A26903:270
Compassionate counsel to all young men especially I. London apprentices, II. students of divinity,…
Compassionate counsel to all young men especially I. London apprentices, II. students of divinity, physic, and law, III. the sons of magistrates and rich men / by Richard Baxter.Compassionate counsel to all young men especially I. London apprentices, II. students of divinity, physick, and law, III. the sons of magistrates and rich men / by Richard Baxter.
London: printed by T.S., 1681
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
§. 22. Away therefore from idleness, pamper not the Flesh with fullness or delights; ⟨p. 150⟩abhor all time wasting, needless Recreations; away from the baits of fleshly lust; be no more indifferent herein and unresolved, than you would be about drinking poison, or leaping into a Coal-pit, or wilfully going among Murderers or Thieves. Presume not on your own strength: he is safest that is furthest from the danger. Gunpowder must not stand near the fire.
§. 22. Away therefore from idleness, pamper not the Flesh with fulness or delights; ⟨p. 150⟩abhorre all time wasting, needless Recreations; away from the baits of fleshly lust; be no more indifferent herein and unresolved, than you would be about drinking poyson, or leaping into a Coal-pit, or willfully going among Murderers or Theives. Presume not on your own strength: he is safest that is furthest from the danger. Gunpowder must not stand near the fire.
§. 23. IV. Be sure to make a prudent choice of your Companions, especially of your bosom Friends.
It is supposed that a man loveth the Company which he chooseth, (though not which he constrainedly is cast upon.) And love and familiarity will give them great advantage over you. If they be wise they will teach you wisdom, if they be Holy & Spiritual, they will be drawing you towards God, and settling you in the resolved hatred of sin, and love of Holiness. But if they be Worldly and Ambitious, they will be filling your heads with ambitious worldly projects; and if they be ungodly Hypocrites that have but the dead image and name of Christians, they will be opposing or deriding serious Godliness, and pleading for the carcass and formalities of piety as better than serious spiritual devotion: and if they be hardened malignants, they will be trying to make you such as they by lies, revilings or plausible cavils, against