Next Part 4 (The SIXTH Commandment)

II. The second thing forbidden in this commandment is, injuring OURSELVES. "You shall not kill." You shall do no hurt to yourself.

You shall not hurt your own body. One may be guilty of self-murder, either:

1. Indirectly or occasionally.

2. Directly and absolutely.

[1] Indirectly and occasionally.

(1) When a man thrusts himself into danger which he might prevent. If a company of archers were shooting, and one should put himself in the place where the arrows fly, so that an arrow kills him—he is accessory to his own death. In the law, God would have the leper shut up, to keep others from being infected. Lev 13:4. If any should be so presumptuous as to go to a leper, and get the plague of leprosy, he might thank himself for his own death.

(2) A person may be guilty of his own death, in some sense, by neglecting the use of means for preserving life. If sick, and he uses no remedy; if he has received a wound, and will not apply a cure—he hastens his own death. God commanded, "Make an ointment from figs and spread it over the boil, and Hezekiah will recover." Isa 38:21. If he had not done so, he would have been the cause of his own death.

(3) By immoderate grief. "The sorrow of the world works death." 2 Cor 7:10. When God takes away a dear relation, and anyone is swallowed up with sorrow, he endangers his life. How many weep themselves into their graves! Queen Mary grieved so excessively for the loss of Calais, that it broke her heart.

(4) By intemperance or excess in diet. Glutting shortens life. "More perish by drink—than by the sword." Many dig their grave with their teeth. Too much oil chokes the lamp. The cup kills more than the cannon. Excessive drinking causes untimely death.

[2] One may be guilty of self-murder, directly and absolutely.

(1) By envy. Envy is, "a secret repining at the welfare of another." "An envious man is more sorry at another's prosperity, than at his own adversity." He never laughs, but when another weeps. Envy is a self-murder, a fretting canker. Cyprian calls it, "a secret wound." Envy hurts a man's self most. Envy corrodes the heart, dries up the blood, rots the bones. Envy is "the rottenness of the bones." Prov 14:30. It is to the body, what the moth is to the cloth—which eats it and makes its beauty consume. Envy drinks its own venom. The viper, which leaped on Paul's hand, thought to have hurt Paul—but fell into the fire itself. Acts 28:3. So, while the envious man thinks to hurt another, he destroys himself.

(2) By laying violent hands on himself. Saul fell upon his own sword and killed himself. It is the most unnatural and barbarous kind of murder for a man to butcher himself and imbrue his hands in his own blood. A man's self is most near to him, therefore this sin of self-murder breaks both the law of God, and the bonds of nature. The Lord has placed the soul in the body, as in a prison; and it is a sin to break open this prison until God opens the door. Self-murderers are worse than the brute-creatures, which will tear and gore one another—but not destroy themselves. Self-murder is occasioned usually by discontent, and a sullen melancholy. The bird that beats itself in the cage, and is ready to kill itself, is a true emblem of a discontented spirit.

Whence comes this discontent?

This discontent arises—

(1) From pride. A man who swells with a high opinion of himself, and thinks he deserves better than others. When any great calamity befalls him, he is discontented, and in a sudden passion will make away with himself. Ahithophel had high thoughts of himself, his words were esteemed oracles, and he could not bear to have his wise counsel rejected. "He put his household in order—and hanged himself." 2 Sam 17:23.

(2) From poverty. Poverty is a sore temptation. "Give me not poverty." Prov 30:8. Many have brought themselves to poverty by their sin; and when a great estate is boiled away to nothing, they are discontented, and think it better to die quickly, than languish in misery. The devil soon helps them to dispatch themselves.

(3) From covetousness. Avarice is a dry drunkenness, a horse-leech that is never satisfied. The covetous man is like behemoth. "Behold he drinks up a river," and yet his thirst is not allayed. Job 40:33. The covetous miser hoards up corn; and if he hears the price of corn begins to fall, he is troubled, and there is no cure for his discontent but a noose!

(4) From horror of mind. A man has sinned a great sin, has swallowed down some pills of temptation, which the devil has given him, and these pills begin to work in his conscience, and the horror becomes so great—that he chooses strangling! Judas having betrayed innocent blood, was in such an agony of conscience, that he hanged himself; as if, to avoid the stinging of a gnat, any one should endure the bite of a serpent! I can see no ground of hope for such as make away with themselves; for they die in the very act of sin, and cannot have time to repent!

Hurting our own souls is forbidden in the command, "You shall not kill." Many who are free from other murders, are guilty here. They murder their own souls. They wilfully damn themselves, and throw themselves into hell.

Who are those who murder their own souls?

(1) They wilfully murder their souls—who have no sense of God, or the world to come, and are past feeling. Eph 4:19. Tell them of God's holiness and justice—and they are not at all affected. "They made their hearts as an adamant stone." Zech 7:12, "The adamant," says Pliny, "is impregnable, the hammer cannot conquer it." Sinners have adamantine hearts. When the prophet spoke to the altar of stone, it rent asunder—but sinner's hearts are so hardened in sin (1 Kings 13:5), nothing will work upon them, neither ordinances nor judgments. They do not believe in God; they laugh at hell. Thus they murder their own souls, and throw themselves into hell as fast as they can.

(2) They wilfully murder their own souls—who resign themselves to their lusts, let what will come of it. The soul cries out in you, "I am killing myself! I am murdering myself!" They "have given themselves over to work all uncleanness with greediness." Eph 4:19. Let ministers speak to them about their sins, let conscience speak, let afflictions speak—they will have their lusts, even though they go to hell for them! Do not these murder their own souls? Many say in their hearts, "let our sins damn us—just so that that they but please us!" Herod will have his incestuous lusts, though it costs him his soul. For a drop of pleasure men will drink a sea of wrath! Do not these massacre and damn their own souls? "A wicked man’s iniquities entrap him; he is entangled in the ropes of his own sin. He will be lost because of his great stupidity." Proverbs 5:22-23

(3) They murder their souls—who avoid all means of saving them. They will go to plays, to drunken meetings—but will not set their foot in God's house, or come near the sound of the gospel-trumpet; as if one that is diseased should shun the healing cordial, for fear of being healed. These are self murderers as much as one who has the means of cure offered him—but chooses rather to die.

(4) They voluntarily murder their souls—who take false prejudices against religion; as if it were so strict and severe that they must live a melancholy life, like hermits and monks, and drown all their joys in tears. It is a slander which the devil casts upon religion, for there is no true joy but in believing. Rom 15:1, 3. No honey is so sweet as that which drops from a promise. Some men foolishly take up a prejudice against religion; they are resolved never to go to heaven, rather than go through the strait gate. I may say of prejudice, as Paul to Elymas, "O prejudice, you child of the devil, you enemy of all righteousness," how many souls have you damned? Acts 13:10.

(5) They wilfully murder their own souls—who will neither be good themselves, nor allow others to be so. "You neither go [into the kingdom of heaven] yourselves, neither do you allow those who are entering to go in." Matt 23:13. Such are those who persecute others for their religion. Drunken meetings may escape punishments from them—but if men meet to serve God, all severity will be used. They are resolved to shipwreck others, though they themselves are cast away in the storm. Oh! take heed of murdering your own souls! No creature but man willingly kills itself.

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