Selected quad for the lemma: master_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
master_n	child_n	servant_n	wife_n	7,379	5	6.5654	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A96433	The art of divine improvement, or, The Christian instructed how to make a right use of [brace] duties, dangers, deliverances both as they concern himself and others : opened and applied in several sermons / by Nathaniel Whiting ...	Whiting, Nathaneel, 1617?-1682.	1662 (1662)	Wing W2020A; ESTC R43819	228,106	313

things we stand in need of and how to deliver his out of every temptation Lastly man may fail being changed in his uffection unto us I but there is no variableness nor shadow of turning with God he loves with an everlasting love These Considerations do caray on the Saints with an holy triumph in their saddest pressures and they say with David I shall yet praise him who is the health of my countenance and my God Psal 43. vers 5. I might multiply Scripture presidences abundantly upon this head but that it is done already in another place Oh friends gather up your experiences and lay them by you among your choisest treasures you will finde them to be singularly useful to you in an evill time and to others also your experiences being faithfully reported to them will comfort quiet and beget holy affiances in them when they are brought into greatest streights Psal 34. vers 2. My soul shall make her boast of God the humble shall hear thereof andbe glad Rejoyce in tribulation This was the end proposed by the onely wise God Psal 78. vers 7. why his people should shew forth his marvellous works namely that their posterity might be taught that excellent lesson of living by faith that they might set their hopes on God that they might beleevingly expect help from a faithful from an Almighty God Fruit 4. A lively sense of mercy received leads the soul on in Gods wayes it is a notable friend to Religion and provokes unto love and good works That soul thrives best heaven-ward which is most in the sense and serious meditation of the goodness of the Lord this will carry on the soul amain for God What a gracious frame was Jacobs spirit in when he had the lively apprehensions of rich mercies and great deliverances upon it Gen. 35. vers 2 3. Jacob said unto his houshold and all that were with him put away the strange gods that are among you and be clean and change your garments and let us arise and go to Bethel and I will make there an Altar unto God and why to Bethel or why make an Altar unto God Oh there is good reason for it He answered me in the day of my distress and was with me in the way which I went There is very much in this passage and much to the present purpose and therefore I shall intreat your stay a while to observe the carriage of this good man there being much teaching in it and that in many particulars 1. Observe from hence That Family-reformation lyes by way of special care and duty upon the Governour of it The Master of a Family is vested with authority from the Lord to command the exercise of Religion in his own house he may authoritatively act within his own precincts and that for God It will not answer the demands of God nor satisfie conscience when awakened that he hath walked in the wayes of God himself and kept up close and closest communion with the Lord if he voluntarily connive at the wickedness of his family and leave them to their own carnal liberty in the things of God he ought to put to his own hand and move the wheels of Religion in his family and command his houshold to fear the Lord God himself gave this testimony of Abraham whose children we are if beleevers and ought to walk in the footsteps of his faith I know him that he will command his children and his houshold after him that they shall keep the way of the Lord Gen. 18. vers 19. ut faciant that they shall do it that they shall keep close to the way and act up to the commands of God It is too much the fault of Family-governours though good to slacken their family care in matters of Religion the best are too remiss in this point and if dealt withall what is the answer of many I hope my family walks orderly I see no ill carriages among them I do not observe a spirit of opposition in any of them to the wayes of God I allow them not in any vicious course they have no command nor countenance from me in any wayes that are evill This is something and more than a great many can say and speak in truth but this comes short of the pattern here proposed besides in matters that relate to your own interest you will see them do your own business you will often stand by them when they dress your horses it may be when they feed your hawks and your hounds ye will observe whether your worldly affairs prosper in their hands ye will follow them into the fields and meadows and see that your own work be done and that seasonably and throughly now why do you not see to the work of the Lord also if a groom be wanting out of your stable ye will misse him and ask for him nay if he give you not a good account ye will chide him or turn him away but when do ye misse him at the worships of God he may come late or not at all to the publick ordinances or family duties and hardly be mist or if mist get off upon easie terms a soft reproof will serve the turn like that of Ely's to his sons 1 Sam. 2.23 24. Why do you such things and do no more so Oh this is a Nationall fault and I fear there is much wrath bound up in it ye see another manner of spirit in Abraham he commands both children and servants to keep the way of the Lord I question not but ye use the imperative mood in your own and why not in the Lords work Ye are good Gramarians for your own and why not for the Lord's interest Masters may in civility entreat ànd gently treat their servants but if they refuse and be stublorn both the authority of a Master and the duty of a Christian obligeth them to command in the case of religion and if commands prevail not David's practice is a worthy pattern Psal 101. ver 7. He that worketh deceit shall not tarry in my house he that telleth lies shall not tarry in my sight now to defraud God and their own souls is the greatest Mirmah the highest peice of cousenage if they pack for any fraud let them pack for that Surely if they do not couzen you in temporalls they make you go much to back-harrow in spirituals they steal away much of your comfort hinder much of that sweet communion which ye and your family might keep up with God if they do not set fire on your houses they make the wrath of God impendent over them for the curse of God which is the most dreadfull scarefire hangeth over the house where the swearer dwelleth and how few families can be found out wherein a swearer dwells not Oh that such a spirit of reformation in the power of it was upon all Governours of families as was here upon Jacob Oh that they were men of resolution like unto Joshua who resolvedly

love to a person or people when their testimony is single and something else be not superadded to render it more authentick for wicked Cham had the same preservation in the ark from the deluge of waters as godly Sem had and Samariah's siege was raised in a way of miracle under wicked Jehoram as well as Jerusalem's was under good Hezekiah Compare 2 Kings 7. verse 6. with Chap. 19. vers 35. It was false Divinity that those Barbarians preached when the Viper fastened on Paul's hand No doubt this man is a murtherer whom though he hath escaped the Sea yet vengeance suffereth not to live Acts 28. vers 4. which our Saviour fully consulteth in the case of the Galileans and the eighteen persons on whom the tower fell in Siloe Luke 13. vers 1 2 3 4. 5. But the glorious and remarkable outgoings of God when falling in with the witness of grace and the spirit when they are the returns of the Saints prayers the fruits of their holy wrastlings and the issue of their hope conceived in the womb of Gods gracious promises are comfortable conclusions of divine favour and do very much seal to the peculiarity of God's love thus the Saints in their own cases can distinguish love from hatred by the things which are before them they know the voice of Christ and read the love of their father in the streight lines of his providencial favours toward them Psalm 87. vers 2. God loveth the gates of Zion how doth this appear Trap. in loc All my thoughts are upon thee with greatest delight All my bowels are in thee making them to be the words of God promising plenty of grace and comfort to them as from overflowing overslowing fountain though other expositours think them to be the Psalmists word see Mr. Jackson in loc why vers 7. God saith All my springs are in thee his wisdome goodness mercy power c. are not in Zion as water in the cisterne pump'd in and soon run out but like water in the fountain streams of mercy flouds of favour and flowings forth of loving kindness Oh! it is clear God loveth Zion if all his springs be in her especially when drought is upon the earth and other parts of Judah are like Gideon's fleece Isa 38. ver 17. Thou hast in love to my soul delivered it from the pit of corruption good Hezekiah read love in the dispensations of God toward him and putteth that Interpretation upon his miraculous restitution to health Surely he doth much offend against the generation of God's people and wrongeth the mercies of God also who concludeth that God loveth us not because he hath prospered our warfare and underwriteth hatred to all those glorious victories which the Lord of hosts hath given to his people in these Nations and then when a day of distress was sadly upon the godly and the contest was very much betwixt the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent Yet I desire we may all look after other evidences of divine love amongst us these are good superstructures where the foundation is well laid and are Zion's security against the gates of hell provided everlasting doors be set open that the King of glory may come in and keep court amongst us 3. This Inference may be drawn from the point That the siunes of saints are circumstanciated with highest aggravations the care of God over them and his love unto them in their distressed estate against both which they offend in sinning do give a sad tincture to their sinnes Sin is sin in any person but circumstances do render it much more sinfull It was high water as to the guilt of sinne for Zimri a Prince of a chief house of the Simeonites to bring a Midianitish woman into his tent and commit whoredome with her when the Lord had so eminently appeared for Israel in turning Balaam's curses into blessings and saving them from the sword of Midian Numb 25. vers 6. Yea when the whole congregation was weeping before the Lord for the business of Baal-Peor where the wrath of God brake forth upon them so that there fell in one day three and twenty thousand 1 Cor. 10. vers 8. The Apostle instead of the cloak of the heat of youth Trap. in loc putteth upon fornication a bloody cloak bathed in the blood of 23000 as one observeth How doth the Lord by his Prophet aggravate David's sin 2 Sam. 12. v. 7 8 9. I anointed thee king over Israel and I delivered thee out of the hands of Saul and I gave thee thy Masters house and thy Masters wives into thy bosome and gave thee the house of Israel and Judah c. What an enumeration of mercies is here How doth the Lord expostulate with him And what doth the Lord inferre from hence why surely that David was acted by a spirit of great dis-ingenuity to sin against such goodness such bounty to break such cords of love which the Lord had cast upon him Wherefore hast thou despised the commandement of the Lord to do evil in his sight what David commit Adultery what David put the bottle to his neighbour to make him drunk thinking to cover sin with sin what David slay Vriah with the sword of the children of Ammon what David slay an innocent person in cold blood what David murther an husband that he might have his wife what David take the Adulteress into his bed and bosome what David do all this Does David give occasion to the enemy to blaspheme Had another person committed adultery or murther nay all this who had been under less obligations unto me who had onely shared in common providences and for whom I had done nothing extraordinary I should have taken it better at his hands and should not have reckoned it such an high dishonour but for David David to do this whom I honoured in the sight of all Israel when he was but a stripling in the slaughter of great Goliah of Gath the Philistines Champion David whom I singled out from amongst his brethren to pour the anointing oyl upon his head David whom I eminently preserved in six troubles yea in seaven when he was hunted as a Partridge upon the mountains David whom I carried as upon eagles wings to the throne through such amazing dangers that himself cried out I shall one day perish by the hand of Saul yea David whom I owned and gave this glorious testimony of I have found David a man after mine own heart who shall fulfill all my wills Oh! for David for this David to do all these abominable things which I hate Oh! Alluding to his gross hypocrisie in seeking to palliate and cover his sin and shame from man what aggravations are wrapped up together to render the sinne of David exceeding sinfull hence himself phraseth it the iniquity of his sinne Psal 32. ver 5. Observe that 1 Kings 11. vers 9. The Lord was angry with Solomon because his heart was turned from

might be to set up and encourage schools of learning in every Town As is with us by the bounty of his Highness that is considerable for number of Inhabitants at least such Schooles wherein the children of the poor might without charge to them be instructed in Scripture-Learning and the Principles of Religion How are the Protestants of the Valleys farre above us in this point The children of Merindol propounded and answered questions amongst themselves in the audience of the Bishop of Cavaillon Mr. Fox Act. and Monu pag. 195. King Hen. 8. and many others with such grace and gravity and so to the purpose that the Papists admired at it nay one of their adversaries professed that he had been often at the common Schools at Sorbone in Paris where he heard the disputations of the Divines but yet he never learned so much as he had done by hearing those children O that some good Nehemiahs would promote this work of encouraging Schools throughout the Nation and that the Ministers would own it more as their business to instruct children and younger people in Catechistical points and that an Act might be brought forth enjoyning under penalties Parents and Masters to bring forth their children and servants to a publick catechising for without this little good will be done in many places as some Ministers can speak by sad experience being forced to lay that necessary work down because no law of man enjoined neither would Governours of Families command their young people to attend upon it and hence it hath been that the children of Christians as to the general Profession have like the children of the Jews Neh. 13. ver 24. spake half in the speech of Ashdod Heathen-like and could not speak in the Jews Language to wit the pure Idiom of the Gospel But suppose your servants be bad enough as I believe too many be yet it will be more your honour to square a knottie peice of timber and polish a churlish stone when ye smooth a rugged spirit and make that plyable to the wayes of God it will more redound to your comfort And consider ye plough in hope and have a bottome from Jacob's success for hope to rest upon for he not onely commanded his houshold to wit children and moenial servants but also all that were with him some of whom probably came out of Mesopotamia with him and many of those Shechemites also that were lately taken captive by his sonnes were in company with him yet his command was given unto all and all submitted unto it for as well the strangers that were with him as his own houshold gave unto him all the strange Gods which were in their hands they freely yielded up all their Idols into the hand and power of Jacob their Governour never to see them more nor worship them more And the text sayes Jacob hid them t is like without their privity under an oak which was by Shechem now then take pattern from hence and act up in your families unto it How know you but the power of the mighty God may so awe the spirits of your servants that the most rugged and rebellious among them may stoop under your reproof How know ye but that they may deliver up their pride oaths drunkenness wilfull ignorance and Gospel enmitie into your hands if in the name of the eternal God as Christian Governours ye demand them And what a noble conquest would that be What a quieting consideration will this be to you at a dying hour 4. Observe further That great deliverances lay great obligations upon Governours to act high in personal and family Reformation If ye say here 's a great deal more urged then needs why did Jacob do this and why must we do this the enforcement is laid down by Jacob who answered me in the day of my distress and was with me in the way that I went as if he had said I cannot discharge my self of that debt I owe unto God nor render my self a person in any measure worthy of his mercies if I should tolerate such principles and practises in my house which are dishonourable unto him and destructive to the very interest of Religion Oh! I will remember the day of distress which was upon me when my brother Esau threatned my life for the birth right and blessing which I obtained from him I well remember mine afflicted estate when I was in the day time consumed with drought and in the night by frost and my sleep departed from mine eyes whilest I served a churlish Laban and had my wages changed ten times by him Being an Hebrew Proverb taken from killing the bird upon the nest with her young ones Hos 10.14 I remember those fears yea great fears which seized upon me when Esau came against me with four hundred men at his heels at which time I wrastled with the Angel and spake before the Lord that I feared greatly least Esau would come and smite me and the mother with her children or ghnal-Bunim upon her children heaps upon heaps And now seing God was with me and answered me in all these dayes of my distress and hath brought me off in a wonderfull way of mercy with safetie to my life and security to my estate I dare not fail in this great duty of fam ly-Reformation I cannot bear any longer the dishonours which are done to God in my Family nor quit my spirit any longer with my personall Religion and therefore I lay it upon you all by way of command as a Magistrace in my own family that ye put away the strange Gods which are among you and be clean and change your garments and let us arise and go up to Beth-el Thus David 2 Sam. vers 1 2. When the Lord had given him rest round about from all his enemies The sence thereof was so lively upon his spirit that he suddenly and seriously resolved to build an house to the Lord and establish the worship of God in the Land to which he was encouraged by Nathan the Prophet at first but afterward received a flat prohibition that he should not build it yet see how the sence of mercies carried him out to prepare abundantly for that magnificent building charging and encouraging Solomon to the work and quickening up his Princes unto free-will offerings 1 Chron. 28. ver 20. and Chap. 29. vers 1 2. and so forward Oh then I make it my humble request to all that read this passage that ye would improve mercies received and deliverances received according to Jacob's pattern that it may quicken you up to family care to set up Religion in your Families and promote it in the Nation that the Lord may feed you with the heritage of Jacob your father Isa 58. ver ult Think often and seriously what your Dangers and what your Deliverances have been and surely if there be any heat and life in the soul for God this will bring it forth there would not be that