Compassionate COUNSEL TO ALL Young-Men Especially I. LONDON-Apprentices II. Students of Divinity Physick and Law III. The Sons of Magistrates and Rich Men. By RICHARD BAXTER LONDON Printed by T. S. and are to be Sold by B. Simmons and Ionath Greenwood at the Three Golden Cocks at the West End of St. Pauls and at the Crown in the Poultry 1681. The CONTENTS Chap. 1. Prefatory Ch. 2. Of what grand Importance the Case of Youth is to themselves that betimes they live to God Ch. 3. Of what publick Concernment the quality of Youth is Ch. 4. How the Case standeth with our Youth in matter of Fact Ch. 5. How sad the Case of many of them is Ch. 6. The joyful State and Blessing of good Children to themselves and others Ch. 7. Vndeniable Reasons for the speedy Repentance of those that have miscarried By way of Exhortation Ch. 8. Directions to them that are willing to amend Ch. 9. Special Counsel to the Candidates for the Ministry Ch. 10. Short Counsel to young Students in Physick Ch. 11. Short Counsel to young Men in the Inns of Court that study the Law Ch. 12. Short Counsel to the Sons of Nobles and Magistrates Ch. 13. Some Memorials to Parents Ch. 14. A short Word to Church Ministers for Youth To the YOUTH of London and the rest of England Richard Baxter's Last and Compassionate Warning and Advice CHAP. I. THere is no man that ever understood the Interest of Mankind of Families Cities Kingdoms Churches and of Jesus Christ the King and Saviour but he must needs know that the right Instruction Education and Sanctification of Youth is of unspeakable consequence to them all In the place where God most blest my labours at Kidderminster in Worcester-shire my first and greatest success was upon the Youth And which was a marvellous way of Divine Mercy when God had toucht the hearts of young Men and Girles with a love of goodness and delightful obedience to the truth the Parents and Grandfathers who had grown old in an ignorant worldly State did many of them fall into liking and love of Piety induced by the love of their Children whom they perceived to be made by it much wiser and better and more dutiful to them And God by his unexpected disposing Providence having now twenty years placed me in and near London where in variety of places and conditions sometimes under restraint by men and sometimes at more liberty I have Preached but as to Strangers in other mens Pulpits as I could and not to any special flock of mine I have been less Capable of judging of my success But by much experience have been made more sensible of the Necessity of warning and instructing youth than I was before The sad reports of fame have taught it me The sad Complaints of mournful Parents have taught it me The sad observation of the wilful impenitence of some of my acquaintances tells it me The many score if not hundred bills that have been publickly put up to me to pray for wicked and obstinate Children have told it me And by the grace of God the penitent Confessions Lamentations and restitutions of many Converts have more particularly acquainted me with their Case Which moved me on my Thursdays Lecture a while to design the first of every month to speak to youth and those that educate them And though I have already loaded the world with books finding that God seems to be about ending my life and labours I am urged in my mind by the greatness of the case to add yet this Epistle to the younger sort Which shall contain I. The great importance of the Case of youth II. How it stands with them in matter of fact III. What are the Causes of their sin and dangerous degeneracy IV. How great a blessing wise and godly youth are to themselves and others V. How great a plague and calamity the ungodly are VI. What great reason ungodly sensual youth have presently to Repent and Turn to God VII Directions to them how to do it VIII And some Directions to Parents about their Education And all must be with the Brevity of an Epistle CHAP. II. To begin betimes to live to God is of unspeakable importance to your selves FOR 1. You were betimes solemnly Dedicated to God as your God your Father your Saviour and your Sanctifier by your Baptismal Vow And as that was a great Mercy it obliged you to great Duty You were capable in Infancy of that holy Dedication and Relation and your Parents were presently obliged as to Dedicate you to God so to Educate you for God And as soon as you are capable of performance the Vow is upon your selves to do it If your Childhood is not presently obliged to Holiness according to your natural capacity no doubt your Vow and Baptism should have been also delayed Little think many that talk against Anabaptists how they condemn themselves by the Sacred Name of Christians while they by perfidious Sacriledge deny God that which they Vowed to him 2. All your time and life is given you by God for one End and Use and all is little enough and will you alienate the very beginning and be Rebels so soon 3. The youngest have not assurance of Life for a day or an hour Thousands go out of the World in youth Alas the Flesh of young men is corruptible liable to hundreds of Diseases as well as the old How quickly may a vein break and cold seize on your head and lungs and turn to an uncurable Consumption How quickly may a Fever a Pleurisie an Impostume or one of a thousand Accidents turn your Bodies to corruption And O that I knew how to make you sensible how dreadful a thing it is to die in an unholy state and in the guilt of any unpardoned sin An unsanctified Soul that hath lived here but to the flesh and the world will be but fewel for the fire of Hell and the wrathful Justice of the most holy God And though in the course of undisturb'd Nature young men may live longer than the old yet Nature hath so many disturbances and crosses that our lives are still like a Candle in a broken Lanthorn which a blast of wind may soon blow out To tell you that you are not certain in an unsanctified state to be one day or hour more out of Hell I expect will not move you so much as the weight of the Case deserveth because meer possibility of the greatest hurt doth not affect men when they think there is no probability of it You have long been well and long you hope to be so But did you think how many hundred Veins Arteries Nerves must be kept constantly in order and all the blood and humours in due temper and how the stopping of one vein or distemper of the blood may quickly end you it would rather teach you to admire the merciful providence of God that such a body should be kept alive one year 4. But were
and most of Germany to what they are Such a Clergie have brought Ireland from the laudable State which it was in in the days of Malachias as Bernard described it into the barbarous briutish ignorance and bloody inhumanity at which it is now arrived and had the chief hand in the murder of two hundred thousand persons in the late Rebellious insurrection such a Clergy had a chief hand in the civil wars in England in the reign of William Rufus King Stephen Hen. 3. King Iohn c. the subject of Pryns History of the Treasons of Prelates And alas such a corrupt sort of Ministers keepeth up the division of the German Protestants under the name of Lutherans and Calvinists about Consubstantiation Church-Images and doctrines of Predestination not understood And had the Low-Countries ever had the stirs between Remonstrants and Contra-remonstrants or England and Scotland ever had the miserable contentions warres and cruelties between the former Episcopal parties and the Laudians or between them and the Presbyterians and Independents and all the silencings and woefull contentions and Schisms that have thence followed if the vices of the Clergy had not been the cause And had we continued in this case these twenty years last silencing reviling and prosecuting about two thousand conscionable Preachers and writing and preaching still for executing the Lawes against them and the prosecuted people flying from such a Clergy as ravening Wolves And some censuring the innocent with the guilty could all this have been done by a wise holy and peaceable Clergy that served God in selfdenyal and knew what it is to seek the good of Church and souls When we yet continue under the same distractions and convulsions and all cry out that a flood of misery is breaking in on the Land and like to overwhelm us all and still it is the Clergy that cannot or will not be reconciled but animate Rulers and people against each other and cannot or will not find the way of peace yea all would be soon healed in probability could the Nation but procure the Clergy to consent certainly there is some grievous disease in our selves which is like to pove mortal to such a Kingdom and that while so many pray and strive for peace Those men that have no more skill or will to heal the wounds and stop the blood of a fainting Church and State nor wil by any reason or humble importunity be intreated to consent to the cheap and necessary cure no nor to hold their hands from continued tearing of us do tell all the world that they are sadly wanting in fitness for their sacred office and that this unfitness is like to cost an endangered Nation dear Wo wo wo to that Church that hath Hypocrites Ungodly Unexperienced Proud Worldly Fleshly Unskilful unfaithful and Malignant Pastors and that hath Wolves instead of Shepherds wo to the Land that hath such Wo to the Prince and States that have and follow such Counsellors and to the Souls that are subverted by them Alas from a bad Clergy hath sprung the greatest calamities of the Churches in all places to this very day § 11. But will such mens sins prove less woful to themselves than others No. 1. It is the sin and guilt it self which is the greatest evil 2. They aggravate their sin and guilt by a perfidious violating a double vow their Baptismal Vow of Christianity and their Ordination Vow to be Faithful Ministers of Christ. 3. They aggravate their guilt by their nearness to God in their Office and Works as Aarons two Sons that were struck dead Lev. 10.2 3. For God will be sanctifyed in them that come nigh him and before all the people he will be glorifyed The examples of the Beth-shemites Vzza Vzziah the bad Priests and False Prophets of old are terrible 4. And it greatly addeth to the guilt to do all this or much of it as in the Name of God or by his Commission This is a dreadful taking of Gods Name in vain for which he will not hold them guiltless To pretend that it is by Gods command that they set up that which he abhorreth that they corrupt his Doctrine or Worship or Church Order that they set up their own wills and sinful Laws instead of and against his Laws that they tear his Church by proud Impositions and wicked Anathema's and Interdicts of whole Kingdoms Excommunicating and Deposing Kings Absolving men from their Oaths of Allegiance Tormenting and Murdering Godly men as Hereticks Silencing Faithful Ministers Smiting the Shepherds and scattering the Flocks and then reviling them as Schismaticks and all this to uphold a worldly Kingdom of their own and keep up their Pride Domination and self-will and to have Riches for provision for fleshly Lusts I say to do all this as in the Name of Christ with a sic dicit Dominus and as for the Church and Truth and Souls is a most heynous aggravation 5. Indeed while a poor blind Clergy man as his Trade for applause and gain doth Study and Preach that Word of God which is against him how dreadful is it to think how all that he doth and saith is self-condemnation and that out of his own mouth he must be judged and that all the woes which he pronounceth against Hypocrites and impenitent carnal worldly men his own Tongue pronounceth them against himself § 12. And when Satan hath once got such Instruments how great an advantage hath he for the success against themselves against the Flock and against the Church and Cause of Christ above what he might expect by other Servants 1. They are farre hardlier brought to Repentance than others 1. Because they have by Wit and Study bended that Doctrine to defend their sin which should be used to bring them to Repentance 2. And because their aggravated sin against Light doth most forfeit that help of Grace which should work Repentance in them 3. And because being taken for Wise Learned men and Preachers of Truth and Teachers of others and reprovers of Errors their Reputation is much concerned in it and their unhumbled Souls which look all others should Assent and Consent to their prescripts will hardly be brought to confesse sin and Errour but will sooner as Papists plead-infallibility or conclude as some Councils have done that a Lay man must not accuse a Clergy man be he never so bad Repentance is hard to all men of carnal interest but to few more than to an unhumbled Clergy man And 2. Whoever accuseth or reproveth them of sin will be represented as an Enemy to the Church a dishonourer of his Ghostly Fathers and one that openeth their nakedness which he should Cover and so their Ulcers are as a noli me tangere and fret as a Gangreen unremedied 3. And their Place Office Titles and Learning with many will give sin Reputation and Advantage If a Drunkard in the Alehouse deride Godly men as Hereticks Schismaticks Hypocrites or Puritanes Sober men will not much regard
the Son may be as foolish as Rehoboam O what a great work it is to make a man truly wise and good How many years study doth it usually require What wisdom and diligence in Teachers What teachableness and diligence in Learners and especially the Grace of God! And when all is done the man quickly dieth and obtaineth his ends in another world But his Children are born as ignorant and perhaps as bad as he was born He can neither leave them his Knowledge nor his Grace They must have all the same teaching and labour and blessing as he had to bring them to the same attainments The Mercy and Covenant of God taketh them into his Church where they have great advantages and helps and promiseth them more mercy for their relation to a faithful Parent if he or they do make no forfeiture of it But as their Nature is the same with others so their actual Wisdom must come by Gods blessing on the use of the same means which are necessary to the Children of the worst men A Christian's Child is born with no more Knowledge than a Heathen's and must have as much labour and study to make him wise § 2. It is certain then that the welfare of this world lyeth on a good succession of the several Generations And that all the endeavours of one Generation with God's greatest blessing on them will not serve for the Ages following All must begin anew and be done over again or all will be as undone to the next Age And it is not the least blessing on the faithful that their faith and godliness disposeth them to have a care of posterity and to devote their Children wholly to God as well as themselves and to educate them in his fear If Nature had not taught Birds and Beasts to feed their Young as well as to generate them their kind would be soon extinct O what a blessed World were it if the blessings of men famous for wisdom and godliness were entailed on all that should spring from them and if this were the common case § 3. But the doleful miseries of the World have come from the degenerating of good mens posterity Adam hath his Cain and Noah his Cham and David his Absalom Solomon Hezekiah Iosiah left not their like behind them The present State of the Eastern Churches is a dreadful instance What places on Earth were more honourable for Faith and Piety than Alexandria Antioch Ierusalem Constantinople Ephesus Philadelphia and the rest of those great and noble Countries and these also strengthened with the powerfullest Christian Empire that ever was on Earth And now they are places of Barbarism Tyranny and foolish Mahometanism where the Name of Christ is made a scorn and the few Christians that keep up that sacred Profession by Tyranny kept in so great Ignorance that alas the vices of most of them dishonour their Profession as much as their Enemies Persecutions do O what a doleful difference is there between that great part of the World now and what it was 1400 or 1000 years ago And alas were it not for the name of a pompous Christian-Church how plain an instance would Rome be of the same Degeneracy And some Countries that received the blessing of Reformation have revolted into the darkness of Popery What a change was in England by Queen Mary's Reign And how many particular Cities Towns are grown ignorant and malignant which in former times were famous for Religion The Lord grant it may never be the case of London Yea how many persons of Honourable and great Families have so far degenerated from the famous Wisdom and Piety of their Grandfathers yea and Fathers as to hate that which their Parents loved and persecute those whom their Ancestors honoured The names of many Great men stand honoured in History for their Holiness to God and their Service to their Countries whose posterity are the men that we are most in danger of Alas in how few such houses hath Piety kept any long succession yea some take their Fathers virtues to be so much their dishonour that they turn malignant Persecutors to free themselves from the supposed reproach of their Relations Yea some Preachers of the Gospel devoted to God by pious Parents become Revilers of their own Parents and despisers of their Piety as the effect of factious Ignorance § 4. And on the other side when Piety hath successively as a River kept its course what a blessing hath it proved But how rare is that And when Children have proved better than their Parents it hath been the beginning of welfare to the places where they lived How marvellously did the Reformation prevail in Germany in Luther's time when God brought out of Popish Monasteries many excellent Instruments of his Service And Princes became wise and pious whose Parents had been blind or impious Godliness or wickedness welfare or calamity follow the changes and quality of posterity And men live so short a time that the work of Educating Youth aright is one half the great business of man's Life He that hath a Plantation of Oaks may work for twenty Generations But he that planteth Gardens and Orchards with Plants that live but a little time must be still planting watering and defending them § 5. Among the Antient Sages of the World the Greeks and Romans and much more among the Israelites the care of posterity and publick welfare was the great thing which differenced the virtuous and laudable from those of a base selfish sensual disposition He was the bravest Citizen of Rome that did most love and best serve his Country And he was the Saint among the Jews who most loved Sion and the Security and Succession of its holy and peaceable posterity And the Christian Faith and Hope and Interest doth lead us herein to a much higher pitch and to a greater zeal for publick good in following him that whipt out prophaners from the Temple even a zeal of God's House which eateth us up It teacheth us by the Cross most effectually to deny our selves and to think nothing too dear to part with to edifie the Church of God nor any labour or suffering too great for common good It teacheth us to pray for the Hallowing of God's Name the Coming of his Kingdom and the doing of his Will on Earth as it is done in Heaven before our daily Bread and any other personal Interest of our own Therefore the Families of Christians should be as so many Schools or Churches to train up a succession of persons meet for the great communicative works which God calleth all Believers to in their several measures It is eminently Teachers but it is also all others in their several ranks who must be the Salt of the Earth and the Lights of the World And indeed the Spirit of Holiness is so eminently the Spirit of Love to God and Man that it inclineth every sanctified person to a Communicative Zeal to make others wise and good and
â—appy § 6. And God in great mercy hath â—lanted yet more deeply and fixedly the Natural Love of Parents to their Children â—hat it might be in them a spring of all this â—uty so that though fleshly vice may make men mistake their Childrens good â—s most ungodly men do their own and â—hink that it consisteth in that which it doth not yet still the general desire of their Childrens well-fare as well as of their own is deeply rooted and will work for their well-fare as soon as they well know wherein it doth consist And God hath not given them this Love only for the good of the individual Children but much more for the Common-Wealth and Church that as many sticks make one fire and many exercised Souldiers one Army so many well educated Children may make up one peaceable and holy Society § 7. And accordingly it is much to be observed that God hath not given Children a natural Love and submissiveness to Parents only for the personal benefit of their provision and other helps but especially that hereby they may be teachable and obedient to those Instructions of their Parents by which they may become Blessings in their Generations and may conjunctly make up wise and holy Societies Families Churches and Common-wealths For these ends it is that God hath bound you as to reverence your Masters Tutors and Pastors so especially both to reverence and love your Parents that you may be the more capable of their necessary Instruction and Advice § 8. Yea the great strictness of God in condemning Polygamy Adultery and Fornication seemeth to be especially for the securing of the good Education of Children for their Souls and for the publick good For it is notorious that confusion in Marriages and Generation would many ways tend to the depraving of humane Education while Mothers had not the necessary encouragement to perform their part The younger Women would be a while esteemed and afterward be cast off and made most miserable and Families be like wandring beggars or like exposed Orphans Disorder and Confusion would deprive Children of much of their necessary helps and Barbarousness and bruitishness corrupt Mankind By all this it is most evident that the great means of the wellfare of the World must be the faithful and holy endeavours of Parents and the willing teachableness â—nd obedience of Children that they may escape the snares of folly and fleshly Lusts and may betimes get that Wisdom and â—ove of Goodness which may make them fit to be blessings to the places where they â—ive CHAP. IV. How the Case standeth with our Youth in matter of Fact § 1. THrough the great mercy of God many Families are sacred Nurseries for Church and Kingdom and many Parents have great comfort in the Grace of God appearing in their Children From their early Childhood many are of humble obedient Dispositions and have a love to Knowledge and a love to the word of God and to those that are good and virtuous persons They have inward convictions of the evil of Sin and a fear of sinning and a great dislike of wicked persons and a great Love and reverend Obedience to their Parents and when they grow up they diligently learn in private and in publick They increase in their love to the Scriptures and good Books and to Godly teachers and godly Company and God saveth them from temptations and worldly deceits and fleshly Lusts and they live to God and are blessings to the Land the joy of their Friends and exemplary and useful to those whom they converse with § 2. But all even religious Parents have not the like blessing in their Children 1. Some of them though religious otherwise are lamentably careless of the duty which they promised to perform at Baptism in the education of their Children and do but superficially and formally instruct them and are too faulty as to the Example which they should give them and seem to think that God must bless them because they are theirs and because they are baptised while they neglect their promised Endeavours 2. And some Children when they grow up and are bound to resist temptations and to use Gods appointed means for their own good do wilfully resist Gods Grace and run into temptations and neglect and wretchedly betray themselves and forfeit the mercies which they needed § 3. In all my observation God hath most blessed the Children of those Parents who have educated them as followeth 1. Those that have been particularly sensible what they promised for them in the Baptismal Vow and made Conscience of performing it 2. Those that have had more care of their Souls than of their outward Wealth 3. Those that have been most careful to teach them the pravity of corrupted nature by original sin and to humble them and teach them the need of a Saviour and his renewing as well as pardoning Grace and to tell them the work of the Spirit of Sanctification and teach them above all to look to the inward state of their Souls 4. Those that have most seriously minded them of death judgment and the Life to come 5. Those that have always spoken of God with the greatest reverence affection and delight 6. Those that have most wisely laboured to make all the knowledge and practice of Religion pleasant unto them by the suitableness of Doctrines and Duties to their capacity 7. Those that have most disgraced sin to them especially base and fleshly pleasures 8. Those that have kept them from the baits of sensuality not gratifying their appetites in meats and drink to bring them to an unruly habit but used them to a habit of temperance and neglect of appetite 9. Those that have most disgraced worldliness and Pride to them and used them so low things in Apparel and Possession and told them how the proud are hateful to God and set before them the example of a crucified Christ and opened to them the Doctrine of Mortification and self-denial and the great necessity of true humility 10. Those that have been most watchful to know their Childrens particular inclinations and temptations and apply answerable remedies and not carelesly leave them to themselves 11. Those that have been most careful to keep them from ill Company especially 1. Of wicked Youths of their own grouth and neighbourhood 2. And of tempting Women 12. Those that have most wisely used them to the meetest publick Teachers and help them to remember and understand what they hear especially the fundamental truths in the Catechism 13. Those that have most wisely engaged them into the familiarity and frequent converse of some suitable godly exemplary Companions 14. Those that have most conscionably spent the Lords days in publick and in their families 15. Those that have done all this as with reverend gravity so especially with tender endearing Love to their Children convincing them that it is all done for their own good And that do not by imprudent weaknesses ignorance passions or scandal frustrate
and Glory § 6. And is it not a joy to you to be your Parents joy To find them love you not only as their Children but as Gods Love maketh it sweet to us to please and be beloved by those whom we love If it be not your grief to grieve your Parents and your pleasure to please them you love them not but are void of natural affection § 7. And O what a mercy will you find it when you come to age and business in the World 1. That you come with a clear Conscience not clogged terrified and shamed with the sins of your Youth 2. And that you come not utterly unfurnished with the knowledge Righteousness and Virtue which you must make use of in every condition all your lives when others are like Lads that will go to the Universities before they can so much as read or write To live in a Family of your own and to trade and converse in the World and specially to go to Church to hear to pray to communicate in private to pray to meditate in a word to live or die like a Christian like a man without the furniture of Wisdom Faith and serious Godliness is more impossible and unwise than to go to Sea without Provision or to War without Arms or to become a Priest without Book or understanding § 8. II. And you that are young men can scarce conceive what a joy a wise and godly Child is to his wise and godly Parents Read but Pro. 10.1 13.1 17.2 25. 19.13 26. 27.11 23.15 19 24 c. The Prayers and Instructions of your Parents are comfortable to them when they see the happy fruit and answer They fear not Gods Judgments upon their houses as they would do if you were Cains or Chams or Absaloms They labour comfortably and comfortably leave you their Estates at death when they see that they do not get and leave it for those that will serve the Devil with it and consume it on their Lusts but will use it for God for the Gospel and their Salvation If you fall sick and die before them they can rejoyce that you are gone to Christ and need not mourn as David for Absalom that you go to Hell If you overlive them they leave the world the easier when they leave as it were part of themselves here behind them who will carry on the work of God which they lived for and be blessings to the world when they are gone § 9. III. And O what a mercy is it to Church and State to have our posterity prove better than we have been and do God more Service than we have done and take warning by our faults to avoid the like Solomon tells us of one poor wise man that saved a City And God would have spared Sodom had there been but ten righteous Persons in it Wherever yet I lived a few persons have proved the great blessings of the place to be Teachers Guides and Exemplary to others as the little Leaven that leaveneth the Lump and as the Stomach Liver and other nutritive parts are to the Body Blessed is that Church that City that Country that Kingdom that hath a wise and just and holy People The nearest good and evil are the greatest Our Estates are not so near us as Wives and Children nor they so near us as our Bodies nor they so much to us as our Souls It 's more to a Person House or Country what they are than what they have or what others do for them or against them It is these that are Gods Children as well as ours that are the Blessing so often mentioned in the Scripture who will as the Rechabites obey their Fathers wholsom Counsels rather than their Lusts and carnal Companions and God before all Who walk not in the Counsel of the Vngodly nor stand in the way of Sinners nor sit in the seat of the scornful But their Delight is in the Law of the Lord and in that Law they meditate day and night Psal. 1. Lo such Children are an heritage of the Lord such fruit of the Womb is his Reward They are as Arrows in the hand of a mighty man Happy is the man that hath his Quiver full of them They shall not be ashamed but they shall speak with the Enemies in the gate Psal. 127.3 4 5. Were it not for wise and godly Children to succeed us Religion and Peace and all publick good would be but as we frail mortals are like the Grass or Flowers of a few days or years continuance and the difference between a Church and no Church between a Kingdom of Christians and of Infidels would be but like the difference between our waking and our sleeping time so short as would make it the less considerable CHAP. VII Vndeniable Reasons for Repentance and speedy amendment of those that have lived a fleshly and ungodly Life By way of Exhortation § 1. ANd now the Commands of God the Love of my Country and the Church the Love of Piety true Prosperity and Peace and the Love of Mankind even of your own Souls and Bodies do all command me to become once more an earnest suiter to the Youth of this Land especially of London who have hitherto miscarried and lived a fleshly sinful life Thousands such as you are dead in sin and past our warning and past all hope and help for ever Thousands that laught at Judgment and Damnation are now feeling that which they would not believe By the great mercy of God it is not yet the case of you who read these words but how soon it may be if you are yet unsanctified you little know O that you knew what a mercy it is to be yet alive and after so many sins and dangers to have one to warn you and offer you Salvation and to be yet in possibility and in a state of hope In the name of Christ I most earnestly intreat you a little while trie to use your reason and use it seriously in retired sober Consideration till you have first well perused the whole course of your lives and remembred what you have done and how Till you have thought what you have got or lost by sinning and why you did it and whether it was justifiable reason which led you to it and such as you will stand to in your sober thoughts yea such as you will stand to before God at last Consider seriously what comes next and whither you are going and whether your life have fitted you for your journeys end and how your ways will be reviewed ere long and how they will appear to you and tast at death Judgment and in the world to come Hold on and think soberly a little while what is in your Hearts and what is their condition what you most love and what you hate and whether God or sinful pleasure be dearer and more delightful to you and how you stand affected and related to the World that you are
is to search study and pray for so firm a belief of this unseen Glory as may so resolve engage and comfort us in some good measure as if we had seen it with these eyes O! what men would one hours being in heaven make us or one clear sight of it Faith hath a greater work to do than a dreaming or dead opinion can perform If it be not well grounded first and well exercised upon Gods Love Promise and Glory from day to day you will find cause sadly to lament the weakness of it For this use you have great need of the help of such Books as open clearly the evident proofs of the Christian verity which I have breifly done in the beginning of the 2d part of my Life of Faith and more largely in 2 other Books viz. The unreasonableness of Infidelity and the reasons of the Christian Religion A firm bâ—lief of the World to come is it that must â—ake us serious Christians and over come the snares of worldly vanity And your Faith being well setled set your selves dayly to use it and live by it dwell in the joyful hopes of the heavenly Glory what is a man that liveth not in the use of Reason And you must know that you have as daily use for your Faith as for your Reason Without reason you can neither safely eat or drink nor converse with men as a man but as a Bedlam not do any business that concerneth you and therefore you must Live by your Reason And without Faith you cannot please God nor obtain Salvation no nor use your Reason for any thing higher than to serve your appetites and purvey for the flesh and therefore you must Live by Faith or live like Beasts and worse than Beasts and cannot otherwise live to God nor live in the hopes of blessedness hereafter O! Consider that the difference between living chiefly upon and for an Earthly fleshly felicity or a heavenly is the great difference between the holy and the unholy and the fore-goer of the difference between those in Heaven and those in Hell IX Still remember that the great Means of all the good that here or hereafter you can expect is the great Mediator the great Teacher Ruler and Intercessor for his people And therefore out of him you can do nothing All duty that you offer to God must be by his Mediation and so must all mercy which you receive from God To come to God by him who is the Way the Truth and the Life must be your daily work of Faith His blood must wash you from all sin past and from the guilt of daily failings and infirmities None but he can effectually teach you to know God and your selves your duty and your everlasting hopes None but he can render your persons praises and actions acceptable to God because you are sinners and unmeet for Gods acceptance without a Mediator All power in heaven and Earth is given him and your Lives and Souls are at his will and it is he that must judge you and with whom you hope to live in Glory Therefore you must so live by the Faith of the Son of God who hath loved you and and given himself for you that you may say it is he that liveth in you Gal. 2.2021 This is the Fountain from whence you must daily fetch your strength and comfort X. And still remember that it is by the operation of the holy Spirit that the Father and the Son do sanctifie Souls and Regenerate and breed them up for Glory It is by the Holy Ghost that God dwelleth in us by Love and Christ by Faith Therefore see that you rest not in corrupted nature and trust not to your selves or to the Flesh. Your souls are dead to God and Holiness and your duties dead till the Spirit of Christ do quicken them You are blind to God and mad in sin till the spirit illuminate you and give you understanding You are like Enemies out of Love with God Heaven and Holiness till this Spirit reconcile you and sanctifie your wills You will have no manlike spiritual holy pleasure till the Holy Spirit renew your hearts and make them fit to delight in God O that men knew the great necessity of the illuminating quickning sanctifying comforting influence of the Spirit of God how far would they be from deriding it as some prophane ones do By this Holy Spirit the sacred Records were written and by miracles of Christ and his Apostles and Evangelists and Prophets sealed and delivered to the Churches And by this Spirit the orders and Government of the Church were setled And by him we are inlightned to understand the Scripture and inclined to Love them and delightfully believe them and obey them Study therefore obediently these Writings of the Holy Ghost and confidently trust them O! be not found among the resisters or neglecters of the Spirits help and motions when proud self-confidence or fleshly lusts do rise against them Christs bodily presence is taken from the Earth he promised instead of it which was but in one place at once to send his Spirit which is to the soul more than the Sun light to the Eye and can shine in all the world at once This is his Agent on Earth by whom in Teachers and Learners he carrieth on his saving work This is his Advocate who pleadeth his cause effectually against unbeleif and fleshly lusts and worldly wisdom This is the well of living water springing up in us to Everlasting life the name the mark of God on Souls the Divine Regenerator the author of Gods Holy Image and the Divine Nature even Divine life and light and love the Conqueror of the World and Flesh the strengthner of the weak the confirmer of the wavering the comforter of the sad and the pledge earnest and first fruits of everlasting life O therefore pray earnestly for the Spirit of Grace and carefully obey him and joyfully praise God in the sence of his holy encouragement and help CHAP. IX Additional Counsel to Youngmen who are bred up to Learning and Publick work especially to the Sacred Ministry in the Vniversities and Schools § 1 IT was the case of the London Apprentices who are nearest me and I have oft to do with which first provoked me to this work and therefore which was chief in my intention But had I as near opportunity to be a Counsellor to others There are three sorts whom I should have preferred for the sake of the Church and Kingdom to which they are of greater signification I. Those in the Schools and Universities who are bred up for the Sacred Ministry II. Those there and in the Inns of Court that are bred up to the knowledge of the Law III. The Sons of Noblemen Knights and others that are bred up for some places of Government in the Kingdom according to their several ranks And of these it is the first that I shall most freely speak to § 2. And first I shall
mention the Importance of their case and secondly the Danger that they are in of miscarrying and what they should do to escape it § 3. I. And indeed their condition as they prove good or bad is of unspeakable importance 1. To the Church and the Souls of men 2. To the Peace of the Kingdom 3. To themselves And 4. To their Parents above the common case of others § 4. 1. Of how great importance the Quality of the Clergy is to the Church and mens Salvation many thousands have found to their Joy and Happiness and I fear many more thousands to their sorrow and destruction And then of what importance the Quality of Scholars and Young Candidates is to the soundness of the Clergy I need not many words to make men of reason and experience know § 5. 2. God who hath instituted the sacred office and by his Spirit qualifieth men for the work doth usually work according to the fitness of their work and qualifications As he doth the works of Nature according to the fitness of Natural second causes giving more light by the Sun than by a Star or Candle c. so he doth the works of Morality according to the fitness of Moral Causes Holiness is the true Morality and usually wrought by holy means And though it be so supernatural in several respects as it is wrought by the supernatural revelation or doctrine or a supernatural Teacher Christ by the operation of the holy Ghost a supernatural Agent commonly called infusion and raising the soul to God a supernatural object and to a better state than that of corrupted nature yet we are natural recipients and agents and it is our natural faculties which Grace reneweth and being renewed exercise the acts of holiness and God worketh on us according to our nature and by causes suited to our capacities and to the work As he useth not to give men the knowledge of Languages Philosophy or any Art by the Teaching of the ignorant and unskilful so much as by Learned skilful Teachers we must say the same of our Teachers of sacred Truth and though Grace be the gift of the holy Ghost experience constraineth all sorts of Christians almost to acknowledge what I here assert Why else do they so earnestly contend that they may live under the Teachers which they count the best Will Hereticks teach men the Truth as well as the Orthodox why then is there such a stir made against Hereticks in the World and why are the Clergy so eager to silence such as Preach down that which they approve Will Papists choose Protestant Teachers or Protestants choose Papists And as men are unfit to teach others that which they know not themselves so unbelieving men and unholy men are far less fit to perswade the hearers to Faith and Holiness than believing holy Teachers are Though some of them may be furnished with the same notions and words which serious Godly Teachers use yet usually even in that they are greatly wanting because they have not so throughly studied saving Truth nor percieved its evidence nor set their hearts upon it nor deeply recieved and retained it For serious affection quickneth the mind to serious consideration and causeth men speedily and deeply to recieve that truth which others recieve but slowly superficially or not at all How eagerly and prosperously do men study that which they strongly love And how hardly do they learn that which they have no delight in much more which they hate and their very natures are against But if an Hypocrite should have good notions and words yet he will usually be greatly wanting in that serious delivery which is ordinarily needfull to make the Hearers serious Christians It seldom reacheth the heart of the Hearer which cometh not from the heart of the Speaker As light causeth light so heat causeth heat And the dead are unfit to generate Life The arrow will not go far or deep if both the Bow and Arm be not strong that shoot it constant experience telleth us undeniably of the different successe of the reading or saying of a Pulpit-lesson or a dull or a mere affected Speech of the judicious serious Explication application of well chosen matter which the experienced Speaker well understandeth and which he uttereth from the feeling of his Soul And the Love of a Benefice no nor of applause neither will not make a man preach in that manner as the love of God and the lively belief of heaven and hell and as the desire of saving Souls will do The means will be chosen and used and the work done agreeably to the principle and the end But if a Stage-Hypocrite should learn the knack or art of preaching with affected fervency and seeming zeal yet Art and Paint will not reach the power and beauty of Nature Usually affectation bewrayeth it self and when it is discerned the Hypocrisie is loathed And it faileth ordinarily in point of Constancie Will the Hypocrite pray alwaies Iob 27.10 Art will not hold out like Nature when the motives of Gain which is their Godliness ceaseth the pleasure of applause the means will cease Yea usually it turneth to a malignant reviling of the serious piety which they counterfeited before or of the persons whose applause they did affect For where the Hypocrisie of the Preacher is discovered by his contrary self-condemning words or life and the people accordingly judg of him as he is his proud heart cannot bear it but he turneth a malicious reproacher of those whose applause he sought thinking by disgraceing them to defend his own esteem by making their censure of him incredible or contemptible And if the Hypocrite should hold on his Stage affectation with plausible art yet it will not reach to an answerable discharge of the rest of his ministerial work It is from men that he expecteth his reward and in the sight of men on the publick Stage that he appeareth in his borrowed Glory But in his Family or his Conversation or his ministerial Duty to men in private he answereth not his publick shew He will not set himself to instruct and win the ignorant and impenitent and zealously to save men from their sins and to raise mens earthly minds to Heaven by praying with them and by heavenly discourse and by a heavenly Conversation nor will he be at much cost or labour to do good § 6. But alas the far greatest part of bad unexperienced Clergie men do prove so hurtful to the Church that they have not so much as the Hypocrites seeming Zeal and Holyness to cloak their sin or profit their people with The sad case of the Christian World proclaimeth this not only in the Southern and Eastern Churches Abassia Egypt Syria Armenia the Greeks and Moscovites c. nor only the Papists Priests in the West but too great a number in the Reformed Churches And it is more lamentable than wonderful For there goeth so much to the general planting of a worthy faithful Ministry
asleep again with unsuitable things or a cold dull formal kind of managing holy things § 9. And such are too often the plagues of the Church and State as well as injurious to individual Souls 1. Their Ignorance or scandalous Ambition Covetousness and other sins do render them so contemptible in the Eyes of many that it tends to make the Church and all Religion so And when Nobles Gentlemen and People think basely of the Ministry Church and Religion for their sakes how sad is the case of such a people The Gospel is half taken away from a Nation when 't is taken out of their esteem and brought under their reproach and scorn And a scorned Clergie will prepare for the scorning of Religion And an ignorant or worldly ambitious fleshly scandalous Clergie will be a scorned Clergy with two many Erasmus much disgraced the Germane Protestants when he described some of them as having a Bottle of Wine at their Girdle and his Translation of the New Testament in their hands ready to dispute for it with blows And so do many that tell the world how many of the Lutheran Ministers are given to excess of Drink and unpeaceable reviling of Dissenters And the same Erasmus much depreciated either Bishops or Scotists when speaking of the Scotist Bishop of London who was Dr. Collets Adversary he saith I have known some such whom I would not call Knaves but never one whom I could call a Christian Not only Drunkenness and bruitish sins but factitiousness envy unpeaceableness Contentiousness and especially a proud and wordly mind will be in most mens Eeyes more ugly in a Minister than others For where there is a double Dedication to God that which is Common will seem Vnclean and when there should be a double Holyness sin will appear to be double sin 2. And indeed a carnal wordly Clergie are oft the most powerful and obstinate hinderers of the Peace and quietness of Church and State 1. By fitting themselves to the humours of those in whose power their preferments are be it never so much to the injury of mens Souls Bodies or Estates or against the publick good and safety Or else leading the people into errour for popular applause 2. By a domineering humour in matters of Religion taking themselves Law-givers to others and taking their witts and wills for uncontroulable laying Heaven and Hell upon their own Inventions or Conceits and the Controversies which they endlesly make but understand not and hereticating or anathematizing such as take them not for Oracles or Rabbi's that must not be gainsay'd 3. And by Corrupting the Christian Religion and Church by departing from the Christian simplicity and purity and forming Doctrine Worship and Government according to their own carnal worldly minds and interest 4. And than militating against the best that contradict them or stoop not to them though it be to the distraction and division of the Churches And usually they are the hardest to be brought to peace and reconciliation and do most against it when ever it is attempted by Peace-makers who pitty the woeful case of such a self-disturbing people § 10. All this hath been so long manifested to the sad Experience of mankind in most Nations and Ages of the Christian World that it is not to be denyed or concealed And should we pretend the Honour of the Church and Clergie for the denying or the hiding of such grievous Sins it would but make us partakers of the guilt and displease the most Holy God who will have sin in whomsoever shamed and harden others who are ready to imitate them The Holy Scriptures open and shame the sins even of Adam of Noe of Lot of David of Solomon of Peter and of Gods chosen people the Iews and this was not a faulty uncovering of their nakedness but a necessary disgrace of sin and manifestation of the Holyness and Justice of God and a warning to others that we should not sin with such Examples before our Eyes 1 Cor. 10.6 7 8. I have written the History of the Bishops and Councils of former Ages in which with their virtues I have opened their miscarriages some blame it as if it were uncovering their nakedness But I have said nothing but what is openly proclaimed of them long agoe by their own greatest flatterers and it was Christ himself that said Remember Lot 's Wife The Pit which so many have fallen into must be uncovered and God and Holyness must be honoured rather than those that dishonour them by sin Sin confessed and forsaken is not so dangerous as sin denyed and extenuated He that hideth it shall not prosper Sin is a reproach to any people Pro. 14.34 and 6.33 Even God that forgiveth it to the penitent will shame it to keep others from committing it He that minceth or hideth it tempteth others to imitate it Alas what work have a worldly proud and ignorant Clergie made in most Christian Nations these thirteen hundred years Athanasius Chrysostoms Isidore-Pelusiota c. but especially excellent Gregory Nazianzene have told it us even of their flourishing times more plainly than I now intend to do They have loved this present world some set themselves by venting new and odd opinions to draw Disciples after them for applause some furiously hereticating them that differed from them by ambiguous words and making themselves Lords of the Faith of others and making their ignorant Dictates the Oracles of the Church striving who should be thought wisest and best but especially who should be greatest as if Christ had never judged in that Controversie Flattering Emperours and Princes till they got Wealth and Power by them and then over-topping them and troubling the World by Rebellious and Bloody Warrs Tearing the Churches in pieces on pretence of Union and killing and burning men on pretence of Faith and Charity and Cursing from Christ his faithful Servants on pretence of using the Keyes of Christs Kingdom setting up themselves and a worldly Kingdom on pretence of the Spiritual Government of Christ making Merchandize of Souls on pretence of feeding and ruling them cherishing the people in Ignorance and sloth and carnality that they might be more obedient to their Tyranny and lesse capable of opposing it hating and destroying the most conscionable Christians as Hereticks or Schismaticks because they are the greatest Enemies to their Sin and desires of Reformation provoking Princes to become the bloody Persecutors of such for the upholding of their worldly State and Dignity yea making them their Lictors or Executioners to destroy such as they condemn Such work as this hath destroyed the Greeks or Eastern Churches set up Turkish Tyranny by dividing Christians weakning and ruining the Emperors making Religion a meer Image of lifeless formality and Ceremony and a powerless dying thing Such a Clergie hath darkned and lamentably brought low the Christian Churches in Moscovie Armenia Georgia Mengrelia Syria Abassia and extirpated them in Nubia and brought them in Italy Poland Hungary Spain France
it But they think they owe more belief and reverence to a Learned Reverend Preacher in the Pulpit even when he preacheth against preaching and against those that practise what he teacheth them at other times O how much of his work hath Satan done in the World by corrupting Sacred Offices and by getting HIS SERVANTS INTO RVLE and MINISTRY TO DO HIS WORK AS FOR CHRIST and his Church and by his authority and in his name Our natural enmity with the Serpent disswadeth him from speaking or sending to us in his own name Should one say in the Pulpit Thus saith the Devil hate Christs servants silence his Ministers call serious Godliness Hypocrisie which is the contrary to Hypocrisie I should not much fear his success with any but if he be a lying Spirit in the mouth of Ahabs Prophets and can get a Prophet to smite Michaiah for pretending to more of the Spirit than he had or if he can get men in the Sacred Office to say Thus saith the Lord when they speak for sin or against the Lord this is the Devils prosperous way § 13. II. I have told you what Plagues bad Clergy men will be and still have been to themselves to the souls of men and to the publick State of Churches and Kingdoms and were it not lest my Writing should be too large I should tell you what Blessings on the contrary Able and Faithful Ministers are Briefly 1. Christ maketh them the cheif instruments for the propagating of his Truth and Kingdom in the World for the gathering of Churches and preserving and defending contradicted Truth They are the Lights of the World and the Salt of the Earth All Christians are bound to teach or help each others in charity but Christs Ministers are set in his Church as Parents in Families to do it by Office And therefore must be qualified above others for it and be wholly dedicated to it and attend continually on it as a Physitian differeth from every Neighbour who may help you in your sores or sickness as they can so do the Pastors of the Church differ from private helpers of your Souls The Scripture is preserved and delivered down by the private means of all the Faithful but eminently by the publick Office of the Pastors It may be expounded and applyed privately by any able Christian but the Pastors do it eminently by Office and to them especially though to all Christians commonly are committed the Oracles of God The Priests lips must preserve knowledge and men should enquire of the Law at his mouth for he is the messenger of the Lord of Hosts Mal. 2.7 Never yet was the Gospel well propagated nor continued in any Country in the World but by the means of the Ministers of Christ And O! what difference hath there been in their successes as they differed in ability piety and diligence And how great an honour is it to be such blessed instruments of building up the house of God and propagating the Gospel and the Kingdom of Christ and the Christian Faith and Godliness in the World 2. And thus God useth them as his special instruments for the Convincing Converting Edifying Comforting and Saving of Souls Others may be blest herein But the special blessing goeth along with those that are specially obliged to the work which is Parents in Families and Pastors in the Church O how many thousand Souls in Heaven will for ever rejoyce in the effects of the Labours of Faithful Ministers and bless God for them And what an honour what a comfort is it to have a hand in such a work He that Converteth a sinner from the Errour of his way doth save a Soul from death and cover a multitude of sins Jam. last 3. And in this they are Co-workers with Jesus Christ the great Saviour of Souls and with the Holy Spirit the Regenerator and Sanctifier Yea Christ doth very much of the work of his Salvation by them when he ascended on high he gave gifts to men for the edifying of his body till they come to a perfect man Eph. 4.6 to 16. and when the Chief Shephard shall appear they shall receive a Crown of Glory that fadeth not away 1 Pet. 5.4 and shall hear well done good and faithful Servant Hence are the Streams of Consolation that make glad the City of God and daily refresh many thousand precious Souls For how shall men believe without a Preacher and how shall they Preach unless they be sent qualified obliged and authorized by Christ Rom. 10. 4. In a word Churches States and Christian Kingdoms are chiefly blest and preserved by the Labour of the faithful part of the Ministry For 1 If we have the rare blessing of a wise and holy and loving Magistracy it is usually by the success of the labours of the Ministry 2 And there is no better means to bring the Subjects to the Conscionable performance of their Duty to Superiours 3 And by the blessing of their Labour the sins of a Nation are prevented or healed which would else bring down Gods heavy Judgments 4 They teach people to live in Love and Peace with one another and to abhor Contention Cruelty Oppression Injury and Revenge and all to do their several duties to promote the common Good 5 When the ignorant and slothful and scandalous sort of bad Ministers betray Souls and would bring the Ministry and Religion into contempt it is a wise and holy Ministry that counter-worketh them by labouring while others are idle and doing that wisely which others do foolishly and shewing in their lives the power of that truth which others disgrace and the reality of that Holiness Love Justice Peace and Concord which others would banish out of the World by making it seem but a name or Image 6 VVhen proud men tear the Church by the Engines of their domineering VVits and VVills these humble Pastors as the servants of all will labour to heal it by Christian meekness and condescension VVhen malignant Priests seek to strengthen themselves by the multitude of the ungodly and to bring serious piety into contempt which doth molest them these faithful Pastors open the just disgrace of sin and the great necessity and honour of holiness endeavouring that vile persons may be contemned and those may be honoured that fear the Lord Psal. 15.4 and distinguishing the precious from the vile the righteous from the wicked and him that sweareth from him that feareth an Oath and him that serveth God from him that serveth him not God saith They are as his mouth Jer. 15.19 Mal. 3.17 18. Eccl. 9.2 To be short as An Ignorant Worldly Carnal Proud Vnholy sort of Prelates and Priests are and have been the great Plague of the Churches these 1300 years at least so the Skilful Holy Humble Faithful Laborious Patient Ministers of Christ have been and still are the great blessings of the World for saving Souls promoting Knowledge Faith Holiness Love and Peace opposing Errour Pride Oppression VVorldliness Sensuality
be servants of the flesh and the world woe to you when your Masters turn you off and you must receive your wages § 26. VII Above all therefore choose like real Christians and take God and Heaven for your hope your all If you do not so you are not Christians indeed nor stand to your baptismal Covenant and if you be here fixed by the Grace of God and your sober consideration and belief you will then know what to choose and do It will teach you to referre all worldly things to spiritual and heavenly ends and uses and to count all things loss and dung for Christ and to choose the one thing needful which shall never be taken from you even that which will guide you in just and safe ways and save you from the greatest evil and give your minds continual peace even that which passeth understanding and will be best at last when sinners are forsaken § 27. VIII My next Counsel therefore is for the order of your Studies Begin then with your Catechism and practical Divinity to settle your own Souls in a safe condition for Life or Death And deal not so foolishly as to wast many years in inferior Arts and Sciences before you have Studied how to please God and to be saved I unfeignedly thank God that by sickness and his Grace he called me early to learn how to Die and therefore to Learn what I must be and how to live and thereby drew me to Study the Sacred Scriptures and abundance of practical spiritual English Books till I had somewhat setled the resolution and the peace of my own Soul before I had gone farre in humane Learning and then I found more leisure and more capacity to take in subservient knowledge in its proper time and place And indeed I had lost most of my Studies of Philosophy and difficult controversies in Theology if I had faln on them too young before I came to due capacity and so had been prepossessed with crude or unsound notions for they had kept out that which required a riper judgment to recieve it Such Books as I before commended to the Apprentices contain the Essentials of Religion plainly affectionately and practically delivered in a manner tending to deep impression renovation of the Soul and spiritual experience without which you will be but like sounding brass or a tinkling Cymbal The Art of Theology without the POWER consisting in Holy Life and Light and Love is the make of the Hypocrite Yet before you come to lay exact Systems of Theology in due Method in your minds much help of subservient Arts and Sciences is necessary How ever a Council of ancient Bishops once forbad the Reading of the Gentiles Books § 28. IX And here next I advise you Throughly to Study the Evidences and nature of the Christian Faith but not to hasten too soon over confidently on hard controversies as if your judgment of them at maturity must have no change but still suppose that greater light by longer Study may cause in you much different thoughts of such difficulties § 29. Lastly I advise you that you begin not the exercise of your Ministry too boldly in publick great or judicious Auditories Over much confidence signifieth Pride and Ignorance of your imperfection and of the greatness of the work and the dreadfulness of the most Holy Majesty But if you can at first settle a competent time in the house with some ancient experienced Pastor that hath some small Country Chappel that needs your help And 1. There you may Learn as well as Teach and learn by his practice that which you must practice which in a great house as a Chaplain you will hardly do but must cast your self into a farre different mould 2. By Preaching some years to a small ignorant people where you fear not critical judgments you will get boldness of speech and freedom of utterance without that servile Study of words and learning your written notes without Book which will be tiresome time-wasting and lifeless And when freedom and use hath brought you to a habit of ready speaking of the great and necessary things and acquaintance with ignorant Countrey people hath taught you to understand their case you will have a better preparation for more publick places when you are clearly called to them than you were ever like to get either in Universities among Schollars or in great mens Houses Compassion to the Church that is plagued with bad Ministers and by the weak undergo exceeding great loss and the sence of the grand importance of the Pastors qualifications to the happiness or misery of Souls and Kingdoms have drawn me to say more to young Students that intend the Ministry than I at first intended And therefore with the other two sorts I shall be very brief ☞ One earnest warning to you and all young men I adde know that one of the most common and pernicious maladies of mankind is an unhumbled understanding rashly confident of its own apprehensions though false hasty judging and presidence the brat of Ignorance and Pride Of a multitude of persons differing how few are not obstinately confident that they are in the right even Lads that are past twenty years of age O! dread this Vice and suspect your understanding Be humble take time trie and hear before you judge Labour for knowledge but take not on you to be sure where you are not but doubt and trie till you are sure CHAP. X. Counsel to Young Students in Physick SUpposing what is said to others which equally concerneth you I briefly add I. Make not the getting of Money and your own worldly prosperity so much of your end as the doing good in the world by the preservation of mens health and lives and the pleasing of God thereby Selfish low ends shew a selfish mind that liveth not to God or publick good II. Undertake not the practice of Physick without all these qualifications 1. A special sagacity or natural searching conjecturing judgment For almost all your work lyeth in the dark and is manageed by Conjecture 2. Much Reading especially of Observators that you may know what hath been the experience of all ages and eminent men before you 3. The experience of other mens practice And therefore if possible stay some time first in the house with some eminent Practitioner whose experiences you may see and hear his counsel III. Begin with plain and easy cases and meddle only with safe and harmless remedies And think not your selves Physicians indeed till you have got considerable experience your selves there is no satisfactory trusting to other mens experiences alone IV. In cases too hard for you send your Patients to abler Physicians and prefer not your reputation or gain before their lives V. Study simples throughly especially the most powerful and affect not such compositions as by the mixture of the less powerful do frustrate the ingredients which would else be more effectual VI. Forget not the Poverty of most
you bound yourselves to do X. Remember still how much the happiness or misery of Church and Kingdoms and of the World doth lie on the right or wrong educating of Youth by Parents much more than our Universities or Schools XI Remember that your own comfort or sorrow in them lyeth most on your own duty or neglect if they prove wicked and Plagues of the World and you are the cause it may tear your hearts but what a joy is it to be the means of their Salvation and of their publick service in the World XII Disgrace sin to them and commend holiness by word and practice and be your selves what you would have them be And pray daily for them and your selves The Lord bless this Counsel to them and you CHAP. XIV What are mens Duties to each other as ELDER and YONGER § 1. IT is most clear in Scripture and Reason that there are many special duties which the Elder and Younger as such owe to each other The Elder are bound 1. To be wiser than the Younger as having longer time and so to be their instructers in their several places 2. And especially to deliver down to them the Sacred Scripture which they received and the Memorials of Gods works done for his Church in their dayes and which they received from their Fathers 3. And to go before them in the example of a holy and heavenly Life Iob 32.4 and 8.8 Heb. 5.14 Tit. 2.2.3 1 Io. 2.13 14. Iudg. 6.13 Psal. 44.1 and 78.3 5. Deut. 1. 21. Exod. 12.26 Deut. 11.19 Ios. 4.6.21 22. Ioel. 1.3 § 2. And nature and Scripture tell us that the Younger owe much Duty to the Elder sum'd up 1 Pet. 5.5 Ye Younger submit your selves to the Elder this submission includeth especially a reverence to their judgments preferring them before their own and supposing that ordinarily they are wiser than the younger and therefore living towards their Elders in a humble Learning disposition and not proudly setting their unfurnished wits against their greater experience without very evident reason For the understanding of which note § 3. 1. That it is certain that meer Age doth not make men wise or good none are more sottishly and uncurably ignorant than the aged ignorants and few so bad as the old obstinate sinners For they grow worse deceiving and being deceived and more and more abuse Gods mercy and are still going further from him as the faithful are growing better and nearer to him 2. And it is certain that God greatly blesseth some young mens understandings and maketh them wiser than the aged and their Teachers 3. And such a one is not bound to think that he knoweth not what he knoweth nor to believe that every old man is wiser than he all this we grant § 4. But though Eccl. 4.13 Better is a poor and a wise Child than an old and foolish King who will no more be admonished Yet 1. It is certain that knowledge cometh much by experience and long experience and use is farre more powerful than the short And Time and Converse is necessary to it naturally or ordinarily long learning and use increaseth knowledge Do not all take it for granted that usually the boys who have been many years at School are better who Scholars than beginners and so in all other acquisitions Therefore it was the Elders that were commonly the Rulers of the people in Church and Commonwealth and the Pastors and Rulers are thence called Elders And if they were not ordinarily the wisest why did not God make the Children the ordinary Teachers and Rulers of their Parents but the Parents of the Children Old men may be Ignorant and Erroneous as well as wicked but young men cannot be ripe in wisdom without a miracle we are not therefore now to suppose unusual things to be usual Ordinarily youth is ignorant and raw their conceptions undigested not well fixed or improved It is but few things that they know and their ignorance of the rest maketh them lyable to many Errours Heb. 5.11 12. For the Time ye ought to have been Teachers fitness to teach supposeth Time the young cannot digest strong meats A Novice must not be a Bishop the reason may seem strange Lest he be lift up with Pride and fall into the condemnation of the Devil 1 Tim. 3.6 One would think youth should be most humble as conscious of defectiveness But because the Ignorant know not that more is to be known than ever they attained therefore they know not their own Ignorance 2. And this PROVD IGNORANCE is so odious a sin and the nurse of so many more and so great an Enemy to wisdom and all good that it is no wonder that it is the way to the condemnation of the Devil § 5. Therefore though young men should not receive any Falshood Heresie or ill example from the aged yet they should still reber that caeteris paribus Age hath the great advantage for knowledge and youth must needs live in an humble teachable sence of Ignorance other mens abuse of Time and aged folly will not prove them miraculously wise The aged are alwaies the wisest if they equally improve their time and helps § 6. It is so odious a sin for Lads and young Students to be self-conceited and unteachable and set up their apprehensions with ungrounded confidence against their Elders that all should be very fearful of that guilt and have such humble thoughts of their own understandings as to be jealous of their conceptions for all these Vices make up their self-conceited prefidence 1. It is both great ignorance of the darkness of mens understanding and great ignorance of themselves to be ignorant that they are ignorant and to think they are sure of that which they know not 2. It is an odious sort of Pride to over-value an ignorant understanding and to be proudly confident of that which they have not 3. It is folly to think that Truth can be known without sufficient time and tryal and contrary to the Worlds continual experience 4. It is an absurd an inhumane a subverting of the order of World for Lads to set up their Wits by groundless self-conceitedness against their Elders as for Subjects to set their Wills against Rulers 5. It is a continual unrighteousness there is a justice required in our common private judging as well as in Judges publick judgment And all should be heard and tryed before we peremptorily judge 6. It is a nest of continual Errour in the mind which is the Souls deformity and contrary to natures love of Truth § 7. And it hath abundance of mischievous effects 1. It keepeth out that Truth or Knowledge which should be received It obstinately resisteth necessary teaching whereas the willingest entertainment is little enough to get true knowledge even by slow degrees As God giveth birds an instinct to feed their young so the young ones by instinct hunger and open their mouths But if they abhorr'd their meat and must be cram'd they