A Christian Directory, Part 2: Christian Economics
Direct. XIII. If you are married to one that is indeed an infidel, or an ungodly person, yet keep up all the conjugal love which is due for the relation's sake. Though you cannot love them as true christians, yet love them as husband or wife. Even heathens are bound to love those that are thus related to them. The apostle hath determined the case, 1 Cor. vii. that christians must perform their duties to husbands or wives that are unbelievers. The faults of another discharge you not from your duty. As Satan hath deceived some by separating principles about church communion, to deny almost all God's ordinances to many, to whom they are due; so doth he thus deceive some persons in family relations, and draw them from the duties which they owe for one another's good.
Direct. XIV. Join together in frequent and fervent prayer. Prayer doth force the mind into some composedness and sobriety, and affecteth the heart with the presence and majesty of God. Pray also for each other when you are in secret, that God may do that work which you most desire, upon each other's hearts.
Direct. XV. Lastly, Help each other by an exemplary life. Be that yourselves which you desire your husband or wife should be; excel in meekness, and humility, and charity, and dutifulness, and diligence, and self-denial, and patience, as far as you do excel in profession of religion. St. Peter saith, that even those that will not be won by the word, may be won without it by the conversation of their wives, 1 Pet. iii. 1; that is, the excellency of religion may so far appear to them, by the fruits of it in their wives' conversations, as may first incline them to think well and honourably of it, and so to inquire into the nature and reason of it, and to hearken to their wives; and all this without the public ministry. A life of undissembled holiness, and heavenliness, and self-denial, and meekness, and love, and mortification, is a powerful sermon; which, if you be constantly preaching before those that are still near you, will hardly miss of a good effect. Works are more palpably significant and persuasive, than words alone.
Direct. VII. Another great conjugal duty is, to be helpful to each other for the health and comfort of their bodies.17 Not to pamper each other's flesh, or cherish the vices of pride, or sloth, or gluttony, or voluptuousness in each other; but to further the health and cheerfulness of the body, to fit it for the service of the soul and God. Such cherishing or pleasing of the flesh, which is unlawful in each person to himself, is also unlawful (ordinarily) to use to another. But such as you may use for yourself, you may use also for your wife or husband. Not to live above your estates, nor as servants to your guts, to serve the appetites of one another by delicious fare; but to be careful of that health, without which your lives will be made unserviceable or uncomfortable; and this must proceed from such a love to one another as you have to yourselves; and that both in time of health and sickness.
1. In health, you must be careful to provide for each other (not so much pleasing as) wholesome food, and to keep each other from that which is hurtful to your health; dissuading each other from gluttony and idleness, the two great murderers of mankind. If the bodies of the poor, in hunger, and cold, and nakedness must be relieved, much more those that are become as your own flesh.
2. Also in sickness, you are to be tenderly regardful of each other; and not to be sparing of any costs or pains, by which the health of each other may be restored, or your souls confirmed, and your comforts cherished.18 You must not loathe the bodies of each other in the most loathsome sickness, nor shun them through loathing; no more than you would do your own.19 "A friend loveth at all times, and a brother is born for adversity," Prov. xvii. 17; much more those that are so nearly bound for sickness and health, till death shall separate them. It is an odious sin to be weary of a sick or suffering friend, and desirous that God would take them, merely that you may be eased of the trouble. And usually such persons do meet with such measure as they measured to others; and those that they look for help and comfort from, will perhaps be as weary of them, and as glad to be rid of them.
Direct. VIII. Another duty of husbands and wives is, to be helpful to each other in their worldly business and estates.20 Not for worldly ends, nor with a worldly mind; but in obedience to God, who will have them labour, as well as pray, for their daily bread, and hath determined that in the sweat of their brows they shall eat their bread; and that six days they shall labour and do all that they have to do; and that he that will not work must not eat. The care of their affairs doth lie upon them both, and neither of them must cast it off and live in idleness (unless one of them be an idiot, or so witless, as to be unfit for care, or so sick or lame, as to be unfit for labour).
Direct. IX. Also you must be careful of the lawful honour and good names of one another.21 You must not divulge, but conceal, the dishonourable failings of each other; (as Abigail, except in any case compassion or justice require you to open them to any one for a cure, or to clear the truth). The reputation of each other must be as dear to you as your own. It is a sinful and unfaithful practice of many, both husbands and wives, who among their companions are opening the faults and infirmities of each other, which they are bound in tenderness to cover. As if they perceived not that by dishonouring one another, they dishonour themselves. Love will cover a multitude of faults, 1 Pet. iv. 8. Nay, many disaffected, peevish persons will aggravate all the faults of one another behind their backs to strangers; and sometimes slander them, and speak more than is truth. Many a man hath been put to clear his good name from the slanders of a jealous or a passionate wife: and an open enemy is not capable of doing one so much wrong as she that is in his bosom, because she will easily be believed, as being supposed to know him better than any other.
Direct. X. It is also a great part of the duty of husbands and wives, to be helpful to one another in the education of their children, and in the government of the inferiors of the family.22 Some men cast all the care of the children while they are young upon their wives; and many women by their passion and indiscretion do make themselves unfit to help their husbands in the government either of their children or servants: but this is one of the greatest parts of their employment. As to the man's part, to govern his house well, it is a duty unquestionable. And it is not to be denied of the wife. 1 Tim. v. 14, "I will that the younger women marry, bear children, guide the house." Bathsheba taught Solomon, Prov. xxxi. 1. Abigail took better care of Nabal's house than he did himself. They that have a joint interest, and are one flesh, must have a joint part in government; although their power be not equal, and one may better oversee some business, and the other, other business; yet in their places, they must divide the care, and help each other; and not as it is with many wicked persons, who are the most unruly part of the family themselves, and the chiefest cause that it is ungoverned and ungodly, or one party hindereth the other from keeping order, or doing any good.
Direct. XI. Another part of their duty is, to help each other in works of charity and hospitality.23 While they have opportunity to do good to all, but especially to them of the household of faith; and to sow to the Spirit, that of the Spirit they may reap everlasting life: yea, to sow plentifully that they may reap plentifully, Gal. vi. that if they are able their houses may afford relief and entertainment for the needy; especially for Christ's servants for their Master's sake; who hath promised that "He that receiveth a prophet in the name of a prophet shall receive a prophet's reward: and he that receiveth a righteous man in the name of a righteous man, shall receive a righteous man's reward: and whosoever shall give to drink unto one of these little ones, a cup of cold water, in the name of a disciple, verily I say unto you, he shall in no wise lose his reward," Matt. x. 41, 42. The woman of Shunem lost nothing by the entertainment of Elisha, when she said to her husband, "Behold, now I perceive that this is an holy man of God which passeth by us continually: let us make him a little chamber, I pray thee, on the wall, and let us set for him there a bed, and a table, and a stool, and a candlestick: and it shall be when he cometh to us, that he shall turn in thither," 2 Kings iv. 9, 10. But now how common is it for the people to think all too little for themselves; and if one of them be addicted to works of charity, the other is covetous and is always hindering them.
Direct. XII. Lastly, it is a great part of the duty of husbands and wives, to be helpers and comforters of each other in order to a safe and happy death. 1. In the time of health, you must often and seriously remember each other of the time when death will make the separation; and live together in your daily converse, as those that are still expecting the parting hour. Help to awaken each other's souls, to make ready all those graces which then will prove necessary, and to live in a constant preparation for your change. Reprove all that in one another, which wilt be unsavoury and ungrateful to your review at death. If you see each other dull and slow in your preparations, or to live in vanity, worldliness, or sloth, as if you had forgotten that you must shortly die, stir up one another to do all that without delay which the approach of such a day requireth. 2. And when death is at hand, oh then what abundance of tenderness, and seriousness, and skill, and diligence, is needful for one, that hath the last office of love to perform, to the departing soul of so near a friend! Oh then what need will there be of your most wise, and faithful, and diligent help! When nature faileth, and the pains of flesh divert the mind, and temptations are strongest while the body is weakest; when a languishing body, and a doubting, fearful, troubled mind, do call for your compassion and help, oh then what skill and holy seriousness will be necessary! Oh what a calamity is it to have a carnal, unsanctified husband or wife, which will neither help you to prepare for death, nor can speak a serious word of counsel or comfort to you at a dying hour: that can do nothing but stand by and weep over you; but have not a sensible word to say, about the life that you are going to, nor about the duty of a departing soul, nor against the temptations and fears which then may be ready to overwhelm you. They that are utterly unprepared and unfit to die themselves, can do little to prepare or help another. But they that live together as the heirs of heaven, and converse on earth as fellow-travellers to the land of promise, may help and encourage the souls of one another, and joyfully part at death, as expecting quickly to meet again in life eternal.
Were it not lest I be over-tedious, I should next speak of the manner how husbands and wives must perform their duties to each other: as, 1. That it should be all done in such entire love, as maketh the case of one another to you as your own. 2. That therefore all must be done in patience and mutual forbearance. 3. And in familiarity, and not with strangeness, distance, sourness, nor affected compliment. 4. And in secrecy; where I should have showed you in what cases secrecy may be broken, and in what not. 5. And in confidence of each other's fidelity, and not in suspicion, jealousy, and distrust. 6. And in prudence, to manage things aright, and to foresee and avoid impediments and inconveniencies. 7. And in holiness, that God may be the first and last, and all in all. 8. And in constancy, that you cease not your duties for one another until death. But necessary abbreviation alloweth me to say no more of these.
CHAPTER VIII.
THE SPECIAL DUTIES OF HUSBANDS TO THEIR WIVES
He that will expect duty or comfort from his wife, must be faithful in doing the duty of a husband. The failing of yourselves in your own duty, may cause the failing of another to you, or at least will some other way as much afflict you, and will be bitterer to you in the end, than if a hundred failed of their duty to you. A good husband will either make a good wife, or easily and profitably endure a bad one. I shall therefore give you directions for your own part of duty, as that which your happiness is most concerned in.
Direct. I. The husband must undertake the principal part of the government of the whole family, even of the wife herself. And therefore, 1. He must labour to be fit and able for that government which he undertaketh. This ability consisteth, 1. In holiness and spiritual wisdom, that he may be acquainted with the end to which he is to conduct them, and the rule by which he is to guide them, and the principal works which they are to do. An ungodly, irreligious man is both a stranger and an enemy to the chiefest part of family government. 2. His ability consisteth in a due acquaintance with the works of his calling, and the labours in which his servants are to be employed. For he that is utterly unacquainted with their business, will be very unfit to govern them in it: unless he commit that part of their government to his wife, or a steward that is acquainted with it. 3. And he must be acquainted both with the common temper and infirmities of mankind, that he may know how much is to be borne with, and also with the particular temper, and faults, and virtues of those whom he is to govern. 4. And he must have prudence, to direct himself in all his carriage to them; and justice, to deal with every one as they deserve: and love, to do them all the good he can, for soul and body. II. And being thus able, he must make it his daily work, and especially be sure that he govern himself well, that his example may be part of his government of others.
Direct. II. The husband must so unite authority and love, that neither of them may be omitted or concealed, but both be exercised and maintained. Love must not be exercised so imprudently as to destroy the exercise of authority; and authority must not be exercised over a wife so magisterially and imperiously, as to destroy the exercise of love. As your love must be a governing love, so your commands must all be loving commands. Lose not your authority; for that will but disable you from doing the office of a husband to your wife, or of a master to your servants. Yet must it be maintained by no means inconsistent with conjugal love; and therefore not by fierceness or cruelty, by threatenings or stripes (unless by distraction or loss of reason, they cease to be uncapable of the carriage otherwise due to a wife). There are many cases of equality in which authority is not to be exercised; but there is no case of inequality or unworthiness so great, in which conjugal love is not to be exercised; and therefore nothing must exclude it.
Direct. III. It is the duty of husbands to preserve the authority of their wives, over the children and servants of the family. For they are joint governors with them over all the inferiors. And the infirmities of women are apt many times to expose them to contempt: so that servants and children will be apt to slight them, and disobey them, if the husband interpose not to preserve their honour and authority. Yet this must be done with such cautions as these: 1. Justify not any error, vice, or weakness of your wives. They may be concealed and excused as far as may be, but never owned or defended. 2. Urge not obedience to any unlawful command of theirs. No one hath authority to contradict the law of God, or disoblige any from his government. You will but diminish your own authority with persons of any understanding, if you justify any thing that is against God's authority. But if the thing commanded be lawful, though it may have some inconveniences, you must rebuke the disobedience of inferiors, and not suffer them to slight the commands of your wives, nor to set their own reason and wills against them, and say, We will not do it. How can they help you in government, if you suffer them to be disobeyed?
Direct. IV. Also you must preserve the honour as well as the authority of your wives. If they have any dishonourable infirmities, they are not to be mentioned by children and servants. As in the natural body we cover most carefully the most dishonourable parts, (for our comely parts have no need,) 1 Cor. xii. 23, 24, so must it be here. Children or servants must not be suffered to carry themselves contemptuously or rudely towards them, nor to despise them, or speak unmannerly, proud, or disdainful words to them. The husband must vindicate them from all such injury and contempt.
Direct. V. The husband is to excel the wife in knowledge, and be her teacher in the matters that belong to her salvation. He must instruct her in the word of God, and direct her in particular duties, and help her to subdue her own corruptions, and labour to confirm her against temptations; if she doubt of any thing that he can resolve her in, she is to ask his resolution, and he to open to her at home the things which she understood not in the congregation, 1 Cor. xiv. 35. But if the husband be indeed an ignorant sot, or have made himself unable to instruct his wife, she is not bound to ask him in vain, to teach her that which he understandeth not himself. Those husbands that despise the word of God, and live in wilful ignorance, do not only despise their own souls, but their families also; and making themselves unable for their duties, they are usually themselves despised by their inferiors: for God hath told such in his message to Eli, 1 Sam. ii. 30, "Them that honour me, I will honour; and they that despise me, shall be lightly esteemed."
Direct. VI. The husband must be the principal teacher of the family. He must instruct them, and examine them, and rule them about the matters of God, as well as his own service, and see that the Lord's day and worship be observed by all that are within his gates. And therefore he must labour for such understanding and ability as is necessary hereunto. And if he be unable or negligent, it is his sin, and will be his shame. If the wife be wiser and abler, and it be cast upon her, it is his dishonour; but if neither of them do it, the sin, and shame, and suffering, will be common to them both.
Direct. VII. The husband is to be the mouth of the family, in their daily conjunct prayers unto God. Therefore he must be able to pray, and also have a praying heart. He must be as it were the priest of the household; and therefore should be the most holy, that he may be fit to stand between them and God, and to offer up their prayers to him. If this be cast on the wife, it will be his dishonour.
Direct. VIII. The husband is to be the chief provider for the family (ordinarily). It is supposed that he is most able for mind and body, and is the chief disposer of the estate. Therefore he must be specially careful, that wife and children want nothing that is fit for them, so far as he can procure it.
Direct. IX. The husband must be strongest in family patience; bearing with the weakness and passions of the wife; not so as to make light of any sin against God, but so as not to make a great matter of any frailty as against himself, and so as to preserve the love and peace which is to be as the natural temper of their relation.
Direct. X. The manner of all these duties must also be carefully regarded. As, 1. That they be done in prudence, and not with folly, rashness, or inconsiderateness. 2. That all be done in conjugal love and tenderness, as over one that is tender, and the weaker vessel; and that he do not teach, or command, or reprove a wife, in the same imperious manner as a child or servant. 3. That due familiarity be maintained, and that he keep not at a distance and strangeness from his wife. 4. That love be confident, without base suspicions, and causeless jealousies. 5. That all be done in gentleness, and not in passion, roughness, and sourness. 6. That there be no unjust and causeless concealment of secrets, which should be common to them both. 7. That there be no foolish opening of such secrets to her as may become her snare, and she is not able to bear or keep. 8. That none of their own matters, which should be kept secret, be made known to others. His teaching and reproving her, should be for the most part secret. 9. That he be constant, and not weary of his love or duty. This briefly of the manner.
CHAPTER IX.
THE SPECIAL DUTIES OF WIVES TO HUSBANDS
The wife that expecteth comfort in a husband, must make conscience of all her own duty to her husband: for though it be his duty to be kind and faithful to her, though she prove unkind and froward, yet, 1. Men are frail, and apt to fail in such difficult duties as well as women. 2. And it is so ordered by God, that comfort and duty shall go together, and you shall miss of comfort, if you cast off duty.
Direct. I. Be specially loving to your husbands: your natures give you the advantage in this; and love feedeth love. This is your special requital for all the troubles that your infirmities put them to.
Direct. II. Live in a voluntary subjection and obedience to them. If their softness or yieldingness cause them to relinquish their authority; and for peace they are fain to let you have your wills; yet remember that it is God that hath appointed them to be your heads and governors. If they are so silly as to be unable, you should not have chosen such to rule you as are unfit; but having chosen them, you must assist them with your better understanding, in a submissive, and not a ruling, masterly way. A servant that hath a foolish master, may help him without becoming master. And do not deceive yourselves by giving the bare titles of government to your husbands, when you must needs in all things have your own wills; for this is but mockery, and not obedience. To be subject and obedient, is to take the understanding and will of another to govern you, before (though not without) your own; and to make your understandings and wills to follow the conduct of his that governeth you. Self-willedness is contrary to subjection and obedience.
Direct. III. Learn of your husbands as your appointed teachers, and be not self-conceited and wise in your own eyes, but ask of them such instructions as your case requireth. 1 Cor. xiv. 34, 35, "Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted to them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience, as also saith the law: and if they will learn any thing, let them ask their husbands at home." (Unless when the husband is so ignorant as to be utterly unable: which is his sin and shame. For it is vain to ask that of them which they know not.)
Direct. IV. Set yourselves seriously to amend all those faults which they reprove in you. Do not take it ill to be reproved: swell not against it, as if they did you harm or wrong: it is a very ill sign to "hate reproof," Prov. xii. 1; x. 17; xv. 10, 31, 32; xvii. 10. And what doth their government of you signify, if you will not amend the faults that are reproved in you, but continue impenitent and grudge at the reproof? It is a miserable folly to desire to be flattered and soothed by any, but especially by one that is bound to be faithful to you, and whose intimacy should make you as ready to hear of your faults from him, as to be acquainted with them yourselves; and especially when it concerneth the safety or benefit of your souls.
Direct. V. Honour your husbands according to their superiority. Behave not yourselves towards them with unreverence and contempt, in titles, speeches, or any behaviour: if the worth of their persons deserve not honour, yet their place deserveth it. Speak not of their infirmities to others behind their backs; as some twattling gossips use to do, that know not that their husbands' dishonour is their own, and that to open it causelessly to others, is their double shame. Those that silently hear you, will tell others behind your back, how foolishly and shamefully you spake to them against your husbands. If God have made your nearest friend an affliction to you, why should you complain to one that is farther off? (Unless it be to some special, prudent friend, in case of true necessity, for advice.)
