N00593:61
Help for distressed parents. Or, Counsels & comforts for godly parents afflicted with ungodly…
Help for distressed parents. Or, Counsels & comforts for godly parents afflicted with ungodly children; and warnings unto children to beware of all those evil courses, which would be afflictive unto their parents. / By Cotton Mather. ; [Two lines of quotation in Latin]
Boston: printed by John Allen for Vavasour Harris, 1695
Title page typeset from the transcription.
Help for Distressed Parents. Offered, at the LECTURE in Boston, 14.… › Case 1: The first CASE.
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.
Are you by Sterility Debarred of Children? The Prophet of God has told you, That you may have a Name better than of Sons and of Daughters. If by Union with the Lord Jesus Christ, you come to have that Name. A Child of God, you have then a Better Name, than if you should be called, The Parent of never so many Sons or Daughters. An Absaloms Pillar, what is it worth? As for the Name of such a Parent, it is Better to have no such Name at all, than to have Wicked Sons or Daughters: They do all they can, to make your Name suffer abroad in the World, and Rot, and Stink, like their own. How many therefore have you heard wishing, O Utinam coelebs man •issem, et prole carerem! or, It had been well for me, if I had never had Children thus to wound me! When the Romans made rueful Havoc ⟨p. 38⟩among the Children of the Jews, it was Exclaimed, in Luc. 23. 29. Blessed are the Barren, and the Wombs that never Bare, and the Paps that never gave Suck. Truly, when you see Devils making Havoc among the Wicked Children of many Troubled Parents, you may Bless your selves, and say, 'Tis better to be Barren, than to Bear and Suckle such Wicked Enemies of God! And at the same Time, you have an Advantage to Lay out your Estates upon those Pious Uses, for the Good of others, which will turn to a far more glorious Account, than if your Children had them.
Are you by Sterilitie Debar'd of Children? The Prophet of God has told you, That you may have a Name better than of Sons and of Daughters. If by Union with the Lord Jesus Christ, you come to have that Name. A Child of God, you have then a Better Name, than if you should be called, The Parent of never so many Sons or Daughters. An Absaloms Pillar, what is it worth? As for the Name of such a Parent, it is Better to have no such Name at all, than to have Wicked Sons or Daughters: They do all they can, to make your Name suffer abroad in the World, and Rot, and Stink, like their own. How many therefore have you heard wishing, O Utinam coelebs man •issem, et prole carerem! or, It had been well for me, if I had never had Children thus to wound me! When the Romans made rueful Havock ⟨p. 38⟩among the Children of the Jews, it was Exclaimed, in