Charles Haddon Spurgeon tells us that "While commenting upon the One Hundred-and Nineteenth Psalm," he was "brought into most intimate communion with Thomas Manton." This is not surprising, for the great Puritan preached no less than one hundred and ninety sermons on the one hundred and seventy six verses of that psalm, and these sermons occupy three-and-a-half volumes in the 22 volumes of his Complete Works.
Spurgeon tells us that while he worked his way through Manton's sermons he was struck with his selective use of similes, or illustrations, and he hit on a plan for a small book; it would consist of a collection of these similes and metaphors, etc., with additional comments by Spurgeon himself. He tells us that in doing this it is not his intention to "rob" the great Puritan of what is rightly his; "I am simply clearing his house of all his pictures," he says, "and hanging them up in new frames of my own." We thought we might give a few of Manton's pictures in Spurgeon's new frames. The title of the small book that ensued was – "Illustrations and Meditations", or "Flowers from a Puritan's Garden. Distilled and Dispensed by C.H. Spurgeon".
We have in earlier editions of our Magazine reproduced some sections from Spurgeon’s small book but here are a few more.
First, we have Manton's illustrations, or simile, and then, Spurgeon's comment.
Manton: As a lute that is not played upon, but hangs by the wall, soon grows out of order for want of use; so, if we do not constantly and diligently exercise ourselves in godliness, our hearts grow dead and vain.
Spurgeon: It would seem that there is no worse abuse of a good thing than to abstain from its use. While it lies idle it lies ill. Grace must be exercised towards God in devout contemplation, wrestling prayer, or adoring praise; and it must be exercised among our fellows in patience, zeal, charity, and holy example; or like an arm which has been long bound by a man’s side, it will become withered. Some of the Children of Israel’s enemies were left in Canaan for the sole reason that the armies of Israel might not forget the art of war. To return to our author’s figure – are we like a lute upon the wall? Are the strings all out of order? Tune us, Lord, and then bring music out of us. Why should a single instrument in the whole concert be silent when the Lord is to be praised?
Manton: Many die of inward bleeding as well as by outward wounds.
SpurgeonEvery surgeon can give many instances of such deaths. Not one abrasion on the skin was visible; the dying man had neither gash, nor cut, nor even a pin’s prick, and yet his life oozed away in secret. This it is that without an open fault, a man’s soul may perish. If wrath rages within, it is fatal, even though no revengeful act is perpetrated; if lust be burning in the heart, the man is lost, though he has never advanced to a lascivious deed; if unbelief proves an inward enmity against God, the man is condemned already, though no blasphemous word has crossed his lips. Sin is a bleeding at the heart. It is a disease which destroys the true life within, as well as the fruit of it without; therefore, let every man beware of flattering himself that he is right with God because no glaring vice is manifest in his daily conversation.
Manton: Men in a tempest are sometimes cast upon a place of safety which they had not made for by intention or foresight.
Spurgeon: Happy mariner who is forced into port! Blessed is that wave which throws the drowning sailor upon the rock of safety! Such forces are abroad at times, and especially in the spiritual world. We mean not to exclude the agency of the will when we speak of certain compulsions which have driven men and women into a happiness for which they had not looked. “Had I not lost my eyes,” said one, “I had never seen my Saviour.” Another attributed his spiritual riches to the fact that he lost all his property, and so was driven to God for consolation. When we reach the heights of glory we shall ascribe our felicity, not to our own will or merit, but to those sweet forces which drew us to heaven; and also, perhaps, to certain ruder agencies, which beat like hurricanes upon our pride, and sank our self-confidence in the floods – wrecking us into rest, and destroying us unto salvation.
Manton: It was a fashion, in the primitive persecutions, to clothe the martyrs in bears’ skins, and then to bait them as bears; and it is a usual practice of Satan and his agents, first to blast the reputation of the godly, and then to persecute them as offenders.
Spurgeon: It is written of the worthies of old that “they had trial of cruel mockings.” Tertullian says that in the primitive times the saints were called herds of asses, vile fellows, the disciples of a man crucified, eaters of men’s flesh, etc. The heathen painted the God of the Christians with the head of an ass, and with a book in his hand, to signify that, though Christians pretended to knowledge, they were a company of fools. The like custom remains still. Good men are first slandered and then censured. They lay to our charge deeds that we never dreamed of, and then they pile on the adjectives of denunciations. But thanks be to God, a saint in a bear’s skin is none the less a saint. The Lord knows the wolf in the sheep’s skin, and the sheep in the bear’s skin.
Manton: The devil is called “the prince of the power of the air.” Infected air is drawn into the lungs without pain, and we get a disease before we feel it, and so die from a pestilential air.
Spurgeon: Thus, doth Satan injure and destroy men’s souls by an influence so subtle and painless that before a man is aware of it, he is inflicted with error or iniquity, and falls a victim to the evil. Whole cities have been carried off by plagues arising from causes which the sick ones never suspected, and whole classes of men perish form wild passions which only the devil could have excited to such a pitch. No gas is so penetrating, so all-pervading, so deadly, as the influence of Satan. In these days it is not polite to speak of him; the common doubt of his existence is a proof of his powerful cunning.
Manton: Take a mirror and put it towards heaven; there you shall see the figure of heaven, the clouds, and things above. Turn it downwards towards the earth, you shall see the figure of the earth, trees, meadows, men. So doth the soul receive a figure from the things to which it is set.
Spurgeon: Are our thoughts and our affections full of worldliness? Let us make good use of Manton’s figure, and turn the looking-glass the other way. Our mind will readily enough reflect divine things if we turn it in that direction. Let us see if it be not so. Reach down the Bible, look at the biography of a holy man, or some lively book of devotion, and see if the heart be not filled with heavenly images. This turning of the mind upward is half the battle. We cannot expect the mind to reflect that to which it is not turned. Those who mind earthly things are earthly, those who set their affections on things above are heavenly. Paul shows us that the way to live “soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world,” is by “looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of our great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ.” We may well cry concerning this matter, “Turn us, O Lord, and we shall be turned.” He who would behold the sun at his rising must not look to the west!