The Enemy

Before conversion he had light thoughts of sin. He cherished it in his bosom as uriah his lamb. He nourished it up, it grew up together with him. He did eat, as it were, of his own meat and drink of his own cup and lay in his bosom and was as to him as a daughter.
But when God opens his eyes by conversion, he throws it away with abhorrence as a man would with a loathsome toad which in the dark he had hugged fast in his bosom and thought it had been some pretty and harmless bird.
When a man is savingly changed he is deeply convinced not only of the danger but the defilement of sin. And oh how earnest is he with God to be purified. He loathes himself with his sins. He runs to Christ and casts himself into the fountain set open for sin and uncleanliness. If he falls, what a stir is there to get clean again. He has no rest till he flees to the word and washes and rubs and rinses in the infinite fountain laboring to cleans himself from all filthiness of the flesh and the spirit.
The sound convert is heartily engaged against sin. He struggles with it. He wars against it. He is too often foiled but he will never yield the cause nor lay down the weapon while he has breath in his body. He will make no peace, he will give no quarter. He can forgive his other enemies. He can pity them and pray for them but here he is implacable. Here he is set upon their extermination. He hunts it as it were for the precious life.
His eyes shall not pity, his hands shall not spare though it be a right hand or a right eye. Be it a gainful sin, most delightful to his nature, or the support of his esteem with is worldly companions. Yet he would rather throw his gain down the gutter, see his credit fail, or the flower of his pleasure wither in his hand than he will allow himself any known way of sin. He will grant no indulgence. He will give no toleration. He draws up on sin where ever he meets it and frowns upon it with this unwelcome salute, " I found thee, oh my enemy."

Joseph Alleine "An Alarm to the Unconverted" 1671