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DISCOURSE

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Way of Inftruction

BY

CATECHISMS,

AND OF THE

Best Manner of Composing them.

By ISAAC WATTS, D. D.

The FOURTH EDITION Corrected.

Ifa. xxviii. 9, 10. For them that are weaned from
the Milk, and drawn from the Breafts, Precept
must be upon Precept, Line upon Line, bere a little

and there a little.

1 Cor. xiv. 9. Except ye utter by the Tongue Words
eafy to be underfood, ye fball speak in the Air.
Cor. iii. 2. I have fed you with Milk and not
with Meat, for ye were not able to bear it.

LONDON:

Printed for T. LONGMAN at the Ship in Pater-
Nofter Row; and JAMES BRACKSTONE,
at the Globe in Cornhill. MDCCXLIII.

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TO THE

Parents and Governors

OF

FAMILIES

Belonging to the

CONGREGATION which ufually affembles for Worthip in BerryStreet, London.

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Chriftian Friends, beloved in our Lord, INCE you make a folemn Profeffion of the Religion of Chrift, and build your Hopes of a Happy Eternity upon it, I am well perfuaded it is the Defire of your Souls that your Families Should be trained up in the Practice of the fame Religion, and become Heirs of eternal Happiness together with yourselves. For

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this End you engage their Attendance on publick Worship; but your Minifters have little hope of obtaining this End by all their publick Labours, unless you join to affift them with your private Inftructions and Prayers.

Even when we addrefs our Difcourfes to the Young, we can do it but in general Language; but you have fome fpecial Advantages with regard to thoje of your own Houfe: There are many Opportunities which you may feize to promote this pious Work; many tender Moments of Address wherein you may apply yourselves in a more particular Manner to the Understandings and to the Confciences of your Children, in order to fix the great Doctrines and Duties of Chriftianity upon their Memory and their Heart.

I need not inform you, for you are well apprized of this great Truth, that the Foundation of all Religion is laid in Knowledge. We must not worship an unknown God, nor pay him Service without UnderStanding. I prefume therefore that you take due Care and Pains to inftruct your Children in their early Years in the chief Principles of our holy Religion, and I would hope that while you make them learn that

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full and comprehenfive Form of Inftruction called the Affembly's fhorter Catechifm, you endeavour to inform them of the Meaning of every Sentence, that they may not learn Words by rote without knowing what they mean.

And yet I beg leave to enquire of you, my Friends, after all your Labours, whether you can find that your Children take in the Senfe of thofe Questions and Answers in the Years of Infancy and Childhood, when you impress the Words upon their Memory? Do they pronounce the Anfwers in fuch a Manner as tho' they understood the Meaning of them? May I be permitted yet further to enquire concerning yourselves when you learned this Catechifm in your younger Years? Did you understand all thofe Sentences and Expreffions, when perhaps you could readily repeat them by beart? I am perfuaded you have made fome Obfervations upon your own Experience, both in learning and in teaching the Things of God: Surely you are convinced it is far better that Children fhould be inftructed in the important Principles of their Duty and Happiness, in fuch a Way, as may lead them to understand the Words which they learn to pronounce. Have not many of you often wished for Jome

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