subjection were it not for this confinement that hath an universal influence upon all persons and transactions what tyranny would reign in the Courts of Princes what rebellion among subjects by this binding concern Princes are made almost unlimitable and subjects most free it is the undissembled affection of Princes upon which the freedom and happiness of the people are firmly planted Friendship is that which secures Families otherwise all things would be in confusion there Brethren like Cain would rise up one against another and a mans enemies be them of his own house besides this the prejudice would yer go higher and all men must stand as in Nehemiahs time with their weapons in one hand and work in the other since the progeny of Adam is encreased to a vast society and numerous issue all manner of disasters as Famine Pestilence Deluge Fire Wilde Beasts have not been so destructive of man as man himself which was occasioned by this want of Friendship Thlrdly There is a Friendship among Relations as that between Father and son Husband and Wife and Brethren these Relations make Friendships and such as must not give place to any other and this proceeds from natural principles which obliges to duty and Obligations not to be violated of which I shall speak more in another place Fourthly There is a Frendship that is grounded purely upon moral Principles and for distinction we call it a moral Friendship here is no Obligation preceeding as in that of relation but every man is left to his free choice and election and is governed by prudential and moral swasion a Father beside his own inclination is bound to love his son the law of nature bindes him to it and a son his Father in like manner but no man is bound to love any person with a complacential love nor can he do it except such an one that he can finde upon prudent considerations agreeable to his reason and fancy these are the most proper and powerful motives to excite the affections Friendship is equal in it self to all the world and hath no difference but is differenced by accidents and by the capacities or incapacities of them that receive it charity commands us not to be enemies to any and reason and prudence directs us to be most friendly to them that are most useful and deserving if we have reason to love many we have much more reason to love some more then others and if my affection be according to reason I must love most where I see most reason this moral friendship as it flows from the most generous principles so it produceth the most desirable effects we may make an estimate of it by its causes and effects sor its causes it derives either from a native candour and generofity of minde or from a noble and ingenious education or something jointly from both these seem as good originals as any thing meerly moral can proceed from and hence it is that we finde those of great minds and extraction most obliging whereas those of abject births and spirits are of a quite differing nature ths first are governed by reason which is still the same and will act equally and consonant to it self excluding an arbitrary will for he that doth things this moment because he will may the next have as weighty arguments to do some contrary and so spend his whole time in unravelling his spiders webs still lying under the lash of the superiour faculties which will be constantly following him with grating reflections who resist its more direct admonitions numerous are the effects that proceed from this cause I shall point at two or three briefly First men are hereby made so like God that nothing can more assimilate man to God love being a supream attribute of the unchangeable being prepares and enables us to a conformiry to the Divine Law Secondly Friendship calls home our wandring fancy that haply may range after a thousand vanities which may allure the affections but can never satissie them and contracts them to objects that are solid and excellent all men naturally afpire after happiness but few finde it because they either mistake the way or the end some place it in wisdom some in honour others in riches taking up with something short of the great end there is more satisfaction to be had in a faithful serious friend then in all sublunary things nothing can reach our content but that which can rationally engage the affections and this cannot be done by riches humane reason or pleasure we may adde the most binding relations and the most powerful obligations that pleasure can invent not any of these nor all together can do it and that because there is not worth enough in them to attract the heart and affections nor weight enough in them to satisfie reason nor power to lay any restraint upon exorbitant passions unlimited fancies but friendship can do all this there is love to attract nothing so attractive as love it self it comes always attended with the lucre of reward and pleasure and hcreby it insinuates it self and lays constraints and limitations upon the person insensibly without force or violence and so makes an absolute conquest Thirdly Friendship is exemplary vertue and carries in its front the clearest conviction of vice Philosophers were of opinion that no true love could be amongst any but ingenious men persons that are vicious cannot build their wood hay and stubble upon so solid a foundation as that of friendship yet this concern harh such credit with the worst of men that it hath not wanted advocates among its greatest enemies which though they have been never so vicious and industrious to defame vertue and condemn it as men do the light because their weak eyes cannot receive the luster of it yet they judge it most amicable and they can bestow praises upon vertuous men and commend the radency of that state they employ their utmost power to circumvent and destroy they can as well hold a Lion in a twine thred as confine their unruly passions and grasp the air as give check to one lust these are the unhappy subjects of those skilful Artificers that vitiate men in their persons to corrupt their principles and when all hopes of vertue is lost they will easily be perswaded into all the infelicity of a contrary state these are so deeply plunged in vice that they are contented that the last should be raised upon the ruine of the first and while they catch after the one with impetuous violence they can tamely endure the other to be vilifyed and despised whereas virtuous men can view them in their hurry and maze though with pity to them with satisfaction to themselves while they with serenity and a calm minde can regulate their opinions and confine a wandring fancy and reduce things to their just value and however this loose age the dreg of times may contemn things in themselves most deserving magnifying an arbitrary will and trampling
without which Friendship is very imperfect and but a lame attainment nor can there be that familiar converse and intimacy necessary to this concern without reflections if not temptations should I enter into this argument I might finde enough to say but I judge it neither grateful nor expedient Let those that are concerned inform themselves from the inconveniences that daily accrue upon such adventures they need go no further then common experience and observation to fatisfie their curiosity The fourth inequality to be avoided is that of Religion if there be a confluence of all other requisites and there be no harmony and agreement here the Friendship will be short lived nothing do more unite or divide persons then Religion if they agree in principles religion wonderfully strengthens the Frendship and engages their hearts one towards another and this must needs be so for if men agree in things of the greatest consequence it is likely they may accord in things less considerable It is observed that no differences are so great as those occasioned by religion and no spirits so bitter and inexorable as such as are by disputes in Religion exasperated how hardly are small dissentings in Religion though but in one single point composed what difficulty then must there needs be in reducing those to compliance that differ in substantial points in the doctrine as well as in the manner of worship and if this be not done the Frendship will be uncertain I grant there may be some circumstantial dissenting among friends and no great prejudice thereby because those may be argued with indifference and moderation and a reconciliation is not impossible but very probable because in this case the best reason carries it but in substantial points the matter is not so soon done Matter of Faith seems too sacred to submit to the best reason while conscience remains unsatisfied who though misguided and led by examples and custome that have no foundation in the word of God the most infallible rule yet these shall have such influences upon the seduced conscience that they will not give place to the most infallible and divine truths and having made the first impression will pleade their propriety and oppose it against the commands of divine justice there is much arguing in this case little yielding and compliance when men are tainted with corrupt principles arguing may beget disgusts and heats and ingage the passions and set them all a quarrelling and winde up the differences to such heights as will admit of no pacifying arguments this is plainly proved by common experience witness the Church of Rome and the Reformed Churches what vast endeavours has there been for an accomodation but with no success the animosity grows higher and a reconciliation more impossible as is evident by the vast treasures that have been expended and effusion of bloud that hath been spilt and is still shedding Look a little nearer even among our selves where the dissentings are not so universal and we shall finde much vexation and trouble Is it not observable that persons that have lived and conversed together a great while have at last parted and no cause visible appearing there seems to be a twofold reason for this First from the difference in opinion which prevails so over the passions that love the master-affection which for some time hath preserved unity has now changed its property and by accident occasions the greatest quarrel had men no religion they would not be so liable to dissentions there being no cause for dispute they were equal in such a condition I had almost said equally unhappy but it may be supposed that prudence may do much to compose things it may keep in the fire a while but not long it will at last break out into a flame nothing more common then for men to be great friends while neuters in religion but if either come to be sincerely pious they fall a quarrelling presently it is not the religion that doth it but the contrariety of the one against the Religion of the other if a man loves his friend he cannot see him walking in ways of death and not reprove him and that smartly and this cannot be born what amity can continue where there can be no arguing without quarelling no reproof without retorting now friends begin to treat one the other with suspision and absent themselves from that equal conversation and intimacy which first made the amity and must still preserve it Secondly the efficacy of piety and religion it self insensibly loosens the knot of this alliance because the one cannot bear the convictions and restraints that will be laid on him by the other which though not by designe and intentially but by example and accidentally will be very severe and confining to his extravagant temper I have read a story of a young gallant who had a pious Father that had given him many admonitions but he little minding the counsel and example of his father became vilely vicious and when he intended to drink to excess or be any other way debauched in the room where the effiges of his dead father hung he would first draw a curtain before the picture saying he could not be frolick while he saw any thing of his father who had so often reproved him such convictions attended him I shall only add that in all alliances religion if sincere is the surest tie nothing we enjoy can be constant and durable without this this is the fruit of the tree of life which if we feed on will make our comforts not onely long lasting but our happiness everlasting Lastly the inequality of relations comes to be considered but before I proceed give me leave to take notice of an objection which seems ready to assault me at my first entrance into this part of the discourse and that is that I have endeavoured all along to confine friendship and limit it to a moral capacity and so have excluded relations which in truth are more capable receptive of it there are three relations especially that make this challenge Father and Son Husband and Wife and Brethren Pray give me leave to leade these Objectors into the nature of these relations and there they will satisfie themselves of the invalidity of this splendid scruple which is more in shew then in substance To begin with the first namely Father and Son this relation is so far from equality that it intends and commands the contrary it is a composition of disparity which is so natural to the relation that it can neither have a being nor well-being without it Instance the power and authority of the Father which can never be lessened the fear and duty of the Son which cannot be excused a father is much more bound in this relation then any other superiour for they may sometimes dispence with their propriety in this regard without prejudice to themselves and with advantage to the inferiour but a parent cannot abate any of his just authority but
apprehensions of it I proceed to the fourth thing which is the great end aimed at in the relation and state friendship First the advantage and utility of friendship is first in our eye as I could never fancy any man whose person was ungrateful so I could not love one whose parts are not desirable I can love my friend for any worthy quality and the more worthy the more he hath of my affections persons may without censure expect profit as well as pleasure in those things they dearly love and this is neither mercinary nor unreasonable but most commensurate and equivalent to the greatest end of friendship their ends in that concern are the same that his was spoken of in the parable that sold all to purchase the field in which the pearl was It was not the sield but the treasure he aimed at so a man doth not love any person barely for himself but as the cabinet that contains the Jewel he values he doth not love the Jewel because of the cabinet but the cabinet with the respect to the Jewel we rationally prize things when we value them according to their usefulness we prize water the sun and bread because these are so necessary that we cannot live without them friendship in some respect is as necessary as our nature cannot subsist without strengthning and nourishment no more as we are sociable can we be happy without society David was fully satisfied in Jonathan not more for the pleasure he had in his embraces as the benefit and profit of his counsel advice and directions as also his example which might prove as great an advantage to David if not greater than any of the rest without question that faithfulness and humility of Jonathan was as exemplary to David as his assistance and friendship was desireable A true and faithful friend is one of the richest talents God entrusteth us with a rich man takes much delight to contemplate his money that lies in such or such a place it is his only treasure and where the treasure is there the heart will be a mans friend is his treasure and as Solomon observed money answers all things that is to say that money can reach with as great truth we may say that an ingenious man answers all things that are necessary to a sociable happiness Secondly Society is one of the greatest ends of frendship that alliance was first contrived to promote sociable happiness man is a sociable creature and there is nothing more equall and consonant to his being and nature then society because hereby he is most capable of doing and receiving good in that method and manner which is most suitable to his reason and nature as also his inclination which is generous and not mercenary he doth not wholly aim at himself but that which amplifies the enjoyment is that it is mutual and can reach the content both of the subject and the object an ingenious man would not have a friend that cannot benefit him because then he could not be useful nor will he so spend and confine his affection if he sees a worthy person till he knows his reward or receives earnest by something extraordinary a true friend doth not study how to inrich himself by his friends bounty but how to better himself by his virtues or else by generous acts and obligations he is evermore making suitable returns nothing more contrary to vertuous persons then to level at low ends most ends are too low for love that noble affection yet we cannot erre here if our scope and aim be at religious principles and rational accomplishments the last makes us happy as men the first as Christians Thirdly a mutual satisfaction is aimed at in this relation of Frendship and that beyond what can possibly be obtained any where else what relation is there that will so far comply as a true friend there is none bound to study my humours but by my friend who must do it or he can never deport himself for this relation there are many paradoxes in frendship but it is to them that are strangers to the nature of this concern the misteries of frendship are very deep and cannot be fathomed by persons that are wholy strangers and unacquainted with this concern the sociable delight and mutual satisfaction between friends though it be very well understood amongst themselves is very intricate to those at a distance the conformity of friends are speaking and acting alike and submitting the reason and will each to other these are the hidden parts of frendship and not visible to every eye the sameness and similitude that is between them is not apprehended by others yet brings vast contentment to the persons concerned and exceedingly strengthens and confirms the alliance we love those that are like our relations much more those that are like our selves how pleasantly can a father look upon his image in his son and the more suitableness appears in their dispositions the more rooted and grounded is their affection we plainly see there can be no frendship between persons of contrary tempers but rather antipathies that which we call prudence is not known among them for if a man hates a person he dislikes all things that are about him so if he loves a person he approves of all things that concern him when the will of friends are melted and like lead run into the same mold then this conformity and the mutual satisfaction of both persons is attained contrary tempers are like contrary creatures still at variance Pride and humility patience and passion folly and ingenuity pieâ—y and carnal policy these can never consiâ—t together conâ—rarieties neither agree in whole nor in part In short this conformity is not only excellenâ—â—â—t self but also in its concomitants and tâ—ey â—re resolution and contentedness with every thing especially that which cannot be divided but with a fundamental destruction To be satisfied with the comfort of frendship without submission to the crosses is a foundation-errour and will occasion a breach irreparable in our humane state natural defects that cannot be cured these therefore must not be reflected on in a way of discontent to reprove or impose an impossibility is alike irrational it 's most unreasonable to dispute impossibilities and unkinde to make grating reflections because they still turn to scorn and scandal if they be publick and to discontent and trouble though they be never so private I can look upon the natural defects of my friends with more pleasure then the perfections of another because they are parts of what I dearly love and so much of himself that they cannot possibly be divided otherwise I would sooner take part of them my self then dislike them in him In the first choice I had my freedom might have declined the whole if I could not be reconciled to every part but now I cannot make exceptions but at this hazard the loss of my friend or at the least a perswasion in him that I cannot love him