David’s Digest: Satan’s Devices & Biblical Remedies: The Glitter of the World, Part 1

He represents the world to them in its beauty and bravery [finery], which proves a bewitching sight to a world of men.

(Footnote: The beauty of the world foils a Christian more than the strength; the flattering sunshine more than the blustering storm. In storms we keep our garments close about us [as in the fable of the sun and wind. — editor])

(It is true, this took not Christ, because Satan could find no matter in him for his temptation to work upon.) So that he [Satan] can no sooner cast out his golden bait, but we are ready to play with it, and to nibble at it; he can no sooner throw out his golden ball, but men are apt to run after it, though they lose God and their souls in the pursuit.

Ah! how many professors [of religion] in these days have for a time followed hard after God, Christ, and ordinances, till the devil hath set before them the world in all its beauty and bravery, which hath so bewitched their souls that they have grown to have low thoughts of holy things, and then to be cold in their affections to holy things, and then to slight them, and at last, with the young man in the Gospel, to turn their backs upon them.

Ah! the time, the thoughts, the spirits, the hearts, the souls, the duties, the services, that the inordinate love of this wicked world doth eat up and destroy, and hath ate up and destroyed.

Where one thousand are destroyed by the world’s frowns, ten thousand are destroyed by the world’s smiles. The world, siren-like, it sings us and sinks us; it kisses us, and betrays us, like Judas; it kisses us and smites us under the fifth rib, like Joab. The honours, splendour, and all the glory of this world, are but sweet poisons, that will much endanger us, if they do not eternally destroy us.

(Footnote: he inhabitants of Nilus are deaf by the noise of the waters; so the world makes such a noise in men’s ears, that they cannot hear the things of heaven. The world is like the swallows’ dung, that put out Tobias his eyes. The champions could not wring an apple oat of Milo’s hand by a strong hand, but a fair maid, by fair means, got it presently.)

Ah! the multitude of souls that have surfeited [consumed too much] of these sweet baits and died for ever.

They are not able to secure you from the least evil, they are not able to procure you the least desirable good. The crown of gold cannot cure the headache, nor the velvet slipper ease the gout, nor the jewel about the neck cannot take away the pain of the teeth. The frogs of Egypt entered into the rich men’s houses of Egypt, as well as the poor. Our daily experience doth evidence this, that all the honours, riches, etc., that men enjoy, cannot free them from the cholic, the fever, or lesser diseases.

(Footnote: The prior in Melancthon rolled his hand up and down in a basinful of angels, thinking thereby to have charmed his gout, but it would not do. Nugas the Scythian, despising the rich presents and ornaments that were sent unto him by the emperor of Constantinople, asked whether those things could drive away calamities, diseases, or death.)

Nay, that which may seem most strange is, that a great deal of wealth cannot keep men from falling into extreme poverty: Judges i. 6, you shall find seventy kings, with their fingers and toes cut off, glad, like whelps, to lick up crumbs under another king’s table; and shortly after, the same king that brought them to this penury, is reduced to the same poverty and misery. Why then should that be a bar to keep you out of heaven, that cannot give you the least ease on earth?

This is the sum of Solomon’s sermon, ‘Vanity of vanities, and all is vanity.’ This our first parents found, and therefore named their second son Abel, or vanity. Solomon, that had tried these things,
and could best tell the vanity of them, he preached this sermon over again and again, ‘Vanity of vanities, and all is vanity.’ It is sad to think how many thousands there be that can say with the preacher, ‘Vanity of vanities, all is vanity,’ nay, swear it, and yet follow after these things as if there were no other glory, nor felicity, but what is to be found in these things they call vanity.

(Footnote: Gilemex, king of Vandals, led in triumph by Belisarius, cried out, ‘Vanity of vanity, all is vanity.’ The fancy of Lucian, who placed Charon on the top of an high hill, viewing all the affairs of men living, and looking on their greatest cities as little birds’ nests, is very pleasant.)

Such men will sell Christ, heaven, and their souls for a trifle, that call these things vanity, but do not cordially believe them to be vanity, but set their hearts upon them as if they were their crown, the top of all their royalty and glory. Oh let your souls dwell upon the vanity of all things here below, till your hearts be so throughly convinced and persuaded of the vanity of them, as to trample upon them, and make them a footstool for Christ to get up, and ride in a holy triumph in your hearts.

(Footnote: Oh the imperfection, the ingratitude, the levity, the inconstancy, the perfidiousness [treachery; traitorousness; breach of faith] of those creatures we most servilely affect. Ah, did we but weigh man’s pain with his payment, his crosses with his mercies, his miseries with his pleasures, we should then see that there is nothing got by the bargain, and conclude, ‘Vanity of vanities, all is vanity.’)

Chrysostom said once, ‘That if he were the fittest in the world to preach a sermon to the whole world, gathered together in one congregation, and had some high mountain for his pulpit, from whence he
might have a prospect of all the world in his view, and were furnished with a voice of brass, a voice as loud as the trumpets of the archangel, that all the world might hear him, he would choose to preach upon no other text than that in the Psalms, ‘O mortal men, how long will ye love vanity, and follow after leasing? Ps. iv. 2.

Tell me, you that say all things under the sun are vanity, if you do really believe what you say, why do you spend more thoughts and time on the world, than you do on Christ, heaven, and your immortal souls? Why do you then neglect your duty towards God, to get the world? Why do you then so eagerly pursue after the world, and are so cold in your pursuing after God, Christ, and holiness? Why then are your hearts so exceedingly raised, when the world comes in, and smiles upon you; and so much dejected, and cast down, when the world frowns upon you, and with Jonah’s gourd withers before you?