and Contention diverting Gods Judgments by Faith and Prayer forsaking all for Christ and patiently suffering for well doing and by Doctrine and Example teaching men to difference the Creator from the Creature Holiness from Sin Heaven from Earth Soul from the Body the Spirit from the Flesh and helping men to prepare by a mortified heavenly heart and life for a comfortable death and endless happiness Of such vast importance is it to the world whether the Clergy be good or bad skilful or unskilful holy or worldly and he is not a true Christian that is insensible of the difference or thinks it small And now do I need to say any more to shew young men designed for the Ministry of what importance it is that they be well prepared and qualified for it God can and sometime doth turn VVolves into faithful Shepherds and convert those that being unconverted undertake the work that should convert others and give wisdom and grace to ignorant and graceless Preachers of wisdom and grace But this is not ordinarily to be expected But as youth is trained up and disposed they commonly prove when they come to age Their first notions lie deepest and make way for their like and resist all that is contrary be it never so true and good and necessary Experience tells this to all the world Those that in youth are trained in Heathenism Mahometanism Popery or any distinct sect of Christians they commonly continue such especially if they live among those who are for it and so make it their Interest in reputation or wealth And if the Rulers and Times should be but Erroneous Heretical or Malignant at enmity to Truth and serious holiness alas how hard is it for ill-taught youth to resist the Stream How hard is it to unteach them the Errours which they first learnt A Vomit may easily bring up that which was but lately eaten but the yellow and the green humors that lie deep must cost heart-gripes before they will be cast up False Opinions as well as Truths are usually linkt together and the chain is neither easily cast off nor broken And they that have received Errours have received their defensatives These are like the Shell-fish that carry their house about them They have studied what to say for it but not what can be said against it or which is worse by a slight and false consideration of the arguments for Truth they have disabled them from doing them any good And if they had never so true Notions in their Memories if they come not in power on their hearts and make them not new spiritual holy men these will not master fleshly Lusts nor overcome ambitious and worldly Inclinations nor make men fit to propagate that Faith and Holiness which they never had And it is now that you must get those eminent qualifications of Knowledge and Holiness which you must after use And how will you use that which you have not And yet proud hearts how empty soever will be desirous of esteem and reputation and will hardly bear vilifying contempt or disregard When as though some few prudent hearers will encourage such young men as they think are hopeful yet most will judge of things and persons as they find them The ignorant dry and lifeless Orations of unexperienced carnal Preachers will not be magnified by such as know what Iudgment and holy Seriousness that place and sacred work require Few will much praise or feed on unsavoury or insippid Food meerly to flatter and please the Cook And then when you find that you are slighted for your slight and unskilful work your stomachs will rise against those that slight you and so by selfishness you will turn malignant and become Enemies to those that you take for Enemies to you because they are not contented with your unholy trifling And all your enmity will turn against your self and be like Satans against the members of Christs which is but his own self-tormenting § 15. II. The Case being so important I shall briefly conjoyn your Danger and your Remedy beseeching you as you have any care for your Souls your Country or the Church of God or any thing which Faith or reason should regard that you will soberly weigh the Counsel that I give you I. The first of your dangers which I shall mention lieth in a too hasty resolving for the Sacred Ministry Pious and prudent desires and purposes I would not discourage But two sorts of Parents in this prove greatly injurious to the Church First Worldly men that set their Sons to the Universities in order to their worldly Maintenance and Preferment looking at the Ministry meerly as a Profession or Trade to live by Secondly and many honest godly Parents ignorantly think it a good work to design their Children to the Ministry and call it a devoting them to God without due considering whether they are like to be fit for it or not And when they have bin some years at the University they think a Parsonage or Vicarage is their due Ordained they must be what have they else studied for It s too late now to change their purposes when they have been at seven years cost and labour to prepare for the Ministry They are too old and too proud to go Apprentices or Servants Husbandmen they cannot be They are used to an idler kind of Life To be Lawyers will cost them more time and study than they can now afford having lost so much and there are more already than can have practice Physicians are already so many that the younger sort know not how to live though they would for money venture on their Neighbours lives to their greater danger than I am willing to express So that there is no way left but for a Benefice to become Church Mountebanks and Quacks and undertake the Pastoral care of Souls before they well know what Souls are or what they are made for or whither they are going or how they must be conducted and prepared for their endless state And it seems to some the glory of a Nation to have many thousand such Lads at the Universities more than there be Cures or Churches in the Land all expecting that their Friends should procure them Benefices And they must be very ignorant and bad indeed that cannot find some Ministers so bad as to certifie that they are sober and of good lives and some Patrons so bad as to like such as they and for favour or somewhat worse to present them and some Bishops Chaplain bad enough to be favourable in examining them and then some Bishop bad enough to ordain and institute them And by that time nine Thousand such youths have got Benefices alas what a case will the Churches and the poor peoples Souls be in § 16. I. And what remedy is there for this That which I have now to propose is first to tell you who they be that should be devoted to the Ministry and next what both Parents and you should
you sure to live to maturity of Age alas how quickly will it come What haste makes Time How fast do Daies and Years roll on Methinks it is but as a few daies since I was playing with my School-fellows who now am in the 66th year of my Age Had I no service done for God that I could now look back upon I should seem as if I had not lived A thousand years and one hour are all one that is nothing when they are past And every year day and hour of your lives hath its proper work And how will you answer for it Every day offereth you more and more mercies and will you despise and lose them If you were Heirs to Land or had an Annuity which amounted but to an hundred pounds a year and you were every day to receive a proportionable part of it or lose it would you lose it through neglect and say I will begin to receive it when I am old Poor Labourers will work hard all the day that at night they may have their wages And will you contemptuously lose your every daies mercies your safety your communion with God your daily blessings and his grace which you should daily beg and may daily receive 5. Either you will Repent and live to God or not if not you are undone for ever Oh how much less miserable is a Dog or a Toad than such a sinner But if God will shew you so great mercy oh how will it grieve you to think of the precious time of Youth which you madly cast away in sin Then you will think O what Knowledge what Holiness might I then have got What a comfortable life might I have lived O what daies and years of mercy did I cast away for nothing Yea when God hath given you the pardon of your sin the tast of his love and the hopes of Heaven it will wound your hearts to think that you should so long so unthankfully so heinously offend so good a God and neglect so merciful a Saviour and trample upon Infinite Divine Love for the love of so base a freshly pleasure That ever you should be so bad as to find more pleasure in sinning than in living unto God 6. And be it known to you if God in mercy convert and save you yet the bitter fruit of your youthful folly may follow you in this World to the grave God may forgive the pains of Hell to a penitent sinner and not forgive the temporal chastisement to his flesh If you waste your Estate in Youth you may be poor at Age If you marry a wicked Wife you may feel it till death notwithstanding your Repentance If by drinking gluttony idleness or filthy lust you contract any uncurable Diseases in Youth Repentance may not cure them till death All this might easily have been prevented if you had but had fore-seeing Wisdom Beggary Prisons Shame Consumptions Dropsies Stone Gout Pox which make the lives of many miserable are usually caused by youthful sins 7. And if ever you think to be men of any great wisdom and usefulness in the World to your selves or others your preparations must be made in Youth Great Wisdom is not got in a little time Who ever was an able Lawyer Physician or Philosopher without long and hard Study If you will not learn in the Grammar-Schools in your Childhood you will be unfit for the University at riper Age and if when you should be Doctors you are to learn to Spell and Read your shame will tell you that you should have sooner begun O that you well knew how much of the safety fruitfulness and comfort of all your after-life dependeth on the preparations of your Youth on the Wisdom and the Grace which you should then obtain As mens after trading doth on their Apprentiship 8. And O what a dreadful danger is it lest your youthful sin become remediless and custom harden you and deceivers blind you and God forsake you for your wilful resistance of his Grace God may convert old hardened sinners But how ordinarily do we find that Age doth but answer the preparations of Youth and the Vessel ever after savoureth of the Liquor which first throughly tainted it And men are but such as they learned to be and do at first If you will be perfidious breakers of your Baptismal Vows it 's just with God to leave you to your selves to a deluded understanding to think evil good and good evil to a seared conscience and a hardened heart and as past feeling to work uncleanness with greediness Ephes. 3.18 and to fight against Grace and your own Salvation till Death and Hell convince you of your madness O sport not with the Justice of a sin-hating God! Play not with sin and with the unquenchable fire Forsaking God is the way to be forsaken of him And what is a forsaken soul but a miserable Slave of Satan 9. Yea did you but know of what moment it is to prevent all the heinous sins that else you will commit you would make haste to Repent though you were sure to be forgiven Forgiveness maketh not sin to be no sin or to be no evil no shame no grief to the soul that hath committed it You will cry out O that I had never known it To look back on such an ill-spent life will be no pleasant thought Repentance though a healing work is bitter yea oft-times exceeding bitter Make not work for it if you love your peace 10. And is it a small thing to you that you are all this while doing hurt to others And drawing them to sin and plunging them into that dangerous guilt which can no way be pardoned but by the blood of Christ upon true Conversion And when they have joyned with you in lust and fleshly pleasure it is not in your power to turn them that they may joyn with you in sound Repentance And if not they must lie in Hell for ever And can you make a sport of your own and other mens damnation But this leadeth me to the Second Point I have shewed you of what vast concernment it is to your selves to begin betimes a holy life I will next shew you of what concernment it is to others CHAP. III. Of what Publick Concernment the Quality of Youth is § 1. THe welfare of the World is of far greater worth than of any single person and he hath put off Humanity who doth not more earnestly desire it If this World consisted but of one Generation then to make that Generation wise and good would be enough to make it a happy World But it is not so In Heaven and in the future glorious Kingdom there is neither marrying nor giving in marriage but they are as the Angels in a fixed everlasting State and one continued Generation maketh up the New Ierusalem Being once holy and happy they are so for ever But here it is not so One Generation cometh and another goeth If the Father be as wise as Solomon
to the Lust of any other He that is false to his God and Saviour after his Baptismal Vows is unlike to be true to his Country or his King if he have but the bait of a strong temptation And he that will sell his Soul his God and Heaven for a Whore or for to please his Appetite it 's like will not stick to betray Church or State or his dearest Friend for provision to satisfie these Lusts. Can you expect that he should love any man better than himself A wicked fleshly worldly man is a soil for Satan to sow the seeds in of any sort of actual sin and is fuel dryed or tinder for the sparks of Hell to kindle in Will he suffer much for God or his Country who will sell Heaven for nothing An evil Tree bringeth forth evil Fruit. If he hath the heart of an Achan a Gehazi an Achitophel no wonder if he hath their Actions and their Reward If he be a Thief and bear the Bag no wonder if Iudas sell his Master § 12. And these wretches if they live are like to be a Plague to their own posterity Woe to the Woman that hath such an Husband And how are the Children like to be bred that have such a Father Doth not God threaten punishment to the third and fourth Generation of them that hate him and to visit the iniquity of the Fathers on the Children Were not the Children of the old World drowned and those of Sodom and Gomorrah burned and Achans stoned Dathans Abirams swallowed up and Gehazi's struck with Leprosie c. for their Fathers sins And the Amalekites Children all destroyed and the posterity of the Infidel Jews forsaken the Curse coming on them and on their Children And as their Children are like to speed the worse for such Parents sins so are such Parents like to be requited by their Children As you shamed and grieved the hearts of your Parents so may your Children do by you And by that time it 's like if Grace convert you not though you have no hatred to your own sins worldly Interest may make you dislike your Childrens Their Lust and Appetite doth not tempt and deceive you as your own did Perhaps when they shame your Family debauch themselves with drink and Whores and consume the Estates which you sold your Souls for you may perceive that sin is an evil and destructive thing especially when they proceed to despise and abuse your persons also and to desire your Death and be a weary of you sooner or later you shall know better what sin is CHAP. VI. The joyful State and Blessing of good Children to themselves and others § 1. FRom what is said Chap. 2. and 5. it 's easie to gather how joyful a case to themselves and what a Blessing to Parents and others it is when Children betime are sober wise and godly and obedient The difference doth most appear at age and when they come to bring forth to themselves and others the fruits of their dispositions And the end and life to come will shew the greatest difference But yet even here and that betime the difference is very great § 2. I. As to themselves How blessed a state is it to be quickly delivered from the danger of damnation and Gods displeasure that they need not lie down and rise in fear lest they be in Hell whenever Death removeth them from the Body Can one too soon be out of so dreadful a state Can one that is in a house on fire or falln into the Sea make too much haste to be delivered If a man deep in debt be restless till it be paid and glad when it is discharged If a man in danger of sickness or a condemning Sentence of the Judge be glad when the fear of Death is over How glad should you be to be safe from the great danger of Damnation And till you are sanctified by Grace you are far from safety § 3. And if a mans Sickness Pain or Distraction be a Calamity the cure of which brings ease and joy How much more ease and joy may it bring to be cured from all the grievous Maladies of reigning sin Sanctification will cure your minds of spiritual blindness and madness that is of damnable Ignorance Unbelief and Error It will cure your affections of idolatrous distracting carnal Love of the itch of fleshly Desires or Lusts of the feaver of revengeful passions and malignant hatred to goodness and good men and of self vexing envy and malice against others of the greedy worm of Covetousness and the drunken desire of ambitious and imperious minds It will cure your Wills of their fleshly servitude and biass and of that mortal Backwardness to God and holy things and that sluggish dulness and lothness to choose and do what you are convinced must be done It will make good things easie and pleasant to you so that you will no more think you have need to beg mirth from the Devil or steal it from sin as if God Grace and Glory had none for you But it will be so easie to you to love and find pleasure in the Bible and good Books in good Company and good Discourse in spiritual Meditations and thoughts in holy Sermons Prayers and Church Communion and Sacraments even in Christ in God and the fore-thoughts of Heaven that you will be sorry and ashamed to think that ever you forsook such joys for fleshly pleasure and defiled your Souls with filthy and forbidden things And is not the itch of Lust better cured than scratch'd Is not the feaverish and dropsie thirst after Drink and Wealth and Honour better cured than pleased to the sinners death And is not a lazy backwardness to Duty better cured by spiritual health than pleased with idleness and sleep § 4. And certainly you cannot too soon attain the delights of Faith and Hope and Love of holy Knowledge and Communion with God and Saints You cannot too soon have the great blessing of Righteousness Peace and Joy in the Holy Ghost and live night and day in peace of Conscience in assurance that all your sins are pardoned and that you are the adopted Sons of God and Heirs of Heaven sealed by his Spirit accepted in your Prayers welcome to God through Christ and when you die shall be with him Can you make too great haste from the folly and filth of sin and the danger of Hell into so safe and good a state as this § 5. And it will be a great comfort to you thus to find at age and use of reason that your baptismal Blessings ceased not with your Infancy by your own rejection but that you are now by your own consent in the Bond of God's Covenant and have a right to all the blessings of it which the Sacrament of Christs Body and Blood will confirm as you had your Entrance by your Parents consent and accepted Dedication For the Covenant of Grace is our certain Charter for Grace
it But they think they owe more belief and reverence to a Learned Reverend Preacher in the Pulpit even when he preacheth against preaching and against those that practise what he teacheth them at other times O how much of his work hath Satan done in the World by corrupting Sacred Offices and by getting HIS SERVANTS INTO RVLE and MINISTRY TO DO HIS WORK AS FOR CHRIST and his Church and by his authority and in his name Our natural enmity with the Serpent disswadeth him from speaking or sending to us in his own name Should one say in the Pulpit Thus saith the Devil hate Christs servants silence his Ministers call serious Godliness Hypocrisie which is the contrary to Hypocrisie I should not much fear his success with any but if he be a lying Spirit in the mouth of Ahabs Prophets and can get a Prophet to smite Michaiah for pretending to more of the Spirit than he had or if he can get men in the Sacred Office to say Thus saith the Lord when they speak for sin or against the Lord this is the Devils prosperous way § 13. II. I have told you what Plagues bad Clergy men will be and still have been to themselves to the souls of men and to the publick State of Churches and Kingdoms and were it not lest my Writing should be too large I should tell you what Blessings on the contrary Able and Faithful Ministers are Briefly 1. Christ maketh them the cheif instruments for the propagating of his Truth and Kingdom in the World for the gathering of Churches and preserving and defending contradicted Truth They are the Lights of the World and the Salt of the Earth All Christians are bound to teach or help each others in charity but Christs Ministers are set in his Church as Parents in Families to do it by Office And therefore must be qualified above others for it and be wholly dedicated to it and attend continually on it as a Physitian differeth from every Neighbour who may help you in your sores or sickness as they can so do the Pastors of the Church differ from private helpers of your Souls The Scripture is preserved and delivered down by the private means of all the Faithful but eminently by the publick Office of the Pastors It may be expounded and applyed privately by any able Christian but the Pastors do it eminently by Office and to them especially though to all Christians commonly are committed the Oracles of God The Priests lips must preserve knowledge and men should enquire of the Law at his mouth for he is the messenger of the Lord of Hosts Mal. 2.7 Never yet was the Gospel well propagated nor continued in any Country in the World but by the means of the Ministers of Christ And O! what difference hath there been in their successes as they differed in ability piety and diligence And how great an honour is it to be such blessed instruments of building up the house of God and propagating the Gospel and the Kingdom of Christ and the Christian Faith and Godliness in the World 2. And thus God useth them as his special instruments for the Convincing Converting Edifying Comforting and Saving of Souls Others may be blest herein But the special blessing goeth along with those that are specially obliged to the work which is Parents in Families and Pastors in the Church O how many thousand Souls in Heaven will for ever rejoyce in the effects of the Labours of Faithful Ministers and bless God for them And what an honour what a comfort is it to have a hand in such a work He that Converteth a sinner from the Errour of his way doth save a Soul from death and cover a multitude of sins Jam. last 3. And in this they are Co-workers with Jesus Christ the great Saviour of Souls and with the Holy Spirit the Regenerator and Sanctifier Yea Christ doth very much of the work of his Salvation by them when he ascended on high he gave gifts to men for the edifying of his body till they come to a perfect man Eph. 4.6 to 16. and when the Chief Shephard shall appear they shall receive a Crown of Glory that fadeth not away 1 Pet. 5.4 and shall hear well done good and faithful Servant Hence are the Streams of Consolation that make glad the City of God and daily refresh many thousand precious Souls For how shall men believe without a Preacher and how shall they Preach unless they be sent qualified obliged and authorized by Christ Rom. 10. 4. In a word Churches States and Christian Kingdoms are chiefly blest and preserved by the Labour of the faithful part of the Ministry For 1 If we have the rare blessing of a wise and holy and loving Magistracy it is usually by the success of the labours of the Ministry 2 And there is no better means to bring the Subjects to the Conscionable performance of their Duty to Superiours 3 And by the blessing of their Labour the sins of a Nation are prevented or healed which would else bring down Gods heavy Judgments 4 They teach people to live in Love and Peace with one another and to abhor Contention Cruelty Oppression Injury and Revenge and all to do their several duties to promote the common Good 5 When the ignorant and slothful and scandalous sort of bad Ministers betray Souls and would bring the Ministry and Religion into contempt it is a wise and holy Ministry that counter-worketh them by labouring while others are idle and doing that wisely which others do foolishly and shewing in their lives the power of that truth which others disgrace and the reality of that Holiness Love Justice Peace and Concord which others would banish out of the World by making it seem but a name or Image 6 VVhen proud men tear the Church by the Engines of their domineering VVits and VVills these humble Pastors as the servants of all will labour to heal it by Christian meekness and condescension VVhen malignant Priests seek to strengthen themselves by the multitude of the ungodly and to bring serious piety into contempt which doth molest them these faithful Pastors open the just disgrace of sin and the great necessity and honour of holiness endeavouring that vile persons may be contemned and those may be honoured that fear the Lord Psal. 15.4 and distinguishing the precious from the vile the righteous from the wicked and him that sweareth from him that feareth an Oath and him that serveth God from him that serveth him not God saith They are as his mouth Jer. 15.19 Mal. 3.17 18. Eccl. 9.2 To be short as An Ignorant Worldly Carnal Proud Vnholy sort of Prelates and Priests are and have been the great Plague of the Churches these 1300 years at least so the Skilful Holy Humble Faithful Laborious Patient Ministers of Christ have been and still are the great blessings of the World for saving Souls promoting Knowledge Faith Holiness Love and Peace opposing Errour Pride Oppression VVorldliness Sensuality