ou shalt be saved. [6793]"No
man sins against the Holy Ghost, but he that wilfully and finally
renounceth Christ, and contemneth him and his word to the last, without
which there is no salvation, from which grievous sin, God of his infinite
mercy deliver us." Take hold of this to be thy comfort, and meditate withal
on God's word, labour to pray, to repent, to be renewed in mind, "keep
thine heart with all diligence." Prov. iv. 13, resist the devil, and he
will fly from thee, pour out thy soul unto the Lord with sorrowful Hannah,
"pray continually," as Paul enjoins, and as David did, Psalm i. "meditate
on his law day and night."

Yea, but this meditation is that mars all, and mistaken makes many men far
worse, misconceiving all they read or hear, to their own overthrow; the
more they search and read Scriptures, or divine treatises, the more they
puzzle themselves, as a bird in a net, the more they are entangled and
precipitated into this preposterous gulf: "Many are called, but few are
chosen," Matt. xx. 16. and xxii. 14. with such like places of Scripture
misinterpreted strike them with horror, they doubt presently whether they
be of this number or no: God's eternal decree of predestination, absolute
reprobation, and such fatal tables, they form to their own ruin, and
impinge upon this rock of despair. How shall they be assured of their
salvation, by what signs? "If the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall
the ungodly and sinners appear?" 1 Pet. iv. 18. Who knows, saith Solomon,
whether he be elect? This grinds their souls, how shall they discern they
are not reprobates? But I say again, how shall they discern they are? From
the devil can be no certainty, for he is a liar from the beginning; if he
suggests any such thing, as too frequently he doth, reject him as a
deceiver, an enemy of human kind, dispute not with him, give no credit to
him, obstinately refuse him, as St. Anthony did in the wilderness, whom the
devil set upon in several shapes, or as the collier did, so do thou by him.
For when the devil tempted him with the weakness of his faith, and told him
he could not be saved, as being ignorant in the principles of religion, and
urged him moreover to know what he believed, what he thought of such and
such points and mysteries: the collier told him, he believed as the church
did; but what (said the devil again) doth the church believe? as I do (said
the collier); and what's that thou believest? as the church doth