William Secker

“ 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 tako 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? Thero are but two channels in which the remaining streams shall run:—1. To those men that want wives, how to choose them. 2. To thoso women who have husbands, how to use them.
Marriago is the tying of such a knot, that nothing but death can unloose. ”

“ Paul of tho stato 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 sunbeams 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. Which leads me from the solitariness of tho condition, Man alone, to the suitableness of the provision, I will make an help-meet for him. ”

“ In creation, God made not woman for many men, or many women for one man. Every wife should be to her husband as Eve was to Adam, a whole world of women; and every husband should be to his wife as Adam was to Eve, a whole world of men. When a river is divided into many channels, the main current starves.
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. ”

“ 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? ”

“ If he sits in the parlour, she hates men always at their wive's apron strings. Thus does she sour every common occurance of life by the most in genious optical delusion, looking at every thing in the worst point of view. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Rash adventures yield gain. Opportunities are not liko tides, that when ono is past, another returns; but yet take heed of flying without your wings; you may breed such agues in your bones, that may shake you to your graves. ”

“ And the Lord God said, it is not good that the man should be alone: I will make him a help-meet for him. Human misery is to divine mercy, as a black soil to a sparkling diamond; or as a sable cloud to the sun-beams, Psalm viii. 4.—Lord, what is man, that thou art mindful of him?
Man is, in his creation, angelical; in his corruption, diabolical ”

“ Take heed, lest these flowers grow in the devil's garden.—Though you bring them out in corruption, yet do not bring them up to damnation!—Those aro net mothers but monsters, that whilst they should be teaching their children the way to heaven with their lips, aro leading them the way to hell with their lives. ”

“ If good and evil be contraries, how contrary then are these two scriptures? Either Moses mistakes God, or Paul mistakes Moses, about the point of marriage. To which I shall give a double answer.
1. There is a public and a private good. In respect of one man, it may be good not to touch a woman; but in respect of all men, It is not good that man should be alone. ”

“ Where there is no generation, there can be no regeneration. Nature makes us creatures before grace makes us christians. If the loins of men had been less fruitful, the death of Christ would have been less successful. ”

“ Man, for the first man. When all other creatures had their mates, Adam wanted his; though ho 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 compoundod in creation, he must be completed 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. ”

“ Let their power command you, that their praise may commend you. Though you may have your husband's heart, yet you should lovo his will Till the husband leaves commanding, the wife must never leave obeying. ”

“ In some families married persons are like Jeremiah's two basket of figs, the one very good, the other very evil; or like fire and water, whilst the one is flaming in devotion, the other is freezing in corruption. There is a two-fold hinderance of holiness: 1. On the right side. 2. On the left. On the right side; when the wife would run in God's way, the husband will not let her go; when the forehorse in a team will not draw, he wrongs all the rest; when the general of an army forbids a march, all tho soldiers stand still. ”

“ Marriage is just like a sea voyage, ho that enters into this ship, must look to meet with storms and tempests, 1 Cor. vii. 20. They that marry shall have trouble in the flesh. Flesh and trouble are married together, whether we marry or no; now a bitter cup is too much to be drunk by one mouth. A heavy burthen is easily earried by assistaneo of other shoulders. Husband and wifo should neither be proud flesh, nor dead flesh. You are fellow-members, therefore you should have a fellow-feeling. While one stands safe on the shore, pity should be shown to him that is toast on the sea. ”

“ But surely he was a monster and not a man; fitter for a tomb to bury him, than a womb to bear him. Some have styled them to be like clouds in the sky; liko motes in tho sun; like snuffs in the candle; like weeds in the garden. But 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 silent from preaching: because they are the weaker vessels, shall they be broken all to pieces? ”

“ A sinning wife was Satan's first ladder, by which he scaled the wall of Paradise, and took away the fort-royal of Adam's heart from him. Thus she, that should have been the help of his flesh, was the hurt of his faith; his nature's under-proper, became his grace's underminer; and she that should be a crown on the head, is a cross on the shoulders. The wife is often to the husband as the ivy is to the oak, which draws away his sap from him.
2. A help to his society, by the fragrantness of her conversation. Man is an affectionate creature ”

“ Good education is the bost 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, O lift up your prayers to make them good, that before you die from them, you may see Christ live in them. Whilst these twigs are green and tender, they should be bowed towards God. Children and servants aro in a family, as passengers in a boat; husband and wife, they aro as a pair of oars, to row them to their desired haven. ”

“ 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. But I will not sink this vessel by the over-burthen of it, nor press this truth to death by laying too great a load upon its shoulders. There is one knot which I must untie, before I make a farther progress, viz.
1 Cor. vii. 1. It is good for a man not to touch a woman. Do all the scriptures proceed out of the same mouth ”

“ What makes some debtors to be such ill pay-masters, but because they look at what is owing to them, but not at what is owing by them. If thou wouldst havo thy wife's reverenco, let her have thy respect. To force a tear from this relation, is that which neither benefits the husband's authority to enjoin nor tho wife's duty to perform. A wife must not be sharply driven, but sweetly drawn. Compassion may bend her, but compulsion will break her. Husband and wife should act towards each other with consent, not by constraint. There are four things wherein the husband is a meet-help to the wifo. ”

“ I she sees any one reading, she never new any good come of reading, but to make young people unfit for conversation. If her husband is going a hunting she hates hunting, it is so dangerous. If he goes for a ride, she is surprised he can take pleasure in sitting on his horse for hours together. ”

“ By his delighting in her society: 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 lifo grew up in tho garden of Eden. They that choose their love, should love their choice. They that marry where they affect not, will affect where they marry not. Two joined together without love, are but tied together to make one another miserable. And so I pass to the last stage of the text, A help-meet.
'A help,' thero is her fallness; 'A meet-help,' there is her fitness. ”

“ Choose 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 moro bright in a clear sky, than when tho horizon is clouded ”

“ In respect of sin, which would not else be prevented: Marriago is like water, to quench the sparks of lust’s fire, 1 Cor. vii. 2. Nevertheless, to avoid fornication, let every man have his own wife, &c. Man needed no such physic when he was in perfect health. Temptations may break nature's best sense, and lay its Paradise waste; but a single lifo is a prison of unruly desires, which is daily attempted to be broken open. Some, indeed force themselves to a single life, merely to avoid the charges of a married state ”

“ As the use of the arm is to keep off blows from the body, so the office of the husband is to ward off blows from the wife. The wife is the husband's treasury, and the husband tho wife's armoury. In darkness he should be her sun, for direction ”

“ Who would trample upon a jewel, because it is fallen in the dirt, or throw away a heap of wheat for a little chaff, or despiso a golden wedge, because it retains some dross? These roses have somo prickles. Now husbands should spread a mantle of charity over their wives' infirmities. ”

“ 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 longer than 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 oneanother to love; and they should love one-another notwithstanding of provocation. ”

“ If the wife be too much above her husband, she either ruins him by her vast expenses, or reviles him with her base reproaches; if sho be too mueh below her husband, oither her former condition makes her too generous, or her present mutation makes her too imperious."—Marriages are styled matches, yet amongst those many that are married, how few are thero that are matched! Husbands and wives are like locks and keys, that rather break than open, except the wards be answerable. ”

“ Let me preserve you from a bad choice. 2. Present you with a good one. To preservo you from a bad choico, take that in threo things: 1. Choose not for beauty. 2. Choose not for dowry. 3. Choose not for dignity. He that loves to beauty, buys a picture; he that loves for dowry, makes a purchase; he that leaps for dignity, matches with a multitudo at once. ”

“ There aro many low in their deseents, that are high in their deserts; such as the eobler's son, who beeame a famous captain; when a great person upbraided the meanness of his original, “My nobility, said he, began with me, but thy nobility ends with thee." Piety is a greater honour than parentage. She is the best gentlewoman that is heir of her own deserts, and not the degenerato offspring of another's virtue. To present you with a good choice in three things. ”

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

“ They desert the Author of nature, who invert the order of nature. The woman was made for the man's comfort, but tho man was not made for the woman's command. Those Shoulders aspiro too high, that content not themselves with a room below their heads. It is between a man and his wife in tho house, as it is between the sun and tho moon in the heavens, when the greater light goes down tho lesser light gets up; when the one ends in setting, the other begins in shining. The wifo may bo a sovereign in her husband's absenco, but sho must be subject in her husband's presenco. ”