William Secker

“ 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. ”

“ 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 ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Man is an affectionate creature: Now the woman's behaviour should be such towards the man as to require his affection, by increasing his delectation. That the new-born love may not be blasted as soon as it is blossomed; that it may not be ruined before it be rooted. А spouse should carry herself so to her husband, as not to disturb his love by her contention, nor to destroy his love by her alienation. Husband and wife should be like two candles burning together, which makes the house more lightsome: or like two fragrant flowers bound up in one nosegay, that augments its sweetness ”

“ 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. ”

“ Better were it for a priest to defile himself with many harlots, than to be married to one wife— These children of the purple whore prefer monasteries before marriages, a concubine before a companion.—They use too many women for their lusts, to chuse any for their love—Their tables are so largely spread, that they cannot feed upon one dish. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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.
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. ”

“ In creation God made not one 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. ”

“ Though you may have your husbands' hearts, yet you must not have their heads; as you will his love, so you should love his will Till the husband leaves commanding, the wife must never leave obeying As his injunctions must be lawful, so her subjection must be loyal. ”

“ The husband must communicate maintenance to the wife, as the head conveys influence to the members; he 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 wives' 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 into 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 ”

“ There are many low in their descents, that are high in their deserts. Such as the cobler's son, who grew to be a famous captain; when a great person upbraided the meanness of his original, My nobility, saith he, begins with me, but thy nobility ends with thee Piety is a greater honour than parentage. She is the best gentlewoman that is heir to her own deserts, and not the degenerate offspring of another's virtue. ”

“ On the right side, when the wife should run in God's way, the husband will not let her go: When the fore-horse in a team will not draw, he wrongs all the rest: When the general of an army forbids a march all the soldiers stand still. Sometimes on the left: How did Solomon's idolatrous wife draw away his heart from heaven? A sinning wife was Satan's first ladder, by which he scaled the walls 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 ”

“ Man for the first man. 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. ”

“ The fire was purified, the air was clarified, the water was purged, the earth was refined. When man was moulded, heaven and earth were married: A body from the one was espoused to a soul from the other. ”

“ 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 on such coarse canvas, and so bright a character on 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 women, excused it thus: Res erit univætatis populous virorum: Without them mankind would fall from the earth and perish.—Marriage turns mutability into the image of eternity: It springs up new buds when the old are withered: It is a greater honour for a man to be the father of one son, than to be the master of many servants. Without a wife, children cannot be had lawfully ”

“ In respect of sin, which would not else be prevented. Marriage is like water to quench the sparks of lust's fire, 1 Cor. vii. 2. Nevertheless, to avoid fornication, let every one have his own wife, &c. Man needed no such physic when he was in perfect health. Temptations may break nature's best fence, and lay its paradise waste; but a single life 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 marriage-state; they had rather fry in the grease of their own sensuality, than extinguish those flames with an allowed remedy: It is better to marry than to burn ”

“ They are 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. If the gold be good allow it grains. Husbands and wives should provoke one another to love; and they should love one another notwithstanding of provocation. ”

“ Chuse not by your ears, for the dignity of her parentage. A good old stock may nourish a fruitless branch. There are many children who are not the blessings, but the blemishes of their parents They are nobly descended, but ignobly minded. ”

“ 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 loved. 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, Gen. ”

“ To God's omniscience there is nothing invisible; to God's omnipotence there is nothing impossible. We work by hands without; but He works without hands. He that made man meet for help, makes a meet help for him.
Marriages are consented above, but consummated below, Prov. xviii. 22. Tho' man wants supply, yet man cannot supply his wants, Jam. i. 17. Every good and perfect gift comes from above, &c. A wife, though she be not a perfect gift, yet she is a good gift. These beams are darted from the Sun of righteousness. ”

“ Husband and wife should neither be proud flesh, nor dead flesh. You are fellow-members, therefore, should have a fellow-feeling. While one stands safe on the shore, the other should pity him that is tost on the sea.—Sympathy in sufferings is like a dry house in a wet day.
3. Chuse such a one as may be serviceable to your salvation. A man may think he hath a saint when he hath a devil; but take heed of a harlot that is false to thy bed ”

“ Take heed of poisoning those springs from whence the streams of your pleasure flows.
4. 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 life grew up in the garden. They that chuse their love, should love their choice. They that marry, where they effect not, will effect 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. ”

“ Common reason suggests so much, that we should be long a doing that which can but once be done. Where one design bas been gravelled in the sands of delay, thousands have been split on the rock of precipitance. ”

“ It is between a man and his wile in the house, as it is between the sun and the moon in the heavens, when the greater light goes down, the lesser gets up: when the one ends in setting, the other begins in shining. ”

“ Augustine says, this pair is primum par et fundamentum omnium, &c.—They are the first link of human society, to which all the rest are joined. Mankind had long ago decayed, and been like a taper fallen into the socket, if those breaches which are made by mortality, were not repaired by matrimony. ”

“ It was well said by one, If the wife be too much above her husband, she either ruins him by her vast expences, or reviles him with her base reproaches: If she be too much below her husband, either her former condition makes her too generous ”

“ The person should be a figure, and the portion a cypher, which added to her, advances the sum, but alone signifies nothing. When Themistocles was to marry his daughter, two suitors courted her together, the one rich, and a fool ”