2. Another punishment of sin, mentioned in this answer, is strong delusion, which is the consequence of the former. This is taken from the apostle’s words, _For this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie_, 2 Thess. ii. 11. the meaning of which is nothing else but this, that God suffers them, who receive not the love of the truth, but take pleasure in unrighteousness, to be deluded, by denying them that spiritual and saving illumination, which would have effectually prevented it. Now, that we may consider what the apostle means by these _strong delusions_, we may observe, that every error, or mistake in lesser matters of religion, is not intended hereby; for then few or none, would be exempted from this judgment; but it includes in it a person’s entertaining the most abominable absurdities in matters of religion, which are contrary to the divine perfections, and the whole tenor of scripture, and subversive of those truths, which are of the greatest importance; or, when persons pretend to revelations, or are turned away from the truth by giving credit to the amusements of signs, and lying wonders; with which Antichrist is said to come, _after the working of Satan_; and the consequence hereof is, that _they believe a lye_, which they suppose to be confirmed hereby. Errors, in matter of religion, are sometimes invincible and unavoidable, for want of objective light, or scripture-revelation, as in the Heathen, Mahometans, and others, who through the disadvantages and prejudices of education, are estranged from the truth: but even this in some respects, may be said to be judicial; for, though such do not sin against the gospel-light, yet they are guilty of other sins, which justly provoke God to leave them in this state of darkness and ignorance. But the punishment of sin, when God gives men up to this judgment, is more visible in those, who have had the advantages of education, above others, and have had early instructions in the doctrines of the gospel; yet, by degrees, they are turned aside from, and have denied them, and so _forsaken the guide of their youth_, Prov. ii. 17. These sometimes call those sentiments about religious matters, which once they received, implicit faith, and please themselves with their new schemes of doctrine, looking, as they call it, with pity, or, I might rather say, disdain, on others, who are not disentangled from their fetters, or have not shook off the prejudices of education, nor arrived to so free and generous a way of thinking, as they pretend to have done. But how much soever they may glory in it, it is a sad instance of God’s giving them up, in a judicial way, to the vanity and delusion of their minds; and accordingly they believe that to be a truth, which others can prove to be a lie, and which they themselves once thought so. Now this appears to be a punishment of sin, in that the gospel, which once they professed to