Selected quad for the lemma: duty_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
duty_n	child_n	parent_n	put_v	1,129	5	5.6599	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A23718	The gentlemans calling	Allestree, Richard, 1619-1681.; Henchman, Humphrey, 1592-1675.; Pakington, Dorothy Coventry, Lady, d. 1679.; Sterne, Richard, 1596?-1683.; Fell, John, 1625-1686.	1660 (1660)	Wing A1116; ESTC R8983	92,528	212

Advantage that of Educacation 1. I Presume it is by this time rendred sufficiently evident that a Gentleman hath a Calling it is now seasonable to advance and shew what that is and o●… this the ground hath already been laid in the last Section by the enumeration of those peculiar Advantages he possesses which being those Talents committed to his managery h●… Calling will be the most exactly anatomize●… and distributed into its parts by unfolding those several Branches of his Receits and e●…amining what improvements each of them 〈◊〉 capable of which as so many distinct Lim●… make up the entire Body of his Calling 2. This I shall do not onely in the gro●… but severally through every one of them an●… shall take the liberty of doing it with the addition of a double reflection the one on t●… contrary practice the other on the pleasu●… and satisfaction that will infallibly attend the discharge of this Duty 3. I begin with that of their Education the former part whereof commonly Commences as timely as the first Exercises of their Reason It is so creditable a thing to have Children put into an early nurture that there are few Parents so careless of their own reputation as to neglect it but do either by themselves or some others to whom they assign the charge put them under such a Discipline as may break their natural rudeness and stubbornness mould them into some form of Civility and teach them that first Fundamental Lesson of Obedience on which all future Instructions must be built And this is a huge Advantage not onely towards the succeeding parts of Education but towards the regularity of the whole life For by having their Infant-Passions thus checked and bridled they become more tame and governable ever after The next part of Education is Erudition and Instruction and under a Succession of this they are for many years Scarce any that owns the name of Gentleman but will commit his son to the care of some Tutor either at home or abroad who at first instils those Rudiments proper to their tenderer years and as Age matures their parts so advances his Lectures till he have let them in to those spacious Fields of Learning which will afford them both Exercise and Delight This is that Tree of Knowledge upon which there lies no interdict which instructs not as that in Ed●… did by sad and costly experience but by fai●… and safe intuitions and may well be looked o●… as a principal Plant in that Paradise wherei●… God hath placed this rank of Men. 4. These two parts of Education united qualifie a man for many excellent purposes It will be impossible to enumerate all becaus●… a minde thus subdued and cultivated must y●… owe the opportunities of many actions to ou●… ward circumstances and occasions which being various and accidental can with no certainty be brought into the account but abstracting from these there are divers more i●… trinsick benefits which nothing but a Ma●… self can frustrate and those alone I shall i●…sist on 5. First a Man thus Educated is better prepared to resist all Errors that may invade h●… Understanding his discerning Faculty is mo●… nimble and agile can suddenly surround Proposition and discover the infirm and se●… ble parts and so is not to be imposed upo●… by such slight Sophisms as captivate who●… herds of the vulgar This Advantage it apparent he hath and it is his duty to ma●… use of it to examine cautiously the grou●… of an Opinion before he give up his ass●… to it and not to betray his Reason either 〈◊〉 hi●… Slo●…h by neglecting to give it a compet●… discussion or to his Interest by electi●… Tenents rather by their profitableness then their truth This certainly is the least that is supposeable to be required of them in this particular and sure it is so moderate an injunction as the most mutinous humor can have no temptation to quarrel at For who could think him a severe imposer who having furnished a man with a light to direct him through some dark passage should onely require him not to blow it out 6. And as he hath this Advantage in respect of his Understanding so hath he in the second place in relation to his Will which though it be a free faculty and consequently cannot be forcibly determined to any thing yet it is capable of perswasions and inducements and is usually bended and inclined by them it must therefore be a fair step towards the rectifying of the Will when the intellect is stored with Arguments and Incentives to goodness And this Learning must be supposed to provide for unless we will exclude out of the Scheme both Morality and Divinity for each of those will yield variety of such Arguments Morality will present Vertue as perfectly amiable in it self and so fit to be embraced for its own sake and not onely so but also as highly profitable and advantagious to us as being that which gives the sublimest perfection to our Natures the sweetest rest and tranquility to our Mindes and in a word a full satisfaction to all our Rational Appetites Divinity confirms all this and superadds what infinitely transcends it the assurance of those eternal and glorious rewards in another world and these surely are such tempting allectives as are very proper to attract the will to chuse what appears thus excellent thus desireable provided they be justly represented to it And the doing that the pressing these motives home upon the will and that in refutation of all the contrary deceiveable pretensions of vice is the first part of their obligation But then there is also a second and that is that they permit themselves to be perswaded by such efficacious arguments and actually conform their wills to these dictates of their understanding that is that they really and effectively be such men as their education directs and requires them to be Which being the work of their wills 't will be absurd to plead impossibility or infirmity since 't is manifest they may if they will which is such a degree of liberty as serves in all other instances to denominate a man a free agent and such as all punishments and rewards both divine and humane are founded on 7. A third advantage is in relation to his Affections which being the inferior and more brutish part of the man are yet so impetuous and assuming that they are very apt to usurp the dominion over the nobler faculties and where they gain it the event is answerable to what we see in States where the Common-people have wrested the Scepter all is put into confusion Now that which may prevent these civil broils in the soul and secure the government to the proper Soveraign may well be reputed an advantage And to this nothing meerly humane is more conducing then Education For first that early discipline which we presumed one part of it puts a bridle in the mouths of these headstrong passions which by many repeated

hands of some treacherous or but impotent person that shall in some important affairs betray his trust or deceive his hopes and then let him tell me whether it be not a mans immediate and most pressing interest to build his confidences on the rock not on the sand Nothing but the amazing exigencies of a sinking man can excuse the folly of catching at reeds but he that should deliberately elect such supporters would be thought as mad as he is sure to be miserable Yet this is but the faint and imperfect emblem of him who rests upon his wealth whereas on the other side he that shelters himself under the shadow of the Almighty is possest of a most inexpugnable fortress for how can he faile of security that has Omnipotence for his guard or be deluded in his trusts that depends on Truth it self Let these so distant states be compared and then sure I shall not need to anticipate any mans judgement but may leave him to pronounce on which side his Interest as well as Duty lies in this particular 34. Lastly Temperance also puts in her claim to Pleasure which I presume those will be sure to resist who place that wholly in the satisfaction of the sensuall appetite yet I beleeve one might take even these men in such a season when they should be forced to give up their verdict for it Come to the Glutton when he is laboring under the load of an overcharged stomack to the Drunkard when his mornings qualm is revenging on him his last nights debauch to the lustfull person when the torment of his bones admonish him of the sins of his flesh and then ask them whether Temperance be not more pleasant then its contrary I can scarce think the Devil has any such stout Confessors but will then betray his cause But this vertue is in it self too amiable to need any of these foyles to illustrate it the pleasure of subduing a lust of denying an appetite is not only nobler but greater then any is to be had in the most transporting moment of satisfing them Every man will call him a bruit that when an Enemy is in the field loses the opportunity of a glorious victory and exposes himself to certain Captivity rather then forsake his liquor or other sordid pleasure And this is just the decision of the present case our lusts are our mortallest Enemies and every time they assault us 't is in our choice either by resisting them to gain a signal conquest or else by stooping to those despicable cures they hold out to us to be vanquished by them He that chuses the last if he have any shadow of pleasure 't is only that of a Beast like a horse who though he hath indeed the satisfaction of receiving meat yet he also takes the bridle yea the whip too from the same hand 'T is the former only that is the pleasure of a man which I suppose sufficient to evince to which the difference belongs for sure none can think God hath been so unkind to his own image in humane nature as in the dispensation of felicity to assign the larger share to the Bruits And therefore in this particular as well as the rest we may conclude that he is not only the most pious but the most happy person that makes the right uses of his wealth SECT VI. Of the third Advantage that of Time 1. LEt us now proceed to the third advantage that of Time which though men do often so industriously wast as if it were rather a burden then an advantage yet the differing estimates they make of it when it is neer expiring the passionate Death-bed wishes of a few daies reprieve witness that it has a reall value For were it an empty useless thing it would not then begin to appear considerable when all other vanities grow in contempt with us The unhappiness of it is that men learn to prize it as they do most other good things rather by the want then the enjoying buy the skill of trading with the loss of the Talent which should maintain the traffick and then only come to account it a treasure when they can no longer dispose it to any benefit and that disposing alone is it that can render it truly valuable It is therefore a most necessary providence to learn this art of improvement this peece of spirituall husbandry without which a mans self becomes that accursed soyle the Apostle mentions Heb. 6. 8. whose end is to be burned Let us therefore a while examine what are those imployments of our Time which may render it most fertile to our present comfort and future accompt 2. Every man saies though perhaps few consider that our time here is but a prologue to Eternity else where and that the condition of that eternity whether happy or miserable depends upon the well husbanding of this time That therefore and that only can be the right managery of it which tends to make our future estate as happy as it is sure to be lasting To this purpose God hath chalked us out some great lines of Duty from whence so many lesser do arise as will if we will permit them twist and winde themselves with every hour of our lives And though these duties are in the kind of them obligatory to all conditions of men yet frequenter Acts of them are expected from those whose Qualities and fortunes gives them more vacancy from secular toyles 3. For certainly it is not to be fancied that God who has put an active principle into our nature should industriously provide for the suppressing its operations in any devote such a Select number of men as an Hecatombe to be offered up to Idleness and yet much less can it be thought that he should so promote that iniquity which he professes to hate as to design them to the pursuits of that Manumit them from labor to leave them freer for vice And if neither of these can be supposed if their leisure were not indulged them either that they might do nothing or do ill there remains only a third end imaginable and that is the doing good For as for Sports and Pastimes the best of them come so neer to Idleness and the worst of them to Vice as the one is not to be allowed any so the other no considerable part of their time Now because none is good but one that is God Mar. 10. 18. we can take our measures of good actions only from his prescription and so those which he has commended as such to Mankind in general point out to this particular rank of men the nature of their Exercises as their especial Vacancie and leisure does the higher degrees of them 4. And first those of Piety towards God justly challenge a great share of their Time For whereas God may seem to have limited and confined the poor mans zeal by that rule of preferring mercy to themselves before sacrifice to him he does by exempting the rich from those

combinations of Deceit that even good Fortune it self will not secure him so that he that has not learnt to Plough with the same Heifer is like to make but sad Husbandry of it and even those that have if they happen to get some few good Crops yet they quite wear out the soyl with them forfeit that Reputation with all considering men which should let them in to farther opportunities and leave themselves to live not so much upon their own Wits as other mens Follies It is true indeed that hath in these latter days proved a pretty large Common to graze on and some have seemed to thrive well upon it but generally such Cattle meet at last with a pinching Winter which leaves them as bare and meagre as ever In short Cheating has usually a reflexed efficacy and deceives none more then those that use it yet such a stroak hath it now got in Gaming that in most Companies it leaves men onely this miserable choice Whether they will be active or passive in it which methinks should be enough to awake men as immoderate Tyrannies use to do to vindicate their Liberties and reduce Gaming from this exorbitancy to its Primitive use make it cease to be a Trade and become a Recreation and that too bounded within such just limits that it may not incroach on those hours which should be destined to greater concernments But as it is between this and the rest either Impertinencies or Vices all their time is so pre-ingaged and fore-stalled that their most important interest is left forlorn and neglected they have as little leisure as Will to consider the poor Soul or scarce to remember that they carry any such trifle about them 13. And now they that thus forget God and themselves no wonder if they afford little consideration to their brethren they will not be guilty of such an Indecorum or deny the Body of Sin its exact symmetry by making this part unproportionable to the rest and therefore they either allow no part of their time to others or do it to such inverted perverse purposes as makes the payment worse then robbery Thus many bestow Visits on others not out of any purpose of kindness but either to trifle away their own time or to make observations what they can spie of ridiculous to entertain their laughter A mysterie the London-visitants are generally well read in who have put this business long since into a setled course so that the discoveries of one Visit sets them in a stock of defaming backbiting discourse for the next and so successively ad infinitum So again many who call themselves Gentlemen much to the reproach of that title if they can find out a young Heir of much wealth and little prudence how officious how diligent are they in attending him watching him as gladly as a Vulture does the fall of a Carkass till they find an advantage to rook him at Play entangle him in Suretiship or perhaps betray him to some mean and unequal Match So if they hear but of a beautiful Woman what contrivances what designs do they lay first to see and then to corrupt her make it a business to themselves as well as a trade to their agents and factors to spring such game And upon such occasions as these can liberally sacrifice their Time of which when any Charitable office would borrow from them but some few minutes they are then such busie persons they can by no means afford it A Nabals blunt and churlish refusal or at best a Felix's put-off to a convenient season are the usual returns to such motions But to anticipate the Proposal to go in quest of such Opportunities looks with them like a piece of Knight-errantry has so little of their practice that it scarce escapes their scorn 14. And now what a heavy Bill of Indictment is like one day to be brought in against them when God their Souls and their Neighbors shall all join in the Charge Oh that they would seasonably consider how sadly obnoxious they are to it and that condemnation which will inevitably follow it that so they may according to Christs councel Mat. 5. 25. agree with these adversaries while they are in the way and by yielding to each of them for the future a just portion of their Time compound the business stop the Process against them That they would remember that of all their prodigalities this of their Time is the most desperate such as is most impossible to redeem and yet that wherein they are of all others the deepliest concerned And this they would certainly be convinced of if their Aery fancies could but so condense into Earth as to bring them into any acquaintance with their Beds of dust give them some foretaste of their Dying terrors For let them but sadly think what they would then give for some few of those Days they now study to fling away and they cannot choose but infer the necessity of being better Husbands We read in Scripture of the Demoniacks dwelling among the Tombs but the Devil has sure changed that habitation for those whom he now Possesses he permits not to converse at all there as knowing it is the properest preparative to his dispossession And doubtless it would be the most powerful Exorcism as of all others so of this Evil spirit this filching Devil that thus steals from men their precious hours often to descend into the Vault or Charnel-house and by serious consideration how short their Time is to inforce upon themselves a care of redeeming it 15. Nor need they fear that to redeem their Time they must sell their Pleasures give up themselves to a joyless state of life for though it is true they must resign their counterfeit they shall have real Delights in exchange they must part with their Glass but shall have Gold in stead of it and as none but a rude Indian will repine at that bargain in the Literal so none but a ruder Christian can dislike it in the Moral sence For in the first place he that imploys his time in conversing with God is not onely more honorably and more profitably but also more pleasantly busied then he can possibly be any other way We all say That God is the centre of Felicity but he gives himself the lie that does not withal confess that the closer acquaintance we have with him the nearer approach we make to happiness For who ever believed the Sun to be the Fountain of heat and yet feared to freeze by drawing near its Rays Indeed none but the down-right Atheist can with any tolerable Logick dispute the pleasantness of this Duty For can any whose Faith has set up a God suffer their fancies to dress him like a Fiend Put on him such unlovely shapes as may beget aversion defer them from approaching to him Can they call him a Deity to whom they will not attribute so much as they will to every ingenuous man the honor of being good Company This