A Christian Directory

A Christian Directory: Or, A SUMM of PRACTICAL DIVINITY. THE SECOND PART: VIZ.Christian Economics: OR, THE FAMILY DIRECTORY: Containing Directions for the true Practice of all Duties belonging to Family Relations, with the Appurtenances.

By RICHARD BAXTER.

LONDON, Printed, by Robert White, for Nevill Simmons, at the Sign of the Princes-Arms in St. Paul's Church-yard. 1673.

To all that fear God in the Burrough and Parish of Kidderminster in Worcestershire.

Y OU are the Only People that ever I took a special Pastoral Charge of: And God's blessing and your Obedience to his Word, do make the remembrance of my Labors and Converse with you to be sweet. It was neither by Your Will, or Mine that we have been this twelve years separated, nor that we yet continue so. I thank our most Gracious God, who, maugre all the Serpents Malice, hath Inwardly and Outwardly so well provided for you, above most others, as that I hope you will be no losers by anything, which hath yet befallen you. That I have hitherto survived so many of my departed Friends both with you and elsewhere, after all that you have known, is my own wonder, as well as yours: And what I have been doing in this time of our separation, I have formerly told you in part by some other Writings, and now tell you more by this (which was written about five or six years ago, though it found not passage into the world till now.) I live not yet Idle: But whether this be the way of my chiefest service to the Church of God, in my present case, some distant Censurers have questioned; If it be not, my Ignorance of my duty, and of what will be most useful to others is the cause, and not my Love of Ease, or my obeying Man rather than God. I judge that my chief duty, which I think is likest to do most good. I am glad that once more before I die, I have opportunity to speak to you at this distance, and to persuade you to, and Direct you in, that Family Holiness and Righteousness, which hath been so much of your Comfort and Honor, and will be so while you faithfully continue it: O how happy a state is it; to have God dwell in your Families by his Love and Blessing, and Rule them by his Word and Spirit, and Protect them by his Power, and Delight in them and they in Him, as his Churches preparing for the Celestial Delights! O how much of the Interest of true Religion must be kept up in the world, by the Holiness and Diligence of Christian Families! How happy a supply doth it afford, where there are sad defects in the Teaching, Holiness and Discipline of the Churches? O that the Rulers of Families, who are silenced by no others, did not silence themselves, from that Instructing, and Prayer which is their work? I should be sorry that this Directory is so Voluminous that few of you can buy it, but that more Ends than One in such works must be intended. If any of you (which God forbid) shall show by an ungodly life, that you have forgotten the Doctrine, which was taught you, or if more yet shall traduce the Doctrine of your once (unworthy) Teacher, Posterity shall here see what it was, in this Record, which may remain, and preach, when I am yet more silenced in the dust. The Lord whom we have served (though with lamentable defects) and in whom (though alas too weakly) we have trusted, preserve us in the Life of Faith; Hope and Love, in Sincerity, Zeal, and patient Constancy, to the Glorious Life, where we hope to behold, in Perfect Love, (without the fear of death or separation) our most Blessed Head and God forever.

A Christian Directory. TOM. II. Christian Economics.

CHAP. I. Directions about Marriage; for Choice and Contract.

A S the Persons of Christians in their privatest capacities are Holy, as being Dedicated and separated unto God, so also must their Families be: HOLINESS TO THE LORD must be as it were written on their Doors, and on their Relations, their Possessions and Affairs. To which it is requisite, 1. That there be a Holy Constitution of their Families. 2. And a holy Government of them, and discharge of the several duties of the Members of the Family. To the right constituting of a Family, belongeth, 1. The right contracting of Marriage, and 2. The right choice and contract betwixt Masters and their Servants. For the first,

§. 2. Direct. 1. Take heed that neither lust nor rashness do thrust you into a married condition, before you see such Reasons to invite you to it, as may assure you of the Call and approbation of God. For, 1. It is God that you must serve in your Marryed state, and therefore it is meet that you take his counsel before you rush upon it: For he knoweth best himself, what belongeth to his service. 2. And it is God that you must still depend upon, for the blessing and comforts of your relation: And therefore there is very great reason that you take his advice and consent, as the chief things requisite to the match: If the Consent of Parents be necessary, much more is the Consent of God.

§. 3. Quest. But how shall a man know whether God call him to Marriage, or consent unto it? Hath he not here left all men to their liberties, as in a thing indifferent?

Answ. God hath not made any Universal Law commanding or forbidding Marriage; but in this regard hath left it indifferent to mankind: yet not allowing all to marry (for undoubtedly to some it is unlawful): But he hath by other General Laws or Rules directed men to know, in what cases it is lawful and in what cases it is a sin. As every man is bound to choose that condition in which he may serve God with the best advantages, and which tendeth most to his spiritual welfare, and increase in Holiness: Now there is nothing in Marriage itself which maketh it commonly inconsistent with these benefits, and the fulfilling of these Laws: And therefore it is said, that He that Marrieth doth well, that is, he doth that which of itself is not unlawful, and which to some is the most eligible state of life. But there is something in a single life which maketh it, especially to Preachers and persecuted Christians, to be more usually the most advantageous state of life, to these Ends of Christianity; And therefore it is said that He that marrieth not, doth better. And yet to individual persons, it is hard to imagine how it can choose but be either a duty or a sin; at least except in some unusual cases. For it is a thing of so great moment as to the ordering of our hearts and lives, that it is hard to imagine that it should ever be indifferent as a means to our main end, but must either be a very great help or hindrance. But yet if there be any persons whose case may be so equally poised with accidents on both sides, that to the most judicious man it is not discernible, whether a single or married state of life, is like to conduce more to their personal Holiness or public usefulness, or the good of others, to such persons Marriage in the individual circumstantiated act is a thing indifferent.

§. 4. By these conditions following you may know, what persons have a Call from God to marry, and who have not his call or approbation. 1. If there be the peremptory will or command of Parents to Children that are under their power and Government, and no greater matter on the contrary to hinder it, the command of Parents signifieth the command of God: But if Parents do but persuade and not command, though their desires must not be causelessly refused, yet a smaller impediment may preponderate than in case of a peremptory command. 2. They are called to marry who have not the gift of Continence, and cannot by the use of lawful means attain it, and have no impediment which maketh it unlawful to them to marry, 1 Cor. 7. 9. But if they cannot contain, let them marry; for it is better to marry than to burn. But here the divers degrees of the urgent and the hindering causes must be compared, and the weightiest must prevail. For some that have very strong lusts may yet have stronger impediments, And though they cannot keep that chastity in their Thoughts as they desire, yet in such a case they must abstain: And there is no man but may keep his body in chastity if he will do his part: Yea and Thoughts themselves may be commonly and for the most part kept pure, and wanton imaginations quickly checked, if men be Godly, and will do what they can. But on the other side there are some that have a more tamable measure of Concupiscence, and yet have no considerable hindrance whose duty it may be to Marry as the most certain and successful means against that small degree, as long as there is nothing to forbid it. 3. Another cause that warranteth Marriage is, when upon a wise casting up of all accounts, it is apparently most probable that in a married state, one may be most serviceable to God and the public good: that there will be in it greater helps and fewer hindrances to the great ends of our lives; the glorifying of God, and the saving of ourselves and others. And whereas it must be expected that every condition should be more helpful to us in one respect, and hinder us more in another respect; and that in one we have most helps for a contemplative life, and in another we are better furnished for an Active serviceable life, the great skill therefore in the discerning of of our duties lieth in the prudent pondering and comparing of the commodities and discommodities, without the seduction of fantasie, lust or passion, and in a true discerning which side it is that hath the greatest weight.

§. 5. Here it must be carefully observed, 1. That the two first Reasons for Marriage ( Concupiscence and the will of Parents ) or any such like have their strength but in subordination to the third (the final cause, or interest of God and our salvation) And that this last Reason (from the end ) is of itself sufficient without any of the other, but none of the other are sufficient without this. If it be clear that in a married state you have better advantages for the service of God, and doing good to others, and saving your own souls, than you can have in a single state of life, then it is undoubtedly your duty to marry: For our obligation to seek our ultimate end is the most constant indispensable obligation: Though Parents command it not; though you have no corporal necessity, yet it is a duty if it certainly make most for your ultimate end. 2. But yet observe also, that no pretence of your ultimate end itself will warrant you to marry when any other accident hath first made it a thing unlawful, while that accident continueth. For we must not do evil that good may come by it. Our salvation is not furthered by sin: And though we saw a probability that we might do more good to others, if we did but commit such a sin to accomplish it, yet it is not to be done. For our lives and mercies being all in the hand of God, and the successes and acceptance of all our endeavors depending wholly upon him, it can never be a rational way to attain them, by willful offending him by our sin! It is a likely means to public good for able and good men to be Magistrates or Ministers: And yet he that would lie, or be perjured, or commit any known sin that he may be a Magistrate, or that he may Preach the Gospel, might better expect a curse on himself and his endeavors, than God's acceptance, or his blessing and success: so he that would sin to change his state for the better, would find that he changed it for the worse: or if it do good to others, he may expect no good but ruin to himself (if repentance prevent it not). 3. Observe also that if the question be only which state of life it is (married or single) which best conduceth to this ultimate end, than any one of the subordinate Reasons will prove that we have a call, if there be not greater Reasons on the contrary side. As in case you have no corporal necessity, the will of Parents alone may oblige you; if there be no greater thing against it: or if Parents oblige you not, yet corporal necessity alone may do it: or if neither of these invite you, yet a clear probability of the attaining of such an estate or opportunity, as may make you more fit to relieve many others, or be serviceable to the Church, or the blessing of Children who may be devoted to God, may warrant your Marriage, if no greater reasons lie against it: For when the Scales are equal any one of these may turn them.

§. 6. By this also you may perceive who they be that have no Call to marry, and to whom it is a sin? As, 1. No man hath a Call to marry, who, laying all the commodities and discommodities together, may clearly discern that a married state is like to be a greater hindrance of his salvation, or to his serving or honoring God in the world, and so to disadvantage him as to his ultimate end.

Quest. But what if Parents do command it? or will set against me if I disobey?

Answ. Parents have no authority to command you anything against God or your salvation or your ultimate end: Therefore here you owe them no formal obedience: But yet the will of Parents with all the consequents, must be put into the scales with all other considerations, and if they make the discommodities of a single life to become the greater, as to your end, then they may bring you under a duty or obligation to marry: not necessitate praecepti, as obedience▪ to their command; but necessitate medii as a means to your ultimate end, and in obedience to that general command of God, which requireth you to seek first your ultimate end, even the Kingdom of God and his Righteousness, Matth. 6. 33.

Quest. But what if I have a corporal necessity, and yet I can foresee that marriage will greatly disadvantage me as to the service of God and my salvation?

Answ. First, You must understand that no corporal necessity is absolute: For there is no man so lustful but may possibly bridle his lust by other lawful means: by diet, labor, sober company, diverting business, solitude, watching the thoughts and senses, or at least by the Physicians help, so that the necessity is but secundum quid, or an urgency rather than simple necessity. And then, 2. This measure of necessity must be itself laid in the balance with the other accidents: and if this necessity will turn the scales by making a single life more disadvantageous to your ultimate end, your lust being a greater impediment to you, than all the inconveniences of marriage will be, than the case is resolved, It is better to marry than to burn. But if the hindrances in a married state are like to be greater, than the hindrances of your concupiscence, then you must set yourself to the curbing and curing of that concupiscence; and in the use of God's means expect his blessing.

§. 7. 2. Children are not (ordinarily) called of God to marry, when their Parents do absolutely and peremptorily forbid it. For though Parents Commands cannot make it a duty, when we are sure it would hinder the interest of God our ultimate end; yet Parents prohibitions may make it a sin, when there is a clear probability that it would most conduce to our ultimate end, were it not prohibited. Because, 1. Affirmatives bind not semper & ad semper as Negatives or prohibitions do. 2. Because the sin of disobedience to Parents will cross the tendency of it unto good, and do more against our ultimate end, than all the advantages of marriage can do for it. A duty is then to us no duty, when it cannot be performed without a chosen willful sin. In many cases we are bound to forbear what a Governor forbiddeth, when we are not bound to Do the contrary if he command it. It is easier to make a duty to be no duty, than to make a sin to be no sin: One bad ingredient may turn a duty into a sin, when one good ingredient will not turn a sin into a duty or into no sin.

§. 8. Quest. But may not a Governors prohibition be over weighed by some great degrees of incommodity? It is better to marry than to burn: 1. What if Parents forbid Children to marry absolutely until death, and so deprive them of the lawful remedy against lust? 2. And if they do not so, yet if they forbid it them when it is to them most seasonable and necessary, it seemeth little better: 3. Or if they forbid them to marry where their affections are so engaged, as that they cannot be taken off without their mutual ruin? may not Children marry in such cases of necessity as these, without and against the will of their Parents?

Answ. I cannot deny but some cases may be imagined or fall out, in which it is lawful to do what a Governor forbiddeth, and to marry against the will of Parents: For they have their Power to edification, and not unto destruction: As if a Son be qualified with eminent gifts for the work of the Ministry, in a time and place that needeth much help; if a malignant Parent in hatred of that Sacred Office, should never so peremptorily forbid him; yet may the Son devote himself to the blessed work of saving souls: even as a Son may not forbear to relieve the poor (with that which is his own ) though his Parents should forbid him; nor forbear to put himself into a capacity to relieve them for the future, nor forb •••• his own necessary food and raiment though he be forbidden. As Daniel would not forbear praying openly in his house when he was forbidden by the King and Law. When any inseparable accident doth make a thing of itself indifferent become a duty, a Governors prohibition will not discharge us from that duty, unless the accident be smaller than the accident of the Rulers prohibition, and then it may be over weighed by it: But to determine what Accidents are Greater or Less is a difficult task.

§. 9. And as to the particular Questions, to the first I answer, If Parents forbid their Children to marry while they live, it is convenient and safe to obey them until death, if no greater obligation to the contrary forbid it: But it is necessary to obey them during the time that the Children live under the Government of their Parents; as in their Houses, in their younger years: (except in some few extraordinary cases.) But when Parents are dead (though they leave commands in their Wills) or when age or former marriage hath removed Children from under their Government, a smaller matter will serve to justify their disobedience here, than when the Children in minority are less fit to Govern themselves. For though we owe Parents a limited obedience still, yet at full age the Child is more at his own dispose than he was before. Nature hath given given us a hint of her intention in the instinct of bruits, who are all taught to protect and lead and provide for their young ones, while the young are insufficient for themselves: But when they are grown to self-sufficiency, they drive them away or neglect them. If a wi • e Son that hath a Wife and many Children, and great affairs to manage in the world, should be bound to as absolute obedience to his aged Parents, as he was in his childhood, it would ruin their affairs, and Parents government would pull down that in their old age, which they built up in their middle age.

§. 10. And to the second Question I answer, that, 1. Children that pretend to unconquerable Lust or Love, must do all they can to subdue such inordinate affections, and bring their lusts to stoop to reason and their Parents wills. And if they do their best, there is either none, or not one of many hundreds, but may maintain their chastity together with their obedience. 2. And if any say, I have done my best, and yet am under a necessity of marriage; and am I not then bound to marry though my Parents forbid me? I answer it is not to be believed: Either you have not done your best, or else you are not under a necessity: And your urgency being your own fault, (seeing you should subdue it) God still obligeth you both to subdue your Vice, and to obey your Parents. 3. But if there should be any one that hath such an (incredible) necessity of marriage, he is to procure some others to solicit his Parents for their consent, and if he cannot obtain it, some say, it is his duty to marry without it: I should rather say that it is minus malum, the lesser evil: and that having cast himself into some necessity of sinning, it is still his duty to avoid both, and to choose neither; but it is the smaller sin to choose to disobey his Parents, rather than to live in the flames of lust and the filth of unchastity. And some Divines say, that in such a case a Son should appeal to the Magistrate, as a superior authority above the Father. But others think, 1. That this leaveth it as difficult to resolve what he shall do, if the Magistrate also consent not: And, 2. That it doth but resolve one difficulty by a greater: it being very doubtful whether in Domestic cases, the authority of the Parent or the Magistrate be the greater.

§. 11. 3. The same answer serveth as to the third Question, when Parents forbid you to marry the persons that you are most fond of. For such fondness (whether you call it Lust or Love ) as will not stoop to reason and your Parents wills, is inordinate and sinful: And therefore the thing that God bindeth you to, is by his appointed means to subdue it, and to obey: But if you cannot, the accidents and probable consequents must tell you which is the lesser evil.

§. 12. Quest. But what if the Child have promised marriage, and the Parents be against it?

Answ. If the Child was under the Parents Government, and short of years of discretion also, the promise is void for want of capacity: And if the child was at age, yet the promise was a sinful promise, as to the promising act, and also as to the thing promised during the Parents dissent: If the actus promittend • only had been sinful (the promise making) the promise might nevertheless oblige (unless it were null as well as sinful ) But the materia promissa being sinful (the matter promised) to marry while Parents do dissent, such a child is bound to forbear the fulfilling of that promise till the Parents do consent or die. And yet he is bound from marrying any other (unless he be disobliged by the person that he made the promise to), because he knoweth not but his Parents may consent hereafter: And whenever they consent or die, the promise then is obligatory, and must be performed.

§. 13. The 3. Chap. of Num. enableth Parents to disoblige a Daughter that is in their house, from a Vow made to God, so be it they disallow it at the first hearing. Hence there are two doubts arise: 1. Whether this power extend not to the disobliging of a promise or contract of Matrimony? 2. Whether it extend not to a Son as well as a Daughter. And most expositors are for the affirmative of both cases. But I have shown before that it is upon uncertain grounds: 1. It is uncertain whether God, who would thus give up his own right in case of Vowing, will also give away the right of others without their consent in case of Promises or Contracts. And, 2. It is uncertain whether this be not an indulgence only of the weaker sex, seeing many words in the Text seem plainly to intimate so much. And it is dangerous upon our own presumptions to stretch God's Laws to everything we imagine there is the same reason for: Seeing our imaginations may so easily be deceived: and God could have expressed such particulars if he would: And therefore (when there is not clear ground for our inferences in the Text) it is but to say Thus and thus God should have said, when we cannot say, Thus he hath said: We must not make Laws under pretense of • xpounding them: whatsoever God commandeth thee, take heed that thou do it: thou shalt •••• nothing thereto, nor take ought therefrom, Deut. 12. 32.

§. 14. Quest. If the Question therefore be not of the sinfulness, but the nullity of such Promises of children, because of the dissent of Parents, for my part I am not able to prove any such nullity. It is said, that They are not sui juris, their own, and therefore their promises are null: But if they have attained to years, and use of discretion, they are naturally so far sui juris as to be capable of disposing even of their souls, and therefore of their fidelity: They can oblige themselves to God or man: Though they are not so far sui juris as to be ungoverned: For so no child, no Subject, no Man is sui juris; seeing all are under the Government of God: And yet if a man promise to do a thing sinful, it is not a nullity, but a sin: not no promise but a sinful promise. A nullity is when the Actus promittendi is Reputative nullus, vel non actus: And when no Promise is made, then none can be broken.

§. 15. Quest. But if the Question be only how far such Promises must be kept? I answer by summing up what I have said: 1. If the child had not the use of Reason, the want of Natural • apacity, proveth the Promise null: Here ignorantis non est consensus. 2. If he was at age and use of Reason, then 1. If the Promising act only was sinful (as before I said of Vows, ) the Promise must be both repented of, and kept. It must be repented of because it was a sin: It must be kept because it was a real Promise, and the matter lawful. 2. If the Promising act was not only a sin, but a nullity (by any other reason,) then it is no obligation. 3. If not only the Promising act be sin, but also the matter Promised (as is marrying without Parents consent,) then it must be repented of, and not performed till it become lawful: Because an oath or promise cannot bind a man to violate the Laws of God.

§. 16. Quest. But what if the parties be actually Married without the Parents consent? Must they live together, or be separated?

Answ. 1. If Marriage be consummated per carnalem concubitum, by the carnal knowledge of each other, I see no reason to imagine that Parents can dissolve it, or prohibit their cohabitation: For the Marriage (for ought I ever saw) is not proved a nullity, but only a sin, and their concubitus is not fornication: And Parents cannot forbid Husband and Wife to live together: And in Marriage they do ( really though sinfully ) forsake Father and Mother and cleave to each other, and so are now from under their Government (though not disobliged from all obedience) 2. But if Marriage be only by verbal conjunction, Divines are disagreed what is to be done: Some think that it is no perfect Marriage ante concubitum, and also that their conjunction hath but the nature of a Promise (to be faithful to each other as Husband and Wife ): And therefore the Matter promised is unlawful till parents consent, and so not to be done. But I rather think (as most do), that it hath all that is essential to Marriage ante concubitum; and that this Marriage is more than a Promise of fidelity de futuro, even an actual delivery of themselves to one another de praesenti also: and that the thing promised in Marriage is lawful: For though it be a sin to marry without Parents consent, yet when that is past, it is lawful for married persons to come together though Parents consent not: And therefore that such Marriage is valid, and to be continued though it was sinfully made.

§. 17. 3. A third sort that are not called of God to marry, are they that have Absolutely vowed not to marry: Such may not marry, unless Providence disoblige them, by making it become an indispensible duty: And I can remember but two ways by which this may be done. 1. In case there be any of so strong Lust, as no other lawful means but marriage can suffice to maintain their chastity: To such marriage is as great a duty, as to eat or drink, or cover ones nakedness, or to hinder another from uncleanness, or lying, or stealing or the like. And if you should make a Vow that you will never eat or drink, or that you will go naked, or that you will never hinder any one from uncleanness, lying or stealing, it is unlawful to fullfil this Vow. But all the doubt is, whether there be any such persons that cannot overcome, or restrain their lust by any other lawful means? I suppose it is possible there may be such: But I believe it is not one of an hundred: If they will but practice the Directions before given, Tom. 1. Chap. 8. Part 5. Tit. 1. & 2. I suppose their lust may be restrained: And if that prevail not, the help of a Physician may: And if that prevail not, some think the help of a Surgeon may be lawful, to keep a Vow, in case it be not an apparent hazard of life. For Christ seemeth to allow of it, in mentioning it without reproof, Matth. 19. 12. if that text be to be understood of castration: But most expositors think it is meant only of a confirmed resolution of chastity: And ordinarily other means may make this needless: And if it be either needless or perilous it is unlawful without doubt.

§. 18. 2. The second way by which God may dispense with a Vow of chastity is, by making the marriage of a person become of apparent necessity to the public safety: And I am able to discern but one instance that will reach the case: And that is, if a King have Vowed chastity, and in case he marry not, his next heir being a professed enemy of Christianity, the Religion, safety and happiness of the whole Nation is apparently in danger to be overthrown. I think the case of such a King is, like the case of a Father that had vowed never to provide food or raiment for his children: Or as if Ahab had vowed that no well should be digged in the Land; and when the drought cometh, it is become necessary to the saving of the people's lives: Or as if the Ship-master should vow that the ship shall not be pumpt; which when it leaketh doth become necessary to save their lives. In these cases God disobligeth you from your Vow by a mutation of the matter: And a Pastor may dispense with it Declaratively: But For the Pope or any mortal man to pretend to more, is impiety and deceit.

§ 19. Quest. May the aged marry that are frigid, impotent, and uncapable of pr • creation?

Answ. Yes, God hath not forbidden them: And there are are other lawful ends of marriage▪ as mutual help and comfort, &c. which may make it lawful.

§. 20. Direct. 2. To restrain your inordinate forwardness to marriage, keep the ordinary inconveniencies of it in memory: Rush not into a state of life, the inconveniencies of which you never thought on. If you have a call to it, the knowledge of the difficulties and duties will be necessary to your prepararation, and faithful undergoing them: If you have no call, this knowledge is necessary to keep you off. I shall first name the inconveniencies common to all, and then some that are proper to the Ministers of the Gospel, which have greater reason to avoid a married life than other men have.

§. 21. 1. Marriage ordinarily plungeth men into excess of worldly cares: It multiplieth their business, and usually their wants. There are many things to mind and do: There are many to provide for: And many persons you will have to do with; who have all of them a selfish disposition and interest, and will judge of you but according as you fit their ends. And among many persons and business • s, some things will frequently fall cross: you must look for many rubs and disappointments. And your natures are not so strong content and patient, as to bear all these without molestation.

§. 22. 2. Your wants in a married state are hardlier supplied, than in a single life. You will want so many things which before you never wanted, and have so many to provide for and content; that all will seem little enough, if you had never so much. Then you will be often at your wits end, taking 〈1 page duplicate〉 〈1 page duplicate〉 thought for the future, what you shall eat, and what you shall drink, and wherewith shall you and yours be clothed?

§. 23. 3. Your wants in a married state are far hardlier born than in a single state. It is far easier to bear personal wants ourselves, than to seethe wants of Wife and Children! Affection will make their sufferings pinch you! And ingenuity will make it a trouble to your mind, to need the help of servants, and to want that which is fit for servants to expect. But especially the discontent and impatience of your family, will more discontent you than all their wants. You cannot help your Wife, and Children, and Servants to contented minds▪ O what a heart-cutting trial is it, to hear them repining, murmuring and complaining! To hear them call for that which you have not for them; and grieve at their condition, and exclaim of you, or of the providence of God, because they have it not? And think not that Riches will free you from these discontents: For as the Rich are but few, so they that have much have much to do with it: A great foot must have a great shoo: When poor men want some small supplys, Rich men may want great sums, or larger provisions, which the poor can easily be without. And their condition lifting them up to greater pride, doth torment them with greater discontents. How few in all the world that have families, are content with their estates.

§. 24. 4. Hereupon a married life containeth far more temptations to worldliness or covetousness, than a single state doth. For when you think you need more, you will desire more: And when you find all too little to satisfy those that you provide for, you will measure your estate by their desires, and be apt to think that you have never enough. Birds and Beasts that have young ones to provide for, are most hungry and rapacious. You have so many now to scrape for, that you will think you are still in want: It is not only till Death that you must now lay up; but you must provide for children that survive you. And while you take them to be as yourselves, you have two Generations now to make provisions for: And most men are as Covetous for their posterity, as if it were for themselves.

§. 25. 5. And hereupon you are hindered from works of Charity to others: Wife and Children are the devouring gulf that swalloweth all. If you had but your selves to provide for, a little would serve: And you could deny your own desires of unnecessary things; and so might have plentiful provision for good works: But by that time Wife and Children are provided for, and all their importunate desires satisfied, there is nothing considerable left for pious or charitable uses: Lamentable experience proclaimeth this.

§. 26. 6. And hereby it appeareth how much a married state doth ordinarily hinder men from honoring their profession. It is their vows of single life that hath occasioned the Papists to do so many works of public charity, as is boasted of for the honor of their Sect: For when they have no Children to bequeath it to, and cannot keep it themselves, it is easy for them to leave it to such uses as will pacify their Consciences most, and advance their names. And if it should prove as good a work and as acceptable to God, to educate your own Children piously for his service, as to relieve the children of the poor, yet is it not so much regarded in the world, nor bringeth so much honor to Religion. One hundred pound given to the poor shall more advance the repution of your liberality and virtue, than a thousand pound given to your own children, though it be with as pious an end, to train them up for the service of the Church. And though this is inconsiderable as your own honor is concerned in it, yet it is considerable as the honor of Religion, and the good of souls is concerned in it.

§. 27. 7. And it is no small patience which the natural imbecility of the female sex requireth you to prepare. Except it be very few that are patient and manlike, women are commonly of poten • fantasies, and tender passionate impatient spirits, easily cast into anger, or jealousy, or discontent: and of weak understandings, and therefore unable to reform themselves. They are betwixt a man and a child: Some few have more of the man, and many have more of the child; but most are but in a middle state. Weakness naturally inclineth persons to be froward and hard to please; as we see in children, old people, and sick persons: They are like a sore distempered body: You can scarce touch them but you hurt them. With too many you can scarce tell how to speak or look but you displease them. If you should be very well verst in the art of pleasing, and set yourselves to it with all your care, as if you made it your very business and had little else to do, yet it would put you hard to it, to please some weak impatient persons, if not quite surpass your ability and skill. And the more you love them the more grievous it will be, to see them still in discontents, aweary of their condition, and to hear the clamorous expressions of their disquiet minds. Nay the very multitude of words that very many are addicted to, doth make some men's lives a continual burden to them. Mark what the Scripture saith, Prov. 21. 9. It is better to dwell in a corner of the house top, than with a brawling woman in a wide house. Vers. 19. It is better to dwell in the wilderness, than with a contentious and an angry woman. So 25. verse. 24. And Prov. 27. 15. A continual dropping in a very rainy day, and a contentious woman are alike. Eccles. 7. 28. One man among a thousand have I found: but a woman among all those have I not found.

§. 28. 8. And there is such a meeting of faults and imperfections on both sides, that maketh it much the harder to bear the infirmities of others aright. If one party only were froward and impatient, the stedfastness of the other might make it the more tolerable: But we are all sick in some measure of the same disease: And when weakness meeteth with weakness, and pride with pride, and passion with passion, it exasperateth the disease and doubleth the suffering. And our corruption is such, that though our intent be to help one another in our duties, yet we are apter far to stir up one another's distempers.

§. 79. 9. The business, care and trouble of a married life, is a great temptation to call down our thoughts from God, and to divert them from the one thing necessary Luk. 10. 42. and to distract the mind, and make it indisposed to holy duty, and to serve God with a divided heart as if we served him not. How hard is it to pray, or meditate with any serious fervency, when you come out of a crowd of cares and businesses. Hear what St. Paul saith, 1 Cor. 7. 7, 8. For I would that all men were as I myself—I say to the unmarried and the widows, It is good for them if they abide even as I. 26, 27, 28. I suppose therefore that this is good for the present distress, that it is good f • r a man so to be:—such shall have trouble in the flesh▪ 32, 33. But I would have you be without carefulness: He that is unmarried careth for the things of the Lord, how he may please the Lord: But he that is married careth for the things of the world how he may please his wife; 34, 35. The unmarried woman careth for the things of the Lord, that she may be holy both in body and in Spirit: but she that is married careth for the things of the world, how she may please her husband. And this I speak for your own profit, not that I may cast a snare upon you, but for that which is comely, and that ye may attend upon the Lord without distraction. 37, 38. He that standeth steadfast in his heart, having no necessity, but hath power over his own will, and hath so decreed in his heart that he will keep his Virgin, doth well. So then he that marrieth doth well, but he that marrieth not doth better. And mark Christ's own words, Matth. 19. 11. His Disciples say unto him, If the case of a man be so with his wife, it is not good to marry. But he said unto them, All men cannot receive this saying, save they to whom it is given—He that is able to receive it, let him receive it.

§. 30. 10. The business of a married state doth commonly devour almost all your time, so that little is left for holy contemplations, or serious thoughts of the life to come: All God's service is contracted and thrust into a corner, and done as it were on the by: The world will scarce allow you time to meditate, or pray, or read the Scripture: You think yourselves (as Martha ) under a greater necessity of dispatching your business, than of sitting at Christ's feet to hear his Word. O that single persons knew (for the most part) the preciousness of their leisure, and how free they are to attend the service of God, and learn his▪ Word, in comparison of the married!

§. 31. 11. There is so great a diversity of temperaments and degrees of understanding, that there are scarce any two persons in the world, but there is some unsuitableness between them. Like stones that have some unevenness, that maketh them lie crooked in the building: some crossness there will be of opinion, or disposition, or interest, or will, by nature, or by custom and education; which will stir up frequent discontents.

§. 32. 12. There is a great deal of duty which Husband and Wife do owe to one another: As to instruct, admonish, pray, watch over one another, and to be continual helpers to each other in order to their everlasting happiness; and patiently to bear with the infirmities of each other: And to the weak and backward heart of man, the addition of so much duty doth add to their weariness, how good soever the work be in itself: And men should feel their strength, before they undertake more work.

§. 33. 13. And the more they Love each other, the more they participate in each others griefs: And one or other will be frequently under some sort of suffering: If one be sick, or lame, or pained, or defamed, or wronged, or disquieted in mind, or by temptation fall into any wounding sin, the other beareth part of the distress. Therefore before you undertake to bear all the burdens of another, and suffer in all another's hurts, it concerneth you to observe your strength, how much more you have than your own burdens do require.

§. 34. 14. And if you should marry one that proveth ungodly, how exceeding great would the affliction be? If you loved them, your souls would be in continual danger by them: They would be the powerfullest instruments in the world to pervert your judgments, to deaden your hearts, to take you off from a holy life, to kill your prayers, to corrupt your lives, and to damn your souls: And if you should have the grace to scape the snare, and save yourselves, it would be by so much the greater difficulty and suffering, as the temptation is the greater: And what a heart-breaking would it be to converse so nearly with a child of the Devil, that is like to lie forever in Hell? The daily thoughts of it would be a daily death to you.

§. 35. 15. Women especially must expect so much suffering in a Married life, that if God had not put into them a natural inclination to it, and so strong a love to their children, as maketh them patient under the most annoying troubles, the world would ere this have been at an end, through their refusal of so calamitous a life. Their sickness in breeding, their pain in bringing forth, with the danger of their lives, the tedious trouble night and day which they have with their children in their nursing and their childhood; besides their subjection to their husbands, and continual care of family affairs: being forced to consume their lives in a multitude of low and troublesome businesses▪ All this and much more would have utterly deterred that Sex from marriage, if Nature itself had not inclined them to it.

§. 36. 16. And O what abundance of duty is incumbent upon both the Parents towards every child for the saving of their souls? What uncessant labor is necessary in Teaching them the Doctrine of Salvation? Which made God twice over charge them to teach his word diligently (or sharpen them) unto their children, and to talk of them when they sit in their houses, and when they walk by the way, and when they lie down, and when they rise up. Deut. 6. 6, 7. & 11. 19. What abundance of obstinate rooted corruptions are in the hearts of Children which Parents must by all possible diligence root up? O how great and hard a work is it, to speak to them of their sins and Savior, of their God, their souls, and the life to come, with that reverence, gravity, seriousness, and unwearied constancy as the weight of the matter doth require? and to suit all their actions and carriage to the same ends! Little do most that have Children know, what abundance of care and labor God will require of them, for the sanctifying and saving of their Children's souls! Consider your fitness for so great a work before you undertake it.

§. 37. 17. It is abundance of affliction that is ordinarily to be expected, in the miscarriages of Children, when you have done your best, much more if you neglect your duty, as even godly Parents too often do. After all your pains, and care, and labor, you must look that the foolishness of some, and the obstinacy of others, and the unthankfulness of those that you have loved best, should even pierce your hearts. You must look that many vices should spring up and trouble you; and be the more grievous by how much your children are the more dear: And O what a grief it is to breed up a Child to be a servant of the Devil, and an enemy of God and godliness, and a persecutor of the Church of God! And to think of his lying in Hell forever? And alas how great is the number of such?

18. And it is not a little care and trouble that servants will put you to: so difficult is it to get those that are good, much more to make them good; so great is your duty in teaching them, and minding them of the matters of their salvation; so frequent will be the displeasures about your work and worldly business; and everyone of those displeasures will hinder them for receiving your instructions; that most families are houses of correction or affliction.

§. 39. 19. And these marriage Crosses are not for a year, but during life: They deprive you of all hope of relief while you live together: There is no room for repentance, nor casting about for a way to escape them. Death only must be your relief. And therefore such a change of your condition should be seriously fore-thought on, and all the troubles be foreseen and pondered.

§. 40. 20. And if Love make you dear to one another, your parting at death will be the more grievous: And when you first come together, you know that such a parting you must have: Through all the course of your lives you may foresee it: One of you must see the Body of your beloved, turned into a cold and ghastly clod: You must follow it weeping to the grave, and leave it there in dust and darkness: There it must lie rotting as a loathsome lump, whose sight or smell you cannot endure; till you shortly follow it, and lie down yourself in the same condition. All these are the ordinary concomitants and consequents of Marriage; easily and quickly spoken, but long and hard to be endured! No fictions, but realities, and less than most have reason to expect. And should such a life be rashly ventured on in a pang of lust? or such a burden be undertaken without forethought?

§. 41. But especially the Ministers of the Gospel should think what they do, and think again, before they enter upon a married life. Not that it is simply unlawful for them, or that they are to be tied from it by a Law, as they are in the Kingdom of Rome, for carnal ends and with odious effects: But so great a hindrance ordinarily is this troublesome state of life to the Sacred Ministration which they undertake, that a very clear call should be expected for their satisfaction. That I be not tedious, consider well but of these four things. 1. How well will a life of so much care and business, agree to you that have time little enough for the greater work which you have undertaken? Do you know what you have to do in public and private? in reading, meditating, praying, preaching, instructing personally, and from house to house? And do you know of how great importance it is? even for the saving of men's souls? And have you time to spare for so much worldly cares and business? Are you not charged, 1 Tim. 4. 15. Meditate on these things: give thyself wholly to them. 2 Tim. 2. 4. No man that warreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please him that hath chosen him to be a Soldier. Is not this plain? Soldiers use not to look to Farms and Servants. If you are faithful Ministers, I dare confidently say, you will find all your time so little for your proper work, that many a time you will groan and say, O how short and swift is time! and O how great and slow is my work and duty. 2. Consider how well a life of so great diversions, avocations and distractions, doth suit with a Mind devoted to God, that should be always free and ready for his service. Your studies are on such great and mysterious subjects, that they require the whole mind, and all too little: To resolve the many difficulties that are before you, to prepare those suitable convincing words, which may pierce and persuade the hearers hearts, to get within the bosom of an hypocrite, to follow on the Word till it attain its effect, and to deal with poor souls according to their great necessity, and handle God's Word according to its Holiness and Majesty, these are things that require a whole man, and are not employments for a divided or distracted mind: The talking of Women, and the crying of children, and the cares and business of the world, are ill preparations or attendants on these studies. 3. Consider well whether a life of so great disturbance be agreeable to one whose Affections should be taken up for God: and whose work must be all done, not formally and affectedly with the lips alone, but seriously with all the heart? If your Heart and warm Affections be at any time left behind, the life and power, the beauty and glory of your work is lost. How dead will your studies and praying, and preaching, and conference be? And can you keep those Affections warm and vigorous for God, and taken up with Heaven and Heavenly things, which are disturbed with the cares and crosses of the world, and taken up with carnal matters? 4. And consider also how well that indigent life will agree to one that by charity and good works should second his Doctrine, and win men's souls to the love of holiness: If you feed not the bodies of the poor, they will less relish the food of the soul: Nay, if you abound not above others in good works, the blind malicious world will see nothing that is good in you; but will say, You have good words, but where are your good works? What abundance have I known hardened against the Gospel and Religion, by a common fame, that these Preachers are as covetous, and worldly, and uncharitable as any others: And it must be something extraordinary that must confute such fame. And what abundance of success have I seen of the labors of those Ministers, who give all they have in works of Charity? And though a rich and resolved man may do some good in a married state, yet commonly it is next to nothing, as to the ends now mentioned: Wife, and Children, and Family-necessities devour all, if you have never so much. And some provision must be made for them when you are dead: And the maintenance of the Ministry is not so great as to suffice well for all this, much less for any eminent works of Charity besides! Never reckon upon the doing of much good to the poor if you have Wives and Children of your own! Such instances are rarities and wonders. All will be too little for yourselves. Whereas if all that were given to the poor which goeth to the maintenance of your families, you little know how much it would reconcile the minds of the ungodly, and further the success of your Ministerial work.

§. 42. Direct. 3. If God call you to a married life, expect all these troubles, or most of them; and make a particular preparation for each Temptation, Cross and Duty which you must expect. Think not that you are entering into a state of mere delight: lest it prove but a fools Paradise to you. See that you be furnished with Marriage-strength and patience, for the duties and sufferings of a married state, before you venture on it. Especially 1. Be well provided against Temptations to a Worldly mind and life: For here you are like to be most violently and dangerously assaulted! 2. See that you be well provided with Conjugal affections: For they are necessary both to the Duties and Sufferings of a married life: And you should not enter upon the state without the necessary preparations. 3. See that you be well provided with Marriage-prudence and understanding, that you may be able to instruct and edify your families, and may live with them as men of knowledge, 1 Pet. 3. 7. and may manage all your business with discretion, Psal. 112. 15. 4. See that you be provided with Resolvedness and Constancy, that you vex not yourself and relations by too late repentings; and come not off with a Had I wist, or non putâram. Levity and mutability is no fit preparative for a state that only death can change. Let the Love and Resolutions which brought you into that state, continue with you to the last. 5. See that you be provided with a diligence answerable to the greatness of your undertaken duties. A slothful mind is unfit for one that entereth himself voluntary upon so much business; as a cowardly mind is unfit for him that listeth himself a Soldier for the Wars. 6. See that you are well provided with Marriage-patience; to beat with the infirmities of others, and undergo the daily crosses of your life, which your business, and necessities, and your own infirmities will unavoidably infer. To Marry without all this preparation, is as foolish as to go to Sea▪ without the necessary preparations for your Voyage, or to go to War without Armor or Ammunition, or to go to work without Tools or Strength, or to go to buy Meat in the Market when you have no money.

§. 43. Direct. 4. Take special care that fancy and passion over-rule not Reason, and Friends advice, in the choice of your condition, or of the person. I know you must have Love to those that you match with: But that Love must be Rational, and such as you can justify in the severest trial, by the evidences of worth and fitness in the person whom you love. To say you Love, but you know not why, is more beseeming children or mad folks, than those that are soberly entering upon a change of life of so great importance to them. A blind Love which maketh you think a person excellent and amiable, who in the eyes of the wisest that are impartial, is nothing so, or maketh you overvalue the person whom you fancy, and be fond of one as some admirable creature, that in the eyes of others is next to contemptible, this is but the Index and evidence of your folly. And though you please yourselves in it, and honor it with the name of Love, there is none that is acquainted with it, that will give it any better name than LUST or FANCY. And the marriage that is made by Lust and Fancy will never tend to solid Content or true Felicity: But either it will feed till death on the fuel that kindled it, and then go out in everlasting shame: or else more ordinarily it proveth but a blaze, and turneth into loathing and weariness of each other. And because this passion of Lust (called Love ) is such a besotting blinding thing, (like the longing of a woman with child) it is the duty of all that feel any touch of it to kindle upon their hearts, to call it presently to the trial, and to quench it effectually, and till that be done (if they have any relicts of wit or reason) to suspect their own apprehensions, and much more to trust the judgment and advice of others.

§. 44. The means to quench this Lust called Love, I have largely opened before. I shall now only remember you of these few. 1. Keep asunder, and at a sufficient distance from the person that you dote upon. The nearness of the fire and fuel causeth the combustion. Fancy and Lust are enflamed by the senses. Keep out of sight, and in time the Feavor may abate. 2. Overvalue not vanity: Think not highly of a Silken Coat, or of the great Names of Ancestors, or of Money, or Lands, or of a painted or a spotted face, nor of that natural comeliness called beauty: Judge not of things as children, but as men: Play not the fools in magnifying trifles, and overlooking inward real worth. Would you fall in Love with a Flower or Picture at this rate? Bethink you what work the Pox, or any other withering sickness will make with that silly beauty which you so admire: Think what a spectacle death will make it: And how many thousands once more beautiful, are turned now to common earth. And how many thousand souls are now in Hell, that by a beautiful body were drowned in lust, and tempted to neglect themselves? and how few in the world you can name that were ever much the better for it? what a childish thing it is to dote on a Book of tales and lies, because it hath a beautiful gilded cover? and to undervalue the writings of the wise, because they have a plain and homely outsides▪ 3. Rule your thoughts, and let them not run masterless as fancy shall command them. If Reason cannot call off your thoughts, from following a lustful desire and imagination, no wonder if one that rideth on such an unbridled Colt be cast into the dirt. 4. Live not idly, but let the business of your callings, take up your time, and employ your thoughts. An idle fleshly mind is the carcass where the Vermin of Lust doth crawl, and the nest where the Devil hatcheth both this and many other pernicious sins. 5. Lastly and chiefly, forget not the concernments of your souls: Remember how near you are to Eternity, and what work you have to do for your salvation: Forget not the presence of God, no • the approach of death: Look oft by faith into Heaven and Hell, and keep Conscience tender; and then I warrant you, you will find something else to mind than Lust; and greater matters than a silly carcass to take up your thoughts, and you will seel that Heavenly Love within you, which will extinguish earthly carnal Love.

§. 45. Direct. 5. Be not too hasty in your choice or resolution, but deliberate well, and thoroughly know the person on whom so much of the comfort or sorrow of your life will necessarily depend. Where Repentance hath no place, there is the greater care to be used to prevent it. Reason requireth you to be well acquainted with those that you trust but with an important secret, much more with all your honor or estates: and most of all, with one whom you must trust with so much of the comfort of your lives, and your advantages for a better life. No care and caution can be too great in a matter of so great importance.

§ 46. Direct. 6. Let no carnal motives persuade you to join yourself to an ungodly person; but let the holy fear of God be preferred in your choice before all worldly excellency whatsoever. Marry not a Swine for a Golden trough: nor an ugly soul for a comely body. Consider, 1. You will else give cause of great suspicion that you are yourselves Ungodly: For they that know truly the misery of an unrenewed soul, and the excellency of the Image of God, can never be indifferent whether they be joined to the Godly or the Ungodly▪ To prefer things temporal, before things spiritual habitually and in the predominant acts of heart and life, is the certain Character of a graceless soul! And he that in so near a case doth deliberately prefer Riches or Comliness in another, before the image and fear of God, doth give a very dangerous sign, of such a graceless heart and will. If you set more by Beauty or Riches than by Godliness, you have the surest mark that you are ungodly. If you do not s • t more by them, how come you deliberately to prefer them? How could you do a thing that detecteth your ungodliness, and condemneth you more clearly? And do you not show that you either believe not the word of God, or else that you love him not, and regard not his interest? Otherwise you would take his friends as your friends, and his enemies as your enemies. Tell me, would you marry an enemy of your own, before any change and reconciliation? I am confident you would not. And can you so easily marry an enemy of God? If you know not that all the ungodly and unsanctified are his enemies, you know not or believe not the word of God: which telleth you that the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the Law of God, nor indeed can • e: so then they that are in the flesh cannot please God, Rom. 8. 7, 8. 2. If you fear God yourselves, your chief end in marriage will be to have one that will be a helper to your soul, and further you in the way to Heaven: But if you marry with a person that is ungodly, either you have no such end, or else you may easily know you have no wiselyer chosen the means, than if you had chosen water to kindle the fire, or a bed of snow to keep you warm. Will an ignorant or ungodly person assist you in prayer and holy watchfulness, and stir you up to the Love of God, and a heavenly mind? And can you so willingly lose all the spiritual benefit, which you should principally desire and intend? 3. Nay instead of a Helper you will have a continual hinderer: when you should go to prayer you will have one to pull you back, or to fill your minds with diversions or disquietments! when you should keep close to God in holy meditations, you will have one to cast in worldly thoughts, or trouble your minds with vanity or vexation. When you should discourse of God and heavenly things, you will have one to stifle such discourse, and fill your ears with idle, impertinent or worldly talk. And one such a hindrance, so near you, in your bosom, will be worse than a thousand further off: As an ungodly heart which is next of all to us, is our greatest hindrance, so an ungodly husband or wife, which is next to that, is worse to us than many ungodly neighbors. And if you think that you can well enough overcome such hindrances, and your heart is so good that no such clogs can keep it down, you do but show that you have a proud unhumbled heart, that is prepared for a fall▪ If you know yourselves, and the badness of your hearts, you will know that you have no need of hindrances in any holy work, and that all the helps in the world are little enough, and too little to keep your souls in the Love of God. 4. And such an ungodly companion will be to you a continual temptation to sin. Instead of stirring you up to good, you will have one to stir you up to evil, to passion, or discontent, or covetousness, or pride, or revenge or sensuality: And can you not sin enough without such a tempter? 5. And what a continual grief will it be to you if you are believers, to have a child of the Devil in your bosom? and to think how far you must be separated at death? and in what torments those must lie forever, that are so dear unto you now? 6. Yea such companions will be uncapable of the principal part of your Love. You may love them as Husbands or Wives, but you cannot love them as Saints and members of Christ. And how great a want this will be in your Love, those know that know what this holy Love is.

§. 47. Quest. But how can I tell who are Godly, when there is so much hypocrisy in the world?

Answ. At least you may know who is Ungodly if it be palpably discovered. I take not a barren knowledge for ungodliness, nor a nimble tongue for Godliness: Judge of them by their Love: such as a man's Love is, such is the Man: If they Love the word, and servants and worship of God, and Love a holy life, and hate the contrary, you may close with such though their knowledge be small, and their parts be weak: But if they have no Love to these, but had rather live a common, careless, carnal life, you may well avoid them as ungodly.

§. 48. Quest. But if ungodly persons may marry, why may not I marry with one that is ungodly?

Answ. Though Dogs and Swine may join in Generating, it followeth not men or women may join with them. Pardon the comparison, (while Christ calleth the wicked Dogs and Swine, Mat. 7. 6.) it doth but show the badness of your consequence. Unbelievers may marry, and yet we may not marry with unbelievers: 2 Cor. 6. 14, 15, 16. Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers? For what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness? and what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an Infidel? and what agreement hath the Temple of God with Idols? For ye are the Temple of the living God—wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing, &c.

§. 49. Quest. But I make no doubt but they may be converted: God can call them when he will: If there be but Love, they will easily be won to be of the mind as those they Love are?

Answ. 1. Then it seems because you Love an ungodly person you will be easily turned to be ungodly. If so, you are not much better already. If Love will not draw you to their mind to be ungodly, why should you think Love will draw them to your mind to be Godly? Are you stronger in grace than they are in sin? 2. If you know well what Grace is, and what a sinful unrenewed soul is, you would not think it so easy a matter to convert a soul. Why are there so few converted if it be so easy a thing? You cannot make yourselves better by adding higher degrees to the grace you have: much less can you make another better, by giving them the grace which they have not. 3. It's true that God is able to convert them when he will: and it's true that for ought I know it may be done. But what of that? Will you in so weighty a case take up with a mere possibility? God can make a beggar Rich, and for ought you know to the contrary, he will do it: And yet you will not therefore marry a Beggar? Nor will you marry a Leper because God can heal him? why then should you marry an ungodly person, because God can convert him? see it done first, if you love your peace and safety?

§. 50. Quest. But what if my Parents command me to marry an ungodly person?

Answ. God having forbidden it, no Parent hath authority to command you to do so great a mischief to yourself, no more than to cut your own throats, or to dismember your bodies.

§. 51. Quest. But what if I have a necessity of marrying, and can get none but an ungodly person?

Answ. If that be really your case, that your necessity be real, and you can get no other, I think it is lawful.

§. 52. Quest. But is it not better have a good natured person that is ungodly, than an ill natured person that is religious, (as many such are)? And may not a bad man be a good husband?

Answ. 1. A bad man may be a good Taylor, or Shoemaker, or Carpenter, or Seaman, because there is no moral virtue necessary to the well-doing of their work. But a bad man cannot be simply a good Magistrate, or Minister, or Husband, or Parent, because there is much moral Virtue necessary to their duties. 2. A bad nature unmortified and untamed is inconsistent with true Godliness: such persons may talk and profess what they please; but if any man among you seem to be religious and bridleth not his tongue, but deceiveth his own heart, this man's religion is vain, Jam. 1. 26. 3. I did not say that Godliness alone is all that you must look after: Though this be the first, yet more is necessary—

§. 53. Direct. 7. Next to the fear of God, make choice of a nature, or temperament that is not too much unsuitable to you. A crossness of dispositions will be a continual vexation: and you will have a domestic War instead of Love. Especially make sure of these following qualities. 1. That there be a Loving, and not a selfish nature, that hath no regard to another but for their own end. 2. That there be a Nature competently quiet and patient, and not intolerably froward, and unpleasable. 3. That there be a competency of wit: for no one can live lovingly and comfortably with a fool. 4. That there be a competent humility: For there is no quietness to be expected with the proud. 5. That there be a power to be silent, as well as to speak: For a babbling tongue is a continual vexation.

§. 54. Direct. 8. Next to Grace and Nature, have a due and moderate respect to Person, Education and Estate. 1. So far have respect to the Person as that there be no unhealthfulness to make your condition over-burdensome; nor no such deformity as may hinder your affections. 2. And so far have respect to Parentage and Education as that there be no great unsuitableness of mind, nor no prejudicate opinions in Religion, which may make you too unequal. Differing opinions in Religion are much more tolerable in persons more distant, than in so near relations. And those that are bred too high in idleness and luxury, must have a through work of grace to make them fit for a low condition, and cure the Pride and sensuality which are taken for the honorable badges of their Gentility: And it is scarce considerable how Rich such are▪ For their pride and luxury will make even with all, and be still in greater want, than honest contented temperate poverty.

§. 55. Direct. 9. If God call you to marriage take notice of the helps and comforts of that condition, as well as of the hindrances and troubles; that you may cheerfully serve God in it, in the expectation of his blessing. Though man's corruption have filled that and every state of life with snares and troubles, yet from the beginning it was not so: God appointed it for mutual help, and as such it may be used. As a married life hath its temptations and afflictions, so it hath its peculiar benefits, which you are thankfully to accept and acknowledge unto God. 1. It is a mercy in order to the propagating of a people on earth to love and honor their Creator, and to serve God in the world and enjoy him forever. It is no small mercy to be the Parents of a Godly seed: and this is the end of the institution of marriage, Mal. 2. 15. And this Parents may expect if they be not wanting on their part; however sometimes their Children prove ungodly. 2. It is a mercy to have a faithful friend, that loveth you entirely, and is as true to you as yourself, to whom you may open your mind and communicate your affairs, and who will be ready to strengthen you, and • ivide the ca • es of your affairs and family with you, and help you to bear your burdens, and comfort you in your sorrows, and be the daily companion of your lives, and partaker of your joys and sorrows. 3. And it is a mercy to have so near a friend to be a helper to your soul; to join with you in prayer and other holy exercises; to watch over you and tell you of your sins and dangers, and to stir up in you the grace of God, and remember you of the life to come, and cheerfully accompany you in the ways of holiness. Prov. 19. 14. A prudent wife is from the Lord. Thus it is said, Prov. 18. 22. Whoso findeth a wife findeth a good thing, and obtaineth favor of the Lord. See Prov. 31. 10, 11, 12, &c.

§. 56. Direct. 10. Let your Marriage Covenant be made understandingly, deliberately, heartily, in the fear of God, with a fixed resolution faithfully to perform it. Understand well all the duties of your relation before you enter into it: And run not upon it as boys to a play, but with the sense of your duty, as those that engage themselves to a great deal of work of great importance towards God and towards each other. Address yourselves therefore before hand to God for Counsel and earnestly beg his guidance, and his blessing, and run not without him nor before him. Reckon upon the worst, and foresee all temptations which would diminish your affections, or make you unfaithful to each other: and see that you be fortified against them all.

§. 57. Direct. 11. Be sure that God be the ultimate end of your marriage, and that you principally choose that state of life that in it you may be most serviceable to him; and that you heartily devote yourselves, and your families unto God; that so it may be to you a sanctified condition. It is nothing but making God our Guide and End that can sanctify our state of life. They that unfeignedly follow God's counsel, and aim at his Glory, and do it to please him, will find God owning and blessing their relation. But they that do it principally to please the flesh, to satisfy lust, and to increase their estates, and to have Children surviving them to receive the fruits of their Pride and Covetousness, can expect to reap no better than they sow; and to have the Flesh, the World, and the Devil the masters of their family, according to their own desire and choice.

§. 58. Direct. 12. At your first conjunction (and through the rest of your lives) remember the day of your separation. And think not that you you are settling yourselves in a state of Rest or felicity or continuance, but only assuming a companion in your travels: Whether you live in a married or an unmarried life, remember that you are hasting to the everlasting life, where there is neither marrying nor giving in marriage. You are going as fast to another world in one state of life as in the other. You are but to help each other in your way, that your journey may be the easier to you, and that you may happily meet again in the Heavenly Jerusalem. When worldlings marry they take it for a settling themselves in the world; And as Regenerate persons begin the world anew, by beginning to lay up a treasure in Heaven; so worldlings call their Marriage, their beginning the world, because then as engaged servants to the world, they set themselves to seek it with greater diligence than ever before: They do but in marriage begin (as seekers ) that life of foolery, which, when he had found what he sought, that Rich man ended, Luk. 12. 19, 20. with a This I will do: I will pull down my barns, and build greater, and there will I bestow all my fruits and my goods: And I will say to my soul, Soul thou hast much goods laid up for many years, take thine ease, eat drink and be merry: But God said unto him, Thou fool this night shall thy soul be required of thee: then whose shall those things be which thou hast provided. If you would not dy such fools, do not marry and live such worldlings.

Tit. 2. Cases of Marriage.

Quest. 1. WHat should one follow as a certain Rule, about the prohibited degrees of Consanguinity or affinity? Seeing 1. The Law of Moses is not in force to us. 2. And if it were it is very dark, Whether it may by parity of reason be extended to more degrees than are named in the text? 3. And seeing the Law of nature is so hardly legible in this case?

Answ. 1. It is certain that the prohibited degrees are not so statedly and universally unlawful, as that such marriage may not be made lawful by any necessity. For Adams sons did lawfully marry their own Sisters.

2. But now the world is peopled, such necessities as will warrant such marriages must needs be very rare, and such as we are never like to meet with.

3. The Law of nature is it which prohibiteth the degrees that are now unlawful; And though this Law be dark as to some degrees, it is not so as to others.

4. The Law of God to the Jews, Lev. 18. doth not prohibit those degrees there named, because of any reason proper to the Jews, but as an exposition of the Law of nature, and so on reasons common to all.

5. Therefore though the Jewish Law cease (yea never bound other nations) formally as that political national Law; yet as it was God's exposition of his own Law of nature, it is of use, and consequential obligation to all men, even to this day: For if God once had told but one man, [ This is the sense of the Law of nature ] it remaineth true, and all must believe it; and then the Law of nature itself, so expounded, will still oblige.

6. The world is so wide for choice, and a necessity of doubtful marriage is so rare, and the trouble so great, that prudence telleth everyone that it is their sin, without flat necessity, to marry in a doubtful degree; And therefore it is thus safest, to avoid all degrees that seem to be equal to those named Lev. 18. and to have the same reason, though they be not named.

7. But because it is not certain that indeed the unnamed cases have the same reason, (while God doth not acquaint us with all the reasons of his Law) therefore when the thing is done, we must not censure others too deeply, nor trouble ourselves too much about those unnamed doubtful cases. We must avoid them before hand, because else we shall cast ourselves into doubts and troubles unnecessarily: But when it is past, the case must be considered of as I shall after open.

Quest. 2. What if the Law of the Land forbid more or fewer degrees than Lev. 18. doth?

Answ. If it forbid fewer, the rest are nevertheless to be avoided as forbidden by God. If it forbid more, the forbdiden ones must be avoided in obedience to our Rulers.

Quest. 3. Is the marriage of Cousin Germans, that is, of brothers children, or sisters children, or brothers and sisters children, unlawful.

Answ. I think not; 1. Because not forbidden by God. 2. Because none of that same rank are forbidden: that is, none that on both sides are two degrees from the Root. I refer the Reader for my Reasons to a Latin Treatise of Charles Butler on this Subject, for in those I rest. As all the Children of Noah's Sons did marry their Cousin Germans, (for they could not marry in any remoter degree,) so have others since without reproof, and none are forbidden. 3. But it is safest to do otherwise, because there is choice enough beside, and because many Divines being of the contrary opinion, may make it matter of scruple and trouble afterwards, to those that venture upon it without need.

Quest. 4. What would you have th • se do that have married Cousin Germans, and now doubt whether it be lawful so to do?

Answ. I would have them cast away such doubts, or at least conclude that it is now their duty to live peaceably in the state in which they are; and a great sin for them to be separated on such scruples. The reason is, because, if it be not certain, that the degree is lawful, at least no man can be sure that it is unlawful: And for Husband and Wife to break their Covenants and part, without a necessary cause is a great sin: And that which no man can prove to be a sin, is no necessary or lawful cause of a divorce. Marriage duties are certainly commanded to the married; but the marriage of Cousin Germans is not certainly forbidden. Therefore if it were a sin to marry so, to them that doubted, or if they are since fallen into doubt whether it was not a sin; yet may they be sure that the continuance of it is a duty, and that all that they have to do is to repent of doing a doubtful thing, but not to part, nor to forbear their covenanted duties. No nor to indulge or suffer those troublesome scruples, which would hinder the cheerful discharge of their duties, and the comfortable serving of God in their relations.

Quest. 5. What should those do that are married in those degrees which are not forbidden by name in Lev. 18. and yet are of the same distance from the Root with those that are named, and seem to have the same reason of unlawfulness.

Answ. If there be clearly a Parity of Degree and also of the Reason of the prohibition, then no doubt but they must part as incestuous, and not continue in a forbidden state. But because Divines▪ are disagreed whether there be in all instances a parity of the Reason of the prohibition, where there is an equal distance as to degrees; and so in those cases some think it a duty to be separated, and others think it enough to repent of their conjunction, and not to be separated, because the case is doubtful (as the Controversy showeth), I shall not venture to cast in my judgment in a case where so many and such men are disagreed; But shall only advise all, to prevent such troublesome doubts before hand, and not by rashness to run themselves into perplexities, when there is no necessity; unless they will call their carnal ends or sinful passions, a necessity?

Quest. 6. But if a man do marry in a degree expressly there forbidden, is it in all cases a sin to continue in that state? If necessity made such marriage a Duty to Adams Children, why may not necessity make the continuance lawful to others? As suppose the King or Parents command it? suppose the Woman will die or be distracted with grief else? suppose one hath made a Vow to marry no other, and yet cannot live single, &c. Here I shall suppose (that If a lustful person marry a kinswoman that he may have change as foreknowing that he must be divorced, punishment, and not continuance in the sin must be his sentence: And if one that hath married a kinswoman be glad to be divorced because he hateth her or loveth change, punishment must rebuke him, but he must not continue in incest.)

Answ. 1. Natural necessity justified Adams Children, and such would now justify you. Yea the benediction increase and multiply did not only allow, but oblige them then to marry, to replenish the earth (when else mankind would soon have ceased:) But so it doth not us now when the earth is replenished. Yet I deny not, but if a man and his sister were cast alone upon a foreign Wilderness, where they justly despaired of any other company, if God should bid them there [ increase and multiply ] it would warrant them to marry. But else there is no necessity of it, and therefore no lawfulness. For 2. A Vicious necessity justifieth not the sin. If the man or woman that should abstain, will be mad or dead with passion, rather than obey God, and deny and mortify their lust, it is not one sin that will justify them in another. The thing that is necessary is to conform their wills to the Law of God, and if they will not, and then say, They cannot; they must bear what they get by it. 3. And it is no necessity that is imposed by that command of King or Parents which is against the Law of God. 4. No nor by a Vow neither: For a Vow to to break God's Law is not an obligation to be kept, but to be repented of: nor is the necessity remediless which such a one bringeth on himself, by Vowing never to marry any other; seeing chastity may be kept.

Quest. 7. Is it lawful for one to marry, that hath Vowed chastity during life, and not to marry, and afterward findeth a necessity of marrying, for the avoiding of lust and fornication?

Answ. I know that many great Divines have easily absolved those that under Popery vowed Chastity. The principal part of the solution of the question you must fetch from my solution of the case of Vows, Tom. 3. Ch. 5. Tit. 2. At the present this shall suffice to be added to it. 1. Such Vows of Chastity that are Absolute, without any exceptions, of after-alterations or difficulties that may arise, are sinfully made, or are unlawful quoad actum jurandi.

2. If Parents or others impose such Oaths and Vows on their Children or Subjects, or induce them to it, it is sinfully done of them, and the actus imperantium is also unlawful.

3. Yet as long as the materia jurata the matter vowed remaineth Lawful, the Vow doth bind, and it is perfidiousness to break it. For the sinfulness of the Imposers act proveth no more but that such a command did not oblige you to Vow. And a Vow made arbitrarily without any command, doth nevertheless bind. And the sinfulness of the Making of the Vow, doth only call for Repentance; (as if you made it causelessly, rashly, upon ill motives, and to ill ends, or in ill circumstances, &c. ) But yet that Vow which you Repent that ever you made must be nevertheless kept, if the thing Vowed be a Lawful thing, and the act of Vowing be not made a nullity (though it was a sin.) And when it is a nullity I have shown in the forecited place.

4. A Vow of Celebate or chastity during life, which hath this condition or exception expressed or implied in the true intent of the Votary [ Unless anything fall out which shall make it a sin to me not to marry ] may in some cases be a lawful Vow: As to one that foreseeth great inconveniences in marriage, and would by firm resolution fortify himself against temptations and mutability.

5. If there were no such excepting thought in the person Vowing, yet when the thing becometh unlawful the Vow is not to be kept: Though it oblige us under guilt for sinful making it, yet God commandeth us not to keep it, because we vowed that which he forbad us not only to Vow but to Do.

6. Either the Papists suppose such Exceptions to be always implied by their Votaries, or at least that they are contained in the Law of God, or else sure they durst never pretend that the Pope hath power to dispense with such Vows: (As they have oft done for Princes, Men and Women, that they might be taken from a Monastery to a Crown) For if they suppose that the persons before the dispensation are under the obligation of their Vow, and bound by God to keep it, then it would be too gross and odious Blaspheamy for the Pope to claim a power of disobliging them, and dissolving God's commands: and not only Antichristianity, but Antitheistical, or a setting himself above God Almighty under pretence of his own Commission. But if they only pretend to dissolve such Vows Judicially or Decisively, by Judging when the person is no longer obliged to keep them by God's Law, then they suppose that the obligation of God's Law is ceased before they Judicially declare it to be ceased. (And if that were all that the Pope undertook, he had no power to do it out of his own Parish, nor more than any lawful Bishop hath in his proper charge.)

7. The matter of a Vow of Celibate or Chastity is then unlawful, when it cannot be kept without greater sin than that life of chastity escapeth, and which would be escaped if it were forsaken, Or without the Omission of greater duty, and Amission of greater good, than that life of chastity containeth or attaineth. For the further opening of this let it be noted that,

8. It is not every degree of sin which marriage would cure, that will warrant the breach of a Vow of Chastity. As if I had some more lustful thoughts or instigations and irritations in a single life than I should have if I married: The reason is, Because, 1. No man liveth without some sin, and it is supposed that there are greater sins of another kind, which by a life of chastity I avoid. And the breach of the Vow itself is a greater matter than a lustful thought.

9. So it is not every degree of Good which by marriage I may attain or do that will warrant it against a Vow of Chastity. Because I may do and get a Greater Good by chastity, and because the evil of perjury is not to be done that good may be done by it; till I can prove that it is not only Good in itself, but a Duty hic & nunc to me.

10. A man should rather break his Vow of Celibate, than once commit fornication, if there were a necessity that he must do the one. Because fornication is a sin which no Vow will warrant any man to Commit.

11. A man should rather break his Vow of celibate, than live in such constant or ordinary lust, •• unfitteth him for Prayer, and a holy life, and keepeth him in ordinary danger of fornication, if there were a necessity that he must do the one. The reason is also because now the Matter Vowed is become unlawful, and no Vow can warrant a man to live, in so great sin, (Unless there were some Greater sin on the other side which could not be avoided in a married life, which is hardly to be supposed, however Popish Priests think disobedience to the Pope, and the incommodity and disgrace of a married life, &c. to be a greater sin than fornication itself.)

12. If a Prince Vow chastity when it is like to endanger the Kingdom for want of a safe and sure succession, he is bound to break that Vow: Because he may not lawfully give away the people's right, nor do that which is injurious to so many.

13. Whether the Command of a Parent or Prince may dissolve the obligation of a Vow of Celibate, I have answered already. I now say but this, 1. When Parents or Princes may justly command it, we may justly obey them. But this is not one of those accidental evils, which may be lawfully done though unlawfully commanded. 2. It is Parents that God hath committed more of this care and power to, about Children's Marriage, than to Princes. 3. Parents nor Princes may not lawfully command the breach of such a Vow, (not nullified at first,) except in such cases as disoblige us whether they do it or not; so that the resolving of the main case doth suffice for all.

14. He that by lawful means can overcome his lust, to the measure before mentioned, is under no necessity of violating his Vow of single life.

15. I think that it is not one of twenty that have bodies so unavoidably prone to lust, but that by due means it might be so far (though not totally) overcome, without marriage, fornication; willful self-pollution, or violent vexatious lustful thoughts. That is, 1. If they employ themselves constantly and diligently in a lawful calling, and be not guilty of such idleness, as leaveth room in their minds and imaginations for vain and filthy thoughts. If they follow such a calling as shall lay a necessity upon them, to keep their Thoughts close employed about it. 2. If they use such abstinence and coursness in their diet, as is meet to tame inordinate lusts, without destroying health: And not only avoid fullness and gulosity and vain sports and pleasures, but also use convenient fasting, and tame the body by necessary austerities. 3. If they sufficiently avoid all tempting company and sights, and keep at a meet distance from them. 4. If they set such a restraint upon their Thoughts as they may do. 5. If they use such a quality of diet and physic as is aptest for the altering of those bodily distempers which are the cause. 6. And lastly, If they are earnest in Prayer to God, and live in mortifying meditations, especially in a constant familiarity with a Crucified Christ, and with the grave, and with the Heavenly Society. He that breaketh his Vow to save himself the labor and suffering of these ungrateful means, I take to be perfidious, though perhaps he sinfully made that Vow. And no greater a number are excusable from Continence after such a Vow, than these that have bodies so extraordinary lustful, as no such other means can tame, (and those foremencioned that have extraordinary accidents to make a single life unlawful.)

16. It must not be forgotten here that if men trust to marriage itself alone as the cure of their lust, without other means, such violent lusts as nothing else will cure, may possibly be much uncured afterward. For Adulterers are as violent in their lusts as the unmarried, and ofttimes find it as hard to restrain them. And therefore the Married as well as others have need to be careful to overcome their lust. And the rather because it is in them a double sin.

17. But yet when all other means do fail, marriage is God's appointed means, to quench those flames from which men's Vows cannot in cases of true necessity disoblige them.

CHAP. II. Directions for the right choice of Servants and Masters.

PART I. Directions for the right choice of Servants.

SErvants being integral parts of the Family, who contribute much to the holiness or unholiness of it, and to the happiness or misery of it, it much concerneth Masters to be careful in their choice. And the harder it is to find such as are indeed desirable, the more careful and diligent in it should you be.

§. 1. Direct. 1. To bid you choose such, as are fittest for your service, is a direction which nature and interest will give you, without any persuasions of mine. And indeed it is not mere honesty or pi • ty that will make a good servant, nor do your work. Three things are necessary to make a servant fit for you: 1. Strength, 2. Skill, 3. Willingness: And no two of these will serve without the third. Strength and Skill without Willingness will do nothing: Skill and Willingness without Strength can do nothing. Strength and Willingness without Skill will do as bad, or worse than nothing. No less than all will make you a good servant. Therefore choose one, 1. That is healthful, 2. That hath been used to such work as you must employ him in; and, 3. One that is not of a flesh-pleasing, or lazy, s • uggish disposition. For to exact labor from one that is sickly, will seem cruelty: And to expect labor from one that is unskillful and unexercised, will seem folly: And heavy, fleshly, slothful persons, will do all with so much unwillingness, and pain, and weariness, that they will think all too much, and their service will be a continual toil and displeasure to them, and they will think you wrong them, or deal hardly with them, if you will not allow them in their fleshliness and idleness. Yea though they should have grace, a flegmatick, sluggish, heavy body, will never be fit for diligent service; no more than a tired horse for travel.

§. 2. Direct. 2. If it be possible, choose such as have the fear of God, or at least such as are tractable and willing to be taught, and not such as are ungodly, sensual and profane. For, 1. God hateth all the workers of iniquity: Psal. 5. 5. And it tendeth not to the blessing or safety of your family, to have in it such as are enemies to God, and hated by him. You cannot expect an equal blessing on their labors, as you may on the service of those that fear him: The wicked may bring a curse on the families where they are (if you willfully entertain them): When a Joseph may be a blessing even to the house of an unbeliever. A wicked man will be renewing those crimes, which will be the shame of your family, and a grief to your hearts, if you have any love to God yourselves; when a godly servant will pray for a blessing from God upon his labors, and is himself under a promise, that whatever he doth shall prosper, Psal. 1. 3. 2. Ungodly Servants for the most part will be mere eye-servants: They will do little more than they find necessary to escape reproof and blame: Some few of them indeed out of Love to their Masters, or out of a desire of praise, or to make their places the better to themselves, will be diligent and trusty: But ordinarily they are deceitful, and study more to seem good servants, than to be such, and to hide their faults, than to avoid them: For they make no great matter of Conscience of it; nor do they regard the eye of God: whereas a truly Godly servant will do all your service in obedience to God, as if God himself had bid him do it, and as one that is always in the presence of that Master, whose favor he preferreth before all the world: He is more careful to please God, who commandeth him to be faithful, than to please you by seeming better than he is: He is moved more to his duty by the reward which God hath promised him, than by the wages which he expecteth from you: He hath a tender purified Conscience, which will hold him to his duty as well when you know it not, as when you stand by. 3. Ordinarily ungodly servants will be false, if they have but opportunity to enrich themselves by deceiving you: Especially those that are entrusted in laying out money in buying and selling. As long as I name no particular persons, I think it no untrustiness, but my duty, to warn Masters whom they trust, by my experience from the confessions of those that have been guilty. Many servants whom God hath converted to his Love and fear, have told me how constantly they deceived their Masters in buying and selling before their conversion; even of so great sum • of money, that some of them were not able to restore it (when I made them know it was their duty so far as they were able): And some of them had so much unquietness of Conscience till it was restored, that I have been fain to give them money to restore, when I have convinced them of it: So that I know by such confessions, that such deceit and robbing of their Masters is a very ordinary thing among ungodly servants that have opportunity, that yet pass for very trusty servants, and are never discovered. 4. Also an ungodly servant will be a tempter to the rest, and will be drawing them to sin: Especially to secret wantonness, and uncivil carriage, if not to actual fornication: And to revellings, and merriments, and fl • shly courses: By swearing and taking God's name in vain, and cursing and lying, they will teach your children and other servants to do the li • e; and so be an infectious pestilence in your families. 5. And they will hinder any good which you would do on others: If there be any in your family under convictions, and in a hopeful way to a better condition, they will quench all and discourage them and hinder their conversion: Partly by their contradicting cavils, and partly by their scorns, and partly by their diverting idle talk, and partly by their ill examples, and alluring them to accompany them in their sin. Whereas on the contrary a godly servant will be drawing the rest of your family to godliness, and hindering them from sin, and persuading them to be faithful in their duty both to God and you.

§. 3. Direct. 3. Yet measure not the Godliness of a servant by his bare knowledge or words, but by his LOVE and CONSCIENCE. A great deal of self-conceited talkativeness about Religion may stand with an unsanctified heart and life: and much weakness in knowledge and utterance, may stand with sincerity. But you may safely judge those to be truly Godly, 1. Who LOVE Godliness, and Love the word and servants of God; and hate all wickedness, 2. And those that make Conscience to do their duty, and to avoid known sin both openly and in secret.

§. 4. Direct. 4. If necessity constrain you to take those that are unfit and bad, remember that there is the greater duty in • umbent on you, to carry yourself towards them in a vigilant convincing manner, so as tendeth most to make them better. Take them not as you buy a horse or an Ox, with a purpose only to use them for your work: But remember they have immortal souls which you take charge of.

PART II. Directions for the right choice of Masters.

SEeing the happiness of a servant, the safety of his soul, and the comfort of his life, depend very much upon the family and place which he liveth in, it much concerneth every prudent servant to be very careful in what place or family he take up his abode, and to make the wisest choice he can.

§. 1. Direct. 1. Above all be sure that you choose not for mere fleshly ease and sensuality, and take not that for the best place for you, where you may have most of your own carnal will and pleasure. I know that fleshly graceless servants, will hear this Direction with as ill a will, as a Dog when he is forbidden his meat or carrion. I know I speak against their very nature, and therefore against their very hearts, and therefore they will think I speak against their interest and good: And therefore I may persuade them to this course a hundred times, before they will believe me, or obey my counsel: All ungodly fleshly servants, do make these the only signs of a good place, or desirable service for them: 1. If they may do what work they will, and avoid that which they dislike: If they may do that which is easy, and not that which is hard: And that which is an honor to them, and not that which seemeth inferior and base: 2. If they may work when they will, and give over when they will. 3. If they may rise when they will, and go to bed when they will. 4. If they may eat and drink what they will, and fare well to the pleasing of their appetites. 5. If they may speak when they will, and what they have a mind to speak. 6. If they may have leave when they will to sport, and play, and be wanton and vain, and wast their time, which they call being merry: 7▪ If they may wear the best apparel, and go fine: 8. If their Masters will be liberal to them, to maintain all this, and will give them what they would have. 9. If their Masters and fellow servants carry it respectfully to them • , and praise them, and make somebody of them, and do not dishonor them, nor give them any displeasing words. 10. And if they are not troubled with the precepts of Godliness, nor set to learn the Scripture, or Catechized, nor called to account about the state of their souls, or the ground of their hopes for the life to come, nor troubled with much praying, or repeating sermons, or religious exercise or discourse, or anything that tendeth to their salvation: Nor be restrained from any sin which they have a mind to; nor reproved for it when they have done it. These are an ungodly carnal persons conditions, or signs of a good service. Which is, in a word, to have their own wills and fl • shly desires, and not to be crossed by their Masters wills, or the will of God: Which in effect is▪ to have the greatest helps to do the Devils will, and to be damned.

§. 2. Direct. 2. See that it be your first and principal care, to live in such a place where you have the greatest helps and smallest hindrances to the pleasing of God, and the saving of your souls: And in such a place where you shall have no liberty to sin, nor have your fleshly will fulfilled, but shall be best instructed to know and do the will of God, and under him the will of your Superiors. It is the mark of those that God forsaketh, to be given up to their own wills, or to their own hearts lusts, to walk in their own counsels, Psal. 81. 12. To live after the flesh, is the certain way to enless misery. Rom. 8. 8, 13. To be most subject to the will of God, with the greatest mortification and denial of our own wills, is the mark of the most obedient holy soul. Seeing then that Holiness and self-denial; the Loving of God, and the mortifying of the flesh, are the life of grace, and the health and rectitude of the soul, and the only way (under Christ) to our salvation; you have great reason to think that place the best for you, in which you have most helps for Holiness and self-denial: And not only to bear patiently the strictness of your superiors, and the labor which they put you upon for your souls, but also to desire and seek after such helps, as the greatest mercies upon earth. First seek the Kingdom of God and his righteousness: Labor not (first) for the food that perisheth, but for that which endureth to everlasting life: Matth. 6. 33. John. 6. 27. Take care first that your souls be provided for, and take that for the best service which helpeth you most in the service of God, to your salvation.

§. 3. Direct. 3. If it be possible, live where there is a faithful, powerful, convincing Minister, whose public teaching, and private counsel you may make use of for your souls. Live not, if you can avoid it, under an ignorant, dead, unprofitable teacher, that will never afford you any considerable help to lift up your hearts to a heavenly conversation: But seeing you must spend the six days in your labor, •• ve where you have the best helps, to spend the Lord's-day, for the quickening and comfort of your souls, that in the strength of that holy food, you may cheerfully perform your sanctified labors, on the week days following. Be not like those brutish persons, that live as if there were no life but this; and therefore take care to get a place, where their bodies may be well fed and clothed, and may have case, and pleasure, and preferment for the world; but care not much what Teacher there is, to be their Guide to Heaven▪ nor whether ever they be seriously foretold of the world to come, or not.

§. 4. Direct. 4. Live, if you can obtain so great a mercy, with superiors that fear God, and will have a care of your souls, as well as of your bodies, and will require you to do God's service as well as their own▪ and not with worldly ungodly Masters, that will use you as they do their beasts, to do their work, and never take care to further your salvation. For, 1. The curse of God is in the families of the ungodly; and who would willingly live in a house that God hath cursed? anymore than in an house that is haunted with evil spirits. But God himself doth dwell with the godly, and by many promises hath assured them of his love and blessing: The curse of the Lord is in the house of the wicked: but he blesseth the habitation of the just. Prov. 3. 33. The wicked are overthrown and are not, but the house of the righteous shall stand. Prov. 12. 7. The house of the wicked shall be overthrown, but the Tabernacle of the upright shall flourish. Prov. 14. 11. So Prov. 15. 25. The righteous man wisely considereth the house of the wicked: God overthroweth the wicked for their wickedness. Prov. 21. 12. Go not into a falling house. 2. A Master that feareth God, will help to save you from sin and Hell, and help your souls to life eternal: He may do more for you, than if he made you Kings and Rulers of the earth. He will hinder you from sin: he will teach you to know God, and to prepare for your salvation. Whereas ungodly Masters will rather discourage you, and by mocks or threatenings, seek to drive you from a holy life, and use their wit, and work, and authority to hinder your salvation: Or at best will take little care of your souls but think if they provide you food and wages, they have done their parts. 3. A Master that feareth God will do you no wrong, but will love you as a Christian, and his fellow servant of Christ, while he commandeth and employeth you as his own servant: which cannot be expected from ignorant, ungodly, worldly men.

§. 5. Direct. 5. Yet choose such a service as you are fit to undergo, with the least hindrance of the service of God, and of your souls: Neither a life of idleness, nor of excess of business should be chosen, if you have your choice. For when the mind is overwhelmed with the cares of your service, and your bodies tired with excessive labor, you will have little time, or heart, or power, to mind the matters of your souls with any seriousness. Yea, the Lord's-day will be spent with little comfort, when the • oil of the week days hath left the body fit for nothing but to sleep. A service which alloweth you no time at all to pray, or read the Scripture, or mind your everlasting state, is a life more fit for beasts than men.

§. 6. Direct. 6. If you can attain it, live where your fellow servants fear God, as well as the Master of the family. For fellow servants usually converse with one another more frequently and familiarly than their Masters do with any of them. And therefore if a Master give you the the most heavenly instructions, the idle frothy talk of fellow-servants may blot out all from your memories and hearts. And their derision of a holy life, or their bad examples, may do more hurt, than the precepts of the Governors can do good: Whereas when a Masters counsels are seconded by the good discourse and practice of fellow-servants, it is a great encouragement to good, and keepeth the heart in a continual warmth and resolution.

§. 7. Direct. 7. If you want any one of these accommodations, be the more diligent in such an improvement of the rest, as may make up your want. If you have a good Teacher and a bad Master, improve the helps of your Teacher the more diligently. If you have a bad Master and good fellow-servants, or a good Master and bad fellow-servants, thank God for that which you have, and make the best of it.

§. 8. Direct. 8. If you would be accommodated yourselves with the best Masters and usage, labor to be the best servants; And then it's two to one but you may have your choice. Good servants are so scarce, and so much valued, that the best places would strive for you, if you will strive to be such. Excel others in labor, and diligence, and trustiness, and obedience, and gentleness, and patience, and then you may have almost what places you desire. But if you will yourselves be idle, and slothful, and deceitful, and false, and disobedient, and unmannerly, and self-willed, and contentious, and impatient, and yet think that you must be respected, and used as good and faithful servants. It is but a foolish expectation. For what obligation is there upon others, in point of Justice, to give you that which you deserve not? Indeed if any be bound to keep you in mere Charity, then you may plead Charity with them and not desert: But if they take you but as servants, they owe you nothing but what your work and virtues shall deserve.

CHAP. III. A DISPUTATION, OR, Arguments to prove the necessity of Family-worship and Holiness or Directions against the Cavils of the Profane, and some Sectaries, who deny it to be a thing required by God.

THat excellent speech of Mirandula is oft in my mind, Veritatem Philosophia qu • rit, theologia invenit, Religio possidet: I do therefore with greater alacrity and delight dispute these points that are directly Religious, that is, immediately practical, than those that are only remotely such: And though I am loath we should see among us any wider Division inter Philosophum Theologum & Religiosum than between the Fantasy, the Intellect and the Will, which never are found disjunct in any act; or rather than between the habits of practical natural knowledge, and the habits of practical supernatural knowledge, and the practical Resolutions, Affections and Indeavors, into which both the former are devolved; yet may we safely and profitably distinguish, where it would be mortal to divide: If, disputing in our present case, do but tend to, and end in, a Religious performance, we shall then be able to say, we disputed not in vain; when by experience of the delight and profit of God's work, we perceive that we do not worship him in vain: Otherwise to evince by a dispute, that God should be worshipped; and not to worship him when we have done, is but to draw forth our learning, and sharpen our wits to plead for our condemnation: as if the Accuser wanted our help, or the Judge of all the world did want Evidence and Arguments against us, unless he had it from our own mouth: Concerning the sense of the terms, I shall say somewhat, both as to the subject, and the predicate, that we contend not in the dark; and yet but little lest I trouble myself and you with needless labors.

I. By [ the worship of God ] we mean not only, nor principally, obedience as such: or service in common things, called 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 : but we mean a Religious performance of some sacred actions, with an Intention of Honouring God as God; and that more directly than in common works of obedience: This being commonly called 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 (is by Austin ) and since him by all the Orthodox, appropriated to God alone, and indeed to give it to any other is contradictory to its definition.

This worship is of two sorts, whereof the first is by an excellency called worship, viz. When the honoring of God is so directly the end and whole business of the work, that our own advantage falls in but impliedly, and in evident subordination: Such are the blessed works of praise and thanksgiving, which we here begin and shall in Heaven perpetuate. Yet see a most admirable Mystery of true Religion: We indeed receive more largely from God, and enjoy more fully our own felicity in him, in these acts of worship, that give all to God, than in the other wherein we more directly seek for somewhat from 〈1 page duplicate〉 〈1 page duplicate〉 him. And those are the second sort of worship-actions, viz. When the substance or matter of the work is a seeking, or receiving somewhat from God, or delivering something Religiously in his name, and so is more directly for ourselves; though yet it's God that should be our ultimate end in this too. You may perceive I make this of three sorts. Whereof the first consisteth in our religious addresses to God for something that we want: And is called Prayer. The 2. consisteth in our religious addresses to God to receive somewhat from him: viz. 1. Instructions precepts, promises, threatenings, from his mouth, Messengers, &c. 2. The Sacramental signs of his grace in Baptism and the Lord's Supper. The 3. is when the Officers of Christ do in his name solemnly deliver either his Laws or Sacraments. His Laws either in general by ordinary Preaching, or by a more particular application in Acts of discipline.

2. The Word [Solemn] signifies sometimes anything usual and so some derive it, Solenne est quod fieri solet. Sometimes that which is done but on one set day in the year; and so some make solenne to be quasi solum semel in anno. But vulgarly it is taken, and so we take it here, for both celebre & usit • tum, that is a thing, that is not accidentally and seldom, but statedly and ordinarily to be done, and that with such Gravity and Honorable seriousness as beseems a business of such weight.

3. By [ family ] we mean, not a tribe or stock of kindred dwelling in many houses as the word is taken o • t in Scripture, but I mean a household.

Domus & familia, a Household and family, are indeed in Economics somewhat different notions, but one thing. Domus is to familia as civitas to respublica, the former is made the subject of the latter, the latter the finis internus of the former. And so Domus est societas naturae consentanea, e personis domesticis, vitae in dies omnes commode sustentandae causa, collecta. Familia est ordo domus per Regimen Patris-familias in personas sibi subjectas.

Where note, that to a complete family must go four Integral parts Pater familias, Mater familias; Filius, Servus. A Father, Mother, Son and Servant: But to the essence of a family it sufficeth if there be but the pars imperans, & pars subdita, one head or Governor, either Father, Mother, Master, or Mistress; and one or more governed under this head.

Note therefore that the Governor is an essential part of the family, and so are some of the governed (viz. that such their be) but not each member. If therefore twenty children, or servants shall worship God without the Father, or Master of the family either present himself, or in some Representative, it is not a family worship in strict sense. But if the head of the family, in himself (or Delegate or Representative) be present, with any of his children or servants, though all the rest be absent, it is yet a family duty; though the family be incomplete and maimed, (and so is the duty therefore, if culpably so performed).

4. When I say [ in and by ] a family, I mean not that each must do the same parts of the work, but that one (either the head or someone deputed by him, and representing him) be the mouth, and the rest perform their parts by receiving instructions, or mentally concurring in the Prayers and praise by him put up. Lastly▪ by [ Divine appointment ] I mean any signification of God's will, that it is men's duty to perform this: Whether a signification by natural means or supernatural, directly or by consequence, so we may be sure it is God's will. The sum of the Question then is, Whether any Sacred Actions religiously and ordinarily to be performed to God's honor by the head of the family, with the rest, be by God's appointment made our duty? My thoughts of this Question I shall reduce to these heads, and propound in this order. 1. I shall speak of family worship in General. 2. Of the sorts of that worship in special. 3. Of the time.

I. Concerning the first I lay down my thoughts, in these Propositions following for limitation and caution, and then prove the main conclusion.

Prop. 1. It is not all sorts of God's worship which he hath appointed to be performed by families as such; There being some proper to more public Assemblies.

2. More particularly the Administration of the Sacraments of Baptism and the Lord's Supper, are proper to the Ministerial or Organized Churches, and not common to families: for as they are both of them committed only to Ministers of the Gospel, and have been only used by them for many hundred years in the Church: (except that some permitted others to baptize in case of necessity.) So the Lord's Supper was appointed for a Symbole and means of a more public communion than that of families. And though some conjecture the contrary from its first institution, and think that as there is a family prayer and Church prayer, family teaching and Church teaching: so there should be family Sacraments, and Church Sacraments, yet it is a Mistake. For though Christ administered it to his family, yet it was not as a family, but as a Church. For that which is but one family may possibly be a Church also. This exposition we have from the Doctrine and practice of the Apostles, and constant custom of all the Churches which have never thought the Lord's Supper to be a family duty, but proper to larger assemblies, and administrable only by ordained Ministers: Nor will the reasons drawn from circumcision, and the passover prove the contrary: both because particular Churches were not then instituted as now; and therefore families had the more to do: and because there were some duties proper to families in the very institution of those Sacraments. And because God gave them a power in those, which he hath not given to Masters of families now in our Sacraments.

3. Many thousands do by their own vitiousness and negligence disable themselves: so that they cannot perform what God hath made their duty; yet it remains their duty still: Some disability may excuse them in part, but not in whole.

I shall now prove, that the Solemn Worship of God in and by families as such, is of Divine appointment.

Argument. 1. If Families are Societies of God's Institution furnished with special advantages and opportunities for God's solemn Worship, having no prohibition so to use them: then the solemn Worship of God in and by families as such, is of Divine appointment: But the Antecedent is true: Therefore so is the Consequent.

For the parts of the Antecedent, 1. That families are societies of God's Institution needeth no proof:

2. That they are furnished with special advantages and opportunities may appear by an enumeration of particulars. 1. There is the advantage of Authority in the Ruler of the family, whereby he may command all that are under him in God Worship, yea, and may inflict penalties on children and servants that refuse; yea, may cast some out of the family if they be obstinate. 2. He hath the Advantage of a singular Interest in Wife and Children by which he may bring them to it willingly, that so they may perform a right Evangelical Worship. 3. He hath the Advantage of a singular dependence of all upon him for daily provisions; and of his Children for their portions for livelihood in the world, whereby he may yet further prevail with them for obedience: He having a power to reward, as well as to punish and command. 4. They have the opportunity of cohabitation, and so are still at hand, and more together, and so in readiness for such employments. 5. Being nearest in Relation, they are stronglier obliged to further each others salvation, and help each other in serving God. 6. They have hereby an Advantage against all prejudices and jealousies, which strangeness and mistakes may raise and cherish among those that live at a greater distance, and so may close more heartily in God's Worship. And their nearness of Relation and natural affections, do singularly advantage them for a more affectionate conjunction, and so for a more forcible and acceptable Worship of God, when they are in it as of one heart and soul. 7. If any misunderstanding or other impediment arise, they being still at hand, have opportunity to remove them, and to satisfy each other: and if any distempers of understanding heart or life be in the family, the Ruler, by familiarity and daily converse, is enabled more particularly to fit his reproofs and exhortations confessions and petitions accordingly, which even Ministers in the Congregations cannot so well do. So that I have made it evident in this enumeration, that families have Advantages, yea, special and most excellent advantages, and opportunities for the solemn Worship of God.

3. The last part of the Antecedent was, that they have no prohibition to use these advantages and opportunities to God's solemn Worship. I add this, lest any should say, Though they have such advantages, yet God may restrain them for the avoiding some greater inconveniences another way: as he hath restrained Women from speaking in the Assemblies. But 1. God hath neither restrained them in the Law of Nature, nor in the written Law: Therefore not at all▪ He that can show it in either, let him do it. 2. I never yet read or heard any knowing Christian once affirm that God hath forbidden families solemnly to worship him, and therefore I think it needless to prove a Negative, when no man is known to hold the Affirmative. Indeed for some kinds of Worship, as preaching and expounding Scripture, some have prohibited them; but not reading, catechizing, all instructing, praying, praises, singing Psalms, much less all solemn Worship wholly. So much for the Antecedent.

I now come to prove the Consequence. 1. The foresaid Advantages and opportunities are Talents given by God, which they that receive, are obliged faithfully to improve for God; Therefore Families, having such Advantages and opportunities for God's solemn Worship, are bound to improve them faithfully for God, in the solemn worshipping of him. For the Antecedent, 1. It is unquestionable that these are Talents, that is, Improvable Mercies given by God. For as none dare deny them to be Mercies: So none dare (I hope) say that God is not the giver of them. And then 2. That such Talents must be improved faithfully for God, from whom they are received; is plain, 1. From Matth. 25. throughout, especially from verse 14. to verse 31. And Luke 20. 10. he requireth the fruits of his Vineyard, And Matth. 10. 42. if he entrust us with a Cup of cold water, he expecteth it for a Prophet, when he calleth for it. And if he entrust us with outward riches, he expecteth that we give to him that asketh, Matth. 5. 42. Luke 6. 30, 38. & 11. 41. & 12. 33. His Stewards must give an account of their Stewardships, Luke 16. 2. Luke 12. 48. Christ telleth us of all our Talents in general, that, Unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required: and to whom men have committed much, of him will they ask the more. And of our words in particular Christ's tells us, Matth. 12. 36. that of every idle word men shall give an account at the day of judgment. Much more for denying to use both our tongues and hearts in God's Worship when he gives us such opportunities. It is required in Stewards, that a man be found faithful, 1 Cor. 4. 2. As every man hath received the gift, even so minister the same one to another, as good Stewards of the manifold grace of God. If any man speak, let him speak as the Oracles of God, &c. 1 Pet. 4. 10, 11. Many more of the like Scriptures prove the Antecedent of the Enthymeme, and the Consequent needs no proof.

Argument 2. The solemn Worship of God in and by families as such, is required by the very Law of Nature. Therefore it is of Divine Institution. The Consequence can be denied by no man that renounceth not reason and Nature itself; denying the Law of Nature to be God's Law, which is indeed partly presupposed in the Law supernatural, and partly rehearsed in it, but never subverted by it. Positives are more mutable than Naturals are.

The Antecedent is thus manifested. 1. Natural reason (or the Law of Nature) requireth that all men do faithfully improve all the Talents that God hath entrusted them with, to his honor: Therefore Natural reason (or the Law of Nature) doth require, that God be solemnly worshipped in Families; he having given them such advantages as aforesaid thereunto. 2. The Law of Nature requireth, that all societies that have God for their Founder or Institutor, should to their utmost capacities, be devoted to him that founded and instituted them: but that God is the Founder and Institutor of families, is known by the light of Nature itself: Therefore the Law of Nature requireth, that families be to the utmost of their capacities devoted to God; and consequently that they solemnly worship him, they being capable of so doing. I need not prove the Major, because I speak only to men that are possessed of the Law of Nature mentioned in it: and therefore they know it themselves to be true. Yet let me so far stay on the Illustration, as to to tell you the grounds of it. And 1. God is the Alpha and Omega, the first and the last, the Principal efficient and ultimate end of all: and therefore of Families. And therefore they should be for him, as well as they are from him: For of him, and through him, and to him are all things. This Argument I draw from Nature, which can have no beginning but God, nor any end but God. The 2. I draw from the Divine intention, in the fabrication and ordination of all things. God made all things for himself: and can have no Ultimate end below himself. The 3. I draw from his Ius dominii, his right of Propriety which he hath over all things, and so over families as such: they are all absolutely his own alone. And that which is solely or absolutely a man's own, should be for his use, and employed to his honor and ends: much more that which is God's, seeing man is not capable of such a plenary propriety of anything in the world, as God hath in all things. 4. I argue à Iure Imperii, from God's Right of Government. If he have a full right of Government of families as families, then families as families, must honor and worship him according to their utmost capacities: But he hath a full Right of absolute Government over families as families, Therefore. The consequence of the Major is grounded on these two things: 1. That God himself is the end of his own Government: this is proper to his Regiment. All Human Government is said by Politicians to be terminated ultimately in the Public good of the society. But God's Pleasure and Glory is the end of his Government; and is as it were the Public or Universal good. 2. In that Nature teacheth us, that Supreme Honor is due to all that are Supreme Governors; therefore they are to have the most honorable Titles, of Majesty, Highness, Excellency, &c. and actions answerable to those Titles, Mal. 1. 6. If I be a Father, where is mine honor? If I be a Master, where is my fear? Fear is oft put for all God's Worship. If then there be no family whereof God is not the Father or Founder, and the Master or Owner and Governor, then there is none but should honor him, and fear, or worship him, and that not only as single men, but as families: because he is not only the Father and Master, the Lord and Ruler of them as men, but also as Families. Honor is as due to the Rector, as Protection to the Subjects, and in our case much more. God is not a mere Titular but Real Governor. All Powers on earth are derived from him, and are indeed his power. All Lawful Governors are his Officers, and hold their places under him, and act by him. As God therefore is the proper Sovereign of every Commonwealth, and the Head of the Church: so is he the Head of every family. Therefore as every Commonwealth should perform such Worship or Honor to their Earthly Sovereign, as is Due to Man: So each Society should according to their Capacities perform Divine Worship and Honor to God: And if any object, That by this Rule Commonwealths as, such must meet together to worship God, which is impossible. I answer, They must worship him according to their Natural Capacities; and so must Families according to theirs. The same General Precept obligeth to a divers manner of duty according to the divers capacity of the Subject. Commonwealths must in their Representatives at least engage themselves to God as Commonwealths, and worship him in the most convenient way that they are capable of. Families may meet together for prayer, though a Nation cannot. As an Association of Churches called a Provincial or National Church, is obliged to worship God as well as particular Congregations, yet not in one place: because it is impossible: Nature limiteth and maketh the difference.

And that the obligation of families to honor and worship God, may yet appear more evidently. Consider that God's Right, and Propriety, and Rule is twofold; yet each Title plenary alone. 1. He is our Owner and Ruler upon his Title of Creation. 2. So he is by his Right of Redemption. By both these he is not only Lord and Ruler of persons, but families; all societies being his. And the Regiment of persons being chiefly exercised over them in societies. All power in Heaven and Earth is given unto Christ. Matth. 18. 18. and all judgment committed unto him, John 5. 22. and all things delivered into his hands, John 13. 3. and therefore to him shall every knee bow, both of things in Heaven and things in earth and things under the earth (either with a bowing of Worship, or of forced acknowledgement,) and every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father, Phil. 2. 10. Bowing to and confessing Christ voluntarily to God's glory, is true Worship: All must do this according to their several capacities: And therefore families according to theirs.

A third Consideration which I thought to have added but for Illustration, may well stand as an argument itself: and its this.

Argument 3. If besides all the forementioned opportunities and obligations, families do live in the presence of God, and ought by faith to apprehend that presence, then is it God's Will that families as such should solemnly Worship him. But the former is true, therefore the latter.

The Consequence of the Major which alone requires proof, I prove by an Argument à fortiori, from the honor due to all earthly Governors. Though when a King, a Father, a Master are absent, such actual honor, to be presented to them, is not Due, because they are not capable of receiving it (further than Mediante aliqua persona, vel re, which beareth some representation of the Superior, or Relation to him) yet when they stand by, it is a contemptuous subject, a disobedient Child, that will not perform actual honor, or human Worship to them. Now God is ever present not only with each person as such, but also with every family as such. As he is said to walk among the Golden Candlesticks in his Churches, so doth he in the families of all by his common presence, and of his servants by his gracious presence. This they easily find by his directing them, and blessing the affairs of their families. If any say, [ We see not God, else we would daily worship him in our families. ]