Selected quad for the lemma: prayer_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
prayer_n	blessing_n	child_n	parent_n	2,068	5	9.3978	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A50403	A memento to young and old: or, The young man's remembrancer, and the old man's monitor. By that eminent and judicious divine, Mr. John Maynard, late of Mayfield in Sussex. Published by William Gearing, minister of the Gospel	Maynard, John, 1600-1665.; Gearing, William.	1669 (1669)	Wing M1451; ESTC R216831	88,644	216

and offered burnt-offerings according to the number of them all Whiles his Children were feasting he was fasting while they were merry he was mourning and sacrificing lest his Sons should blaspheme and dishonour God A godly Father's Prayers do fly to Heaven and return into the bosom of his posterity with rich and pretious blessings If these rules I have propounded here were well and conscionably observed Parents and Children would be a crown and glory to one another and God would set an incorruptible crown of glory upon the heads both of Parents and Children CHAP. VIII SECT I. THis in the next place may serve for a just conviction of those whose Fathers lived in gross errours and wicked practices think it no dishonor to them to live and do as their Fathers did before them When Hezekiah sent the Posts from City to City through the Countries of Ephraim and Manasseh with this Message that he would have a Reformation according to the first Institution and pattern and would not have them abide any longer in the wayes of their Fathers it is said 2 Chron. 29. 10. They laughed the Messengers to scorn They mock'd them what must we be wiser than our Fathers See what answer is given to them Be not ye like your Fathers which trespassed against the Lord God of your Fathers ver 7. They that will erre by their Fathers Copy may also perish by their Fathers example In the beginning of King James his Reign in England the Papists made a Supplication to that King of happy memory one branch whereof was this We request no more favour at your Graces hands than that we may securely profess that Catholick Religion which all your happy Predecessors professed from Donaldus the first converted unto your Majesties Peerless Mother And to this purpose doth Dr. Kellison recite unto that King a long Catalogue of his noble Predecessors to encline him if possible to embrace the Popish Religion Many of our Fathers lived in times of ignorance had they lived in the light which we do it is not probable they would have lived in such gross errours and superstitions as they did Therefore we are not hand over head to follow all that our Fathers did but try them and follow the best When Frederick the IV. Elector of the Roman Empire and Count Palatine of the Rhine was by a certain Prince advised for his Religion to follow the example of his Father Lewes his answer was In Religione non Parentum non majorum exempla sequenda sed tantum voluntas Dei In matters of Religion we must neither follow the examples of Parents nor Ancestors but the will of God only is to be regarded And for this resolution he alledged the testimony of the Lord out of Ezek. 20. Walk ye not in the Statutes of your Fathers nor observe their Judgements nor defile your selves with their Idols I am the Lord walk ye in my Statutes vers 18 19. Therefore it was a good Confession of the Church Psal. 106. 6. We have erred with our Fathers S. Hierom once desired of S. Augustine that he might have leave to erre with seven Fathers whom he found of his opinion I should not crave that leave nor envy any one the priviledge The Fathers are but Children when they erre and they who will erre with their Fathers are more foolish than Children SECT II. THere are many others that make the manners of their Fathers the rule of their life and conversation The Children of idle Beggars take up the same wandring course of life as their Fathers did before them And it is commonly seen for the most part that whole Families are tainted with the same vices of their Stock John Baptis●● 〈◊〉 of a generation of Vipers So if we look abroad into the world we shall see generations of Swearers generations of Drunkards generations of Idolaters of Worldlings of unclean persons Ahab was a very none such in wickedness and all that come from him are like him in evil manners It is said of his Son Ahaziah that next succeeded him in the Kingdom of Israel 1 Kings 22. 25. That he walked in the way of his Father and in the way of his Mother in the way of wicked Ahab and cursed Jezebel There was annother Ahaziah King of Judah the Grand-child of Jehosophat by the Fathers side and of Ahab by the Mothers side He drew poison from the Mother and so trod in the paths of Ahab The Scripture saith expresly of him 2 Reg. 8. 27. That he walked in the way of the house of Ahab and did evil in the sight of the Lord as did the house of Ahab for he was the Son in Law of the house of Ahab Oh what mischief cometh to many a man and his whole stock by joyning himself in affinity with a wicked Family See the wilful resolution of a generation of Idolaters Jerem. 44. 17 18 19. We will certainly do whatsoever thing goeth forth of our own mouth to burn Incense to the Queen of Heav●● and to pour out Drink-offerings to her as wo●ave done we and our Fathers our Kings and our Princes in the Cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem For then had we plenty of victuals and were well and saw no evil But since we left off to burn Incense to the Queen of Heaven and to pour out Drink-offerings to her have we wanted all things and have been consumed by the Sword and by Famine How doth our Saviour complain of the Pharisees Matth. 23. 32 33 35. Wherefore ye be witnesses to your selves that ye are the Children of them that killed the Prophets Fill ye up then the measure of your sins ye Serpents ye generation of Vipers how can ye escape the damnation of Hell CHAP. IX SECT I. IT becometh every one of us therefore to confess our own sins the sins of our Fathers Nehem. 9. 2. The seed of Israel separated themselves from all strangers and stood and confessed their sins and the iniquities of their Fathers So in vers 16. But they and our Fathers dealt proudly and hardened their necks and harkened not to thy Commandements And vers 33. 34. Speaking of the Judgements of God that came upon them for their sins they say How be it thou art just in all that is brought upon us for thou hast done right but we have done wickedly neither have our Kings our Princes our Priests nor our Fathers kept thy Law nor hearkened to thy Commandements and thy Testimonies wherewith thou didst testifie against them Moreover it is worth observing that the Holy Ghost doth not record their sins which they confessed as their own present abounding sins but recordeth the sins of their Fathers which they confessed before God as appeareth from the ninth to the 30th verse It is not recorded we dealt proudly we hardened our necks we refused to obey we were disobedient and rebellious No question this was their own carriage towards God But it is said They meaning their

forget their Creatour Oh they think they are absolute men they are as they desire to be and cannot wish to be better their blood hath free passage in their veins their Spirits in their Arteries without obstructions they are lively amiable merry jovial free from wants fears sorrows troubles and as Job describeth the young galgallant His Breasts are full of milk and his Bones are mositned with marrow thy are wholly at ease and quiet and therefore God is not in all their thoughts 3. This lusty youthful temper makes them every way more sensible and capable of earthly delights and pleasures and so more apt to forget their Creatour and his service Old Barzillai knew not what to do at Court 2 Sam. 19. 35. I am this day Four score years old and can I discorn between good and evil Can thy servant saith he to King David Taste what I eat or what I drink can I hear any more the voice of singing men and singing women wherefore then should thy servant be yet a burthen unto my Lord the King Old Age is not sensible nor capable of many delights which younger persons take in with greediness No carnal pleasure but it suiteth with their dispositions they have a temper fitted to all fleshly delights and so can please their wanton appetites with variety of dishes that is their diverse lusts with variety of fleshly delights and in this case no wonder though they forget their Creatour when by reason of the constitution of their bodies peculiar to that age they can so many wayes please themselves in the Creature Men naturally forget God untill they need him But the young man in his prime finding so much below in the earth which ministreth matter of contentment to him apprehendeth no present need of him that made him and so mindeth him not unless the Lord open his eyes and cause him to see the emptiness and vanity of these things and his own miserable folly in resting his Soul upon them 4. A Fourth cause is want of experience in the uncertain condition of earthly things Young Men are in the Spring of their lives and pleasures and know not yet what a Winter meaneth They have not yet for the most part been beaten off from their pleasing folly by any notable change of estate they know not what sorrow meaneth and so they securely promise themselves a continuance of this seeming happiness and forget God as not perceiving any special need of him They hope to speed as well as they have done and so long they care not Those crosses which sometime befall the younger sort may for the present make them exceeding passionate but they are soon vanished and no print of their foot-steps remaineth behind them their delights are after a while never awhit embittered by them and thus forgetting their crosses they become forgetful of their God and that account which must be rendred to him you see how easie it is for youth to spin a snare wherein to entangle it self even out of its own bowels CHAP. V. BUt left this should not hold them fast enough Satan hath other instruments to help twist the threds many wicked wretches there are in the world who help them forward in their misery 1. Want of care and conscience in Parents not obeying the charge of the Apostle which is to bring up their Children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord Ephes. 6. 4. Not imitating the Father of the Faithful in the fruits of his Faith Gen. 18. 19. In commanding their Children and houshold after them that they may keep the way of the Lord to do Judgment and Justice Not taking advice of Solomon who counselleth them to teach their Children in the trade wherein they should go and giveth an hopeful promise for encouragement That they will not depart from it when they are old Prov. 22 6. Not looking with a single eye at the glory of God nor with a tender eye on the poor souls of their Children to whom deriving misery from their own Loyns they take no care to cure them of it 2. The evil examples which even Parents themselves give unto their Children many of them in their ripest yea in their rotten years returning to the sins of youth or at least glorifying in them even in the hearing of their Children How many young men are Drunkards Swearers Unclean Persons Scoffers at Holiness Contemners of the Word even by Succession and Inheritance The Son heareth his Father Swear he heareth him use filthy communication he seeth the old Beast come home Drunken and who can wonder though he forgeteth his Creatour whom he hath not seen whiles he findeth such wickedness in his Father whom he daily seeth or if they scorn such boys-play yet many times by that aged Sin of Covetousness they shewing themselves dead-hearted towards God cold careless in his services not feelingly and zealously mindful of his glory teach their Children to forget him that made them though they differ in those things which they embrace The very example of a coveous Father may make a Son riotous by teaching him to fall off from God and then his heart will cleave to that which is most suitable to it The Father's example setteth him out of the right way and his own peculiar lusts and distempered passions carrying him in such a by-path as best fiteth his own foot whereas many times the Father is displeased not because it is a wrong way but because it is not his own not because it is contrary to the wayes of God but because it crosseth his wayes no because it is more sinful but more chargeable than his own course which is most pleasing to him 3. The neglect of Religious duties in the Fathers Family is the ready way to make the Son unmindful of him that made him When Christ hath no Church but Mammon hath his Chappel in the house when there is no serious remembrance of God from one end of the year to the other in effectual prayers in constant reading of the Word in whetting it on as Moses speaketh by repetitions pious and seasonable admonitions when the Lord hath no entertainment there it is no marvel to find the younger sort forgetful of God CHAP. 6. BUt besides these faults in Parents many others will help to build up Satans Kingdom upon the ruines of the younger sort As 1. Their own equalls in years by whom they shall be drawn into the same excess of riot which the others have followed For as Satan himself being fallen could not endure to lye alone but sought companions in wickedness and wretchedness so he instilleth the same disposition into those who are caught in his nects These therefore partly by hellish scoffs at those who even out of ingenuity or good education loath their courses at the first partly by pleasing insinuations smooth language especially by that 〈◊〉 name of good fellow-ship wherewith the Father of lies hath sought to grace one of his own occupations do hale