Puritan Books Evaluated (Pt. 11) – The Works of John Boys
The Puritans produced some of the greatest works on Spiritual Warfare. William Gurnall’s massive exposition of Ephesians 6:1-10 called The Christian in Complete Armour comes to mind, as does Thomas Brooks’s Precious Remedies Against Satan’s Devices. Then there is Richard Gilpin’s Daemonilogia Sacra, which ought to be reprinted. Finally, I should mention John Bunyan’s Holy War, with its themes of the creation, temptation, capture, corruption, and retaking of Mansoul, woven into an ingenious allegory. These are individual works which, although they cover much of the same ground, do so from distinctive angles. Each deserves the name of classic.
Of great interest, therefore, is the appearance of John Arrowsmith’s volume on the subject. Arrowsmith was an erudite acadenician at Cambridge, and this book, though “scholastic-pastoral” (49, 114), seems to me to have had in mind that fraternity. Though the style is direct and conversational (was the term “elbow grease” in use in 1700? – 196), the book is permeated throughout with references to a great many authors, ancient and contemporary (53-54). Arrowsmith usually introduces them as though they were familiar to his audience (“Therefore, I will rehearse Tirinus’s arguments…[130]; “With your permission, let me again quote from John Eusebio Nieremburg…” [174]; “The proverbial saying is that the penniless have lost their belt, as we find in Horace…” [226]). This means that it would be wrong to do an automatic comparison of Arrowsmith with his fellow Puritans who wrote and preached on this subject. We don’t, for example, come across such lines as this:
“Now Captain Boanerges and Captain Conviction were men of great dignity. Their faces were like the faces of lions, their words like the roaring of the sea, and they continued to stay in Mr. Conscience’s house.” (John Bunyan, The Holy War, Aneko Press, 2016 updated edition, 135).
Men like Bunyan, Gurnell, and Brooks proliferate their works with these sorts of deep observations put in a single sentence. This book is different. Plans For Holy War introduces a theme, but it illustrtates it by constant referral to other authors. So, if you buy the book expecting something along the lines of,
“There is an opening of the eyes of the mind to contemplation and joy, and there is an opening of the eyes of the body to shame and confusionHe promises them the former but intends the latter, and so cheats them – giving them an apple in exchange for a paradise…” – Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan’s Devices, under the first heading, 5).
Well, you will be disappointed. For starters, the book begins with “Three Speeches Against the Weigelians.” These brethren denied the right of the civil magistrate to reform the church or deal with heretics (58). This odd inclusion of around 30 pages devoted to this group does not exactly kick off the book itself in rousing fashion. Prior to this the editor supplies a historical and theological account of Arrowsmith’s life in ca. 70 pages.
I realize this is meant to be a standard edition, so I cannot complain about the “Three Speeches” that begin Plans For Holy War, but they add nothing to the production and can be safely skipped. That is not why I bought the book.
Coming then to the substance of the book itself, the author introduces his main text of Genesis 3:15 (114). He does this rather ponderously in several pages by citing scholars he likes and engaging others he dislikes (115-118). He then gets to the passage in question. His remarks are not by way of an exposition of the temptation and fall and God’s response, but more of an explanation of its decreed fixity. He ends the chapter with two predestinarian quotes from Augustine (120).
Arrowsmith takes a metaphorical direction in expounding his text which involves him comparing the Devil to the physical and mental characteristics of a serpent. This is not unusual for 17th Century writers, but there is not much in the observations to really get one’s teeth into. Then the author turns to the kind of sins making up satan’s character. First in the list (and well chosen) is the sin of arrogance. This is what is said:
“The reader should weigh carefully that passage of Paul to Timothy, where he forbids the election of a new believer to the office of elder, that he not fall…(1 Tim. 6:6) – that is, into arrogance (as some say), through which the angels fell and because of which they were exiled from heaven. ‘Here is disclosed,’ – I quote from Abraham Scultetus, although he himself settled on a different meaning for the passage – ‘that secret of the origin and reason for the Devil’s fall. I am not at all sure whether this is ever discussed somewhere else in Scripture.’ Prosper of Aquitane, moreover, remarks shrewdly enough that ‘arrogance made demons out of angels, while humility makes men like the holy angels.'” – Plans For Holy War, 127.
This is a typical specimen of Arrowsmith’s style and method. Personally, I do not think the quotes from either Sculterus or Prosper do much to help the point. Maybe it is unfair to say that a Bunyan or a Brooks would have investigated and exposed arrogance as the sin that makes men stupid in the midst of the folly of a time and place? But I expect more. Just think of how Lord Willbewill is carried away in his pride before he is finally brought to his senses in The Holy War.
Book II is an improvement on Book I in my opinion. In it Arrowsmith tackles the various armour supplied to the Christian. The chapter (ch. III) on “The Belt of Truth in the Will” is very helpful. The author extols simplicity and openness to the Truth (254-257). “The buyers’ habit,” he says, “is to to push into the sunlight and carefully scrutinize the wares they have purchased. The upright in heart make it their habit to seek earnestly for as much light as is necessary…” (255). But this kind of application is only found here and there. When dealing with “The Shield of Faith” (Ch. VII) we are led into disputations with Bellarmine and Arminius and others for pages on end. The same might be said for his chapters on the greaves and the helmet.
At the end of his chapter on “The Sword of the Spirit” (Ch. X), we have Arrowsmith affirming a holy eloquence in preachers. He avers,
“Let him be astonishingly eloquent…not in poets and historians, not in philosophers and the study of words, not in the Scholstics and the fathers, much less in thetraditions and lives of the saints, but in the Scriptures. Fine, let him read all books, so long as he is most aquainted with the Holy Spirit’s library.” – (372).
Yes and Amen. Such is the balance one finds in Gurnall and Gilpin and Brooks. But I find it harder to see the balance displayed in Arrowsmith. Still, Book III, chapter I, entitled “Victory Through Holy Exhortations,” is the best in the book. It is a chapter on Prayer, and Arrowsmith’s method is put to better use here. He is perceptive and practical, providing a well rounded treatment of this vital subject. Here, at last, my heart was lifted in worship. The close of the chapter is wonderful, being a prayer the author had written on the outline of the Lord’s Prayer (411-413). Let me give a sample of it:
“Yes, O Lord, You are our sun and shield, because we live in this world full of snares, because we bear deceptive hearts and we have to deal with an enemy extensively equipped with trickes and deceits of every kind, lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Grant us to stayconstantly vigilant and to pray, so we do not fall into satan’s snares…Trample the serpent’s head in our hearts, by Your blessed seed, so that, although we are drowned beneath innumerable floods, we, at last, by Your grace, may rise above them and be welcomed safely and happily into the heavenly harbor” – (413).
The next chapter is about Christ who gives the victory and about His gifts for the battle. This is followed by two more chapters that might be seen as Appendices; one on Christ-hymns and one on Heavenly Triumph.
Plans For Holy War is a lot of work for relatively little reward, especially when one considers the great works on Spiritual Warfare that were produced in its era. There are good moments in it, but the constant citation of all and sundry to supoort a point that is so much better made in other Puritan works is its main downfall. I said in my introduction to this series that I was not going to be uncritical. Other reviewers sing the praises of this work, but I have to wonder if these people have actually read the book. If they did read the book, I ask how they could think that it compares favorably to Gurnall or Brooks? We may not do an automatic comparison with these authors, but they loom largely in the background when we choose this volume ahead of them.
Reading the complimentary blurbs by the likes of Kevin DeYoung on the dustjacket, I have to ask myself what is wrong with me? This question has hung in the air all through my reading of the book. I found the author’s interactions with Scripture to savor of fairly banal commonplaces. I have to say I have wondered what these blurb writers have found so absorbing in this work. I know the author was esteemed in his day, and that he was a man of God, but I confess that I do not find him a spiritually engrossing writer. I can turn any page of Gurnall or Gilpin or Brooks and be held captive by something those men wrote. But I can scarcely find anything truly edifying among the name-dropping asides of Arrowsmith. I am easily moved by the toughts of the Puritans, but this Puritan leaves me cold. “Horses for courses” as they say where I’m from. Perhaps my reader will pick up this book and find gold in abundance?
