N00727:26
A family well-ordered. Or An essay to render parents and children happy in one…
A family well-ordered. Or An essay to render parents and children happy in one another. Handling two very important cases. I. What are the duties to be done by pious parents, for the promoting of piety in their children. II. What are the duties that must be paid by children to their parents, that they may obtain the blessings of the dutiful. / By Cotton Mather. ; [Three lines from Malachi]
Boston: printed by B. Green for Michael Perry, 1699
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.
What shall I Say? I may say, The Time would fail me to mention a thousandth part of what might be said. But, in short: Is it not a sad Thing to be The Father of a Fool? Alas, man, till thy Children become Regenerate, Thou art the Father of a Fool; Thy Children are but the Wild Asses Colt! I add; would it not Break thy Heart, if thy Children, were in Slavery to Turks, or Moors, or Indians? Devils are worse than Indians, and Infidels: Till thy Children are brought home to God, they are the slaves of Devils. In a word; Can thy Heart Endure, that thy Children, should be Banished from the Lord Jesus Christ, and Languishing under the Torments of Sin among Devils, in outer Darkness ⟨p. 13⟩throughout Eternal Ages? Don't call thy self a Parent; Thou art an Ostrich! Call not these, the Children of thy Bowels; Thou hast no Bowels! I will not say, That Zipporah called her Husband, A Bloody Husband. But all the Angels in Heaven call thee, A Bloody Father, and, A Bloody Mother; and are astonished at the Adamantine Hardness of that Bloody Heart of thine; and those Heartstrings that are Sinews of Iron!
What shall I Say? I may say, The Time would fail me to mention a thousandth part of what might be said. But, in short: Is it not a sad Thing to be The Father of a Fool? Alas, man, till thy Children become Regenerate, Thou art the Father of a Fool; Thy Children are but the Wild Asses Colt! I add; would it not Break thy Heart, if thy Children, were in Slavery to Turks, or Moors, or Indians? Devils are worse than Indians, and Infidels: Till thy Children are brought home to God, they are the slaves of Divels. In a word; Can thy Heart Endure, that thy Children, should be Banished from the Lord Jesus Christ, and Languishing under the Torments of Sin among Devils, in outer Darkness ⟨p. 13⟩throughout Eternal Ages? Don't call thy self a Parent; Thou art an Ostrich! Call not these, the Children of thy Bowels; Thou hast no Bowels! I will not say, That Zipporah call'd her Husband, A Bloody Husband. But all the Angels in Heaven call thee, A Bloody Father, and, A Bloody Mother; and are astonish'd at the Adamantine Hardness of that Bloody Heart of thine; and those Heartstrings that are Sinewes of Iron!