him early how to live and how to die and what to seek and what to shun You should have given him the Example of a holy and heavenly mind and life You should have watch'd over him for his safety and unweariedly instructed him for his Salvation But you led him the way to despise God's Word and set light by Christ and Holiness and Heaven to hate Instruction and Reproof to spend the Lords day in idleness or worldly vanity and to seek first the World and the prosperity of the Body and glut the Flesh with sinful pleasure What wonder if a Serpent breed a Serpent and quickly teach him to hiss and sting and if Swine teach their young to feed on dung and wallow in the mire This is part of the fruit of your worldliness fleshliness ungodliness and neglect of your own Salvation and your Childs Now he is as you are a slave of sin and an heir of Hell Was this it that you vowed him for to God in Baptism Was it to serve the Flesh the World and the Devil against our God our Saviour and our sanctifier Or did the mistake of the Liturgy deceive you to think that it was not you but the God-Fathers that were bound by Charge and Vow to bring him up in the Faith and Fear of God and teach him all that a Christian should know for his Soul's Health Was it not you that God bound to all this The sin and misery of your Child now is so far your curse as you are guilty of it and will add to your misery for ever Such are the sorrows that wicked Parents and wicked Children do prepare and heap on one another Such miseries will come but woe to those by whom they come it had been good for that man that he had never been born § 10. And it is no small grief to faithful Ministers to see their labour so much lost and to see so much evil among their flocks and such sad Prognosticks of worse to come He is no true Minister of Christ as to his own acceptance and Salvation whose heart is not set on the winning and sanctifying and saving of Souls What else do we study for preach for live for long for suffer for in our Work All faithful-Teachers can say with Paul that they are willing to spend and be spent for them and now we live if ye stand fast in the Lord. 2 Cor. 12.15 1 Thes. 3.8 He told them weeping of those that were Enemies to the Cross of Christ whose God was their Belly who glory in their shame and mind earthly things instead of a Conversation in Heaven Phil. 3.18 19. When God hath blessed us with the comfortable enjoyment of many ancient holy Christians who are the beauty and honour of the Assemblies and Death calls home one of them after another to Christ and the rest are ready to depart Alas Must a seed of Serpents come after them Must those take their places to our grief and shame who are bred up to the World and Flesh in Drunkenness Fornication and Enmity to God and a holy Life O what a woful change is this And if any be like to be the stain and Plague of the Church it is such as these If we preach holy truth to them Lust cannot love it If we tell them of Gods word the fleshly mind doth not savour it nor can be subject to it Rom. 8.5 6 7. If we reprove them sharply they smart and hate us If we call them to Confession and Repentance their Pride and Carnality cannot bear it If we excommunicate them for Impenitency as Christ requireth or but deny them the Sacrament as unmeet they rage against us as our fiercest Enemies If we neglect Discipline and admit Swine to the Communion of Saints we harden and deceive them and flatter them in their sin pollute the Church and endanger our Souls by displeasing the chief Pastor What then shall we do with these self-murthering ungodly men Many of them have so much Reverence of a Sacrament or so little regard of it that they never seek it but keep away themselves Perhaps they are afraid left they eat and drink damnation to themselves by the prophanation of holy things But do they think that it is safe to be out of the Church and Communion of Saints because it 's dangerous to abuse it Are Infidels safe because false hearted Christians perish What if breaking your Vows and Covenant be damnable Is it not so to be out of the holy Covenant What if God be a consuming fire to those that draw near him in unrepented heinous sin Is it therefore wise or safe to avoid him Neither those that come not to him nor those that come in their hypocrisie and reigning sin shall be saved And yet what to do with these self-suspenders we know not Are they still Members of the Churches or are they not If they are we are bound to call them to Repentance for forsaking the Communion of Saints in Christs commanded Ordinance If they are not we should make it known that Christians and no Christians may not be confounded and they themselves may understand their case And neither of these can they endure But for dwelling in the Parish and hearing the Liturgy and Sermons must still pass for Church Members lest Discipline should exasperate and further lose them This is that Discipline which is thought worthy the honour of Episcopal Dignity and Revennues and is supposed to make the Church of England the best in the world by the same men that would rage were Discipline exercised on them and must either be admitted to the Sacrament in a life of Fornication Drunkenness Sensuality and Prophaneness without any open Confession Repentance and Reformation or else must pass for Church Members without any exercise of Discipline while they shun the Sacramental Communion of the Church Such work doth wickedness make among us § 11. Indeed these are the men that are the trouble of Families the trouble of Neighbours the trouble of good Magistrates the shame of bad ones and the great danger of the Land All the foreign Enemies whom we talk so much against and fear are not so hurtful and dangerous to us as these These that spring out of your own bowels These that are bred up with care and tenderness and cost in your houses These that should succeed godly Ancestors in Wisdom and well doing and be their glory Who plot against us but home bred sinners Who more hate the good and persecute them Who are more malignant Enemies of Godliness and scorners of a holy Life and hinderers of the Word of God and Patrons of Prophaneness and of Ministers and People that are of the same mind If England be undone as the Eastern Churches and much of the Western are undone it will be by your own carnal ungodly Posterity He that is once a slave to Satan and his fleshly Lust is ready for preferment or a reward to be a slave
asleep again with unsuitable things or a cold dull formal kind of managing holy things § 9. And such are too often the plagues of the Church and State as well as injurious to individual Souls 1. Their Ignorance or scandalous Ambition Covetousness and other sins do render them so contemptible in the Eyes of many that it tends to make the Church and all Religion so And when Nobles Gentlemen and People think basely of the Ministry Church and Religion for their sakes how sad is the case of such a people The Gospel is half taken away from a Nation when 't is taken out of their esteem and brought under their reproach and scorn And a scorned Clergie will prepare for the scorning of Religion And an ignorant or worldly ambitious fleshly scandalous Clergie will be a scorned Clergy with two many Erasmus much disgraced the Germane Protestants when he described some of them as having a Bottle of Wine at their Girdle and his Translation of the New Testament in their hands ready to dispute for it with blows And so do many that tell the world how many of the Lutheran Ministers are given to excess of Drink and unpeaceable reviling of Dissenters And the same Erasmus much depreciated either Bishops or Scotists when speaking of the Scotist Bishop of London who was Dr. Collets Adversary he saith I have known some such whom I would not call Knaves but never one whom I could call a Christian Not only Drunkenness and bruitish sins but factitiousness envy unpeaceableness Contentiousness and especially a proud and wordly mind will be in most mens Eeyes more ugly in a Minister than others For where there is a double Dedication to God that which is Common will seem Vnclean and when there should be a double Holyness sin will appear to be double sin 2. And indeed a carnal wordly Clergie are oft the most powerful and obstinate hinderers of the Peace and quietness of Church and State 1. By fitting themselves to the humours of those in whose power their preferments are be it never so much to the injury of mens Souls Bodies or Estates or against the publick good and safety Or else leading the people into errour for popular applause 2. By a domineering humour in matters of Religion taking themselves Law-givers to others and taking their witts and wills for uncontroulable laying Heaven and Hell upon their own Inventions or Conceits and the Controversies which they endlesly make but understand not and hereticating or anathematizing such as take them not for Oracles or Rabbi's that must not be gainsay'd 3. And by Corrupting the Christian Religion and Church by departing from the Christian simplicity and purity and forming Doctrine Worship and Government according to their own carnal worldly minds and interest 4. And than militating against the best that contradict them or stoop not to them though it be to the distraction and division of the Churches And usually they are the hardest to be brought to peace and reconciliation and do most against it when ever it is attempted by Peace-makers who pitty the woeful case of such a self-disturbing people § 10. All this hath been so long manifested to the sad Experience of mankind in most Nations and Ages of the Christian World that it is not to be denyed or concealed And should we pretend the Honour of the Church and Clergie for the denying or the hiding of such grievous Sins it would but make us partakers of the guilt and displease the most Holy God who will have sin in whomsoever shamed and harden others who are ready to imitate them The Holy Scriptures open and shame the sins even of Adam of Noe of Lot of David of Solomon of Peter and of Gods chosen people the Iews and this was not a faulty uncovering of their nakedness but a necessary disgrace of sin and manifestation of the Holyness and Justice of God and a warning to others that we should not sin with such Examples before our Eyes 1 Cor. 10.6 7 8. I have written the History of the Bishops and Councils of former Ages in which with their virtues I have opened their miscarriages some blame it as if it were uncovering their nakedness But I have said nothing but what is openly proclaimed of them long agoe by their own greatest flatterers and it was Christ himself that said Remember Lot 's Wife The Pit which so many have fallen into must be uncovered and God and Holyness must be honoured rather than those that dishonour them by sin Sin confessed and forsaken is not so dangerous as sin denyed and extenuated He that hideth it shall not prosper Sin is a reproach to any people Pro. 14.34 and 6.33 Even God that forgiveth it to the penitent will shame it to keep others from committing it He that minceth or hideth it tempteth others to imitate it Alas what work have a worldly proud and ignorant Clergie made in most Christian Nations these thirteen hundred years Athanasius Chrysostoms Isidore-Pelusiota c. but especially excellent Gregory Nazianzene have told it us even of their flourishing times more plainly than I now intend to do They have loved this present world some set themselves by venting new and odd opinions to draw Disciples after them for applause some furiously hereticating them that differed from them by ambiguous words and making themselves Lords of the Faith of others and making their ignorant Dictates the Oracles of the Church striving who should be thought wisest and best but especially who should be greatest as if Christ had never judged in that Controversie Flattering Emperours and Princes till they got Wealth and Power by them and then over-topping them and troubling the World by Rebellious and Bloody Warrs Tearing the Churches in pieces on pretence of Union and killing and burning men on pretence of Faith and Charity and Cursing from Christ his faithful Servants on pretence of using the Keyes of Christs Kingdom setting up themselves and a worldly Kingdom on pretence of the Spiritual Government of Christ making Merchandize of Souls on pretence of feeding and ruling them cherishing the people in Ignorance and sloth and carnality that they might be more obedient to their Tyranny and lesse capable of opposing it hating and destroying the most conscionable Christians as Hereticks or Schismaticks because they are the greatest Enemies to their Sin and desires of Reformation provoking Princes to become the bloody Persecutors of such for the upholding of their worldly State and Dignity yea making them their Lictors or Executioners to destroy such as they condemn Such work as this hath destroyed the Greeks or Eastern Churches set up Turkish Tyranny by dividing Christians weakning and ruining the Emperors making Religion a meer Image of lifeless formality and Ceremony and a powerless dying thing Such a Clergie hath darkned and lamentably brought low the Christian Churches in Moscovie Armenia Georgia Mengrelia Syria Abassia and extirpated them in Nubia and brought them in Italy Poland Hungary Spain France
you bound yourselves to do X. Remember still how much the happiness or misery of Church and Kingdoms and of the World doth lie on the right or wrong educating of Youth by Parents much more than our Universities or Schools XI Remember that your own comfort or sorrow in them lyeth most on your own duty or neglect if they prove wicked and Plagues of the World and you are the cause it may tear your hearts but what a joy is it to be the means of their Salvation and of their publick service in the World XII Disgrace sin to them and commend holiness by word and practice and be your selves what you would have them be And pray daily for them and your selves The Lord bless this Counsel to them and you CHAP. XIV What are mens Duties to each other as ELDER and YONGER § 1. IT is most clear in Scripture and Reason that there are many special duties which the Elder and Younger as such owe to each other The Elder are bound 1. To be wiser than the Younger as having longer time and so to be their instructers in their several places 2. And especially to deliver down to them the Sacred Scripture which they received and the Memorials of Gods works done for his Church in their dayes and which they received from their Fathers 3. And to go before them in the example of a holy and heavenly Life Iob 32.4 and 8.8 Heb. 5.14 Tit. 2.2.3 1 Io. 2.13 14. Iudg. 6.13 Psal. 44.1 and 78.3 5. Deut. 1. 21. Exod. 12.26 Deut. 11.19 Ios. 4.6.21 22. Ioel. 1.3 § 2. And nature and Scripture tell us that the Younger owe much Duty to the Elder sum'd up 1 Pet. 5.5 Ye Younger submit your selves to the Elder this submission includeth especially a reverence to their judgments preferring them before their own and supposing that ordinarily they are wiser than the younger and therefore living towards their Elders in a humble Learning disposition and not proudly setting their unfurnished wits against their greater experience without very evident reason For the understanding of which note § 3. 1. That it is certain that meer Age doth not make men wise or good none are more sottishly and uncurably ignorant than the aged ignorants and few so bad as the old obstinate sinners For they grow worse deceiving and being deceived and more and more abuse Gods mercy and are still going further from him as the faithful are growing better and nearer to him 2. And it is certain that God greatly blesseth some young mens understandings and maketh them wiser than the aged and their Teachers 3. And such a one is not bound to think that he knoweth not what he knoweth nor to believe that every old man is wiser than he all this we grant § 4. But though Eccl. 4.13 Better is a poor and a wise Child than an old and foolish King who will no more be admonished Yet 1. It is certain that knowledge cometh much by experience and long experience and use is farre more powerful than the short And Time and Converse is necessary to it naturally or ordinarily long learning and use increaseth knowledge Do not all take it for granted that usually the boys who have been many years at School are better who Scholars than beginners and so in all other acquisitions Therefore it was the Elders that were commonly the Rulers of the people in Church and Commonwealth and the Pastors and Rulers are thence called Elders And if they were not ordinarily the wisest why did not God make the Children the ordinary Teachers and Rulers of their Parents but the Parents of the Children Old men may be Ignorant and Erroneous as well as wicked but young men cannot be ripe in wisdom without a miracle we are not therefore now to suppose unusual things to be usual Ordinarily youth is ignorant and raw their conceptions undigested not well fixed or improved It is but few things that they know and their ignorance of the rest maketh them lyable to many Errours Heb. 5.11 12. For the Time ye ought to have been Teachers fitness to teach supposeth Time the young cannot digest strong meats A Novice must not be a Bishop the reason may seem strange Lest he be lift up with Pride and fall into the condemnation of the Devil 1 Tim. 3.6 One would think youth should be most humble as conscious of defectiveness But because the Ignorant know not that more is to be known than ever they attained therefore they know not their own Ignorance 2. And this PROVD IGNORANCE is so odious a sin and the nurse of so many more and so great an Enemy to wisdom and all good that it is no wonder that it is the way to the condemnation of the Devil § 5. Therefore though young men should not receive any Falshood Heresie or ill example from the aged yet they should still reber that caeteris paribus Age hath the great advantage for knowledge and youth must needs live in an humble teachable sence of Ignorance other mens abuse of Time and aged folly will not prove them miraculously wise The aged are alwaies the wisest if they equally improve their time and helps § 6. It is so odious a sin for Lads and young Students to be self-conceited and unteachable and set up their apprehensions with ungrounded confidence against their Elders that all should be very fearful of that guilt and have such humble thoughts of their own understandings as to be jealous of their conceptions for all these Vices make up their self-conceited prefidence 1. It is both great ignorance of the darkness of mens understanding and great ignorance of themselves to be ignorant that they are ignorant and to think they are sure of that which they know not 2. It is an odious sort of Pride to over-value an ignorant understanding and to be proudly confident of that which they have not 3. It is folly to think that Truth can be known without sufficient time and tryal and contrary to the Worlds continual experience 4. It is an absurd an inhumane a subverting of the order of World for Lads to set up their Wits by groundless self-conceitedness against their Elders as for Subjects to set their Wills against Rulers 5. It is a continual unrighteousness there is a justice required in our common private judging as well as in Judges publick judgment And all should be heard and tryed before we peremptorily judge 6. It is a nest of continual Errour in the mind which is the Souls deformity and contrary to natures love of Truth § 7. And it hath abundance of mischievous effects 1. It keepeth out that Truth or Knowledge which should be received It obstinately resisteth necessary teaching whereas the willingest entertainment is little enough to get true knowledge even by slow degrees As God giveth birds an instinct to feed their young so the young ones by instinct hunger and open their mouths But if they abhorr'd their meat and must be cram'd they
age they come to true understanding of the Covenant which they made and must renew and till they give credible signs of real Godlyness by a Godly Life and of what mischievous effects it is to confirm them and admit them to the Lords Supper on their bare saying the words of the Catechism the Creeds Lords Prayer and Decalogue without tryed Vnderstanding and serious Piety And what a wrong it is to the Christian Church and Religion to confound and corrupt our Communion for want of Parish Discipline and distinctions And how little good all Canons or Laws for Reformation or Religious duty will do if the Ministry be ignorant worldly and ungodly and the Churches be not taught and guided by able godly humble self-denying and loving Pastors I beseech you read him diligently he was no violent man and his books here mentioned were purposely written for K. Edward and the Bishops and Church of England and accepted kindly by them His burnt bones were honourably vindicated by the publick praise and his memory by many in Cambridge solemnly commended to posterity I beseech you let his Counsel in these Books be revived and true Reformation be tryed by their Light I hope they will hear that great and moderate Reformer that will not hear me or such as I. And if you will adde the Reading of old Salvian and of Nic. Clemangis it may do you good and excite you to do good to others and promote the ends of this Advise to Youth March 25. 1681. FINIS A CATALOGUE of Mr. Baxter's Books to satisfie some Foreigners And are to be Sold by B. Simmons at the Three Golden Cocks at the West End of St. Pauls I. Doctrinal 1. A Phorisms of the Covenants and Justification suspended for some imperfections 12 mo 2. The Reasons of the Christian Religion 4 to 3. The Unreasonableness of Infidelity How the Spirit is Christs Witness Of the sin against the Holy Ghost 8 vo 4. More Reasons for the Christian Religion confuting the Ld. Herbert de Veritate 12 mo 5. A Confession of his Faith against Antinomians 4 to 6. The Vindication of Gods goodness against some melancholy Exceptions 12 mo 7. How far Holiness is the design of Christianity 4 to 8. A Latine Methodus Theologiae Christianae which with the Body of Practical Divinity maketh an entire System It consists of 73 Tables or Methodical Schemes pretending to a juster Methodizing of Christian Verities according to the Matter and Scripture than is yet extant furnishing men with necessary distinctions on every Subject shewing that Trinity in Unity is imprinted on the whole Creation and that Trichotomising is the just distribution in Naturals and Morals The 1st Part of the Kingdom of Nature The 2d of the Kingdom of Grace before Christs Incarnation The 3d of the Kingdom of Grace and the Spirit since the Incarnation The 4th of the Kingdom of Glory All in the Political Method in the Efficience Constition and Administration viz. Legislation Judgment and Execution The first Part mostly Philosophical with a full Scheme of Philosophy or Ontology The Doctrine de Anima most largely handled with above 200 select Disputations Prolixe ones of the Trinity Predetermination the Faculties of the Soul Original Sin And a multitude of Controversies briefly decided in Fol. II. Practicals for all sorts 9. A Christian Directory or Body of practical Divinity 1. Christian Ethicks 2. Oeconomicks 3. Ecclesiasticks 4. Politicks Resolving multitudes of Cases on each Subject Fol. 10. The Saints everlasting Rest. 4 to 11. A Treatise of Self-Denial 4 to 12. The crucifying of the World by the Cross of Christ. 4 to 13. The mischiefs of Self-Ignorance 8 vo 14. A Sermon of Repentance preached to the Commons the day before they voted the King's Return 4 to 15. Right Rejoycing A Thanksgiving Sermon at St. Pauls foretelling the danger of their turning all into greater Calamity 4 to 16. The vain Religion of the formal Hypocrite And the Fools prosperity 12 mo 17. A Sermon of Faith before the King 4 to 18. The poor mans Family Book for them that cannot buy many A familiar Dialogue shewing the Unconverted how to become true Christians and the Converted how to live and die as such With a Catechism Prayers and Psalms 8 vo III. Practicals for the Vnconverted 19. A Call to the Unconverted to Turn and Live 12 mo 20. Directions and Persuasions to a sound Conversion 8 vo 21. Now or Never 12 mo 22. A Treatise of Conversion 4 to 23. A Saint or a Bruit 4 to 24. A Sermon of making Light of Christ. 8 vo 25. A Treatise of Judgment 8 vo 26. True Christianity Christs absolute Dominion and Mans Subjection Assize Sermons 12 mo 27. Catholick Unity How to be all of one Religion Ungodliness the great Divider 12 mo IV. Practicals for the Faithful 28. The right Method for settled Peace of Conscience and Spiritual Comfort 8 vo 29. The weak Christian strong Christian and Hypocrite characterized 8 vo 30. The Divine Life 1. A Treatise of the Knowledge of God and use of his Attributes 2. Of Walking with God 3. Conversing with God in solitude 4 to 31. The Life of Faith in every State 4 to 32. Mrs. Bakers Funeral Sermon Death the last Enemy 8 vo 33. Mr. Hen. Stubs Funeral Sermon 12 mo 34. Mrs. Coxes Funeral Sermon 4 to 35. Alderman Ashursts Funeral Sermon 4 to 36. Mr. Io. Corbets Funeral Sermon 4 to 37. Mrs. Baxters Life and her Mothers Funeral Sermon The last work of a Believer 4 to 38. Poetical Fragments Partly Thanksgiving partly the groans of the afflicted 8 vo V. Controversies against Popery 39. The safe Religion Three Disputations 8 vo 40. One Sheet of Reasons against Popery 8 vo 41. A Key for Catholicks to open the juglings of the Jesuits The first part answering all their common Sophisms The second against the Soveraignty and necessity of General Councils 4 to 42. The certainty of Christianity without Popery 8 vo 43. Full and easie satisfaction which is the true Religion Transubstantiation shamed 8 vo 44. Naked Popery Answering Mr. Hutchinson 4 to 45. The true Catholick Church A popular Sermon of its Unity 12 mo 46. The successive Visibility of the Church where it hath been in all Ages An Answer to W. Iohnson alias Terret 8 vo 47. Which is the true Church A full Answer to his Reply proving that the General Councils and the Popes Primacy were but in one Empire 4 to 48. The Grotian Religion discovered 12 mo 49. The History of Bishops and their Councils abridged and of the Popes 4 to VI. English Church Controversies 50. Gildas Salvianus The Reformed Pastor shewing the Nature of the Pastoral Office especially of personal Instruction 8 vo 51. Christian Concord The Agreement of the associated Pastors and Churches of Worcestershire 4 to 52. Their Agreement for Catechising and personal Instructing their Parishes 8 vo 53. Disputations of Right to Sacraments 4 to 54. Disputations of Church Government Liturgies and Ceremonies 4 to 55. Of