A26903:86
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
Chapter 6: The joyful State and Blessing of good Children, to themselves and others.
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.
§ 5. And it will be a great comfort to you, thus to find at age and use of reason, that your baptismal Blessings ceased not with your Infancy, by your own rejection; but that you are now by your own consent in the Bond of God's Covenant, and have a right to all the blessings of it, which the Sacrament of Christs Body and Blood will confirm; as you had your Entrance by your Parents consent and accepted Dedication: For the Covenant of Grace is our certain Charter for Grace and Glory.
§ 6. And is it not a joy to you to be your Parents joy? To find them love you not only as their Children, but as Gods? Love maketh it sweet to us to please and be beloved by those whom we love. If it be not your grief to grieve your Parents, and your pleasure to please them, you love them not, but are void of natural affection.
§ 7. And O what a mercy will you find it, when you come to age and business in the World! 1. That you come with a clear Conscience, not clogged, terrified, and shamed with the sins of your Youth. 2. And that you come not utterly unfurnished with the knowledge, Righteousness and Virtue, which you must make use of in every condition all your lives: when others are like Lads, that will go to the Universities before they can so much as read or write. To live in a Family of your own, and to trade and converse in the World▪ and specially to go to Church, to hear, to pray, to communicate, in private to pray, to meditate, in a word, to live or die like a Christian, like a man, without the furniture of Wisdom, Faith, and serious Godliness, is more impossible and unwise, than to go to Sea without Provision, or to War without Arms, or to become a Priest without Book or understanding.