N00593:8
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.
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.
Proverbs X. 1. A Wise Son maketh a Glad Father, but a Foolish Son is the Heaviness of his Mother.
When the Child of Jephthah was by him to be made a Sacrifice unto God, in those Darker Days, wherein the Frequency of Humane Sacrifices among all Nations, made a […] Confession of the Divine […], calling for no less a Sacrifice than that of the Messiah, the Distressed ⟨image ?⟩[…] of that poor Iphigenia, [o […] ] Cried out, in Judg. 11. 3• Alas, my Daughter, Thou hast brought […] very Low, and thou art one of them which Trouble me. Though I am not of the Age to Feel it, yet I See daily, and very dismal Cause to Think it, That a more Abasing Trouble, cannot befall a Godly Parent, than to behold their own Children, by the Courses of Ungodliness, making Themselves a Sacrifice unto the Devil Godly Parents, have such a Love to God in their own Souls, that it must needs be a terrible Trouble unto them, to see any of their own Children Herding among the Haters of God. Godly Parents are so Gratefully Concerned for the Glory of the Lord Jesus Christ their Blessed Saviour, that it must needs be a terrible Trouble unto them, to see their own Children turn Traitors and Rebels unto that Blessed Lord. It is the Joy of all Parents, to see their own Image Conveyed unto their Children, as they are Humane Creatures; but it is the Grief of all Godly Parents to see their Children partakers of their Image, as they are Sinful Creatures; and therefore, 'tis the greatest of all their Cares, about their Children, to obtain the Image of God Renewed on them, in Knowledge, Holiness, ⟨image ?⟩and Righteousness; but when […] thereof, they see the Image of […] horribly Defacing of them, and Expressed in all the motions of their Hearts and Lives; This causes them to say, Alas, my Children, You bring me very Low, you Trouble me exceedingly! Godly Parents are desirous of nothing for their poor Children, so much as This; That the Holy Spirit of God may take Possession of their Children, to make them Vessels of Honour for the Lord for ever; For This they are Praying, for This they are Weeping, for This they are Wishing before the Lord continually; yea, perhaps many months before their Children were Born, with Solemn Fasting and Prayer before the Lord, they implored such a Possession of the Holy Spirit for them. Now, to see these Children afterwards Possessed by the Evil Spirit, and […] Employed, and […] Abused as instruments of […] unto the most Faithful […] and […]: Oh!