before, they have no power or influence on his will. His corrupt affections and passions are set loose by it.

Lust especially gains strength through temptation. When a fitting temptation meets a lust, it gives it a new life, force, violence, and rage that it did not seem to have before — or even to be capable of.

2. Some lusts are far more perceptible and obvious in their violent workings than others. Paul distinguishes sexual immorality from all other sins (1 Corinthians 6:18): 'Flee sexual immorality. Every sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body.' Because of this, the motions of that sin are more perceptible and discernible than others. A person may have the love of the world no less habitually dominant in him than the sin of immorality, yet it does not create the same turmoil throughout the whole person.

On this account, some men may be regarded by themselves and by others as mortified people — yet have no less a dominance of lust in them than those who cry out in astonishment at the perplexing turmoil of theirs. Their lusts simply concern things that do not create such upheaval in the soul, in which they are exercised with a calmer spirit, because the very fabric of human nature is not as directly involved in those sins as in others.

The first step in mortification, then, is weakening this habit so that it no longer drives and stirs as it did before — so that it no longer entices and draws aside, disturbs and perplexes — killing its vitality, energy, readiness, and eagerness to stir. This is what is meant by crucifying the flesh with its lusts (Galatians 5:24): draining its blood and vital spirits that give it strength and power. It is the wasting of the body of death day by day (2 Corinthians 4:16).

Think of a man nailed to a cross: at first he struggles, strains, and cries out with great strength and vigor. But as his blood and vital strength drain away, his struggles grow faint and infrequent, his cries weak and barely audible. When a person first sets himself against a lust or corruption, it thrashes violently trying to break free. It cries out with intensity and impatience to be relieved and satisfied. But when mortification has drained its blood and vital strength, it moves seldom and feebly, cries rarely, and is scarcely heard in the heart. It may sometimes have a dying convulsion that looks like great vigor and strength, but it passes quickly — especially if kept from significant success. This is what the apostle describes, particularly in Romans 6:6.

Sin, he says, is crucified — fastened to the cross. To what end? That the body of death might be destroyed — sin's power weakened and abolished little by little — so that we should no longer serve sin. That is, sin should no longer incline and compel us with such force as to make us its servants, as it once did. This applies not only to carnal and sensual desires or worldly ambitions — not only to the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life — but also to the flesh that is in the mind and will, that natural opposition to God which is in us by birth. Whatever the nature of the troubling disorder, however it manifests — whether by driving toward evil or hindering from good — the principle is the same. Unless this is done effectively, all further contention will fail to reach the goal. A man may beat down bitter fruit from a corrupt tree until he is exhausted. As long as the root remains strong and vigorous, knocking off the present fruit will not stop it from producing more. This is the folly of some people: they set themselves with all energy and diligence against the outward eruptions of lust, but leaving the principle and root untouched — perhaps never even looking for it — they make little or no real progress in mortification.

2. In constant fighting and contending against sin. Simply being able to keep pressing against sin is itself no small degree of mortification. When sin is strong and vigorous, the soul can barely hold its ground against it. It sighs, groans, mourns, and is troubled — as David speaks of himself — but it rarely has sin on the run. David complained that his sin had taken firm hold of him and he could not look up (Psalm 40:12). Several things are required in and make up this fighting against sin.

1. Knowing that you have such an enemy to deal with — recognizing it, treating it as a real enemy, one that must be destroyed by every possible means — is required for this. As I said, the contest is fierce and the stakes are high; it is a fight about eternal realities. When people have only passing, casual thoughts about their lusts, it is not a good sign that those lusts are being mortified or that they are on the path to mortification. This is what every person must do — know the plague of his own heart (1 Kings 8:38). Without this knowledge, no other work can be done. It is to be feared that very many know very little of the main enemy they carry around within their own hearts. This ignorance makes them quick to justify themselves and impatient at reproof or warning, because they do not know that they are in any danger (2 Chronicles 16:10).

2. Laboring to become acquainted with sin's ways, tricks, methods, advantages, and the occasions of its success is the beginning of this warfare. This is how men deal with enemies: they investigate their plans and schemes, study their purposes, consider how and by what means they have previously won victories — so they can be prevented from winning again. This is how they deal with lust who truly mortify it. Not only when lust is actively vexing, enticing, and seducing them, but even in quiet moments they reflect: 'This is our enemy — this is his approach and pattern, these are his advantages, this is how he has prevailed, and this is how he will again if not prevented.' David said it this way: 'My sin is ever before me' (Psalm 51:2). Indeed, one of the choicest and most important aspects of practical spiritual wisdom consists in uncovering the subtleties, strategies, and deep workings of any indwelling sin — to consider and understand where its greatest strength lies, what advantages it tends to exploit from circumstances, opportunities, and temptations, what its arguments and pretexts and reasonings are, what its tactics and excuses and disguises are. It means setting the wisdom of the Spirit against the cunning of the old man, tracing this serpent through all its twisting and winding, and being able to say even at its most secret and imperceptible workings, 'This is your old pattern; I know what you are aiming at.' Maintaining this readiness is a vital part of our warfare.

3. Pressing sin down daily with all the things that will later be described — those that are painful, deadly, and destructive to it — is the heart of this contest. A person fighting this way never concludes that his lust is dead simply because it is quiet, but labors daily to strike it with new wounds and new blows. So the apostle writes (Colossians 3:5).

While the soul is in this condition — while it is actively pressing in this way — it is certainly on top. Sin is under the sword and dying.

3. In success: frequent success against any lust is another part and evidence of mortification. By success I mean not merely preventing sin from being carried out or completed, but winning a victory over it and pursuing it to a decisive conquest. For example: when the heart catches sin at work — seducing, forming schemes, making provision for the flesh to fulfill its lusts — it immediately arrests sin and brings it before God's law and the love of Christ, condemns it, and pursues it with execution to the very end.

When a man arrives at this state — where lust is weakened at its root and principle, where its motions and activities are fewer and weaker than before, so that they cannot hinder his duties or break his peace, and where he can in a calm and settled spirit find sin out, fight against it, and prevail over it — then sin is mortified to a considerable degree. Despite all its opposition, a man in this condition may have peace with God all his days.

These, then, are the headings under which I place the mortification being aimed at: the mortification of any one troubling disorder through which the general depravity and corruption of our nature tries to assert and express itself.

1. First, weakening its indwelling disposition — by which it inclines, entices, drives toward evil, rebels, opposes, and fights against God — through the planting, habitual growth, and cherishing of a principle of grace that stands in direct opposition to it and is destructive of it. This is the foundation. So pride is weakened by the planting and growth of humility; anger by patience; impurity by purity of mind and conscience; love of this world by heavenly-mindedness. These are graces of the Spirit — or the same habitual grace variously active through the Holy Spirit, according to the variety of objects it engages with — just as the various lusts are the same natural corruption variously active according to the various opportunities and circumstances it encounters.

2. The readiness, eagerness, and vigor of the Spirit or new man in contending with and cheerfully fighting against the lust in question — through all the appointed ways and means, constantly making use of the resources provided against its motions and actings — is the second element required.

3. Success to varying degrees follows from these two. If the disorder does not have an unconquerable advantage from its natural situation, this success may possibly rise to such a complete conquest that the soul never again feels its opposition in any meaningful way. In any case, it will certainly reach a point that allows for peace of conscience according to the terms of the covenant of grace.