thers and sisters, an instrument of good to your country, and attain an honest, creditable, and competent subsistence in this world, and an everlasting inheritance of glory and immortality in the world to come. Thus I have given you a large letter of sound and good counsel: set your heart to it, and observe and remember it. We see how unstable our lives are! You nor I know how soon either or both of us may leave this world: it may be, this may be the last paper of advice that your father may give you. But however it shall please God to deal with you or me, touching our continuance in this world, yet let me leave this with you, in the close of this letter:-If I shall find that these directions are dutifully observed, I shall be ready from time to time, freely to advise and direct you; and as I have passed by your former extravagancies, so I shall thereby have great assurance that God hath blessed this visitation to you: but, on the other side, if I shall find that you neglect my counsels, that you make light of them, that you still pursue those courses that will certainly be bitterness in the end, I must then tell you, I shall pray for you, and be sorry for you

with my heart; but I shall not easily be persuaded to give any more advice or counsels, where I find them despised or neglected. In this paper there are many things omitted, which might have been inserted; but the constant reading of the Holy Scriptures will supply unto you that defect: I have chosen only in this paper to mention such things which are seasonable for you upon this occasion. God Almighty hath not been wanting to you in admonition, correction, mercy and deliverance; neither hath your father been wanting to you in education, counsel, care and expense: I pray God Almighty bless all unto you. is the prayer of

Your loving Father,

This

MATTHEW HALE.

THE GREAT AUDIT:

WITH THE

ACCOUNT OF THE GOOD STEWARD.

THE great Lord of the world hath placed the children of men in this earth as his Stewards; and according to the parable in Matthew xxv, he delivers to every person his Talents, a stock of advantages or opportunities. To some he commits more; to some, less; to all, some.

This stock is committed to every person under a Trust, or charge, to employ the same in ways, and to ends, and in proportion, suitable to the talents thus committed to them, and to the measure and quality of them.

The Ends of this deputing of the children of men to this kind of employment of their talents are divers: 1. That they may be kept in continual action and motion, suitable to

the condition of reasonable creatures, as almost every thing else in the world is continued in motion suitable to its own nature, which is the subject of the wise man's discourse: "All things are full of labour.*" 2. That in that regular motion they may attain ends of advantage to themselves; for all things are so ordered by the most wise God, that every being hath its own proportionable perfection and happiness, inseparably annexed to that way and work which his providence hath destined it unto. 3. That in that due and regular employment, each man might be in some measure serviceable and advantageous to another. 4. That although the great Lord of this family can receive no advantage by the service of his creature, because he is perfect and all-sufficient in himself; yet he receives glory and praise by it, and a complacency in beholding a conformity in the creature, to his own most perfect will.

To the due execution of this trust committed to the children of men, and for their encouragement in it, he hath annexed a Re

* Eccles. i. 8.

ward by his promise, and the free appointment of his own good pleasure. This reward therefore is not meritoriously due to the employment of the talent; for as the talent is the Lord's, so is the strength and ability whereby it is employed; but by his own good pleasure and free promise the reward is knit to the work. In this case therefore, the reward is not demandable, so much upon the account of the divine justice, as upon the account of the divine truth and fidelity. On the other side, to the mal-administration of this trust, there is annexed a retribution of Punishment; and this most naturally and meritoriously for the law of common justice and reason doth most justly subject the creature, that depends in his being upon his Creator, to the law and will of the Creator; and therefore, having received a talent from his Lord, and together with his being, an ability to employ it according to the will of his Lord, a non-employment or misemployment thereof, doth most justly oblige him to guilt and punishment, as the natural and just consequent of his demerit.

Of the Persons that do receive these talents, some do employ them well, though in various