I as young as I am have to do all this hard work in which is the point I am on Young Man if Death overtake thee thou canst not put it off till thou set about the work thou hast neglected all the cryes in the Word will avail nothing Bethink thee then if Ahijah had not been good betimes he must have been eternally undone so it may be thy Case O Child of ten years old if thou dost not get Grace before thou art a Year older or it may be a Month or Week older thou must dye graceless Doth not the Word tell thee of some who dye in youth and their life is among the unclean Job 6. 14. Shall that be thy Case canst thou bear it be perswaded now to fix thy thoughts on such things as these Shall I Lye or Swear now who may be dead within a Month Dare I prophane this Sabbath who may be dead within a Week yea my next sin may be the last act of my Life How can I live without Christ a day longer when I may dye to Night shall I delay to know and love and fear my God who must do it soon or never I am sure if I do not fear God before I dye Hell will be my place and I am not sure of a Week to attain this Fear of God Did the youngest of you know your frailty you would tremble at delays you would not dare to sin you would blush at your slothfulness in any good Work Oh then hear this Sermon as one that may never hear another Pray the next time as one that may never Pray again When thou art next tempted ask thy self Would I yield to this if I were to dye to morrow Will you believe this and walk as them that believe it even Youth is too uncertain for any wise one to venture to sin or neglect his Salvation as if sure of time to repent and repair his neglects 2. Vanity is taken in a moral sense viz. as it regards the minds and manners thus Eph. 4. 17. the Spirit of God warns us against walking in the Vanity of the Mind Vanity is oft put for all sins 2 Kings 17. 15. several sins are expresly called Vanity and this Name is applyed partly with respect to the Nature of some sins but chiefly from the tendency and consequence of every sinful course Every way of sin is vain and sin deserves the Name of Vanity from this consideration that it is committed to no valuable purpose yea it ends in what is destructive and far worse than meerly unprofitable In this sense I shall improve the Text and it includes these things 1. Young people are prone to many sins that are notoriously vain 2. Young People are apt to live to very low and unprofitable purposes which is Vanity 3. Young People are apt to live to evil and destructive purposes which is the heighth of Vanity Before I enter on these things let me ask you young Folk Is not this a true Charge and is it not as awful a description of your State as true Obj. But how comes this to be laid so universally that all young People are thus vain Ans. 1. Because the generality of young People are vain For one that is sober how many are wild for one that is pious there be many prophane A religious Child is become a wonder Godliness in youthful years is very rare The body of your ordinary young People is sottish the generality of witty Youths are atheistical and irreligious When the Disease is so common the charge is proper as against the whole Ans. 2. All young Persons are inclin'd to be vain Vanity is the Temptation of that Age your Constitution and want of Experience do especially expose you to this mischief though Grace may deliver some of you from the power of Vanity yet it hath not cleansed you from all disposition to Vanity it hangs about you and liveth though restrained Your stumbles will be at this stone and your Faults will be under this head of youthful Vanity Young People you see why the Charge is so common Will you then apply what I shall say to your selves When I describe the Disease say This is my Disease When I propose the Remedy speak to thy Soul This is proper for my Case this is necessary to my Condition Thou Child say I am a Child and therefore apt to be vain Thou young Man say I am a young Man and therefore I am apt to be vain I must deny my Age or own this Charge Nay further reason awfully with your selves Most young People are under the power of Vanity The wicked Youths are a hundred to one that 's pious Oh my Soul what is my Condition is not there more danger that I am one of those hundred wicked ones than that I am that One pious young one I shall now return to consider the three particulars under which I included the Moral Vanity of young People 1. Young People are prone to many sins that are notoriously Vain There be some particular sins that in their Nature argue more Vanity than other sins they inferr a very vain mind in the Persons committing them Young ones have many of these sins and Lusts strongly prompting thereto I shall reduce your sins to eight particulars and give you some Directions under each to help you against that particular sin But remember each of these are sins every sin defileth thy Soul and bindeth thee to undergo the Punishment threatned if it be not repented of and mortified Nor canst thou hope that these sins will be put away unless thou follow the Methods which God hath directed for that end He will not Convert thee as a Bruit that regards nothing thô he must consider thy weakness as a Sinner and therefore exert his Power by the Means thou attendest 1. Young People are subject to Folly The Spirit brands our tender years with this Crime Prov. 22. 15. Folly is bound up in the Heart of a Child Is this limited to Children No A young Man void of understanding is too often seen Prov. 7. 7. This fault is not a want of that Wisdom which is unexpected from your Age But it is such Folly as in your Years might have been healed and it 's made up of blindness and mistakes against that light which God hath afforded you God hath given you reason to govern your selves by you are under the Means of Wisdom whereby you may know your true end and the proper means to that end Nevertheless most young Persons are Fools Dost not thou place thy Interest in things which are vain and destructive Dost not thou think Jollity thy only Heaven and the pleasing thy Lusts the only real Paradice What is enjoying God or glorifying God to thee these are things thou art unacquainted with and unconcerned for Obj. Perhaps thou wilt say I desire to be saved and I do something towards it how then do I mistake my end or means Ans. 1.
THE VANITY OF CHILDHOOD YOUTH WHEREIN The Depraved Nature of Young People is represented and Means for their Reformation proposed BEING SOME SERMONS PREACHED In Hand-Alley at the Request of several Young Men. To which is added A CATECHISM For YOUTH By DANIEL WILLIAMS LONDON Printed for Iohn Dunton at the Black Raven in the Poultrey MDCXCI To the Children and Young People who were Hearers of the following SERMONS THE Design of these Sermons was to regulate and improve the state of your Souls The Blessing of God having made them successful to several of you enclined me to publish them at your importunity thô I do oft refuse a Compliance with many judicious Friends in desires of the same kind even when the Subjects are more perswading Having overcome the Discouragement which I suggested to my self from the plainness of these Discourses I dare not make an Apology for the commonness of the Stile or Matter It had been a Profanation of an Ordinance when desired to preach to Youth to propose any Subject below what tends to their Salvation from that Sin and Wrath they are naturally under It had been folly to treat of such a Subject for Edification before Children and Apprentices in words unapt to inform or perswade them I thank God I could rather bear the dislike of a few less serious wits than neglect the eternal Concerns of so many less intelligent Hearers On the same account I am now afraid to raise the Style or omit the very repeated Appeals and Pleadings with Children being resolved to approve my self to the weakest Reader and leave the judicious to what is more fitted to their improvement My Prayer and Hopes be That God will accompany this Book with powerful effects on your Souls and not leave you to that obstinacy as will render it a farther aggravation of your sin and punishment you cannot pretend that God never informed you of your Disease nor directed you to a Cure You dare not after reading this Book say My Danger was concealed from me and Rules for my Safety were not prescribed God will severely witness that he condescended to argue matters with thy Soul he disswades thee from the Sins that will condemn thee at last however thou now flatterest thy self He useth many Arguments to encline thee to Duties which his very Gospel cannot dispence with the want of in any person whom he will save Let me then acquaint thee oh young Man that God addresseth himself to thee as by Name Thou by nature art brutish and devilish and as long as thou followest the imaginations of thy vain mind thy case becomes more desperate thy Lusts by indulgeuce grow more violent and Conscience still less concerned to vindicate the Affronts thou offerest to Gods Dominion or to represent the injury thou dost to thy own Soul yet be assured whether thou mindest it or not there is a God whose right it is to govern thee and will be sure to judge thee Thou art born his Subject thô unwilling to obey and forward to rebell against him thou hast an immortal Soul how little soever thou providest for its future State yea how much soever thou actest to expose it to endless misery and this for a short and fading Pleasure Thou art naturally depraved and thereby under that Condemnation which was pass'd by the Law of Innocency against man in the least sinful Oh then do not fancy that Baptism did regenerate thee whiles thou findest the want of every Grace and carnal Inclinations are thy governing Law Do not conceit that Baptism delivered thee from thy cursed State when thy Vnbelief and Enmity against holiness do both express it and further expose thee to it It 's true there is a way of Salvation for lost man published in the Gospel but that can benefit none who continues to reject Christ and refuse the terms of Peace Thou art the dedicated Child of believing Parents but their Faith cannot save thee now that thou art capable of consenting to the Covenant and refusest it yea thy early Dedication adds Perjury and Falshood to thy Profaneness Plead not thy Christian Name whiles thou art a Reproach to it Boast not of religious helps when they have not that good effect on thee as the light of Nature hath on meer Pagans which may convince us that where the Gospel fails to convert its Hearers Satan oft governs more powerfully than if the Gospel had never been preached to them We live in an Age of wonders among which it is not the least strange or awful that professed Christians are viler than Heathens and most of our baptized Youths scorn the plainest Rules of Christianity Ah wretched Age wherein Gospel-light cannot convince of that wickedness which even Nature condemns what Conceptions have they of God who think he can approve of such Enormities as they commit or be satisfied with those heartless and trifling Regards to which they confine all the Homage which they afford him Surely England's Calamities are like to be terrible when this jealous God ariseth to force men to juster Thoughts both of his Nature and his Laws I must allow that this Treatise is intended to convince thee of the great Evil of such things as most esteem indifferent and practise as allowable yea so far doth their blindness prevail that Sobriety much more Godliness is ridicul'd as Folly But know that the feeling of endless Torments will soon convince such as dare mock at Divine Revelations The Perfections that render God able to endure their Affronts now will oblige him to vindicate his Government and Honour then Poor Wretches that would not be ruled by means suited to their Natures as rational shall without their Consent undergo the inflicted Evils which whiles only threatned did not move them Therefore young Man be not affrighted from true Wisdom by the Clamours of the worst of Fools whatever Wit they pretend to Vndo not thy self for the sake of a Crowd for it 's better be religious with the lesser number now than be damned hereafter with the multitude Sure thou must be an Atheist and wholly disbelieve unseen things if the Contempt or Perswasions of enslaved Factors for the Devil can encline thee to chuse Hell by resolving the Course that infallibly tends to it I must acquaint you That in the last Sermon I add no Particular to the Notes one of your selves took from me when I preached and supplyed me since with to help the defect of my own Papers yet I have added many of the Directions for avoiding the eight particular sins I disswaded you from in my first Sermon I have also thought fit to subjoyn a short Catechism in the end wherein you may learn the Essentials of Practical Religion in familiar Terms if you think fit to learn it consult the Proofs The good Lord prosper all to you Could I but see young ones generally enclined to serious Religion I would hope that God hath a mercy in reserve for England and the Vengeance
that hangs over it because of the last thirty years too successful Contrivances to debauch the Nation in order to Slavery and Popery might be diverted or at least confined to such as are too far engaged or obstinate to admit a Reformation That every Child and Youth who shall read this Book may as many of you already do thus contribute to my Hopes and Share in the Benefit thereof shall be the Prayer of Your Compassionate Friend Daniel Williams THE CONTENTS THE Context explained to Page 5. Vanity considered as its natural Frailty p. 7 8 9. Vanity in a moral sence in General 10 11 12. Particularly as to eight Sins to which Youth is prone 1. The folly of Youth in the Concerns of Eternity explained and demonstrated from p. 13. to 17. Directions against Folly from p. 18 to 21. 2. The Inconsiderateness of Youth with Directions against it from p. 21. to 24. 3. The Obstinacy of Youth described disswaded from with Directions against it from p. 25 to 33. 4. Anger and violent Passions of youth described disswaded from with Directions from p. 33 to 37. 5. Youths idleness and mispence of time described disswaded from with Directions from p. 37 to 43. 6. The Levity and inordinate Mirth of young people described disswaded from with directions to get Sobriety from pag. 43 to 51. 7. The sin of Lying described disswaded from with Directions against it from p. 51 to 55. 8. Fleshly Lusts viz. Drunkenness Gluttony and Vncleanness described and disswaded from from p. 55 to 57. Directions against Gluttony and Drunkenness from p. 58 to 61. Directions against Vncleanness from p. 61 to 67. The Vanity of Youth as it consists in their living to no valuable purposes demonstrated from p. 68 to 74. The Vanity of Youth as it lives to destructive purposes from p. 74 to 77. An Account how Childhood and Youth became vain where Original Sin is treated of from p. 77 to 82. An Enquiry why Youth continues vain where also the possibility of their healing is spoken to from p. 82 to 90. The Reasons why many young people do grow more vain daily from p. 90 to 92. Inferences from the whole Doctrine 1. The dismal Aspect of the World p. 92 93. 2. Parents and Masters care and pains in the Education of youth urged and directed suitably to the Disease of youth from p. 94 to 97. 3. The reasonableness of youths subjection to the Rebukes and Restraints of Superiours p. 97 98. 4. Attentiveness to Advice needful and fit p. 98 99. Exhortations 1. A serious Examination of the present state of youth whether they are still vain or no urged p. 99 100 2. They are called to admit Directions answerable to their present Condition 1. A Call to young people still vain with Directions and Arguments for their present casting off their Vanity from p. 100 to 110. 2. Advice proper for such young Ones as are serious from p. 110 to 121. A plain youths Catechism from p. 110 to the end Ecclesiast ch 11. v. 10. last clause Childhood and Youth are Vanity THis present Meeting is for the spiritual advantage of you Children and young People Your good we Ministers must intend and it s your Interest and Duty to regard and improve these helps as well as elder Persons for your Souls are are as Immortal as the Aged God hath a right to govern you being you are his Creatures He hath given you a Rule of Life he observeth your Hearts and Carriage with concern Young Ones shall be arraigned at Gods Tribunal and judged by the Rule contained in his Word according to what they have been and done Heaven and Hell are before you one of them will be the eternal dwelling of the youngest in this Assembly and considering that most of Mankind dye when young Heaven and Hell are fuller of Young People than of such as arrived to a greater Age. Do such Considerations affect you ought they not to make me serious and importunate with your Souls And with yours especially because Youth is under great indispositions to all that is serious and saving Oh let us look earnestly for a blessing to him who is the God of the Spirits of all Flesh Numb 16. 23. and therefore is able to impress and manage your Spirits tho' unruly and vain The Author of this Book is Solomon will you regard what a Great Man saith He was King of Israel in its most prosperous State Are a wise Mans dictates to be heeded He was the wisest of meer Men. But above that this Book was the result of great Experience he speaks his feeling as well as his Judgment yea he records these things as a Penitent after great offences and therefore must represent things according to their truth and importance especially since he was inspired by the Infallible Spirit in what he here delivers I shall not look further than the 11th verse to lead you to my Text. 1. There he doth by a sharp Sarcasm reprove the sensual delights of Young People rejoyce O Young Man c. it s such a saying as Christs to his Disciples Sleep on and take your rest Mar. 14. 41. It 's not said by way of approbation but he exposeth the Sensualist by disdain which may affect some People more than a direct Reproof and God for our good condescends to try all ways Surely you that think sensual pleasure the greatest happiness you are capable of will suspect that it is not what it appears to your foolish minds whon God by the Wisest Man doth thus Ironically brand it he loads you with scorn while you fondly please your selves with these poor delights as your only Paradice God keep me from that as my Portion which God accounts my reproach Obj. But may not a Young Man rejoyce Answ. Yes no doubt thou oughtest to delight thy self in the Lord Psal. 37. 4. yea thou mayst delight moderately and holily in Objects of sence but that 's not the rejoycing here exposed The following words explain the nature of this forbidden joy it 's that evil pleasure which thou takest in walking in the wayes of thy heart and in the sight of thine eyes q. d. Oh vile Creature how base art thou become that confinest thy pleasures to and resolvedly wallowest in the delights that come by following the vain imaginations of thy carnal heart and meer gratifying thy sences What a bruit art thou that sportest thy self in a disregard of God and unseen things and valuest the time of Youth only as it fits thee to execute what is sinful and relish what is sensual Is this rejoycing becoming thee as a reasonable Creature made for and suited to things of so far a higher nature Is thy correspondence to the Objects of Faith quite gone art thou so sunk and buried in flesh Is there no spiritual light or love to govern thy desires and pleasures If this be the merry Young Man what an object of contempt is he in all his mirth even in
Crimes whiles he was young Learn wisdom by such now whiles thou hast opportunity and warnings I now proceed to the second head of the Vanity of Childhood and Youth viz. 2. Children and young People are apt to live to no valuable purpose which is Vanity Thou wilt easily allow that to spend ones strength and time for nothing or for what is as good as nothing is vain Is not he a vain body that thinks much talks much and doth much to no purpose Common opinion will grant this we brand Caius Caligula as vain for bringing a great Army to the Sea-shore and gathering Cockle-shells when he pretended a great attempt The Spirit of God justly accuseth those Persons Isa 41. 29. Behold they are all vanity their works are nothing Solomon doth frequently mean this in his Book of Ecclesiastes when he saith This is also Vanity that is it 's to no valuable purpose it is not worth the labour and concern a man is at One had as good let it alone and be unemployed as reap no other fruit Young People this is your very Case Most of you live and busie your selves for nought 1. You are apt to design nothing at all in your living It 's long before thou askest thy self What do I live for What end shall I pursue are not most of thy actions performed thou knowest not why Most of you are hurried by a foolish Temper allowing no deliberate design to govern you A vain mind or Devilish suggestions determine the actings of most Young People Is not this a reproach to thee if thou happen to do any good it 's more by chance than by thy choice If thou receivest any real advantage it 's by a merciful Providence and not by thy Intention If God should ask thee at the Church Door wherefore comest thou hither May not some of you say I do not know or it was from a fancy I had to hear or from custom But how few can say I had a design to get some help to grapple with my youthful lusts I proposed to meet with God in his Word for my Souls improvement When you intend so little in an Ordinance what purposes must govern you in the ordinary affairs of Life 2. Your Youth is spent to no considerable purpose May not I tell most here thy time past is lost and the time to come is like to be lost For 1. Thou hast lived in vain as to thy self What hast thou gotten by the ten years thou hast lived Oh Child of ten years old What hast thou improved by the fifteen years thou hast lived Oh Youth of fifteen years old yea may not I as justly ask the Young Man of twenty What hast thou done what use hast thou made of thy twenty years Must not Conscience answer Oh! I had as good been just now born for any good I have gotten That I may fasten this Conviction I call every Soul to answer me what art thou nearer God to this day how much is Sin mortified what Grace hast thou attained to this very time Oh youth hast thon yet got an Interest in Christ what Treasure hast thou laid up in Heaven If thou must own I am further from God and not nearer Sin is stronger and not weakned then sure thou wilt own thou hast lived in vain to thy self 2. But yet farther how many others may lay to thee the charge of unprofitableness Thou livest in vain as to God He may say This young Body never served nor praised me I had as good there had not been such a Youth in the World Thou livest in vain to thy Friends thy Parent may say It is an unprofitable Child to me I have yet had no comfort by him Thy Relations may cry He never gave us good Counsel or Example Thou livest in vain to thy Master he hath got little advantage by thy care or labour Thy Minister may cry This young body brings me little joy as yet I have striven to little purpose with him he seems as if I had laboured wholly in vain 1 Thes. 3. 5. Thou hast lived in vain to the Church what increase or Glory hath it reaped by thee Thou hast lived in vain to the Nation thou hast not helped to make it more innocent by thy Life more flourishing by thy industry or more safe by thy Prayers So that now Young man is it not a true Charge which I lay to thee mayest thou not cry out Oh useless I I have lived for nought I have been an useless shadow I have cumbered the ground and God may justly cut me off as an unfruitfull one Luk. 13. 7. Obj. I foresee some Young one will be ready to evade this Charge and say I do live to some purpose that is valuable I gratifie my senses I live pleasantly I begin to look after the world c. Answ. Alas poor Creature is living to the Flesh valuable Is living barely to this World valuable Is living to the Devil valuable Methinks thy Reason should tell thee It 's better not to live at all than live to these An intelligent Spirit to live to the Flesh is base an immortal Soul to live barely to this World is madness A Creature of God redeemed by the Lord Jesus to live to the Devil is self-destructive and foolish What! live to him who hath undone thee in the Fall and is so studious to prevent thy recovery by Christ Live to him who hath blinded blemished and debased thee as he hath done Live to him who tho he hates thy God cannot escape his own misery Live to him who envieth thy good desires thy woe opposeth all that is the benefit of Mankind and contributes to all the miseries and disorders which the World is distressed by Oh young man canst thou justifie this course of living But this will more appear if upon a due reflection on thy Life thou wilt answer me these Questions 1. Doth thy Life answer Gods End and Purpose in giving thee a Being The wisdom of God may assure thee he had an end becoming himself in thy creation he tells thee all things were created by him and for him Col. 1. 10. The blessed God had an Eye to himself and a regard to Christ the Redeemer in giving thee an Existence He exerted his Power in thy Being that thou mightest serve and honour him dost thou answer this End by living as thou dost hast thou ever aimed at this doth thy behaviour contribute to this at all Thy way of Life would be a Reproach to thy Maker to have proposed to himself in thy Creation 2. Are there not greater Purposes to which thy Nature and Abilities are suited He lives to an unvaluable purpose that neglects to live to the highest Purposes he is capable of Little things are a reproach to him that is adapted to great things Have not you Faculties to know and love your God and do your childish or wicked employments answer them You are capable to serve and glorifie
the blessed God and is the gratifying thy lusts equal to these You are receptive of divine Joys and are thy carnal merriments answerable to these Oh young Body what use art thou fit for to others What benefit mayest thou yield to thy self how canst thou seem to answer these by a trifling diversion or a perishing advantage Sure thy Capacity is thy shame the very Beast that liveth to the utmost of his Powers will witness against thee who behavest thy self so much below thine It would have been thy Mercy whose Exercises have been so low that thy abilities had been less Hence 3. Wilt not thou shortly acknowledge with shame and grief that thou hast lived to unvaluable Purposes No Ministers rebukes will be so sharp as thy own when Grace renews thee or endless Torments overtake thee If the Spirit ever enlighten thy Mind and alter thy Will we may ask thee What fruit had you of those things whereof you are now ashamed Rom. 6. 21. With a grieving blush thou wilt answer Nothing I dare boast of nothing I can justifie I am ashamed of my Reward as well as my Labour What I reaped by Sin is my shame as well as sin it self it was a Fools Diversion wherewith I pleased my self it was my Blemish wherein I gloried it was my Loss whereby I valued my self What are they now to me they are Dogs meat 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to what I now taste Phil. 3. 8. I am astonished that I could relish these unsavoury things or derive the least Contentment from them when my chief Good was unsecure Young Man if Grace do not awaken thee Hell will the never-dying Worm will be Convictions of the emptiness of what thou hast pursued and the base Purposes thou hast lived to How will they tear thy Soul with such Thoughts as these where 's the Pleasure now where 's the Satisfaction to which my Endeavours were confined oh that I had been but a Beast who have lived to designs so brutish Oh that I had had no intellectual Nature being I studied not to know my God and the way of Life Oh that I had been void of rational Powers since I did not govern my self accordingly Oh that ever I had natural Abilities to love and fear being I have not loved my God nor so revered him as to abstain from Vanity Wo is me that I had a Capacity for any Service seeing I have lived so uselesly to God to my Friends and to my self Alas where is the Fruit of my labonr what now do I enjoy that deserved one hour of my life or answers the least of my Abilities These these oh Child will be the Effects of thy present way 3. Children and young People are apt to live to destructive purposes which is the height of Vanity The last Head is convincing that it were as well thou hadst never lived but by this it were far better for thee thou hadst remained meer nothing to this day to live to hurtful Ends is worse than not living at all yet this is thy Condition you dishonour God you provoke the Eyes of his Glory you trample the blood of Christ under your Feet with Contempt How many young People serve the Devil with their strength are a Snare and Infection to all they can influence One young body spoils many others and leads them to that Villany they had never thought of You oft break your Parents Hearts and they by thy means feel that a foolish Son is the heaviness of his Mother Prov. 10. 1. You frequently destroy your Master's Estate To the serious you are a Grief to the City and Kingdom a Plague as helping on its Sin hastning its Punishment and obstructing its Good How many may complain of Harm on thy account But whatever Hurt you bring to others sure you avoid Mischief to your selves No no Young men live most to their own Hurt and seem to take great pains to make their Misery sure and great Oh vain Youth thou daily makest thy self more the Child of Wrath by thy sinful Practices thy wicked Habits grow more strong by idleness and frequent opposition hopeful Principles are more baffled and expelled Conscience by thy Affronts is less concerned and capable to admonish thee Thy ill treatment of Gods Spirit makes him withdraw and his Visits are more seldom so that he is ready to say of thee Let him alone Hos. 4. 17. Believe it careless Youth thy ways tend to more sin and less hopefulness of Grace and Glory Oh wretched Life to live only to be more guilty and to be exposed to greater Punishments thou runnest Hell-ward thy Thoughts tend there thy Words lead there thy vile Actions heap the greater store of eternal Flames Indignation and Wrath Tribulation and Anguish are the things thou workest for Rom. 2. 8 9. Thou labourest for these Wages thou livest thy self daily to a greater obnoxiousness to these Woes as if thou wert afraid thou shouldest not be miserable enough Oh Soul to be pitied not to be born had been thy mercy as well as Iudas unless thou change thy living is it not to thee those words are proper Behold you are worse than nothing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Isa. 4. 24. Hadst thou not lived at all thou hadst not done the mischief thou now art doing thou couldst not have felt the hurt thou must shortly endure How may most young Folk bemoan the day of their Birth their Life is a misery which might have capacitated them for the Bliss of Angels had they well employed it The Lord grant you be not found thus foolish and cruel to your selves yet to this you are more proner than to a more profitable Course The next Work is to shew you 1. How Childhood and Youth became thus vain 2. Why they continue so 3. How most young People grow still vainer 1. Quest. How comes it to pass that Childhood and Youth are vain Ans. Childhood and Youth became vain by Original Sin There 's the Spring of the Disease thou didst not come out of God's Hand thus prone to sin and thus averse to himself But a depraved Nature descends to thee from Adam by the Line of thy Ancestors Thou wert born under the Infection common to Mankind generated in the ordinary manner the very quickened Embrio in the Womb hath all the Seeds of those sins which time ripens and opportunity brings forth our Constitution is become sinful and all corrupt Effects are next to natural I shall not trouble you with Disputes but meerly inform you 1. How our Nature became corrupt 2. How it descends thus corrupted to thee 1. Our Nature became corrupt or vain by the entrance of Sin whereby the Divine Image was expelled as well as forfeited A Rational Soul cannot be void of moral Qualities and Dispositions as it is a Subject of God's moral Government there must be Wisdom or sinful Ignorance in the Mind there must be Love or Enmity to what is good and Aversion or Inclination
vain Answ. Childhood and Youth continue vain for want of a due use of means appointed for their healing O young People here are three things in this that are very fit to move you 1. First here 's Comfort that the Vanity of Youth is healable thy case is sad but 't is not desperate there 's hope in Israel concerning the Recovery of Sinners in their Youth The Devils became wicked and never can be recovered they may grow viler but they can never grow better but blessed be God this is not thy case the Wound though sad is yet curable There have been many young Folk made pious and serious Isaac was good betimes Timothy and Iohn were Old Disciples before they could call Man Iosiah's tender years were impress'd with Grace I have known undoubted Evidence of Grace before ten year old Oh then you need not resolve to be vile because 't is in vain to attempt to be good no no No young Persons in this Assembly need to say so or need think so God has not resolved against Young Persons that they shall never be recovered nay he has determined that out of the mouth of Babes and Sucklings he will ordain praise Psal. 8. 2. Children Our Lord Jesus has never said he will have nothing to do with such as you I 'll neither wash you nor heal you nor teach you Nay he has said quite otherwise Suffer little Children to come unto me and forbid them not c. Mat. 19. 14. The Spirit of God never resolv'd I will convince no wicked Children I will sanctifie no prophane Youth nay instead of that to you he speaks in Psal. 34. 11. Come ye Children hearken to me and I will teach you the fear of the Lord. The Spirit has a Mind to be the Teacher of Children and the Instructer of Youth he has a mind to train up the Young Generation for Heaven as well as the Old ones So that Young ones may say to Day Why though I am wicked yet there 's hope and though I have a vile Nature yet there 's hope I may be recovered even though my whole frame seems thus set for Villany and appears thus desperately dispos'd There 's the first point and that 's a great matter and under the power of that I preach to Young Ones and under the hopes of that you Young Ones should regard what I say and urge for the case of Youth is healable 2. Secondly Here 's a loud Call to you that God uses means to heal Young Ones of their Vanity This confirms the former Is God at pains with Youth to make them better then there 's hope of Youth for God would not be at this labour if it were wholly useless O my Friends God has sent his Son to dye for young Children as well as old Men even Young ones receive forgiveness by his Blood My little Children to whom I write for your sins are forgiven 1 Ioh. 2. 12. The Spirit of God strives with many Young ones as soon as they can understand any thing he bids early for your compliance I do believe there 's not a Child of six years old under the Gospel Means but the Spirit of God has been striving with This holy One can truly say I have been dealing with this Child to make it happy Pray let 's a little consider Thou Child or Youth hast thou had no sence of Hells misery ever upon thy Heart hast thou never been convinc'd that 't was ill to Lye or Swear Hast thou never found pressing motions to be good and to resolve against evil have no good desires stirr'd in thy Soul Why all these were the workings of the Spirit of God on thy poor Soul God has been labouring with every young Body in this Congregation He has been labouring with thee by the advice of thy Parents when they taught thee to read or taught thee thy Catechism or instructed thee to pray it was God by them taking pains with thee We Preachers preach to you Young Ones as well as to the Old nay we preach to you with more hopes expecting that you are not hardned as old Persons are Young People have not the Mercies of God have not the preservations of God towards you been so many Teachers What has been the Language of every Mercy to thee Child to you young ones but this Oh Children don 't you provoke this God don't make me your Enemy for you see I would fain do you good I would fain be merciful and not a Destroyer of you Nay have not Afflictions been the pains of God with you Is there ever a Young one here that has not been sick at one time or other Why the Lord sent that Sickness to thee and spake in this manner thereby I will warn this Young one to be Religious lest he should dye before he be converted all the Corrections of thy Parents and Master for thy Sin they have all been the Calls of God and his Language in them all has been I would fain imbitter Sin to this poor Young one by something short of Hell I would gladly restrain the Wickedness of this Youth before I must damn him You see you had need look to it for God has used means towards your recovery think not God doth not mean me in his Word don't say God did not intend my cure in the helps I enjoy alas he intendeth thee as well as any other It 's thy enlightening Oh Young Man he intends by all his teachings 'T is thy Conversion O Young Woman that he designs by all his Calls all these have been directed upon this very design and least you should doubt it the Spirit of God does particularly name you O Young Men and Maids praise you the Lord Psal. 148. Young Men be sober Tit. 2. 6. Nay Christ himself tells us in Prov. 1. 4. that his great design there is to give discretion to the simple young ones Therefore I beg that not one young body in this place may forget what I say now that they frustrate God's hopes if they be not Good and disappoint him of all his labour if they be not gracious all the pains that have been taken with them are lost upon them and will God bear this will he always bear this what will become of you if you proceed this way 3. Thirdly Here 's an awful Charge That you young Men continue vain because you don 't rightly use the means for your healing Ah sad Charge the case of young ones is curable but why is it not altered before now Why O Conscience speak Children you have Consciences Young Ones you have Consciences Can you say 't is long of God I am vile still 't is long of the want of means that I am vile still Ah Friend Father Son and Spirit can all say 't is not my Fault that this Child is bad still 't is not my Fault this young Man and Woman is wicked so long 't is not long of me May not
the Spirit of God say I have taken more pains with this Child and spoken oftner to this young person than I have done with thousands in the World Alas so it is concerning every one of you Children of Pagans in all their days never had thy helps Consider a little with your selves God may this day say I begin early with this young one I have still pleaded after many a repulse I have followed him and her from day to day and from sin to sin Oh how earnest have I been with this young Stripling that I could propose very little good by yet have I taken pains and labour with him Come young People is it now to begin that God has cry'd to you Turn unto me why will you die Ezek. 33. 11. Is now the first time that he has said unto you When will you be made clean when shall it once be Jer. 13. 27. Has Christ never said unto thee O look to me and be saved Look to me for help for there 's help no where else Thy distress makes me needful and pity makes me willing Lay these things to Heart and I will defie any young body in this place to go away and say I have lived up to what I know I have improved all that God has afforded me but he denied to give me more I am miserable and wicked still because God has refused to help me when I have sought it of him Is there any that can talk at this rate No not one Not one Why then whence is it that we have so many young People bad still Why still so fatal to thy self why a Slave to base Lusts O Friends God knows the cause and thou knowest the cause thou didst not use that knowledge thou hadst thou didst not improve thy opportunity doth not Conscience witness thy Ear has not been opened thy Heart has not been attentive thou didst not frame to turn unto the Lord. Hos. 5. 4. God can say this day this poor Creature might have been in a good case he would have been serious before now if he would but have yielded to my pleadings if he had turned at my Reproofs This young body would have been an eminent Christian before now had all my Impressions been retained and all my Calls complied with he had known me better had he been but teachable in my ways as he was in other things Prov. 2. 15. Oh then young People Consider with your selves what has been your case you have told God plainly I will not come to thee that I might have Life Where 's the young body that has not practically given God a denyal And every time thou wert under Conviction of sin and didst not leave it thou didst tell God Lord I would be thine but I love my sin better I would be happy for ever but I will not unless I may be wicked in this World The youngest here hath the great hand in his own ruine he that is but of ten Years old if he perish he is his own Destroyer I think it 's true of many younger Children you were born vain and you have wilfully chosen to remain so You may be ready to accuse Adam by whom you became wicked but it is your own fault that you continue wicked since God hath provided a Remedy it s your sin that you are no better for Mercies no better for Affliction no better for Means wicked before and wicked still O therefore what will you be able to answer how sad is it that any young body here should be forc'd to say Lord 't is my fault that I am no better for a Christ and no better for the Gospel my Misery is of my own choosing God has taken pains with me but 't is all lost through the obstinacy of my Will These three things are plain under that second Head wherein you see why Young people remain vile and vain 3. Thirdly Youth becomes yet more vain by evil Customs and indulging carnal self vanity unhealed is of an improving nature and there 's no bad Child but grows worse Sin is not a Stream that grows empty or a Root that dies by meer time God knows we have had experience of that Alas how does Villany grow with Years the Child that began with few sins grows up to many sins insomuch that we have some young men before eigthteeen have committed as great sins as the man of eighty Youth enters with lesser sins and proceeds to grosser sins We have many young People that seem to abound in wickedness as they improve in age as if they grew older only that they may grow viler Oh what a mercy would it have been for those to have died in the Womb or any one year before another Now Sirs whence is it how can it be that young people should grow vainer and vainer instead of better and better I tell you one sin brings on another by the lesser thou art fitted for a greater Sinful Habits are strengthned by sinful Acts and fear and shame for sin wear off yea are even extinguished by a course of sin O poor Soul Satan has got the faster hold The Spirit has been provoked and given over striving and it may be thy Parents through Despair have almost given over praying Conscience that warn'd thee is sear'd and silenc'd and so the wicked Creature has his whole Scope 2 Tim. 4. 2. God sayes of him Let this poor Creature alone I 'le strive with him no more Gen. 6. 3. O young Folks you may be harden'd before you grow old Lust may be strongly rooted before old Age and I fear 't is so with abundance of Youth Is it not so with some of you Did not some of you blush at a little sin and now thou canst mock at great ones Are there not some amongst you that once dared not to tell a small Lye and now you can lye all sorts Are there none here that trembled when they swore a little Oath and now can swear at the bloodiest rate and add Blasphemy and Cursing to their Oaths Sirs did not some of you feel a check for a light act and now you can commit Fornication and Uncleanness without any inward Rebuke It was hard to bring thee to pilfer a Peny and now thou canst steal Shillings and Pounds It was much ado that thou couldst endure to be drunk in the Night but now thou canst do it openly and glory in it Thou durst not formerly have neglected a Sermon and thou must pray by thy self but now alas poor Creature thou canst play away a whole Sabbath and spend Weeks without Prayer without one serious Prayer My Friends what 's the matter is sin grown a less evil by no means Is God and Heaven and Hell less certain No no Sirs you will feel it to your Cost Is thy poor Soul less precious and less valuable No this is not it neither but the reason of it is this Wickedness is grown by Wickedness committing sin has
made it easie the Current of sin running has made the Channel wider and the opposition less O therefore for the Lords sake begin this day to consider the Devil is grown more impetuous by thy Consent And I can tell thee to day and let the youngest of you observe it That if thou continuest wicked thou wilt be yet more and more so And thou wouldst now blush to think what Wickedness thou wilt hereafter come to As Hazael when it was foretold him by the Prophet what Cruelties he should commit cries out Is thy Servant a Dog 2 King 8. 13. c. Thus I have finished what I intended in the Explication I now come to the Use. First by way of Inference the Lord set it home Some own'd great good on this day twelve-month may more receive good to day The Inferences then are these Inf. 1. How dismal a sight doth this Truth afford us of this World Childhood and Youth is Vanity Ah Lord how true then is it that even the whole World lies in Wickedness 1 Joh. 5. 19. the greater part doth so for Young People are many more than old ones The chief part of Age is Vanity the best part of Time is Vanity Childhood is the time fittest to learn in Youth is the time fittest to act in and yet both these are Vanity Oh how little are heavenly Designs carried on by Young Ones Oh how little is God worshipp'd and serv'd by Young ones How few of them are engag'd in their own true Concerns Dreadful that in Youth we will do nothing and in Age we can do nothing Oh who loves God and is not grieved who loves Souls and is not melted All men come sick into the World and most men grow more diseased by their stay there All come miserable and most help on each others Ruine and encrease their own Oh how many go off the Stage and have reason to wish would to God I had perish'd before I saw the light So like Hell is this present State that i'ts a wonder we are able to take any Delight therein God is serious with pleople in their younger Years and they heed it not Ministers are earnest with young People and they regard it not Ah poor Wretches they think we have nothing to do with them Oh Young Ones help us to mourn to day for I am calling on Men to mourn for you who in your Youth yield your selves up to your Lusts and thereby are injurious to Christ and cruel to your own Souls and will you be unmoved Inf. 2. What Care is incumbent on Parents and Masters in the managing of Young Persons Youth is vain and that bespeaks a suitable carriage O Parents you don't beget Angels but sinful Children you breed up corrupt ones and not perfect ones Few are sanctified in the Womb and therefore you should deal with Children as with deprav'd and corrupt Persons as with them whose Childhood and Youth is Vanity The very Distemper directs Parents and Masters in their duty and carriage towards their Children I shall especially name Parents in my Directions 1. Children are Ignorant Oh therefore take you occasion to instruct them Alas canst thou let thy Children be unacquainted with God and insensible of their own Misery or the way of their escape What must thy Child be inspir'd or it must perish for want of knowledge If it must know pray who is fittest to teach it Upon whom does it lye in point of Duty as it does upon you And who has the Advantage of doing it as thou hast Who is so like to prevail with thy Child as thy self None faithfully dedicates his Child to God in Infancy that will not carefully instruct him when of age to learn 2. Youth have unruly Appetites and therefore don't indulge them Oh that every Parent here had but his Heart open to what I say and I speak it out of pity to the Souls of Young ones 'T is an ill practice in Parents to feed their Child by the cravings of i'ts Lust and not by their own Judgment I will tell you the Mischief of it besides the laying a foundation of distemper in Age it gives the Appetite an ungovernable force Children being alwayes indulg'd in what they crave they cannot deny themselves any thing they desire and by the same rule that they must now eat what and when and drink what and when they will while they are under thy care they will be drunk and Whore c. when they grow in years their Reason cannot bridle it then as thine which ought to guide them neglects to do it now Oh dreadful thing that any Childrens Appetites should come from under their Parents tuition unbridled I look on nothing a greater Reproach to Parents And what 's the ground of all Wickedness in the World more than an Inordinate Appetite yet how few Parents do help to cure it while cureable whereas an Appetite curbed in Childhood would endure a denial in Age. 3. Youth have violent Humours and Selfishness and therefore don 't foolishly gratifie them A Child left to himself brings his Mother to shame Pr. 29. 15. Oh what a Devilish Sight how pleasing to Satan to see Children cocquer'd and Youth indulg'd It 's peevish then all must be done to please it it 's obstinate and it must have it's will it 's revengeful and it must not be check'd this is the way of most Parents And 't is just with God that Child should break your Hearts whose Will you never broke How many poor Creatures will have cause in Hell to curse their Parents Dreadful that they prove the worst Enemies to their Children under a pretence of fondness 4. Youth have many Lusts and are prone to sin therefore be afraid for them and prevent all Occasions Iob knew this Iob 1. 5. He went and offer'd Sacrifice lest his Children should have sin'd and cursed God in their hearts Oh that Parents would consider what brittle Vessels Children be what dry'd tinder Youth is Occasions though small over-rule Young Persons What then Oh then be perswaded to choose the Company of your Children for them see that it be of their own Sex and Virtuous Put them to Trades and such Trades as have the least Snares set them in Families where most Good is to be got and least evil to be catch'd Find them business and fulness of Employ and cut out their time for them Parents learn this Wisdom that your Children have no time for Idleness Marry them as soon as convenient if so be you are not very certain of their Sobriety 5. The Vanity of Youth is deeply rooted therefore be importunate pleaders and sharp Correctors If advice prevail not 't is not an easie thing to cure a Child of it's Vanity or Youth of it's Folly Foolishness is bound up in the heart of a Child the Rod of Correction will drive it far from him Prov. 22. 15. And withhold not correction from thy Child and he shall not dye Prov. 23.
Soul would say Amen how would Satan be disappointed how would Heaven rejoyce it would be thy best day and the entrance of eternal Life Obj. But I believe some here are ready to say Sir must I now change must I now stop my Vanity surely 't is too soon Sure I might be vain a little longer there 's no danger in it I hope Answ. My Address to you is for this Instant even to day harden not your Hearts Heb. 4. 7. Oh Child just now cease to be vain 't is late enough with the youngest of you it 's not too soon to stop a wicked Course now now thou shouldst yield to Christ If you ask Why now I tell you 1. Because young Peoples Souls shall be saved or damned by the same Rules as the old ones if they be past Infancy Oh if you die to night God will judge you by the Gospel Rom. 2. 16. and that 's the lowest Rule God can judge you by Youth must be judged as well as Men Eccl. 11. 10. Young ones that obey not the Gospel shall not escape the Vengeance 2 Thess. 1. 8 9. 2. God is concerned at and provok'd by the Vanity of Children Pray consider you think it may be that God takes no more notice of what you say or do than you do your selves Alas you are deceived don't you think God was angry with the Children whom he slew by the Bears for deriding the Prophet 2 King 2. 24. God notes what you do Young Ones God doth not rule old Men and leave Children to their own Wills his Laws are prescribed to young Men under the same Threats as to the old and it 's not indifferent to him what you do God observes what you do as much as any other person for you are his Subjects you were made for his Glory you serve him or his Enemy the Devil and what you do is good or evil 3. The youngest of you are under Vows to God against Vanity I suppose you were entred into Gods Covenant by your Parents as Deut. 29. 11 12. Was not a holy Heart and a serious godly Life engaged in that Covenant in opposition to Sin and Satan You are dedicated to God in your Infancy you are his and not your own Young Children what will you lie to God now will you be perjur'd now O God forbid Dare any young Person here say I was given to God in my Infancy but I now retract it I was sworn to be the Lords but I will not keep to him Baptism will sink those Children of Believers who perform not their Vows and practically renounce their God 4. Let me tell you if you remain vile all your Youth a thousand to one but you will be ever so You may die before you are old and then you are undone but if you live and are not converted when young it 's improbable that ever you should O it 's ill dealing with old Sinners they are conceited full of Prejudices immersed in worldly Cares the Calls and Threatnings of God are grown familiar to them and their Souls stupid and void of Affections God makes now and then an Instance of Grace in them but 't is rare the last Hour Converts are next to Miracles most feel that he that hardens his heart being often reproved shall die without Remedy Prov. 29. 1. 5. Again Oh what service mayst thou do for God when thou ceasest to be vain betimes Come my Friends what a heap will every days little come to in time if Young persons would but now begin to be holy tho they act but a little for God every day it will at length amount to much As we say he that begins with the Sun will make a long days Journey Oh how much do Young People do for the Devil in a state of sin when they live long how large is the Roll of their Transgressions and how much might they do for God in a state of Grace how many may bless God for thee what a publick blessing mayst thou prove thou mayst well be an eminent Saint much improved for Heaven and abundant in the fruits of Righteousness 6. Our Youth will be the Plague or Hope of this Land in this great Crysis Great things are before us the rapid motion of Providence hints no common matters There have of late been many ways taken to debauch Young People in their Manners to prejudice them against Holiness and Sobriety Nevertheless the holy God has seasoned some Young Ones there are many looking Heaven-ward and God seems designed to reform the rest Well whether of these two prevail doth determine England's lot Oh if our Youth grow yet more profligate God's about to leave us if he recover our Youth we may hope he 'll yet continue amongst us Young Ones I would be earnest with you for God indicates his mind to England by you Oh be you all ready to say Can I help to save a Nation by the Grace of God I will be one of these that will do it let Satan and the World and the Flesh struggle with me as they can 7. This youthful Vanity continued in will be the grief and wounding of Age tho thou shouldst be converted then Little do you now know what youthful sins may cost you in old Age Thou makest me to possess the sins of my youth sayes Iob ch 13. 16. Oh how bitter will the remembrance of past Villanies be oh how wilt thou tremble to think thou hast help'd any one in the way to Hell when thou thy self art got out of that road How will it grieve thee to think thou hast been a means to damn any Soul can it be a little thing to thee the Joy of late Converts is abated by the thoughts of youthful Sins Paul carry'd it to the Grave with him that he was a Persecutor in his Youth Believe me Sirs the Evidence of our Conversion when late is more than made up by the Innocency of our Lives when converted young And they are to blame who seem to complain that gross Villanies have not made their Change more remarkable Thus I have done with the first Vse God grant it be to such purpose that none may go out of this place unwearied and unresolved unwearied with his Vanity and unresolved to put an end to it Exhort 2. To such as through Grace are delivered from this Vanity Before I enter on this I must declare you are our Joy and our Crown I would I could speak it of every one here to day Oh that every Young One in this place were of this Number You are our Comfort that God has some to propagate Religion when we are dead and gone How lovely is Gods Image in your tender Years Your Grace is less questionable now than it would be if you were aged I say your Conversion's more evident now for you are now in your Health and Heat you are now under the force of Temptation you are not decripid and aged and under the
his jollity he is to be scorned as well as pityed 2. He allarms this brutish Sensualist with a prospect of Judgment God addresseth himself to thee as one stupidly ignorant but know thou it 's what thou art little acquainted with or thoughtful about for all these things he will bring thee into judgment a sore thorn in thy gay Cloaths a great cooler to thy lusts meer gall in thy Cups and a sad disturbance to thy airy conceits God will bring thee into judgment for all these things Thô thou despise his Laws thou shalt not escape his Sentence he will not leave it to thee whether thou shalt be miserable though he referr'd it to thy choice whether thou wouldst be serious hee 'l compell thee to feel his wrath though he would not force thee to refrain thy voluptuousness Yea Oh thou that sportest thy self in thy brutish delights thou shalt account for all thou shalt suffer for each Thy punishment shall be proportioned to thy sins and to thy pleasures thou didst take in sinning and dost thou never consider how great that 's like to be 3. He then annexeth a serious Caution against two evils to which Young Persons are obnoxious v. 10. Therefore remove sorrow from thy heart that is anger as the word may be rendred or all those heart lusts which will end in sorrow of heart Thou art afraid of seriousness thou seemest to prevent sorrow by thy carnal mirth but alas thou art making way for the deepest groans by thy seeming cure thou bringest on sorrow by a pretended driving it away But Young Man God seeing thou takest a wrong course condescends to warn thee against the anguish which thou preparest by thy vicious inclination 2. And put away evil from thy flesh that is fleshly pollutions to which Youth is prone or the bodily punishments which vile courses expose to If you take the first sence then as in forbidding heart lusts he stops a course of sin at the Spring-head without which all the attempts for Reformation will be too feeble so in forbidding fleshly pollutions he would restrain the acting of sin q. d. Thô Lust is conceived in the Heart yet let it not break forth in thy practice for abstinence from wicked acts will conduce to change thy temper and abate thy guilt If you take the latter sence then he argues from that misery which brutish Youth is most likely to be affected by q. d. That Body which thou so indulgest that flesh whereof thou art so tender is like to feel the woful effects of thy folly Therefore as thou lovest thy very flesh kindle not the flames which are to devour it in Hell bring not down those Judgments which may torment thy Body on this side the Grave The wise Man introduces these advices by a Motive referring to v. 9. Therefore c. as if he had said because God will bring thee to judgment avoid these sins for which thou shalt certainly be arraigned and prevent the miseries which the sentence will include and which the Judge must execute according to the sanction of that Law whereby thou shalt be judged Then then O Young Man thou shalt know by the punishment felt that thy Lawgivers threatnings were not vain though during temptations they appeared so My Text is a further Motive and as such is here inserted For Childhood and Youth are Vanity q. d. To these sins your young years are prone they have room in your temper and without great care and labour cannot be removed or put away therefore be intent and vigorous to put away evil from your flesh to remove sorrow from thy heart Having thus described the Coherence of the words I shall lay them down for a Doctrine as they be in my Text. Doct. Childhood and Youth are Vanity I shall explain this Doctrine and insist on that sence of the words which will most conduce to the advantage of Young Persons 1. Childhood and Youth may be taken for that time of Humane Life which is short of Manhood If you take it thus then the whole clause may be thus expressed Though you are very apt to boast of these years as most conducive to happiness though now your Spirits are vigorous your Bodies healthy and strong your Sences quick the Cares and Maladies of Old-Age are far from you yet all this will not make you happy This time of Youth it self is vanity it 's insufficient to make thee a Blessed Creature yea though thou didst enjoy all sensible things that can minister to its satisfaction it is but vanity a poor thing a short and empty matter which leaves its admirers deceived yea undone if they have no better provision A serious Old Man disdains those years and would not live them over again yea few live long that wish not much of that time expunged out of their life and remember it with a blush 2. Childhood and Youth note Persons of those Years or age viz. Children and Young People I shall consider these words in this sence and of such of you the Spirit of God proclaimeth vanity as your proper Epithite Quest. What is meant by Vanity as it predicates of these Young People Answ. Vanity is either natural or moral and then it 's the same as to say 1. Young People are frail and mortal All flesh is grass and the goodliness thereof as the flower of the Field Isa. 40. 6. The robust Youth hath his breath in his Nostrils by the Course of Nature he may live longer than Old men yet by the Frailty of Nature he may die before the oldest man Thou reckonest upon long Life but thou mayest dye tomorrow Oh young man thou hast the seeds of Death in thee thou canst not resist any Messenger of Death Heb. 9. 17. the Sentence lies against thee and sin the cause of Death cleaves to thy early Age Rom. 8. 10. What variety of accidents art thou subject to every moment It 's by Gods power you Children are alive till now as well as the Man of eighty Oh young Folk that think of many years before Death and you can meet how many younger than you are already rotten in their graves there may be many Children in this place whose death your Fathers yea Grandfathers may live to mourn for it 's a brittle house your very Souls inhabit Exh. I cannot omit this Exhortation Do and forbear all you ought to do and forbear in order to Eternity as Persons within a step of Death I hope the youngest here are assured that there is no working in the grave Eccl. 9. 10. What is to be done for Eternity must be done while you live the state of trial lasts no longer than Life whatever is beyond the Grave is unchangeable reward or punishment Wilt thou lay to Heart these things 1. I have much to do for Eternity 2. Work for Eternity is hard to do 3. This work as hard as it is must be done or I perish for ever 4. How short a while may
Therefore press thy Soul with the sence of it's want and with the loveliness and necessity of Wisdom This will help thee to strong desires which are fervent Prayers Oh Child wilt thou be a Fool for want of praying Shall God say Here 's a Youth void of Wisdom because he would not ask it 2. Study and believe the Scriptures If thy Judgment bedirected by the Word it will be sound that gives understanding unto the simple Psal. 119. 130. Be sure you learn to read and when you can read read the Scriptures most there you must learn to think aright of God they will teach thee what the Will of God is the way of Salvation is there discovered from them thou hast the truest account of Sin and Holiness In the written Promises thou wilt know what to hope for in the Threatnings what thou shouldst fear in the Commandments what thou must do in the revealed Doctrines what thou shouldst believe Come Children you are allowed to learn the Scriptures Timothy is commended for knowing the Scriptures from a Child 2 Tim. 2. 15. Study you these there is nothing needfull for a Christian which is not contained therein Every thing as to Salvation is doubtful which is not deduced from these 3. Suspect thy first thoughts and never be governed by thy Fancy If thy sudden imaginations be right they will bear enquiry if they be wrong they need amendment Ordinarily the first dictates proceed from Vanity and shall that prescribe when Life and Death depend on thy Resolves nay how knowest thou but that they be Satans whispers which thou executest when Fancy is thy Guide for he speaks to the Soul by impressing the Imagination 4. Converse with the Godly Wise and strictly observe and lay up their Sayings and Examples The Word tells us He that walketh with wise men shall be wise but the Companion of fools shall be destroyed Prov. 13. 20. Their Speeches will instruct their practice will allure imitation whereas ill Company will debauch thy Mind and nourish thy Lusts. Prudent Persons will judge thy temper by thy associates well knowing thou art already or wilt certainly be what thy chosen Companions are 5. Design all knowledge in order to practice and live up to the light thou receivest He that in Sacred things takes up with Notions for notions sake is as truly a Fool as if he knew nothing It 's a practical Judgment that makes us spiritually wise when other knowledge will aggravate our sin and woe Oh Young Man wilt thou say unto Wisdom Thou art my Sister Prov. 7. 4. wilt thou cast off Folly with Indignation as thy great Disease should you be fond of that which sin introduced and will obstruct your healing whiles it prevails Folly is the bane of intellectual Beings and that 's of the worst sort which guides our practice Folly is the root of all your other Sins Wer 't thou spiritually wise thy work were more than half done and methinks thou shouldst not be hardly perswaded to get Wisdom Child wouldst thou be willing to be an Ideot Surely no every one pitieth such a one and is too apt to laugh at him But I tell thee to be a Fool as to Eternal things is much worse than to be an Ideot The Ideot hath few if any actual Sins to answer for but thou hast many There may be hopes of an Ideots Salvation especially if he be the Child of a Believer but if thou remain spiritually a Fool there 's no hope of thee tho' both thy Parents were the best of People All Folly is the blemish of Humane Nature but Spiritual Folly most of any 2. Young People are subject to Inconsiderateness and rashness How hard is it to make you think or lay the greatest things to heart neither Danger nor Duty do Young Ones apply to themselves Would not the Consciences of most of you agree with my accusation if I tell thee Child and thee Young Man or Woman Thou art under God's Wrath but wilt not consider it Thou dost not meditate on the way of recovery tho it be at great expence provided Christ dyed for thee but thou hast not spent one hour in the Contemplation of him Thou art loth to think what thy wayes are whether good or bad nor thy State whether safe or dangerous How few Young Ones here have seriously asked themselves Am I born again or no what will my sins bring me to what evil is there in my Sins when I must stand at Gods Tribunal to be judged what shall I answer what is like to be the issue how shall I dwell with everlasting burnings It 's too commonly with others as it was with that Young Man He goeth after her straightway or suddenly as an Oxe goeth to the slaughter till a dart strike through his Liver As a Bird hasteth to the snare and knoweth not that it is for his life Prov. 7. 22 23. He took not time to think what would be the issue of Sin unavoibable Torment gives the first prospect of his danger when consideration would have represented this Misery as a guard against Sin even whiles Temptation solicited Quest. What shall I a Young one do to deliliver me from this inconsiderateness Answ. In general strive to consider and bind thy mind to suitable and fixed Thoughts To this end 1. Do not at any time allow thy Thoughts to wander unaccountably It 's hard to confine them at any time when they usually rove It 's a great help for this World and for another to have our thoughts manageable and our Souls capable of being easily fixed in their Contemplations When ever thou thinkest be able to say What I think of it is worth a thought 2. Awe thy Soul with the importance of the things thou oughtest to consider If they be Soul-matters they be of the highest nature and they be of greatest concern to thee Tell thy self Life and Death depends on these If Sin have dominion over me I shall dye If I am not born again I cannot enter into the Kingdom of God Joh. 3. 5. And shall I lightly think of these what 's all the World to me if I perish for ever Things Divine things on which Eternity depends must be considered Oh my Soul wilt yea darest thou refuse to dwell on these which thou wert made for which thou must shortly converse with as the only realities whether thou wilt or no. 3. Get so much Knowledge of what thou shouldst consider as that thou mayst be able to represent it to thy Mind in some evidence It 's hard to consider long of what we little know if it be of God be not unacquainted with his Nature if it be of Sin be not ignorant of arguments to disswade from it and a sence of what aggravates it c. 4. Learn to discourse with thy self and to urge things upon thy Heart This will fix thy thoughts and bring things with some due impression on the Heart If thou canst not debate the matters
inwardly speak outwardly with thy Tongue as if two Persons were in talk together What shall I lose my Soul for a Lust Must not I if Gods Word be true rue my present Course It 's Gods charge that you commune with your own hearts Psal. 4. 4. he can neither be true nor profitable to himself who seldom speaks to himself 5. Take fit time and place to debate and apply things of most concern and bring things to a good conclusion Great things must not be determined by a few thoughts for so thou wilt neither pass a right judgment nor yet be duly affected Neither are serious matters becomingly considered in a Crowd or when thou art unfit to think And to consider without coming to a conclusion cannot fix thy Judgment or govern thy Will and Practice Therefore if the matter thought of be a Doubt press it to a resolution if it be a Duty consider all arguments 'till thy Will be fixedly determined to do it if it be a Sin which thou layest to Heart cease not representing the evil and danger of it before thou feelest thy self resolved against it and a strong indignation kindled to support that resolve Will you resolve to follow these Rules will you strive to manage your thoughts and shew your selves willing to be considerate I am sure thou wilt not refuse if thou hast a mind to chuse aright to walk safely or to have the benefit of what God hath afforded by natural Light Revelation or Providence to govern Mankind by Yea Young Man it 's impossible to be truly Religious or to answer the great ends of Religion without considering Oh then ponder the path of thy feet maturely deliberate on things that thy thoughts are due to 3. Young People are subject to be obstinate and heady This is one of your diseases you break through restraints and are regardless of advice intreaties avail little Yea Children though you be compared to tender Twigs do not you discover much stubbornness Parents command but you are disobedient they correct but you remain obstinate they perswade and intreat you to be sober but you are still vain Masters reprove you are still the same Ministers importunately call thee Oh Young Man from thy destructive Course but thou passest on and shuttest thy Ears against the Word Conscience oft speaks and represents thy guilt but thou seemest resolved on thy own ruine Yea God stands in thy way as the Angel with a drawn Sword but thou art fearless and seemest to say I will sin still let come what will of it Iob 15. 26. Let guilt grow let God strike let my Soul perish all these shall not alter me Oh poor Stripling how soon can God undo thee how soon will Hell Torments break thy Stomach and wilt thou still be like the wild Ass which snuffeth up the wind and in her occasion who can turn her away Jer. 2. 24. How canst thou Child endure to hear thy Parents groan I perswade my Child to be good but I cannot prevail I would instruct him but he is unteachable Woe is me I have brought forth for the Destroyer when this my Child was born I see him running Hell-ward and cannot restrain him I tremble to think from his setting out what he is like to come to Oh that the fruit of my Body should dishonour God as he is like to do that he should do the Mischiefs I foresee he will If God change not his Heart he may come to an untimely end and is sure to be damned for ever Oh that I had been written Childless canst thou be unmoved and still perverse Quest. How shall a Young Person be cured of this Obstinateness 1. Get thy Heart possessed of a holy Fear Beg of God a Heart that is in awe of him a Heart that reverenceth thy Parents and Superiours a Heart afraid of Sin and trembling at Hell and all other punishments due to Sin Fearlesness is a great ground of obstinacy Young Man these deserve fear God hath put this Passion into thy Nature to make thee governable What horrid madness is it not to fear a God who is a Consuming Fire Heb. 12. 29. Not to fear Hell and Misery which will force thee to weep and wail and gnash thy teeth for ever Mat. 22. 13. What a confusion and disorder is it among Mankind that Inferiors are wholly fearless of their Superiors especially sinful Worms of a dreadful God 2. Believe the kindness of these against whom thou art obstinate and stir up some grateful returns of love to rhem Thy perverseness implies that thou lovest not thy advisers nor thinkest that they have any love to thee when they advise thee But young Boy I would mind thee to day that it is from Love all these opposed Admonitions do proceed Doth not God love thee who made thee who put such Bowels in thy Parents towards thee Doth he not love thee who gives thee all the good thou enjoyest who spares thee and intreateth thee month after month when he might have sent thee to Hell at first without any loss to himself Doth not Christ love thee Oh Child who gave his Life for thee when thou wert an undone Enemy to him who sent his Spirit to strive with thee his Gospel to offer Mercy to thee his Ministers and others to teach thee as soon as thou couldst understand any thing must not he love thee young Man who pleads with God ready to cut thee down Lord let him alone this year longer Luk. 13. 8. Doth not he love thee that weeps over thee when he finds thee unperswadable and this becaufe he knows the woful anguish thy contempt will end in Do not thy Parents love thee Oh think at what care and pains thy Father is at for thy livelihood Think of the tender bowels of thy Mother what sorrow she hath selt what fears she is in when thou art in danger what tears she poureth forth when thou art sick and how it goeth to her Heart to correct thee I might shew all others love thee who advise thee to be good Well young Body canst thou chuse but think that the reproofs of these must proceed from love and art thou such a Brute as not to love them at all what not love thy God who is so good to thee Not love thy Christ who bled out his Soul in love to thee what not love thy Father and Mother to whom thou art so indebted wouldst thou be so requited when thou hast Children Obj. I hope I do love God Christ and my Parents I am not such a Devil and I think they love me Answ. What love them and be obstinate against their intreaties Love them and be disobedient in things they most insist on God and Christ account them Enemies Luke 19. 27. that are Rebels and puts thee plainly to it If you love me keep my Commandments Joh. 14. 15. As if he should say Never fancy or talk that you love me unless you will obey me
Thy Parents if they be pious will reduce thy love to the same instances Thus thy Mother bespeaks thee What my Son and the Son of my Womb and what the Son of my vows Give not thy strength to Women Prov. 31 2 3. and so she v. 4 5. forbids Drunkenness Thy Father charges thee My Child hear the instruction of a Father Let thy heart retain my words keep my Commandments and live get wisdom c. Prov. 4. 1 4. They will both intreat thee Child if thou hast any love for us keep from sin save thy self from Hell we are most concerned to see thee a real Saint and eternally glorious we 'll bear any thing rather than sin we are afraid for nothing as much as thy Soul if thou destroy that thou shewest the greatest hatred and art as cruel as thou canst be unto us Canst thou think thou lovest them and be thus perverse Nay if thou think they love thee that must cause some relentings How can I run so cross to my God and to my Parents who so dearly love my Soul and are so solicitous for its weal my hardned Heart begins to yield and I cannot continue obstinate my Love to them and my sense of their Love to me doe overpower my stubborn spirit 3. Be perswaded of thy own ignorance and unfitness to direct thy self A proud conceit that you know better than any what is for your good or harm is included in an obstinate frame Dost not thou think that if thou wert convinced that God bids thee do nothing but what were for thy good nor forbids thee any thing but what is for thy harm thou would'st do what he commanded and cease from what he forbids and would it not be the same as to thy Parents and others Let me then reason with thee Young Man Dost thou think thy God would deceive thee or thy Parents and Ministers would lye to thee when they disswade thee from sin and perswade thee to serious Piety and are so earnest in it thou must conclude they think as they say If they be not mistaken they would encourage me to do as I do but if I be mistaken I ought and would do as they advise Then young People the Matter is brought to this thou art obstinate against Counsel because thou art in the right and they that give thee Counsel are in the wrong They as thou thinkest advise thee to thy loss and all things set together thou consultest thy own true Interest better than they do But is not this a very vain Conceit and capital Error Oh Child sure thou art not wiser than thy holy Parents they know more than thou they have experienced what thou hast not they and thy Masters are forced to teach thee the little things of this Life thou would'st soon spoil and kill thy self if they left thee to thy own management Oh young Men and Women are not you sordidly foolish can you imagine you know what God will do with you better than he knows it do you know what you must lose by sin and suffer for sin better than God knows you judge by a short moment but he sees what Eternity is You conclude from what your Body now feels but he knows what thy Soul is and what himself is to the Soul whether in Wrath or Love He knows what the Glory of Heaven and Terrors of Hell amount to Thou concludest by thy Fancy but he passeth a just Judgment which every one will soon submit to therefore I do begg thee to distrust thy self as ever thou wouldst save thy self Consider all the good Men in the World were Conceited as thou art now but they have repented and owned their Folly when they came to their right minds then they came to be of God's mind Yea all the Wicked will be convinced of their Mistake why else will they wail and mourn for ever if it be best to be in Hell why should they always Complain there The Prodigal thought he was wise when he rioted Luk. 15. 17 18. but Repentance assured him that he had been mad Young Folk have you never seen resolved Sinners even in Sickness and Poverty roar out and mourn at the last saying How have I hated Instruction Prov. 5. 12. Consider how unlikely is it that thy Opinion is truer than thy holy Master or Minister thy Lusts darken thy mind they have all the wise part of the World on their side Thou canst remember thou wert as confident of other things which now thou seest to be false as they told thee then Thou sometimes now condemnest thy self for thy course when thy sinful Inclinations are calmed When thou wert sick thou didst own that thy loose way thy irreligious way was thy Folly And after all these wilt thou bear it out must that be thy Character The Fool rageth and is confident whiles thou knowest not at what thou stumblest Prov. 14. 16. Must this be written on thy Grave-stone He shall dye without Instruction and in the greatness of his folly he went astray Prov. 5. 23. 4. Acknowledge thou art one under Dominion and not at thy own disposal People refuse to be subject from a Conceit that they have a right to govern themselves Is not this your Case Our lips are our own who is Lord over us Psal. 12. 4. therefore I will Lye Swear talk frothily let who will contradict But Child thou canst tell who made thee it was God and should not he that made thee govern thee ought not the Creature to observe the Laws which his Creator gives him Nothing thou hast is so much thine as thou art his Christ bought thee with his Blood and additionally founded his Dominion in his Purchase He therefore dyed that he might be Lord both of the dead and living Rom. 14. 9. Thou art therefore the most unjust of Rebels if thou art an obstinate Sinner Thy Parents thy Masters thy Ministers have an Authority over thee and disobeying their just Commands and Calls is a renouncing an Authority thou shouldst own and usurping a power to which thou hast no claim A Masterless Child a masterless Youth is a Slave under pretence of Liberty and doubleth his yoak while he seeks to break it Therefore know young Folk you 'll find God a terrible Judge whom you rejected as a Law-giver Hee 'll vindicate his own Authority and the deputed Authority of your Parents by the sorest Vengeance Eternal Chains shall hold that Youth which would break God's easie bands If any of you say I do own God to be my Ruler and Master consider God's challenge If I be a Master where is my fear saith the Lord God of Hosts Mal. 1. 8. To finish this how many sturdy resolute Young People are here will none of your knees tremble will love melt no Heart will a sence of Gods skill to direct and authority to Command bend no stubborn will this day Dare any Child or Young Person go hence and say I have been stiff-necked
and wll be so nor will I follow these Rules to become more perswadeable If thou hast the impudence to do thus I have God's warrant to tell thee Thou shalt suddenly be destroyed and that without remedy Prov. 29. 1. 4. Young People are subject to Anger and violent Passions Children are apt to be peevish and cross Young Men to be full of rage the Verse before the Text may be rendred Oh young man put away anger from thy heart How soon is the fire kindled how fervently doth it blaze Young Persons are oft angry with their best Friends even for what they should be thankful they are incensed too freqneutly without a cause and are so hasty as not to search the reason Sleighty Matters are with them great provocations and moderation in their resentments they disdain And no wonder for thy Reason is darkened from seeing the fatal consequences of thy Fury Lasting Enmities Quarrels Murthers are too frequently the effects of this inordinate fervour Young Man is this a thing allowable Consider with thy self anger is a short madness Thou losest the management of thy own Soul whence our Lord Commands in patience possess your Soul Luke 21. 19. An overheated Spirit is void of Prudence and sure to procure bitterness to its self God saith he that is soon angry dealeth foolishly and truly he that is very angry is next to mad he looks he speaks he acts too near a Lunatick A Passionate Man is at the mercy of any designing Foe and by indulging his Anger becomes his own Tormentor how uneasie to his Family how dangerous to himself how unfit for Counsel how troublesome to his Friends how ensnaring and infecting to Society is a Passionate Man May not I hope you young Ones will be out of love with Anger it unmans you though it seems brave It makes you contemptible with the wise 1 Tim. 6. 11. but above all argue with your selves This my God forbids me Let all bitterness wrath and anger be put away Eph. 4. 31. This will unfit me for the visits of the Spirit who loves a calm Temper 1 Tim. 2. 8. and therefore appoints meekness Jam. 1. 21. as a qualification for communion with him in his Ordinances How lovely is patience it 's the height of fortitude Yea God saith He that rules his Spirit is better than he that takes a City and he that is slow to anger than the mighty Prov. 16. 32. In a word a meek and quiet Spirit is an Ornament and describes one Blessed Mat. 5. 5. How amiable is a patient Child he is more beloved by all than a froward one How excellent is that Young Man who is Master of his passion He is armed against sudden assaults he is fit for great services and sufferings he is fit to use the knowledge he hath attained in the most dangerous passages of his Life Quest. What shall a Young Person do to be healed of Anger and unruly passions Answ. 1. In general get the Grace of patience and delightfully accustome thy self to the exercise of it as thy Glory and no way a Reproach But more particularly 2. Get thy Heart filled with Love to God and Man Love to God will encline thee to imitate him who is long-suffering slow to anger full of Love and good to all Luke 16. 35. Love to Man will encline thee to interpret all to the best afraid to hurt him willing to benefit and forgive him and not prone to those dislikes which are unsuitable to thy fellow Creature especially if the Image of Christ be enstamped on him as you see 1 Cor. 13. 45 7. 3. Often present to thy Soul the Example of thy Saviour and strive to imitate him he was humble meek lowly and patient under the greatest provocations He calls thee to learn of him Mat. 11 29. If thou hast any part in him he hath formed thy Soul to some degree of imitation and to endeavour after more 1 Ioh. 4. 17. 4. Reckon on provocations and be still armed against them Thy own Carriage is not so inoffensive nor are thy Acquaintance so innocent but that thou oughtest to expect some Trials to expect them and be unguarded is Folly neither is it possible to prevent anger when wholly unprepared Therefore awe thy Soul against Passion and accustome thy Mind to such Considerations as are fit to restrain thy Spirit 5. Be humbly convinced how mean sinful and ill-deserving a Creature thou art Contention is from Pride Prov. 13. 10. and he is fondly conceited of himself who thinks he ought to bear nothing whereas a due sence of thy own nothingness and offensiveness to God will make thee fit to endure much especially considering thy provocations from Men may be the humbling rebukes of thy God who must forgive thee great things if he cast thee not into Hell it self yet whose Decree it is if you do not forgive neither will he forgive your trespasses Mar. 11. 26. 6. Allow not thy froward Spirit a liberty even where thou hast most power and freedom He that is not pettish at home will not be passionate abroad whereas anger indulged among Servants and in trifles will expose thee to its power when more dangerous and indecent 7. When thou feelest Anger begin to kindle forbear to do or say any thing till thou hast well considered The cause of thy resentments if just will abide the thoughts of a Calm Temper and the wayes of thy vindication are far likelier to be due whereas if the Cause in it self is too sleighty or thy sudden purposes are too severe to be approved how darest thou take blind passion for thy Guide Thou must believe that the discretion of a man deferreth his anger Pro. 19. 11. 5. Young People are subject to Idleness and waste of time It 's a while before you are fit ro learn or do any thing but when you are capable how commonly are you remiss and sloathful Were you left to your selves what would you do besides eating drinking sleeping and playing Thou art put to learn and thou art idle at thy Book not learning in a week what thou mightest learn in a day if diligent Thou art a Servant or Apprentice having work to do but art thou not a Waster of that time which is thy Masters and not thy own and loath to do the business incumbent on thee How little do most of our Youth for this World or for Eternity Sports and Idleness eat up that season which is the best opportunity of Life and the character of most young People is to spend their time in doing nothing or next to nothing or worse than nothing You are idle in the Duties of Religion and waste that time you pretend to employ with God You are idle in your particular Callings as if you had no business as Inhabitants of this lower World Oh Young People how precious is that time you do mispend and how sad an account are you able to give of those hours that are
mind as one determined to run thy Christian Race with intenseness and haste 1 Pet. 1. 13. 6. Young People are subject to Levity and inordinate Mirth This is a common distemper your talk is frothy and unsavoury How far from grave are you in your Carriage or Dress Vain Books thou lovest to read idle Tales thou likest to hear foolish Sights thou art best pleased with foolish Songs thou greedily learnest what airy Conceits is thy Imagination filled with These thou indulgest till they become the Guides of thy practice and chief Object of thy thoughts and Discourse To say nothing of thy Instability excessive Laughter vain Jestings Merriments c. Oh young ones is this a Temper to be allowed it is condemned by all prudence it 's contrary to all that is serious and obstructs all improvement in wisdom How odious is the character of a vain Fellow 2 Sam. 6. 20. How do God and Angels despise thee How do the Good and Wise compassionate thee Yea canst thou refuse to be angry with thy self Reason a little with thy own Soul Have I not better things to think of than these silly matters which tend to no good for Soul or Body Do not these antique gestures make me ridiculous What hurt to others what a wound to my self comes by this frothy talk Is not my mind grosly vain that I can relish such fooleries Can it ever be bettered whiles I employ my self in nothing but what is foolish Dost not thou find that this lightness is even risen to prophaneness Thou canst ridicule the Scriptures sport with the Divinest Subjects and turn the most serious matters into Fuel to thy childish Conceits Poor Wretch God will force thee to be ferious by the Torments hee 'l shortly inflict Thou wilt be convinced that thy Atheistick thoughts have not put God out of his Throne though they cast thee out of his Favour Thy ridiculing of Religion hath not made it less real or necessary though it hath excluded thee from all the blessings of it Thy making a mock of sin Prov. 14. 9. hath not a jot lessened its evil but exposed thee more to the Vengeaance due to it Thy jocular temper shall not delay the awful recompense of that Contempt wherewith thou hast treated the gravest Matters What is more fit to make a serious Heart bleed than to see thee jest and fool thy self into eternal Flames how surprizing will those Torments be to a poor Creature that always disdained a sober thought Luk. 12. 46. Q. How shall a young Person be healed of this Levity and inordinate Mirth Ans. In general follow after Sobriety and Discretion 1 Pet. 4. 7. The want of these is evident in thy frothy Behaviour and a total want of them is unbecoming thee in the early exercise of thy Reason much more in improved Age. The gravity of an old Man cannot be expected in a Child but a degree of it is necessary to the youngest that is capable of acting by the notices of a discerning mind What is thy Reason for but to discern what is meet direct thee to what is fit and govern thee in thy Carriage according to the Rules of thy Condition Discretion will tell thee a godly Book is more profitable than a Play-Book the Soul deserveth more Care than a perishing Body that will shortly be Meat for Worms that silly Tales edifie not as wise Discourses Sobriety will direct thee to endeavour a demeanour becoming a Man rather than an Ape it will check thee in those Jests which discovers thy Vanity as well as expose a Christian Name it will urge thee to refrain matter of future sorrow for the sake of that contemptible pleasure which thou takest in indulging a light Fancy whiles more important things are not regarded To this end 1. Oft represent to thy self thy Condition in this life Sure it must conduce to seriousness when thy mind is accustomed to such thoughts as thy present State suggest Oh young Man thou art born a Child of Wrath Eph. 2. 3. thy Nature is vicious the condemning Sentence was pass'd on thee by the Law of Innocency Rom. 5. 18. Death is justly fearful thou art in a state of Trial and on thy good Behaviour for an endless Joy or Misery Thou hast contracted much guilt by thy actual Enormities and Omissions Satan the World and thy own Lusts are active to fix the Curse and prevent thy reconciliation with God by keeping thee in a state of Infidelity Impenitency and Disobedience to the Gospel Thy Exercies as a Christian are difficult if thou art saved it must be scarcely 1 Pet. 4. 18. and many endeavours for Salvation do prove ineffectual because a perseverance in so many things are essential to determine thy State Alas of many called how few are chosen multitudes of Professors miscarry seemingly strong hopes are oft delusive The Heart is above all things deceitful and so desperately wicked that it may well be asked who can know it Jer. 17. 9. These and the like things may call thee to mind thy self and lay that froth which argueth small sense of thy bleeding Wounds slippery Paths disadvantages and dangers attending thy Case in this Life as it leadeth to Eternity 2. Deliberately propose a becoming End in all thy Words and Actions and let them be conducive to that end To speak or act thou knowest not why is a reproach to thy Prudence and so it is to speak or do things to an end which they are not fit to serve Neither is it becoming a serious Person to intend that which will put him to the blush whiles he deliberates of it I can hardly think thou darest say to thy self in thy Closet I 'le spend so many hours to day in shewing my own Folly or gratifying anothers Madness I 'll lay out my Pains to divert my own mind or anothers from all that is serious to make my Heart vainer than it is to furnish my self with those false Notions of things which I must with trouble unlearn before I be wise and to strengthen that levity to which I am already too prone Canst thou resolve I will spend this week in trimming a poor Carkass and neglect my Soul let this shift for it self as to any care of mine unless it be to add to its hurt by the snares which my vain conversation shall expose it to But if thy design be what 's edifying thou canst not imagin a course of Foolery will ever accomplish that design Yea this very fixing on warrantable Purposes will gradually dispose thee to seriousness 3. Remember thou art still under the observation of such as should awe thee to Sobriety and make thee ashamed and afraid of a frothy behaviour Thou wouldst be ashamed that a wise Friend were acquainted with all thy light Francies and talk but one day Oh! forget not that God trieth the reins and knows all thy thoughts Isa. 66. 18. Poor Youth is not the Eye of thy God and Judge more than
to what is evil in the Will for Man is not considered in Gods Law meerly as an Agent with respect to what he occasionally acteth but he is considered also as to his temper what he is what are his governing Principles and prevailing Disposition those are necessary to the denominating him a godly or ungodly Man as well as influential into the ordinary course of his Actings which will be answerable to his inclinations and light Adam was created after Gods Image which consisted in Knowledge Righteousness and true Holiness Gen. 1. 27. Eph. 4. 23 24. Col. 3. 10. This was his Constitution tho' not so fixed as to prevent the possibility of sinning And whiles Adam sinned not our Nature was impressed with that holy Power Light and Love which answered the Law and capacitated us for that exact Obedience injoyned by it These divine Qualities were inconsistent with their Contraries by the Law of Innocency tho' they are not incompatible by the Law of Grace for that Law insisted on Perfection and entire Innocency and fixed a Forfeiture of all holy Gifts by man considered in any degree sinful yea besides this Forfeiture of these Gifts by the penal Sanction of the Law Man was not entitled to those Aids of the Spirit whereby Divine Qualities might subsist in the same Soul with contrary sinful Dispositions as they do under the Law of Grace no snch influences of the Spirit were provided in the Law of Creation and therefore as the least sin in the Soul brought down our Holiness below perfect and thereby made it cease to be Holiness by the Rule of Innocency for Love was not Love by that Law if there was any mixture of Enmity against God So sin would prevail to extinguish that Purity and expel those holy Dispositions at first implanted if once it entred into the Soul Adam did subsist a while happy under this Law but at last he sinned his Heart turned from God to the Creature which implies Ignorance in the Mind and Aversation and Enmity to God in the Will The entrance of these did of Course deprave the Soul of Adam Knowledge was expelled by Darkness corruption removed his original Purity The Disease invaded the whole Man the Poison operated to the extinction of his glorious Excellencies there was no need for God to take any good out of the Humane Nature it necessarily died by the force of sin And it is by a new grant that there be any Remains of God in lapsed man It is not from any thing in Man or in the first Covenant that there be any moral Vertues or good Nature in any God in mercy bestows these and restrains the growing Contagion of sin that we become not more devilish When holy Light and Love were expelled by Sin the appetite of course became Master of our Reason and all disorders hence ensue The Soul being cloathed with Flesh doth for want of holy Principles become subject to sensible Inclinations which through the presence of agreeable objects hurry poor Man into all that is Flesh-pleasing whiles the proper concerns of the soul are forgotten and its intercourse with unseen things is cut off for want of that Light which should perceive them and that holy Love which might relish and desire them A Soul thus debased and entangled becomes little better than an active Power to contrive Fuel for our various Lusts and receive the little delights which are ministred by Sense and Fancy Oh wretched state especially when Error and Enmity against God and Holiness help to compleat its depravedness 2. Thy Nature thus corrupted descended to thee as propagated by the appointed Law of natural Generation Adam was not only the common Head of Mankind as representing all meer Men but also he was the Original of all men in order to propagation As Representative he was capable to forfeit much good As he was the common Parent he must transmit the Nature which he had with its Impurities he was to propagate his Kind Gen. 5. 4. he begat Seth in his own likeness this is opposed to the likeness of God wherein Adam was made v. 1. Tho' Seth was the Father of the holier part of the World and a good man yet he was not begotten after Gods likeness or with a nature in its Original purity but with a Nature as depraved in fallen Adam Lapsed corrupted Nature cannot propagate a holy Nature Can a clean thing come out of an unclean Job 24. 4. How can he be pure who is born of a woman Job 25. 4. A Person naturally sinfull cannot generate a Child free from that sinfulness if the Father be naturally void of spiritual Wisdom the Son in the course of nature will be so and if we are born void of Wisdom and Holiness we must be vain foolish and ungodly for humane Nature must be unholy if it be not holy This made David own I was shapen in iniquity and in sin did my mother conceive me Psal. 51. 5. This is so fixed a Rule that our blessed Lord must have an extraordinary generation to escape the Pollution of humane Nature Mary was found with Child of the holy Ghost Act. 1. 18 20. The Spirit overshadowed her and this Christ is the only One born holy Luk. 1. 35. Others are made holy by Grace some it may be are renewed in the Womb but none are naturally so or by Generation therefore if thou shouldst ask Why do not good Men naturally beget good Children I answer Their goodness is superadded to their Natures it comes by another Law than that of nature their Grace is from Christ for the Salvation of their own Persons but not to propagate to their Offspring by Generation Oh young Man thou seest how thou groanest under Adam's Fall and labourest under the depravedness of humane nature as propagated from Adam by thy Ancestors down to thee And is there ever a Child here but is a living Witness to this Corruption Are you not all proner to sin than holiness Is it not easier to make you vile than to make you gracious Do not fewer and weaker Arguments incline you to be wicked than to be godly Is there not that in thee which serves instead of a Tempter to evil tho there were no ill example or Solicitation from without Wert thou ever sensible of this oh Child hast thou been yet truly humbled for Original Sin Thou wert wicked whiles an Infant as to the temper of thy Soul the corrupt Nature thou then hadst is the Spring of all thy Vanity Thy nature is to be foolish to lye to be unclean and what else is vile That nature whiles unrenewed will express its unholiness and enmity against God one way or another it 's true the power of one Contrary Lust thy bodily Constitution God's Restraints Education c. may prevent the raging of some Lusts but the malignity continueth and cannot fail to govern till the Grace of Christ do alter thee Quest. 2. Why do Childhood and Youth continue
13. I look on 't as a sad sign of growing Villany in the next Age that correction is become unfashonable The Lord pity us Let me tell you once for all Sirs Youth is governed chiefly by fear and they that lose the benefit of that passion lose the greatest advantage which Youth have to be manag'd or improv'd by People may talk of love but God's injoining the Rod so oft discovers that it will prevail but with very few Wisdom must be exercised in this matter as the end may be best attained But be assured the Blood of that Child lyes at the Parents door who might have been reform'd by Corrections and was not Can Parents forget God's severe Judgment against Eli for his indulgence to his Sons or do you think that Children are now so harmless that they need not to be corrected I should have call'd you to give them good Examples as being powerful to encline them who strictly observe and are prone to imitate you they are apter to evil than good deny them no help to their holy improvements and create them no hinderances But time prevents me Inf. 3. How should Young Ones bear the Rebukes and Restraints of Superiours in sence of their own Vanity Here I call to Young Ones again Parents and Masters know what will harm you better than you do your selves they know how weak you are to resist Temptations they know what 's sinful and destructive better than you Oh therefore thank God and thank them that are over you who endeavour your healing and don 't suffer sin to lye upon you Lev. 19. 17. If you be good your selves you 'l do the same for your Children when you have them therefore don't take that ill which is your necessary cure but reckon Am I vain Oh then though I have not the Liberty I would and have not the Allowance I desire matters are better order'd for me for I can't bear those other things Inf. 4. How Attentive ought you to be to all Advices and Pleadings of your Relations being design'd to heal you O! for thy Souls sake Young One never let the Advice of thy Parents be lost never let thy Friends Counsel and Reproof be lost because 't is all design'd to remove this Disease Thou dost not see the Hell thou art just running into thou dost not see the Heaven thou art flying from thou dost not see the God thou hast provok't thou dost not know the Misery thou art under thou art ignorant what Grace what Wisdom thou wantest how much must thou learn and attain before thou art wise or good thou art ignorant of many snares and sins thy folly hides thy folly from thee O therefore be heartily intent to all their Advices and say to thy self Lord is this for my cure and shall I neglect it Is this Reproof for my good and shall I make light of it Is all this pains to heal my poor diseas'd Soul and shall I cast it behind my back God forbid Inf. 5. How great a Wonder of Grace is a young Convert and how thankfully should such acknowledge it O the power that makes the vain Prodigal come to himself Luk. 15. 17. How near does God come to the Soul to tame it when 't is like a wild Asses Colt How efficacious is Grace that overcomes Lust in it's greatest rage and that deadens Temptations when they strike on Youth so prone to relish the offer and yield to it O Blessed work that inclines us to fear that God whom in our Youth we are so apt to despise Having laid these things before you I offer two General Vses of Exhortation Exh. 1. Reflect on your selves whether you are under this Vanity or deliver'd from it Young Folks I speak mostly to you and therefore I intreat you for the Lords sake to lay to heart what I am saying Your case is dismal you are born vain and prone to be vain are you still so or not 'T is a great work that goes to the healing you is that work pass'd on thee 'T is a great deal of God goes to the making a Youth good and serious have I felt that Pray ask your selves Am I vain or am I not Is my Heart a Spring of Divine Motions or Beastly Inclinations Young People how is it with you Try your mayes are they under the Government of Grace or of Lust are they under the Conduct of Wisdom or Folly Ask your selves Do my wayes profit or hurt People Is it not time to ask What Sirs are the years you have spent unfit to be enquired after or is thy Sin not worth being concerned about Oh ask your selves often What am I doing whither am I going Does my walk please God or provoke him Do I walk with him or do I forsake him Try and judge impartially it 's thy greatest concern thou mayest deceive thy self thou canst not delude thy God who will judge as the matter truly stands with thee How is it with you O Young ones There 's none here but ought to be concern'd how 't is with them You will be concern'd nay within a while you must be concern'd therefore enquire this to day and never rest till it be determined Exh. 2. Receive Directions suitable to your case And here I must divide this whole Assembly into two parts First Such as are under the power of Vanity Secondly Such as are by Grace delivered from it One of these two is every one in this Assembly Young and Old you are still under the power of Vanity or you are delivered from it There is a great difference in your Case I 'll speak to each 1. Those of you that are yet under the power of this Vanity Poor Souls would you be delivered or have you a mind to continue what you are Come Children dare you be still blind and still obstinate shall thy Soul that was made for God be a Cage of unclean Birds Shall thy Tongue which is his Glory be employed to his Dshonour O Young body shall not Christ heal thee of that Nature which the Devil introduced Wilt thou live a Bruit and a Devil still shall Satan serve himself of thy parts and of thy strength and of thy opportunities shall the Devil say of thee Here 's a Child I hope will do me a great deal of Drudgery Here 's a young Person will do my Work while he lives and be damned with me when he dies Young Folks Satan stands by and seems to speak thus of you And must Christ all this while weep over thee and say Here 's a young thing that 's my Creature but he will rebell against me as long as I spare him here 's a Youth fit to serve me but he will bring on me all the Dishonour that he can and obstruct my Interests as far as he is able Here 's a Stripling that I bought with my Blood a young Girl or Boy but he serves Satan before me and will not be saved unless against his Will For
the Lords sake lay these things to heart to day What say you Child to this what say you Young People I hope some of you will be ready to answer O Sir help me give me some counsel for I am weary of this present Condition and would be in a better if so take these few Advices and resolve to follow them in earnest 1. Believe how had thou art by nature and bewail it before God Oh 't is thy Picture I have been drawing as bad as it is Come poor young Folks you that pride your selves when you look in the Glass could you but see your Souls with a right Eye you would abhor your selves Young People will you believe God speaking of you Does not he say you are vain and vile will you believe all the wise People that know you and will they not all agree in this That thou art a sinful wretched Creature Doth not thy own experience convince thee Oh Friend own it and go away mourning and how canst thou but do so when thon consider'st My Heart is filthy my Affections disorder'd the powers of my Soul poor and wounded the Image of God lost Satan's nature is visible upon me what a Reproach doth every title fasten what can be said worse of thee than that thou art thus Is this a Case to be rested in is this a state to be quiet in yet this is thy Case O young Person by Nature thou art full of what 's hateful to God and hurtful to others thou art intent on thy own Ruine Oh Sirs the most innocent young Sinner here is fuller of Poison than a Toad and filthier than a Swine All of you are thus by Nature and yet thou remainest so 2. Consider often how miserable thou art whilst thou continuest thus vain Danger will affright some whom Sin will not But O how unable am I to represent the Horror of this to you Young People you are Children of wrath as well as others Eph. 2. 3. Every Lust is a killing Wound every step is on the brink of Hell there 's not a wicked Child in this Congregation but I can stand over it and say Here 's a Child with whom God's angry every day here 's a young Body for whom God reserves his wrath Nah. 1. 2. and sees his time a coming Young People sure you will be afraid to go home and say I am a Sinner and I am an impenitent Sinner and therefore an unpardon'd Sinner a Sinner for whom everlasting Wrath is reserved Once for all you resolve to be wicked and God cannot but be just You will not be born again and God must keep you out of his Kingdom then Ioh. 3. 3. You will live after the flesh ay and God is as resolved you shall die in your sins Rom. 8. 13. Come Young People God will be as peremptory as you and his Will shall stand therefore tremble to go out of this Congregation unless in a founder Mind than you came 3. Be convinc'd that nothing short of renewing Grace can savingly heal thee Morality may polish thee Fear and Shame may restrain and conceal a Sinner but 't is only Grace can truly alter a Sinner O my Friends it must be a new Heart or it will always be a vain Heart Vain Inclinations will govern till God writes his Law there Heb. 8. 10. The youngest must be a new Creature or natural Corruption will baffle all pretensions Gal. 6. 15. 4. Be assur'd Grace cannot be had but from God through Christ by the Operations of his Spirit Don't think it an easie thing to attain Grace tho it be necessary to have it Young Folks God must open his Treasures anew or thou wilt for ever want it Christ must plead for thee or thy Disease is incurable he must act towards thee as Redeemer and not meerly as Creator unless he pass by thee as one rejected He seeks the lost sheep Mat. 18. 12. he makes the stubborn willing Faith is his Gift Consent is his Purchase as well as the Blessings annex'd to it there is no other Name by which we can be saved Act. 4. 12. there is no other Fountain of Grace or Help Know also it 's the Spirit must give of Christ's fulness Ioh. 16. 14. he must enlighten thee O Child or thou wilt go blind to thy Grave he must renew thee or thou wilt die in thy Uncleanness Christ made the Atonement but the Spirit makes us capable of its Application Christ hath acquired a fulness of Grace and Blessings it 's by the Spirit he imparts thereof to Man Men cannot renew thee means of themselves are too weak to alter thee Oh then look upwards wait on God direct thy Eye to Christ depend on the Holy Spirit as able to conquer thy Reluctancy and ready to work by the means to which his Presence is promised 5. Observe that the more thou sinnest and the longer thou art graceless the more opposition thou layest in the way of Grace think serioully of this the hopes of the Soul are upon the Spirit 's working and the disposedness of the Heart to yield unto them Oh my Friends will you go on in sin then the Spirit of God will leave you he will not always strive Gen. 6. 3. The more you sin the more you quench the Spirit Will you go on in sin then your Heart will be hardned the more Heb. 3. 8. Wilt thou go on delaying then to morrow it will be harder to prevail with thee than to day Oh therefore be allarm'd to day More sin will strengthen your Lusts and further prejudice your Soul against Christ. Is not Conversion difficult enough already is there need to make it next to impossible for the Lords sake consider greater Offences may make God and Men say of thee This Wretch is resolved against Grace he arms himself against Hope 6. Resolve within thy self that thou wilt follow after Christ and throw off thy Vanity without delay Oh that I could but get this Consent from you all this day That all the young People in this Congregation would say O Lord Amen Amen Come poor Sinners put it to your selves this moment Say For this I will pray that I may cease to be vain I will meditate for this I will hear for this O young Folks that are yet in a state of sin you have work enough for your time sometimes you know not how to pass away your time what spiritually blind and not know how to pass away time what dead and graceless and not know how to pass away time a Sinner wild in his frame and have no Work Oh be intreated this day to be earnest with God and never be quiet till he has given thee Wisdom instead of Folly till he has given thee Sobriety instead of Rashness Humility instead of Conceit Calmness instead of Passion Truth instead of Falshood Yea never be satisfied till God has brought thee to live to the best and highest purposes And oh that every