Children andReldtions how to he denied. cable alms or Legacy, this is to preferr filf before the Lord ; even as it is imagined tQ furvive in Your progeny, even when rAtural fetf can no longer enjoy it. Itsa wonder how fo marky men feeming holy and devoted to God, canquiet their confciences in fuch a palpable fin as this . Ifoneof them have two hundred, or three hundred poun.d a year, its a wonder if he leave an hundred a year of it to any pious or cha- ritable ufe ; but ifhe leave tourty or fiftypound to the poor, or build force fmall AIms-houfe, he thinks he bath done well ; all the reit Muft go to leave his fon in equal dignity and riches in the world as himfelf. But of this I (poke before. i o.Laflly,he Pure that you be very fu/pit offelf when the cafe ofyour children or any dear Reldtion u before you. for fe/f is neer you, and will flick clofe, and will not eafily be thrult on,t of your Counfels, nor Ihakenoff : And therefc re in your own cafe, and your Childrens cafe, or the cafe of your neer friends, you will have much ado to overcome the cunning and firong temptations to Partiality, if you were the -holieft Saint onearth : (though overcome them youwill in the main ifyou have true grace) : But ifyou are dead profeffors its twenty to one but they will overcome you ; andyou will thew the world that you are felfith hypocrites,andmore for your children and friends then God. Let me here give a few infiances in this warning. r. How oft have we feen it here and elfewhere, that people that make force thewof Religion, and are for ward to have vicepunithed, and difcipline exercifed, yet when it fats on any children, or neer relations of their own, they are as much againfi it as they are for it on others ; yea rife up withpaffion and bitter re- proaches of Officers, Minifters or others that are the caufes of it. As one Hypocrite is tried when he denieth to fiiffer for Chria himfelf fo others thew themfelves Hy- pocrites fooner , by preferring their children yea their final' children, yea the prefent eafe, or profit, or credit of their children, before their duty and the honour of God : And they will rather have God provoked, fin unpunifhed, and their childrens own falvation hazarded, then they will have them juilly and regularly chaftifed : yea fome of them rife
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