Casuistical morning-exercises the fourth volume /

I am sure, none ought to have Licenses for the keeping such houses who will suffer them to be places of licentiousness, and not be careful to observe good hours and orders.

Seventhly▪ Let all inferior Officers be very careful and diligent in their places. For their places are not dormitories, places to idle and sleep in, but to watch and work in. Church-wardens, Constables and others have a very considerable power, and without doubt they have it not for nothing. And as it is given them for good ends, so for those ends they ought to employ it. That power is in vain which is not reduced into Act. The Staff which you Constables carry up and down with you is for something more than a bare and empty sign, and to tell people what you are, and though you do frequently leave your Staff at home, yet I pray, be sure to carry your eyes and ears along with you to the farthest bounds of your jurisdiction. What a great deal of good may be done, and what abundance of wickedness may be prevented ⟨p. 352⟩by one active person. And I think I am not mistaken when I reckon upon a curious inquisition as one part of the work of your Office. Surely it is not for you to sit still at home till you are alarmed and called forth by riots and uproars in the Streets, or have men come with their complaints rapping at your doors, but you should take your walks, and make enquiry after evil-doers, find out their nests, and haunts; See what Companies meet in public houses, for entertainment, and what they do, how they behave themselves when they are together, and be sure to dissolve their wicked Clubs, and debauched meetings and carry the Persons whom you find so transgressing before those Superior Magistrates whom you know most hearty and active in their places. For, verily, when there are good and excellent Laws in a Land for the regulating of things, and correcting that which is amiss, and yet sin grows because of a Male-administration, much, very much of the guilt will be chargeable upon and lie at the doors of inferior Officers, more than they will be able to answer for.