153 meet with fome things of Importance, which he doth not fo plainly fet before you, but will become thereby the more capable of making a good Proficiency in the reading of him.

He infifts upon five of your particular Advantages. above others, and acknowledging my felf beholden to him, I fhall endeavour to confider the fame in a more eafy Stile, with fuch brief Reflections as I fhall judge to be most Pertinent and useful. They are enumerated by him in this Order.

I. The Advantage of an ingenuous Education.
II. That of Wealth.

III. That of Time or Leifure.

IV. That of Authority or Influence upon others, especially your Dependents and Inferiors.

V. That of Reputation and Esteem in the World.

As your Condition of Life does commonly expofe you to great Temptations; fo for the enabling you to refift and overcome them, you have alfo confiderable Advantages, if rightly ufed. And the very fame things which fome make the fatal Occafions of their Sin and Ruine, are to others that wifely manage them, the effectual Inftruments of greater Virtue and Felicity.

Now, that all these your Advantages may become real Bleffings unto you, remember I beseech you, in the first Place, who is the Author and Donor of them; who hath made you to differ from others; who has given you all your Distinctions of Quality and Eftate; all your Endowments, Poffeffions, and Privileges, of what Kind foever. You cannot furely imagine, that either your felves, or any of your Anceffors, were the prime Authors of them. For whatever hath not been from all Eternity; whatever was once Nothing, and did afterwards begin to be, that must owe itself, and all it hath, to fome Superior Cause, which never

had

had a Beginning, but is Originally and Eternally of Itfelf: And fuch alone is the ever Bleffed God, who has no dependence upon any other, but is the immenfe and inexhaustible Fountain, from which all other Existence, and all Enjoyments, Priviledges, and Advantages, are derived. Whoever were your Earthly Parents, you are the Offspring of God; in him you Live and Move, and have your Being. He giveth to all Men, whether High or Low, Life and Breath, and all Things. Nor have you any fort of Good, of Mind, or Body, or Fortune, but what is totally from his Bounty; which infinite Obligation to him, ought moft humbly and gratefully to be acknowledged, with the profoundest Reverence, and the highest Praise. Do you hear your felves faluted with Titles of Honour, and fee the redundant Affluence of the Good Things of this Life, with which you are furrounded? Do you make a Figure in the World, whereby you appear Great and Happy to all the gazing and admiring Crowd, and perhaps to your felves alfo? Recollect, I befeech you, with your Morning Thoughts, that it was not your Aufpicious Fate or Destiny; it was not your lucky Chance or Fortune,that brought about this Happiness unto you, but it is the free and unconfined Kindness of your Good and Gracious God, that has fhewn you fuch diftinguishing Favours.

Next, let me defire you to confider the general Nature and Defign of thefe Advantages: They are all fo many Talents committed to your Truft, by receiving of which, you have not the abfolute Propriety, do do with them what you pleafe; but are only Stewards, to employ them all according to the Will of the Donor, who has referved to himfelf the Supream Right of ordering and appointing how they fhall be ufed. Whatever you poffefs, or are endowed, or intrufted with, is a Depofitum, not only to be kept, but by a right employment of it, by an induftrious Traf fick and Negotiation, to be managed and improved

for

155 for the Service of your Lord, who when the time of your Stewardship fhall be at an end, will demand an account of all that you have received, and expect that you make him fuch returns as may bear fome proportion to the largenefs of his Donations. For unto whomfoever much is given, faith our Saviour, of him fhall be much required, and to whom Men have committed much, of him they will ask the more, Luke 12. 48. The Omnipotent Lord of Heaven and Earth, may certainly do what he will with his own. He hath an abfolute, fovereign, and unquestionable Right to difpofe of his Gifts and Talents as he pleaseth: And his infinite Wisdom chufeth to distribute them with fuch Variety and Inequality, as tends to his own greatest Honour, and greatest Good of the whole Univerfe. Unto fome he gives much, unto others lefs: Unto fome he commits a higher Truft, unto others a lower. His Beneficence is most free and unlimited, furnishing diverse Men with diverfe Kinds and Degree of Endowments, and placing them in no lefs different Conditions. But then his impartial Juftice will incline him to make an exact Enquiry into the refpective Gifts they have received, according to their various Measures and Proportions, and to call for fuch Improvements of them as are anfwerable and agreeable to their feveral Receipts. This is graphically reprefented by our Saviour in the Parable of the Talents, Matt. 25. 14, 15,&c. Where, after the Lord of the Servants, to whom the feveral Talents were committed, came to reckon with them, he highly commended and greatly rewarded the Fidelity and Diligence,of. thofe that ufed their respective Talents to good purpose, and returned them to their Lord with a fuitable Increase. But as for the Slothful and Wicked Servant, who hid his Lord's Money, and took no care to employ and improve it, he commands, that the Talent fhould be taken from him, and that he should be cast into outer Darkness, where fhall be weeping and gnashing of Teeth.

But

But to defcend to more particular Advice for your improving the Advantages before-mentioned, I begin with,

I. The firft of them, That of your Education, which is generally fuch as gives you greater Opportunities of Knowledge and Learning, both Divine and Humane, than meaner People can ordinarily reach. As your Birth and Fortune has elevated you above the Vulgar, and made you ftand on a more Eminent Height, whereby you do as it were naturally enjoy a more free and open Profpect; fo you are commonly furnished with all the Inftruments of Art, to enable your Natural Organs to fee the further, and penetrate the deeper. There is no Gentleman that has any regard to the Honour and Welfare of his Family, but will take an early care to put his Children under fome good Difcipline,either at Home by Domestick Tutors and Inftructors, or by fending them abroad to the moft flourishing Schools; and their Sons feldom want an Academical Erudition, whereby they may have all imaginable Opportunities of Leifure, and Books, and Converfation with the moft Learned in every Profeffion.

Having therefore fo good Helps and Means, for the furnishing and adorning your felves with the nobleft Accomplishments of Knowledge and Wisdom, and Virtue, nothing can be of greater Concern to you, than do devote your younger Years to the early and aufpicious Improvement of them. The Regularity and good Conduct; the Ufefulness and Happiness; the Comfort and Satisfaction of all your Life in this World, as well as your eternal Felicity in the other, will very much depend on the Ufe you make of this advantage of Education: For without fome Care and Pains in the Seed time, there is little Reafon to expect the Joy and Pleafure of a fruitful Harvest. If then, while any of you are under the Direction and Govern

Government of others, an overweening conceit of your fuperiority in Wealth and Honour, weakens your Refpect to their Perfons, and makes you unwilling to fubmit to their Difcipline and Inftruction; or if the love of Eafe, Idlenefs, and foftnefs, render you impatient of Study, Enemies to ferious Thinking, averse to the charging your Memory with Rules and Precepts, or the exercising your Judgment with any clofe Application for difcerning the difference of Truth and Falfhood, Good and Evil; you are not like to be very well provided to make a Voyage through a dangerous World, amidst thofe Difficulties and Temptations to which you may be expofed. Neither is there any great hope that you should be in any measure fitted and qualified for the chief Bufinefs and End of Life, fuch as the Glorifying of God, the ferving your Prince and Country, and the promoting your own Welfare.

It is abfolutely neceffary, both to your own good State, and to the better State of others, who have any Relation to you, or Concern with you, That your Understanding be illuminated with the Rays of Truth, and the Principles of Wisdom; and that your Will and Affections, and all your Appetites and Inclinations, be under the Conduct of fuch a clear and found Understanding; that you may both know and do, what your Great Creator defigned and made you for ; and this not only in general, as you are reasonable Creatures, but in particular, as you are Gentlemen or Ladies, placed in a higher Rank than others; elfe you will have received your Being, and all your Advantages, to no purpose; you will never attain your End. But this is not all, you will be certainly Miferable; you will not only fall fhort of the End and Ufe for which God defigned you, but 'oppofe it. You will be fo far from being Wife, and Good and Happy your felves, and contributing to the good State of others, that you will pull down Ruine upon your own Heads,