PUBLIC-DOMAIN CHRISTIAN BOOK
A Christian Directory, Part 4: Christian Politics
Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691 · 274,957 words · 366 reading sections
Part 181
_Answ._ As is before said, When it is against either justice or charity. 1. When it is like cheating bargaining, which under pretence of consent and a form of justice doth deceive or oppress, and get from another that which is not truly ours but his. 2. When you lend for increase where charity obligeth you to lend free…
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_Answ._ Yes, in case that contracting determine an uncertain case without sufficient cause: as if you agree, that whether the borrower gain or lose, and be poor or rich, I will have so much gain; that is, whether it prove merciful or unmerciful, I will have it. But then in that case, if it so prove unmerciful, it may n…
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_Answ._ Yes, 1. If you make not the game itself bad, by any accident. 2. If your wager be laid for sport, and not for covetousness (striving who shall get another's money, and give them nothing for it). 3. And if no more be laid than is suitable to the sport, and the loser doth well and willingly pay. _Quest._ VI. If …
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_Answ._ Here also the law of the land as regulating proprieties must be very much regarded; and especially the true meaning of the parties must be understood: if it was antecedently the expressed or implied meaning that one party in such or such a case should bear the loss, it must in strict justice be according to the…
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3. It is not only lawful, but one of the best works in the world, for fit persons to go on a design to convert the poor infidels and heathens where they go. Therefore the preachers of the gospel should not be backward to take any opportunity, as chaplains to ambassadors, or to factories, &c. to put themselves in such a…
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_Answ._ 1. We must distinguish between what is necessitated, and what is voluntary. 2. Between what is done by the wife's consent, and what is done without. 3. Between a wife that can bear such absence, and one that cannot. 4. Between a short stay, and a long or continued stay. 1. The command of the king, or public ne…
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II. But the too ordinary course of young gentlemen's travels out of England now practised, I take to be but a most dangerous hazarding, if not a plain betraying them to utter undoing, and to make them afterwards the plagues of their country, and the instruments of the common calamity. For, 1. They are ordinarily sent i…
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2. And usually all this while the most of them lay by all serious studies, and all constant employment, and make idleness and converse with the idle or with tempters, to be their daily work. And what a mind is like to come to, which is but one half year or twelve months accustomed to idleness, and to vain spectacles, a…
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5. And in the mean time the loss of all the helps which they should have at home, doth greatly tend to their destruction. For they oft travel into countries, where they shall have no public worship of God which is lawful, or which they understand; or if they have, it is usually cold preaching and dull praying, when the…
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I know that carnal minds will distaste all this, and have objections enough against it, and reasons of their own, to make it seem a duty to betray and undo their children's souls, and to break their promise made for them in baptism: "All this is but our preciseness: they must have experience and know the world, or else…
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_Direct._ III. Send them as the last part of all their education, when they are settled in knowledge, sound doctrine, and godliness, and have first got such acquaintance with the state of the world, as reading, maps, and conversation and discourse can help them to: and not while they are young, and raw, and uncapable o…
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_Direct._ XI. Set yourselves to do all the good you can to the miserable people in the places where you come. Furnish yourselves with the aforesaid books and arguments, not only to preserve yourselves, but also to convince poor infidels and papists. And pity their souls, as those that believe that there is indeed a lif…
752 wordsSECTION 193DIRECTIONS AGAINST OPPRESSION.
_Tit. 1. Motives and Directions against Oppression._ Oppression is the injuring of inferiors, who are unable to resist, or to right themselves; when men use power to bear down right. Yet all is not oppression which is so called by the poor, or by inferiors that suffer; for they are apt to be partial in their own cause…
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6. Especially unmerciful landlords are the common and sore oppressors of the countrymen: if a few men can but get money enough to purchase all the land in a country, they think that they may do with their own as they list, and set such hard bargains of it to their tenants, that they are all but as their servants, yea, …
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3. Yea, an oppressor is not only the agent of the devil, but his image: it is the devil that is the destroyer, and the devourer, who maketh it his business to undo men, and to bring them into misery and distress. He is the grand oppressor of the world: yet in this he is far short of the malignity of men-devils, 1. That…
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_Direct._ II. Consider with fear how oppression turneth the groans and cries of the poor to the God of revenge against the oppressors. And go to that man that hath the tears and prayers of oppressed innocents, sounding the alarm to the vindictive justice, to awake for their relief. "And shall not God avenge his own ele…
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_Direct._ IV. Be not strangers to the condition or complaints of any that are your inferiors. It is the misery of many princes and nobles, that they are guarded about with such as keep all the lamentations of their subjects and tenants from their ears; or represent them only as the murmurings of unquiet, discontented m…
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And so I answer, 1. If the landlord that selleth it expect that the buyer do use the tenants as well as he hath done, and sell it accordingly, it is unrighteous to do otherwise (ordinarily). 2. In many countries it is the custom not to turn out a tenant, nor to raise his rent; so that many generations have held the sam…
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_Answ._ No one proportion can be determined of; because a great alteration may be made in respect to the tenant's ability, his merit, to the time and place, and other accidents. Some tenants are so rich, as is said, that you are not bound to any abatement. Some are so bad, that you are bound to no more than strict just…
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_Answ._ A bad man hath a title to his own, as well as a good man; and therefore if he have either legal or equitable title, you may not; nor yet if the scandal of it is like to do more hurt, than the good can countervail which you intend. Otherwise you may either raise his rent, or turn him out, if he be a wicked, prof…
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_Answ._ Not when he doth, in a covetous desire to grow rich, disable his poor neighbours to live by him on the same callings, seeking to engross all the gain to himself; nor yet when they are callings which are inconsistent; or when he cannot manage one aright, without the sinful neglect of the other. But otherwise it …
122 wordsSECTION 202CASES ABOUT, AND DIRECTIONS AGAINST, PRODIGALITY AND SINFUL WASTEFULNESS.
Because men's carnal interest and sensuality is predominant with the greatest part of the world, and therefore governeth them in their judgment about duty and sin, it thence cometh to pass that wastefulness and prodigality are easily believed to be faults, so far as they bring men to shame or beggary, or apparently cro…
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_Object._ But this is still a difficulty insuperable: how can a man in every action and expense discern which way it is that the greatest good is like to be attained? This putteth a man's conscience upon endless perplexities, and we shall never be sure that we do not sin; for when I have given to a poor man, or done so…
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And yet on the other side, it may fall out that a person of quality, by a seasonable, prudent, handsome, respectful entertainment of his equals or superiors, may do more good than by bestowing that charge upon the poor. He may save more than he expendeth, by avoiding the displeasure of men in power: he may keep up his …
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_Answ._ The question is thus commonly stated, but not well; for it seemeth to imply, that no delights are necessary, and so putteth things in opposition which are oft coincident. Therefore I distinguish, 1. Of necessity: some things are necessary to our being, and some to our felicity, and some but to our smaller benef…
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_Inst._ VIII. Another act of prodigality is cards and dice, and other gaming; in which whilst men desire to get that which is another's, they lose and waste their own. _Inst._ IX. Another act of prodigality is giving over-great portions with children: it being a sinful waste of our Master's stock, to lay it out otherw…
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_Answ._ This is answered before in its due place, part i. Every one that is able, rich or poor, must live in some profitable course of pains or labour. _Quest._ XII. Is it a duty to desire and endeavour to get, and prosper, and grow rich by our labours; when Solomon saith, "Labour not to be rich?" Prov. xxiii. 4. _An…
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_Direct._ III. Carefully mortify that greedy fancy, and fleshly lusts, which is the wasting sin, and the devouring gulf. Quench the fire, and you may spare all this fuel. Cure the fever or dropsy, and you may spare both your drink and life. A greedy throat and a diseased fancy are never satisfied, till they have wasted…
399 wordsSECTION 209CASES AND DIRECTIONS AGAINST INJURIOUS LAW-SUITS, WITNESSING, AND JUDGMENT.
_Tit._ 1. _Cases of Conscience about Law-suits and Proceedings._ _Quest._ I. In what cases is it lawful to go to law with others? _Answ._ 1. In case of necessary defence, when the plaintiff doth compel you to it. 2. When you are intrusted for orphans or others whom you cannot otherwise right. 3. When your children, o…
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_Quest._ VIII. May a guilty person plead not guilty, or deny the fact? _Answ._ Common use is the interpreter of words. If the common use of those words doth make their public sense a lie, it may not be done. But if the forensic common use of their denial is taken to signify no more but this, Let him that accuseth me, …
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1. Such contentious suits do show the power of selfishness in the sinner; how much self-interest is inordinately esteemed. 2. They show the excessive love of the world; how much men overvalue the things which they contend for. 3. They show men's want of love to their neighbours; how little they regard another man's int…
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1. An unrighteous judge doth condemn the cause of God himself; for every righteous cause is his. 2. Yea, he condemneth Christ himself in his members; for in that he doth it to one of the least of those whom he calleth brethren, he doth it to himself, Matt. xxv. It is a damnable sin, not to relieve the innocent and impr…
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_Direct._ V. Remember the day when all these causes must be heard again, and the righteous God will set all straight, and vindicate the cause of the oppressed. Consider what a dreadful appearance that man is like to have at the bar of heaven, who hath falsely accused or condemned the just in the courts of men. What a t…
394 wordsSECTION 214CASES OF CONSCIENCE, AND DIRECTIONS AGAINST BACKBITING, SLANDERING, AND EVIL SPEAKING.
_Tit. 1. Cases of Conscience about Backbiting and Evil-speaking._ _Quest._ I. May I not speak evil of that which is evil? and call every one truly as he is? _Answ._ You must not speak a known falsehood of any man under pretence of charity or speaking well. But you are not to speak all the evil of every man which is t…
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_Answ._ When you have a just call to do it, you may; but not at your own pleasure. Historians may take much more liberty to speak the truth of the dead, than you may of the living: though no untruth must be spoken of either: yet the honour of princes and magistrates while they are alive is needful to their government, …
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_Answ._ Negatively: 1. Not to fill up the time with other idle chat, or table talk. 2. Not to second any man, how good soever, who backbiteth others; no, though he pretend to do it to make the sin more odious, or to exercise godly sorrow for other men's sin. 3. Not whenever interest, passion, faction, or company seemet…
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_Direct._ III. Especially involve not yourselves in any faction, religious or secular. I do not mean that you should not imitate the best, and hold most intimate communion with them; but that you abhor unlawful divisions and sidings; and when error, or uncharitableness, or carnal interest hath broken the church into pi…
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_Direct._ VI. Rebuke backbiters, and encourage them not by hearkening to their tales. Prov. xxv. 23, "The north wind driveth away rain, so doth an angry countenance a backbiting tongue." It may be they think themselves religious persons, and will take it for an injury to be driven away with an angry countenance: but Go…
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5. And it tendeth also to destroy the love, and consequently the soul of him that you speak evil of. For when it cometh to his hearing, (as one way or other it may do,) what evil you have reported of him behind his back, it tendeth to make him hate you, and so to make him worse. 6. It is a great make-bate and peace-br…
773 wordsSECTION 220CASES AND DIRECTIONS AGAINST CENSORIOUSNESS AND UNWARRANTABLE JUDGING.
_Tit. 1. Cases of Conscience about Judging of Others._ _Quest._ I. Am I not bound to judge truly of every one as he is? _Answ._ 1. There are many that you are not bound to meddle with, and to pass any judgment at all upon. 2. There are many whose faults are secret, and their virtues open; and of such you cannot judge…
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_Answ._ If you judged it to be certain, your judgment and error was your sin; but if you only judged him a professor of christianity, and one that on that account you were bound to have church communion with as if he were sincere, because you cannot prove the contrary, this was no error; or if you erred for want of suf…
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_Direct._ I. Meddle not at all in judging of others without a call. Know first whether it be any of your work; if not, be afraid of those words of your Judge, Matt. vii. 1-5, "Judge not, that ye be not judged; for with what judgment ye judge, you shall be judged," &c. And Rom. xiv. 4, "Who art thou that judgest another…
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_Direct._ VII. Value all God's graces in his servants; and then you will see something to love them for, when hypocrites can see nothing: make not too light of small degrees of grace, and then your censure will not overlook them. _Direct._ VIII. Remember the tenderness of Christ, who condemneth not the weak, nor caste…
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2. They that usurp not God's part in judging, yet ordinarily usurp the part of the magistrate or pastors of the church. As when mistaken, censorious christians refuse to come to the sacrament of communion, because many persons are there whom they judge to be ungodly, what do they but usurp the office of the pastors of …
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10. Censoriousness is a sore temptation to them that are censured, either to contemn such as censure them, and go on the other hand too far from them; or else to comply with the errors and sinful humours of the censurers, and to strain their consciences to keep pace with the censorious. And here I must leave it on rec…
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_Direct._ II. Take heed lest whilst you are impatient under their censures, you fall into the same sin yourselves. Do they censure you for differing in some forms or ceremonies from them? Take heed lest you over-censure them for their censoriousness: if you censure them as hypocrites who censure you as superstitious, y…
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_Tit. 1. Cases of Conscience about Trusts and Secrets._ _Quest._ I. How are we forbidden to put our trust in man? And how may it be done? _Answ._ 1. You must not trust man for more than his proportion, and what belongs to man to do: you must not expect that from him which God alone can do. 2. You must not trust a bad…
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_Answ._ You must be faithful to your trust, 1. If it be true religion and a good cause for which he suffereth. 2. Or if he be falsely accused of abuses in religion. 3. Or if he be faulty, but the penalty intended, from which you secure him, is incomparably beyond his fault and unjust. Supposing still that you save him …
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_Answ._ 1. If a purpose of sinning be antecedently confessed, it is unlawful to further the crime, or give opportunity to it by a concealment: but it must be so far opened as is necessary for the prevention of another's wrong, or the person's sin; especially if it be treason against the king or kingdom, or any thing ag…
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_Direct._ II. Be very careful what persons you commit either trusts or secrets to; and be sure they be trusty by their wisdom, ability, and fidelity. _Direct._ III. Be not too forward in revealing your own secrets to another's trust: for, 1. You cannot be certain of any one's secrecy, where you are most confident. 2. …
309 wordsSECTION 231DIRECTIONS AGAINST SELFISHNESS AS IT IS CONTRARY TO THE LOVE OF OUR NEIGHBOUR.
The two tables of the law are summed up by our Saviour in two comprehensive precepts: "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and soul, and might:" and, "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." In the decalogue the first of these is the true meaning of the first commandment, put first because it is the…
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2. Therefore selfishness is the cause of all sin in the world, both positive and privative, and is virtually the breach of every one of God's commandments. For even the want of the love of God is caused by the inordinate love of self; as the consuming of other parts is caused by the dropsy, which tumefieth the belly. I…
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_Direct._ IV. Nothing but returning by converting grace to the true love of God, and of man for his sake, will conquer selfishness. Make out therefore by earnest prayer for the Spirit of sanctification; and be sure that you have a true apprehension of the state of grace; that is, that it is indeed the love of God and m…
391 wordsSECTION 234CASES AND DIRECTIONS FOR LOVING OUR NEIGHBOUR AS OURSELVES.
_Tit. 1. Cases of Conscience about loving our Neighbour._ _Quest._ I. In what sense is it that I must love my neighbour as myself? Whether in the kind, of love, or in the degree, or only in the reality. _Answ._ The true meaning of the text is, you must love him according to his true worth, without the diversion and h…
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_Answ._ If only good, as such, be the object of love, then certainly none should be loved but in proportion to his goodness. But you must distinguish between mere natural and sensitive love or appetite, and rational love; and between love, and the effects of love; and between natural goodness in the object, and moral g…
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And though some define loving to be _bene velle alicui ut illi bene sit_, to desire another's welfare, yet indeed this may be without any true formal love at all. As I may desire the welfare of my horse, without any proper love to him, even for myself and use. When God from eternity willeth to make Paul, and to convert…
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_Answ._ We may and must hate sin in every one; and where it is predominant, as God is said to hate the sinner for his sin, so must we; and yet still love him as ourselves: for you must hate sin in yourselves as much or more than in any other; and if you are wicked you must hate yourselves as such; yea, if you are godly…
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_Direct._ VIII. Avoid the company of censorious backbiters and proud contemners of their brethren: hearken not to them that are causelessly vilifying others, aggravating their faults and extenuating their virtues. For such proud, supercilious persons (religious or profane) are but the messengers of Satan, by whom he en…
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_Motive_ X. Consider also that it is your own interest, as well as your great duty. 1. It is the soundness and honesty of your hearts. 2. It is pleasing to that God on whom only you depend. 3. It is a condition of your receiving the saving benefits of his love. 4. It is an amiable virtue, and maketh you lovely to all s…
694 wordsSECTION 240SPECIAL CASES AND DIRECTIONS FOR LOVE TO GODLY PERSONS AS SUCH.
_Tit. 1. Cases of Conscience about Love to the Godly._ Whom we must take for godly I answered before, chap. xxiv. tit. 1. quest. v. _Quest._ I. How can we love the godly when no man can certainly know who is sincerely godly? _Answ._ Our love is not the love of God, which is guided by infallibility; but the love of m…
682 wordsSource & rights
Public domain in the USA; original historical text digitized by Project Gutenberg.
Project Gutenberg source record →
Historical Christian writing; not Scripture.