The second volume of Baxter's manual of Christian ethics: Directions against pride, covetousness and sensuality, then for the government of time, thoughts, passions, senses, tongue, work and dress.
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A Christian Directory · 3 volumes:Vol. 1Vol. 2Vol. 3
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Manual of practical theology and cases of conscience
Length
About 265,000 words · a 19-hour read
A Christian Directory, Volume 2: Governing Heart and Life is the second of five volumes in Richard Baxter's 1673 manual of practical theology. It finishes his Directions against pride, covetousness, and flesh-pleasing, then treats the government of a Christian's time, thoughts, passions, senses, tongue, work, recreations, and dress.
How the argument unfolds
01
Pride and humility. Opening where Volume 1 broke off, Baxter defines pride, gives its signs in worship and in ordinary dealings, and separates it from the vigor and self-knowledge often mistaken for it.
02
Covetousness and the master sin. Shorter parts follow on love of riches and worldly care, then the flesh-pleasing Baxter calls the master sin, because every lesser appetite draws on it.
03
Redeeming time. Eleven kinds of season oblige a person to act now, and twelve thieves carry the hours off, from sloth and excess sleep to games and romances, ending with a master-thief that is not an activity at all but "an unsanctified, ungodly heart."
04
The thoughts. Directions for driving out evil thoughts, stocking the mind with good ones, and making them effectual through meditation, plus a chapter for the melancholy and twenty directions for young students.
05
The passions. Love, desire, discontent, mirth, hope, aversion to God, anger, fear, grief, and despair, each with its own signs and remedies.
06
The senses and the tongue. Brief parts on the eyes and ear, long ones on gluttony, drunkenness, and fornication, then the tongue: swearing, lying, idle talk, and scorn of godliness.
07
Labor, recreation, and apparel. Last comes the body's employment: choosing a calling, sloth in work and in prayer, what makes a recreation lawful, and the ends clothing is meant to serve.
Key themes
Diagnosis before remedy. Baxter settles what each sin is, lists its signs, names the counterfeits of the opposing virtue, and clears away what gets mistaken for it, before offering any cure: "when pride is seen it is shamed, and to shame it is to destroy it."
Time as the scarce good. "It is a more necessary thrift to be sparing and careful with your time than with your money." The sluggard's failure is not disagreement but delay: "Tomorrow is always the sluggard’s working day; today is his idle day."
Written for households, not scholars. The unit is the numbered Direction, short enough to read aloud and specific enough to settle a case, which is why the book functions as a reference rather than a continuous argument.
Directions against Pride and for Humility
Pride, being widely regarded as the great sin of the devil by which he fell, is in name and general reputation infamous and odious to almost everyone. Yet its nature is so little understood, and the sin so seldom recognized by most people, that it is commonly cherished even while it is commonly condemned. Therefore the chief directions for conquering pride are those that expose it fully. For when pride is seen it is shamed, and to shame it is to destroy it. On this subject, read the preface to my book Self-Denial, and chapters 41 through 51.
Direction 1. Understand the nature of pride rightly, so that you neither ignorantly cling to it nor oppose your duty by mistaking it for pride. Here I will explain: I. What pride is, what commandment it violates, and what humility, its opposite, consists in. II. Some appearances that resemble pride, which may cause people to be judged proud for what is not pride at all. III. The counterfeits of humility, which may cause a proud person to appear humble to himself or others.
I. Pride is an excessive self-exaltation, a lifting of oneself above the state or degree God has appointed. The Greek word for it carries the sense of appearing to oneself, and desiring to appear to others, as greater than one actually is or greater than others of one’s standing. Pride is a branch of selfishness; it contains within it the man-pleasing described earlier, and it produces hypocrisy, being indeed that hypocrisy’s root and life. It consists in the following acts or parts.
1. A will to be higher or greater than God would have us be.
2. An overvaluing of ourselves, esteeming ourselves greater, wiser, or better than we truly are.
3. A desire that others should think of us, speak of us, and treat us as greater, wiser, or better than we are.
4. An effort or striving to rise above our appointed place, or to be overvalued by others.
5. An outward display of our inordinate self-esteem in speech or action.
Each of these is an act of pride. The first three are its inward acts in the mind and will; the last two are its external acts.
As love of God and love of neighbor are the comprehensive duties of the Decalogue, expressed most fully in the first and last commandments but extending throughout all the rest, so selfishness and pride (which is a principal part of selfishness) are the opposing sins, forbidden chiefly in the first and last commandments as contrary to the love of God and neighbor, but also contrary to all the rest. They are sins against the very relationship in which God and other people stand to us, not merely against a particular rule. They are against the very constitution of God’s kingdom, not only against its administration. Pride is treason and idolatry against God, a seizing of some portion of his own prerogative. And in the body of humanity it is a monstrous swelling, a single member rising above and therefore against the rest: against superiors (and so against the fifth commandment) or against equals (and so against the remaining commandments).
Humility is the opposite of pride, and therefore consists in these things.
1. A contentedness with the degree and state God has assigned us.
2. Modest thoughts of ourselves, esteeming ourselves no greater, wiser, or better than we truly are.
3. A willingness and genuine desire that others should not think of us, speak of us, or treat us as greater, wiser, or better than we are; that they should give us no more honor, praise, or affection than is our due, since anything beyond that is only a deception, and an injury to both sides.
4. Avoiding all inordinate and ambitious striving, and contentedly fulfilling our assigned duties, including the humblest tasks belonging to our own station.
5. Avoiding all pretense or display of greatness, wisdom, or goodness we do not possess, and fitting our speech, dress, provision, furnishings, and entire bearing and conduct to the modest measure of our abilities, our place, and our actual worth.
This is the very nature of humility. Its more particular signs I will set out later.
Directions for Redeeming and Making Good Use of Time
Time is the opportunity given to every person for all the works of life that their Creator expects of them, and on which their endless life depends. Redeeming time, making right use of it, is therefore of the highest importance, and it is fittingly made by the apostle Paul the great mark that distinguishes the wise from fools: “See then that you walk circumspectly; not as fools, but as wise, redeeming the time.” (Eph 5:15–16) I will give you specific directions for this duty, but first I will explain the nature of the duty itself, what is meant by time, and what by redeeming it.
Time, in its most common sense, refers generally to the whole space of this present life, which is our opportunity for all the works of life and the measure of them. More strictly, time is used for some special opportunity suited to a particular work, what we call the season, or the fittest time. In both senses, time must be redeemed.
Just as every work has its season that must be taken (Eccl 3:1), so the greatest works assigned to us for God and our souls have special seasons beyond our common time.
1. Some times God has fitted by nature for his service. The time of youth, health, and strength is especially suited to holy work.
2. Some time is made specially fit by God’s own institution, the Lord’s Day above all other days.
3. Some time is made fit by the appointment of those in authority: the hour of public meeting for God’s worship, lecture-days, and the hour for family worship, which every head of a household may appoint for his own household.
4. Some time is made fit by the condition of our bodies: the morning hours are best for most people, the evening for some; and for everyone, the time when the body is freest from pain and disabling weakness.
5. Some time is made fit by the course of our necessary, natural, or civil business: the daytime is fitter than the sleeping hours of night, and that hour is fittest when our other employments will least disturb us.
6. Some time is made fit by a special shower of mercy, public or private: when we live in godly households, among exemplary and helpful company, under lively and excellent means, with faithful pastors, profitable teachers, the best masters or parents, and with faithful friends.
7. Some time is made fit by particular acts of providence: a funeral sermon at the death of someone near us; the presence of an able minister or private Christian whose company we cannot ordinarily have; or a special leisure, as the Ethiopian eunuch had to read the Scripture in his chariot (Acts 8).
8. Some time is made specially fit by the special workings of God’s Spirit upon the heart, when he illuminates, teaches, quickens, softens, humbles, comforts, stirs up, or confirms more than ordinarily. Both time in general and these particular seasons must each be put to good use for their own works. We must take the wind and tide while we can, and strike while the iron is hot.
9. Some time is made fit by the needs of others and the call of God: it is the time to relieve the poor when they ask, or when they are most in need; to help our neighbor when it will do him most good; to visit the sick, the imprisoned, and the afflicted in their hour of need (Matt 25). The godly are thus like trees planted by the riverside, bringing forth fruit in their season (Ps 1:3). So also we must speak in season to the ignorant or ungodly for their conversion, or to the sorrowful for their consolation (Isa 50:4).
10. Our own necessity also makes our seasons: the time of old age and sickness is made by necessity the season of special repentance and preparation for death and judgment.
11. The present time is commonly our season, because of the uncertainty of finding a fitter time, or indeed any time at all. “Withhold not good from them to whom it is due, when it is in the power of thy hand to do it. Say not unto thy neighbour, Go, and come again, and to-morrow I will give; when thou hast it by thee.” (Prov 3:27) “Give a portion to seven, and also to eight; for thou knowest not what evil shall be upon the earth.” (Eccl 11:2) “Boast not thyself of to-morrow; for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth.” (Prov 27:1) “As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good to all men; especially to them who are of the household of faith.” (Gal 6:10) These are our special seasons.
To redeem time presupposes five things:
1.) That we know what we are to do with time, what we ought to spend it on, and how great the worth of those things is for which we must redeem it.
2.) That we highly value time in light of this necessary work.
3.) That we feel the weight of our sin and loss in having negligently and willfully squandered as much as we already have.
4.) That we know the particular season of each duty.
5.) That we value all that we must part with in redeeming time less than we value time itself and its proper ends, for otherwise we will not make the exchange.
Questions
What is A Christian Directory, Volume 2 about?+
A Christian Directory, Volume 2: Governing Heart and Life covers a Christian's private duties: pride, covetousness, and sensuality, then the government of time, thoughts, passions, senses, tongue, work, recreation, and dress. It belongs to the part Baxter titled Christian Ethics.
Can Volume 2 be read on its own?+
Volume 2 of A Christian Directory can be read on its own, because each chapter is a self-contained set of numbered Directions on one subject. It does begin partway into a chapter that Volume 1 leaves unfinished, so anyone wanting the full argument should start there.
How is A Christian Directory divided into volumes?+
Our edition of A Christian Directory runs to five volumes, following the nineteenth-century printing. Volumes 1 and 2 hold Christian Ethics, the duties a person owes in his own heart and life; the later volumes take up the family, church, and civil relations.
What does Baxter mean by redeeming the time?+
Redeeming the time, for Baxter, means buying hours back at the cost of whatever else claims them, so that none is wasted and each duty is done in its proper season. He treats it as a skill with prerequisites: knowing what time is for, valuing it, and feeling the loss of what is already squandered.
What does Baxter say about melancholy?+
Baxter gives the melancholy a chapter of their own and treats their condition as a disorder of the imagination rather than a spiritual state. He marks it by groundless fear and the magnifying of every ordinary weakness into a heinous sin, and writes against those who read such states as workings of God's Spirit.
Richard Baxter (1615 to 1691) was minister at Kidderminster and the most prolific English Puritan author. He wrote The Reformed Pastor and The Saints' Everlasting Rest, and was ejected from the Church of England under the Act of Uniformity in 1662.
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