N00618:26
A good master well served. A brief discourse on the necessary properties & practices…
A good master well served. A brief discourse on the necessary properties & practices of a good servant in every-kind of servitude: and of the methods that should be taken by the heads of a family, to obtain such a servant. / By Cotton Mather. ; [Two lines from Joel]
printed by B. Green, 1696
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.
Casting a careful Eye upon our Assembly, I behold here many Hundreds of persons, which have been Stated in both of these two Orders, by the God of Order. 'Twill therefore be but a part of our Stewardly Faithfulness, our Pastoral Watchfulness, to Address both of these Orders, with such Admonitions as may be agreeable unto their Circumstances.
[…] And First, I will have the Servants to star by, as it becomes them, till their Masters a Served before them. I must in the First place Exhort you that are Masters, to Read serious ly those Paragraphs in the Oracles of God which lye next unto them, wherein the Duti•• of Servants are specified, for you will there find your Duties also, abundantly declared: an• when Masters are spoken to, Let the […] also take all that shall be spoke, unto themselves
〈…〉 And First, I will have the Servants to star by, as it becomes them, till their Masters a Served before them. I must in the First plac• Exhort you that are Masters, to Read seriou• ly those Paragraphs in the Oracles of God which lye next unto them, wherein the Duti•• of Servants are specified, for you will there find your Duties also, abundantly declared: an• when Masters are spoken to, Let the 〈…〉 also take all that shall be spoke, unto themselve•
I. But the first of those Counsels, which as proper and needful for you is; Oh! see to […] You that are Masters, and have Servants, I E treat you, see to it, That you be not yourselv the Servants of the worst Masters in th World. You do a little bear the Image of Go in that Government, which you have over you Servants; but God forbid, that you should be at the same Time, the Image of the Devil, an be under the Government of that Wicked One Very Lamentable was the Curse of Canaan, […] Ger. 9. 25. He shall be a Servant of Servant And how lamentably Cursed then will you […] to make your Servants, if their Master must […] a Servant of the Devil. Poorly sit is that man to Command others, who shall be himself Commanded always by the Devil, and by the Earth Sensual Devilish Inclinations of his own Hear Sirs, Do you first your selves become the Servants