TO THE MASTERS AND GOVERNORS, ETC.

of my congregation; which, if it may find acceptation also with, and prove beneficial unto, other families, I shall rejoice. The more generally useful my poor endeavours are, as it will tend so much the more unto the glory of my great Master, so it will yield to my self the greatest comfort, especially in a dying hour. I shall take my leave of you, though I be not departed from you, with the departing exhortation of the apostle, Acts xx. 32. "And now, brethren, I commend you to God, and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up, and to give you an inheritance among all them which are sanctified."

Your earnest souls' well-wisher,

T. VINCENT.

TO THE YOUNG ONES OF MY CONGREGATION; ESPECIALLY THOSE THAT ANSWER THIS EXPLANATORY CATECHISM IN OUR PUBLIC ASSEMBLY.

SHOULD I leave you out in my dedication of this book, I might seem both injurious unto you for whose sake chiefly the book itself was composed, and injurious to my own love, which I have for you, so many ways endeared, whereby also I am strongly obliged to do all the service I can do for your souls. Your reciprocal love is a great tie, but the chief obligation of all is, the near relation betwixt us, when I can write to you, not as my hearers only, but to many of you, as my children, and that I may say in the words of the apostle, 1 Cor. iv. 15, which I desire to speak not to mine own, but to the praise and glory of God, through whose blessing alone it is, that my ministry, so I mean comparatively, has had this effect, "Though

you should have ten thousand instructers in Christ, yet have ye not many fathers for in Christ Jesus I have begotten you through the gospel." My endeavours are, as a father to his children, to feed you with knowledge and understanding, and that of incomparably the most excellent things. Had you as large understanding in the secrets and mysteries of nature, as the greatest and most wise philosopher, Solomon himself not excepted; had you skill in all languages under heaven, and could speak with the tongues of men and angels; yet all human knowledge, in the greatest height and improvement of it, would not be worthy to be compared and named the same day with the knowledge of Jesus Christ, and the mysteries of salvation with which I would acquaint you. You have seen the light of the moon, and some brightness in the stars, when the curtains of the night have been drawn over the heavens; all which luminaries, upon the rising of the sun with its more glorious light, have disappeared and shrunk out of sight into darkness: such is the light of all human knowledge, compared with the beams of a divine light, which doth issue forth from the Sun of righteousness. It is the light of the knowledge

of the will and ways and glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, that I desire to hold forth unto you. The whole Scripture is full of this light, but as in the moon some parts are clearer than others; so in the Holy Scripture, some parts are more full of this light: such are those parts which contain the chief things to be known or believed, to be done and practised in order unto salvation. These things are excellently reduced by the late reverend Assembly into questions and answers, in their Shorter Catechism. In this Catechism, I have been some years instructing some of you, and that you might the better understand what you there learn, I did above four years ago, begin this Explanation of it, which at first you had in writing, and upon your desire, afterward I put it sheet after sheet, as you learned it, in the press for you. The often failure of the printer has caused many interruptions and intercisions in our work therefore having finished the whole, I have now printed the whole together, that we be not broken off upon that account any more: which, as the fruit of much study, and as a token of most dear love, I present unto you. And now, dear young ones, think not much in taking pains

in learning that which has cost me so much pains in composing for you. Such of you, as have not time or strength of memory for the learning of it, I advise to the frequent reading of it, and where it is not read in your families, that you often read it over alone. How profitable this will prove, experience, through God's blessing, in a short time will show. Hereby you may be able to look over the heads of most of your years in knowledge; which that you may be filled with, as with every grace, is the prayer for you, to the Father of lights, from whom cometh every good and perfect gift, of

Yours in the sincerest bonds,

T. VINCENT.