William Secker

“ To conclude, good servants are a great blessing; good children a greater blessing; but a good wife is the greatest blessing; and such a help, let him seek for her, that wants one; let him sigh for her, that hath lost one; let him take pleasure in her that enjoys one.
Where there is nothing but a picture of virtue, or a few shadowy qualities, that may subsist without any real excellency, death will hide them for ever in the night of despair. The blackness of darkness will close upon the naked and wandering ghost ”

“ It is dangerous taking her for a wife, who will not take God for a husband. It is not meet that one flesh should be of two spirits. Is there never a tree thou likest in the garden, but that which bears forbidden fruit?—There are but two channels in which the remaining streams shall run. 1. To those men that want wives, how to chuse them 2. To those women who have husband, how to use them.
1. To those men that want wives, how to chuse them. Marriage is the tying of such a knot, that nothing but death can unloose. ”

“ Chuse not by your eyes, looking at the beauty of the person. Not but this is lovely in a woman: but that this is not all for which a woman should be beloved. He that had the choice of many faces, stamps this character upon them all. "Favour is deceitful and beauty is vain." The sun is more bright in a clear sky, than when the horizon is clouded: but if a woman's flesh hath more of beauty, than her spirit hath of Christianity, it is like poison in sweet-meats, most dangerous. ”

“ A speuse should carry herself so to her husband, as not to disturb his love by her contention, nor to destroy his love by her alineation. Husband and wife should be like two candles burning together, which makes the house mere lightsome ”

“ In respect of one man, it may be good not to touch a woman; but in respect of all, so It is not good that man should be alone.
Moses speaks of the state of man created; Paul of the state of man corrupted: Now that which by institution was a mercy, by corruption may become a misery; as pure water is tainted by running through a miry channel, or as the sun-beams receive a tincture by shining through a coloured glass. There is no print of evil in the world, but sin was the stamp that made it. They that seek nothing but weal in its commission, will find nothing but woe in the conclusion. ”

“ A wife takes sanctuary not only in her husband's house, but in his heart. The tree of love should grow up in the family, as the tree of life grew up in the garden. They that chuse their love, should love their choice. ”

“ Tho painter is most studious about that which he intends to make his master-piece. Tho four elements were taken out of their elements to make up the perfection of man’s complexion: the firo was purified, the earth was refined. When man was moulded, heaven and earth was married; a body from the one was espoused to a soul from the other. ”

“ Pity it is but the moon should be ever in an eclipse, that will not acknowledge her beams to be borrowed from the sun. He that praises not the giver, prizes not the gift; and so I pass from the agent to the object, A help.
She must be so much, and no less: And so much, and no more. Our ribs were not ordained to be our rulers. They are not made of the head, to claim superiority; but out of the side, to be content with equality. They desert the Author of nature who invert the order of nature. The woman was made for the man's comfort, but the man was not made for woman's command. ”

“ When all other creatures had their mates, Adam wanted his, though he was the emperor of the earth, and the admiral of the seas yet in Paradise without a companion; though he was truly happy, yet he was not fully happy; though he had enough for his board, yet he had not enough for his bed; though he had many creatures to serve him, yet he wanted a creature to solace him: when he was compounded in creation he must be compleated by conjunction; when he had no sin to hurt him, then he must have a wife to help him: "It is not good that man should be alone." ”

“ It is not good to play the butcher with that naked sex, that hath no arms but for embraces. A preacher should not be silent for those who are silenced from preaching; because they are the weaker vessels, shall they be broken all to pieces: Thou that sayest women are evil, it may be thy expression flows from thy experience: But I shall never take that mariner for my pilot, that hath no better knowledge than the splitting of his own ship. ”

“ What absurdity to imbitter one's alloted portion of happiness by so obstinately persisting to anticipate inconvenience! Why not be disposed to think fair appearances promise fair conclusions? Why, if the sun shines in the morning, be unwilling to enjoy it then? ”

“ Nature makes us creatures, before grace makes us Christians. If the loins of man had been less fruitful, the death of Christ would have been less successful. It was a witty question that one put to him that said, "Marriage fills the earth but virginity fills the heavens." How can the heavens be full, if the earth be empty?
Had Adam lived in innocency, without matrimony, there would have been no servants of God in the church militant, nor no saints with God, in the church triumphant. ”

“ Is the woman to be a help to the man? Then let the man be a help to the woman. What makes these debtors to be such ill paymasters, but because they look at what is owing to them, but not to what is owing by them. If thou wouldest have thy wife's reverence, let her have thy respect. To force a tear from this relation, is that which neither benefits the husband's authority to enjoin, nor the wife's duty to perform. A wife must not be sharply driven, but sweetly drawn. Compassion may bend her, but compulsion will break her. ”

“ Wilt thou condemn the frame of all, for the fault of one? As if it were true logic, because some are evil, therefore none are good. He hath ill eyes, that disdains all objects. To blast thy helper is to blame thy Maker. ”

“ But where there is a living image of true goodness begun in this state, death will deliver it with safety into the finishing hand of Eternity, to be produced with every mark of honour in the open view of heaven ”

“ They use too many women for their lusts, to choose any for their love.——Their tables are so largely spread, that they cannot feed upon one dish. As for their exalting of a virgin-state it is like him who commended fasting when he had filled his belly. Who knows not, that virginity is a pearl of a sparkling lustre? But the one cannot be set up, without the other be thrown down: No oblation will pacify the former, but the demolishing of the latter. Tho' we find many enemies to the choice of marriage, yet it is rare to find any enemies to the use of marriage. ”

“ It is good for a man not to touch a woman.—Do all the scriptures proceed out of the same mouth, and do they not all speak the same truth? The God of unity will not indite discord; and the God of verity cannot assert falsehood; if good and evil be contraries, how contrary then are these scriptures? Either Moses mistakes GOD, or Paul mistakes Moses about the point of marriage—To which I shall give a double answer. ”

“ One would have thought that they should rather have looked for grace in the heart, than for beauty in the face: take care of inning at the fairest signs; the swan hath black flesh under her white feathers. ”

“ The husband must communicate maintenance to the wife as the head conveys influence to the members; thou must not be a drone, and she a drudge. A man in a married estate, is like a chamberlain in an inn, there is knocking for him in every room. Many persons in this condition, waste that estate in luxury, which should supply their wife's necessity:—— they have neither the faith of a Christian, nor the love of a husband! It is a sad spectacle to see a virgin sold with her own money unto slavery when services are better than marriages ”

“ Though you bring them out of corruption; yet do not bring them up to damnation. Those are not mothers, but monsters, that, whilst they should be teaching their children the way to heaven with their lips, are leading them the way to hell with their lives. Good education is the best livery you can give them living: and it is the best legacy you can leave them dying. You let out your cares to make them great ”

“ She must not be a field-wife, like Dinah; nor a street-wife, like Thamar; nor a window-wife, like Jezebel.
Phildeas, when he drew a woman, painted her under a snail-shell; that she might imitate that little creature, that goes no further than it can carry its house upon its head. How many women are there, that are not labouring bees, but idle drones; that take up a room in the hive, but bring no honey to it; that are moths to their husband's estates, spending when they should be sparing? As the man's part is, to provide industriously, so the woman's is, to preserve discreetly ”

“ Other creatures were made like themselves, but man was made like God as the wax hath the impression of the seal upon it. It is admirable to behold so fair a picture in such coarse canvas, and so bright a character in so brown paper. ”

“ It is not good in respect of mankind, which then would not be propagated. The Roman Historian, relating the ravishing of the Sabine woman, excused them thus, “Without them, mankind would fall from the earth, and perish." Marriages do turn mutability into the image of eternity; it springs up new buds, when the old are withered. ”

“ Chuse not by your hands, for the bounty of the portion. When Cato's daughter was asked, Why she did not marry? She thus replied, She could not find the man that loved her person above her portion. Men love curious pictures, but they would have them set in golden frames. Some are so degenerate, as to think any good enough, who have but goods enough. Take heed, for sometimes the bag and baggage go together. The person should be a figure and the portion a cypher, which added to her, advances the sum, but alone, signifies nothing. ”

“ Hast thou a sweet wife? She is of God's making. Let me draw up this with double application.
1. When thou layest out for such a good on earth, look up to the God of heaven, let him make thy choice for thee, who made his choice of thee. Look above you before you, about you; nothing makes up the happiness of a married condition, like the holiness of a mortified disposition: count not those the most worthy that are the most wealthy. ”

“ They be ill birds that defile their own nests. It is a great deal better you should fast, than feast yourselves upon their failings. Some husbands are never well, but when they are holding their fingers in their wife's sores. Such are like crows that fasten only upon carrion. Do not put out the candle because of the snuff. Husbands and wives should provoke one another to love; and they should love one-another notwithstanding of provocation.—Take heed of poisoning those springs from whence the streams of your pleasure flow. ”