SER M. congregation guilty in that kind, they would point him out particularly, and let fly at him with great

LIII.

zeal.

I have likewife known fome parents that have ftrictly forbidden their children the use of fome forts of recreations and games under the notion of heinous fins, upon a mistake, that because there was in them a mixture of fortune and skill they were therefore unlawful; a reafon which I think hath no weight and force in it, though I do not deny but humane laws may for very prudent reafons either reftrain or forbid the use of these games, becaufe of the boundless expence both of money and time which is many times occafioned by them.

I have known others, nay perhaps the fame perfons, that would not only allow but even encourage their children to defpife the very service of GOD under fome forms, which according to their feveral apprehenfions they efteemed to be fuperftitious or factious. But this I have ever thought to be a thing of moft dangerous confequence, and have often observed it to end either in the neglect or contempt of all religion.

And how many parents teach their children doubtful opinions, and lay great stress upon them as if they were faving or damning points; and hereby fet fuch an edge and keennefs upon them for or against fome indifferent modes and circumftances of GOD's worship as if the very being of a church and the effence of religion were concerned in them?

These certainly are great mistakes, and many times have very pernicious effects, thus to confound things which are of fo wide and vaft a difference

LIII.

as good and evil, lawful and unlawful, indifferent S ER M.
and neceffary. For when children come to be men,
and to have a freer and larger view of the world,
and fhall find by the contrary practice of very wife
and ferious perfons that they have quite different
apprehenfions of these matters, and do not think
that to be a fin which their parents have fo ftrictly
forbidden them under that notion, and many times
punished them more feverely for the doing of it
than if they had told a lye, this may make them apt
to queftion whether any thing be a fin: and the
violences which they offer to their confciences, and
the strain that they give them upon such an occasion,
by complying with the general practice of others
contrary to the principles of their education, doth
many times open a gap for great and real fins.

Befides, that children which are bred up in high
prejudices for or against indifferent opinions or
practices in religion, do ufually when they are grown
up prove to be men of narrow and contracted fpi-
rits, peevish and froward and uncharitable, and
many times great bigots and zealots either in the
ways of fuperftition or faction, according to the
principles which have been inftilled into them to
bias them either way. And very hardly do they
ever quit themselves fo clearly of their prejudices,
as to become wife and peaceable and fubftantial
Chriftians.

In fhort, if we carefully obferve it, we shall find that when children have been thus indifcreetly educated, their religion differs as much from that of fober and judicious chriftians as the civil behaviour and converfation of those who have been unskilfully and

con

LIII.

SERM. conceitedly taught how to carry themselves, does from the behaviour of those who have had a more free and generous education.

II. In matter of example. There are many parents whose lives are exemplary in the main, who yet feem to use too great a freedom before their children. It is an old rule, and I think a very good

one:

Maxima debetur pueris reverentia.

"There is a very great reverence due to children.” There are many things which are not fins, and therefore may lawfully be done, which yet it may not be prudent and expedient to do before all perfons. There are some words and actions fo trivial and light, that they are not fit to be faid or done before those for whom we have a reverence. There is a certain freedom of converfation which is only proper among equals in age and quality, which if we ufe before our fuperiors and betters, we seem to contemn them; if before our inferiors, they will go nigh to contemn

us.

It ought to be confidered, that children do not understand the exact limits of good and evil, fo that if in our words or actions we go to the utmost bounds of.. that which is lawful, we fhall be in danger of fhewing them the way to that which is unlawful. Children are not wont to be careful of their steps, and therefore we will not venture them to play about a precipice, or near a dangerous place, where yet men that will take care may go fafely enough. And therefore parents fhould be very careful to keep their children from the confines of evil, and at as great a diftance

from

LIII.

from it as they can. And to this end their words SERM.
and actions should be ever tempered with gravity and
circumfpection, that children may not fee or hear any
thing which may acquaint them with the approaches
to fin, or carry them to the borders of vice; left
they should not stop juft there, but take a step
further than you intended they should go.

III. In matter of reproof and correction: many religious and careful parents are guilty of two great miscarriages in this part of education.

First, Of too much rigor and severity; which, especially with fome fort of tempers, hath very ill success. The first experiment that should be made upon children should be to allure them to their duty, and by reasonable inducements to gain them to the love of goodness; by praise and reward, and sometimes by fhame and difgrace: and if this will do, there will be no occafion to proceed to severity; especially not to great severities, which are very unsuitable to humane nature. A mixture of prudent and seasonable reproof or correction when there is occafion for it, may do very well; but whips are not the cords of a man: humane nature may be driven by them, but it must be led by fweeter and gentler ways.

Speufippus caufed the pictures of joy and gladness to be fet round about his fchool, to fignify that the business of education ought to be rendred as pleasant as may be and indeed children stand in need of all the enticements and encouragements to learning and goodness. Metus haud diuturni magifter officii, fays Tully; "Fear alone will not teach "a man his duty and hold him to it for a long "time:" For when that is removed, nature will

66

break

SERM. break loofe and do like it felf: befides, that fre

LII. quent corrections make punishments to lose their

awe and force, and are apt to fpoil the difpofition of children, and to harden them against fhame; and after a while they will defpife correction, when they find they can endure it.

Great feverities do often work an effect quite contrary to that which was intended. And many times those who were bred up in a very fevere fchool, hate learning ever after for the fake of the cruelty that was used to force it upon them: and so likewise an fo endeavour to bring children to piety and goodness by unreasonable strictness and rigor does often beget in them a lafting difguft and prejudice against religion, and teaches them, as Erafmus fays, virtutem fimul odiffe & noffe, "to hate virtue at the "fame time that they teach them to know it: " for by this means virtue is represented to the minds of children under a great disadvantage, and good and evil are brought too near together: fo that whenever they think of religion and virtue, they remember the severity which was wont to accomthe inftructions about it; and the natural hapany tred which men have for punishment is by this means derived upon religion it felf. And indeed how can it be expected that children fhould love their duty, when they never hear of it but with a handful of rods fhak'd over them?

I infift upon this the more, because I do not remember to have observed more notorious instances of great miscarriage, than in the children of very ftrict and severe parents; of which I can give no other account but this, that nature when it is thus