holiness of your souls is; and what it is to have to do with a holy God, and to be near to judgment and an endless state? He is mad in sin, whom such considerations will not humble.

4. Another of your dangers is from flatterers, who will be pleasing and praising you, but who will never tell you of that which should humble you and awake you to a sense of your everlasting concerns. But in this respect none are so dangerous as a flattering clergy, who, being themselves carnal worldlings, would serve that flesh which is their master, by your favour and beneficence. Ahab had such prophets, who said, "Go and prosper;" in whose mouths the devil was a lying spirit. How many sincere men have been undone by such!

Remember then what it is to be a sinful man, and what need you have of vigilant friends and pastors, that will deal faithfully with you, as if it were on your death-bed and encourage such, and abhor worldly flatterers. Your souls have need of as strong physic, and as plain dealing as the souls of the poorest men; bear it, therefore, and thankfully accept it.

5. One of your greatest dangers here will be, that your own fleshly minds and this worldly sort of men (especially if they be of the clergy,) will be drawing you to false and contemptuous thoughts of serious godliness, and of serious godly men. Whereas, if you be not such yourselves, you are undone for ever; and all your flatterers, your big names, wealth and honour will neither save you, nor ease your pains in hell. As ever you believe that there is a God, believe that you owe him the utmost reverence, obedience and love, which your faculties can perform. And as ever you care what becomes of you for ever, pay him this great due, and hate all that would divert you; and, much more, all those diabolical suggestions which would draw you to think that to be a needless thing which must be your life and your all.

6. But, above all, I beseech you, fear and watch, lest you be drawn to espouse any thing, as your interest, which is against the interest and command of Christ, and against his kingdom, or the good of his church or of the commonwealth. As the devil first undid the world, by making deceived Eve believe, that God's command was against her interest; so doth he to this day, but with none so much as with nobles and rich men. God hath commanded you nothing but what is for your own good, nor forbidden you any thing but what

1

is for your own hurt and that of others. He needs not you, or any one; you must allow him to be God, and, therefore, to be wiser and better than you, and to know better what is best and fittest for you and others. But Satan will slander to you God's laws, ways and servants; for he is in favour of your continued enmity and separation from God, and therefore would draw you to believe that God and his ways are enemies to you, and against your pleasure, honour, domination, commodity, or ease. O how many princes and great men have been utterly undone, by believing the flesh, the devil and his ministers, when they plead that Christianity is against their power, honour or other interests; that the Scripture is too precise, and that conscience, obeying God before them, is against their power and prerogative; and thus have they set themselves as enemies to keep under conscience and serious godliness, lest obedience to their wills should be thereby hindered.

Yea, how many also so dote as to think that the interest of head, heart, stomach and members, of rulers and subjects, stand not in union, but in contrariety and victory against each other! Woe to the land that hath such rulers, and to the poor tenants that have such landlords! But, much more, woe to such selfish oppressors, that had rather be feared than loved, and take it for their honour to be free and able to do mischief, and to destroy those whose common welfare should be more pleasant to them than their own; and to them, especially, that take serious godliness and godly men to be against them, and therefore bend their wit and power to suppress them; as if they said, as those in Luke xix. 27, "We will not have this man to reign over us!" Such persons Christ will destroy as his unthankful enemies, and "will break them with his iron rod, and dash in pieces as a potter's vessel." (Psalm ii.)

7. If you love yourselves and the common good, get good men about you. Read the fifteenth, sixteenth, and one hundred and first Psalms. Especially procure faithful teachers, and godly friends, servants and companions. Read much the histories of the lives of wise and godly men, such as King Edward the Sixth, and Lord Harrington. Young men, imitate such excellent persons as Scripture and other history justly commend to your imitation. It will be profitable to read the lives of worthy men, such as are gathered

by Mr. Clark, Dr. Fuller, Thuanus, Beza, the lives of the Martyrs, and of such Christian princes as Constantine, Theodosius, &c.; the Emperor Maximilian the Second, John Frederick of Saxony, Philip Prince of Hessia, and Louis the Pious of France. Read also the lives of such Heathens as Titus, Trajan, Adrian, but especially Aurelius Antonius and Alexander Severus; of such lawyers, philosophers, physicians, but especially such divines as Melchior Adamus hath recorded in his four volumes; and of such Bishops as Cyprian, Nazianzen, Ambrose, Augustine, Basil, Chrysostom, our Usher, and such others.

8. Live not in idleness,-as the sons of rich men too often do; for that will rust and corrupt your minds, and cherish besotting and damning lusts, and will render you worthless and useless in the world, and consequently the greatest plagues of your country, to which you should be the greatest helps and blessings. Make as much conscience of improving your hours, as if you were the poorest men: you have the highest wages, and ought to do most work for God. Let holy and useful studies take up your time one part of the day, doing good to others another part, and necessary refreshment and exercise another. He in whose hands are all your times, has allowed you no part for any thing unprofitable, much less for any thing that is hurtful.

O what a blessing to the world are wise and godly magistrates; and what a curse are the foolish and ungodly!

9. Remember that the grand design of the devil and of all deceivers, is, to delude and corrupt the rulers of the people, knowing to which ever way they turn how much significance they carry with them by their laws, power and examples. Remember likewise how sad it will be to be judged as a persecutor or a captain of iniquity. You must therefore have a greater self-suspicion than others, and a greater fear of seduction and sin; and you must watch more carefully against wicked counsel and example, but especially against the temptations of your own flesh and corrupted nature, and of your wealth and situation in society.

CHAP. XIII.

Counsel to Parents and Tutors of Youth.

SHOULD I now instruct parents and teachers in what on their parts is necessary to their great duty, and to the good of youth, it would be more than all I have already written. But that is not my intention in the present work; you may see much of it done in my "Christian Directory." Yet because so much labour is required at the hands of parents and teachers, and such responsibility lies upon them, I beseech all such persons that read these lines, to remember,

1. How near their relation to their children is; and that for a parent to betray their souls to sin and hell, by neglect or by ill means, seems more inexcusable cruelty than for the devil, that is a known enemy, to do it.

2. Consider how very much their welfare is entrusted to your care. You have the teaching of them before the ministers, have them always nearer with you, and have greater power over them. O that you knew what holy instructions, heavenly excitations, and good example God requireth of you for their good and how much of the hopes of the church and world lie on the holy skill and fidelity of parents, in the right education of youth!

3. O feed not their sinful desires and lusts; accustom them not to pride, to idleness, to too much fulness or pleasing of the appetite; but teach them the reasons why they ought to exercise the virtues of temperance and mortification, and shew them the sin and mischief of all sensuality.

4. Yet use them with tender and fatherly love, making them perceive that the abstaining from these evils, is for their own good. Cherish their profitable delights; study how to make all good delightful to them, and encourage them by sparing rewards and prudent commendations. Tell them of the wisdom and goodness of God's word, and let them read the lives of holy men.

5. Choose them such callings, habitations and relations as will make most for the common good, and for the advantage of their souls; and not those that will be most subservient to the covetousness, pride or slothfulness of their na

ture.

6. Know their particular inclinations, corruptions and temptations, and accordingly keep and restrain them with the greatest vigilance, watching against these dangers as you would do against death.

7. Settle them under wise and godly pastors, and in the familiar company of godly persons, especially those of their own age and usual converse.

8. Keep them as much as possible from temptations at home and abroad, especially those that tend to sensuality, and to impiety or corrupting their judgments against religion. Thrust them not beyond sea or elsewhere in an unfortified state of mind among deceivers, as some cruelly do for the sake of a mere ornament.

9. Remember how you dedicated them to Christ in baptism, and what was promised to be done, and what renounced on their parts, and what you bound yourselves to do.

10. Remember likewise how much the happiness or mi sery of the church of Christ and of the kingdoms of the world, doth lie on the right or wrong education of youth, by the PARENTS, much more than by our UNIVERSITIES or

SCHOOLS.

11. Remember that your own comfort or sorrow in them, lieth chiefly on your own duty or neglect. If they prove to be wicked persons and the plagues of the world, and you be the cause, it may tear your own hearts. But what a joy is it to be the means of their salvation, and of their public service in the world!

12. Disgrace sin to them, and commend holiness by word and practice. Be yourselves what you would have them to be; and pray daily for them and for yourselves. The Lord bless this counsel to them and to you!

CHAP. XIV.

What are Men's Duties to each other as Elder and Younger.

1. It is most clear in Scripture and reason that there are many special duties, which the elder and the younger, as such, owe to each other. The elder are bound,

(1.) To be wiser than the younger, as having had longer