The Gentlemans Calling, Section 2
SECT. II. Of Varieties of Callings.
1. NOw since the universal obligation, which is incumbent upon all and renders it strict duty to have a Calling, rests upon this undeniable ground, that all men have received from God some abilities to actuate, some Talents to improve; it follows by all laws of inference, that those who have received the most of these, can of all others the least reasonably pretend to an exemption, but must on the contrary be acknowledged under the constraint of the stronger and more numerous ties, the general duty which herein lies upon all, extending and spreading it self into several branches, according to the quality and proportion of mens re…its.
2. Hence it comes to pass, that mens callings and imployments become so various, not only by the free choices of the several men, but even by the direction and assignation of God and nature, because one man is furnished with an ability, which qualifies him for one sort of calling, another is by his distinct propriety markt out for another. And hence also it is, that those callings, which are distinct in several persons, may come to be united in one man, because the several abilities, which constitute those Callings, concurring in him, the duties must by unavoidable consequence do so also. This is in some degree observable in most men, who besides the general powers common to mankind, do receive some peculiar in order to some special end, and so are obliged not onelyonly to those exercises which belong indifferently to their whole species, but to those also for which they are individually qualified. Thus those whom God hath called to Christianity, are by that impowered for those performances which that holy profession exacts; and so have the calling of Christians superadded to the other, which either natural or civil obligation had laid upon them; so that the same man may have various callings, in relation to his differing capacities, unless as we distinguish mens souls into the vegetative, the animal and the rational, which in stricter speaking may be said to be only divers operations of the same soul; so in truth what we terme several callings, be but the same comprehensive one, stretching it self into the several faculties of the person.
3. I need not attempt to evince the impropriety of the phrase 'twill serve my end as well that they pass for several, and the application I shall make of it, is to shew those who are unwilling to heare of any Calling at all, that they have obligations indispensable to more then one. They have whatever can belong to them as men, they have also what belongs to them as Christians; and they have also a peculiar addition appertaining to them as Gentlemen, that is by interpretation, those who are distinguished from the vulgar, not only by empty names and aery titles, but by real donatives, distributed to them by God, as so many distinct advantages, fertile and prolifical abilities, towards the bringing him in his expected harvest of honor and glory.
4. It is too much to be doubted, many of them may need admonition concerning the two former of these callings; the duties even of men, much more of Christians being so farr worne out of practice, that they seem to be out of memory too, or if they be at all reflected on, 'tis with the same scorn that the antiquated habits of our forefathers are, as things fit only to dress a man up, an object of laughter and derision. But this would be too vast a Theme, and besides is superseded by the many pious labors of others; my purpose therefore is not to crea… at all of them, otherwise then they shall happen to be linked and interwoven, …s in many particulars they are, with the third that of the Gentleman
5. And here they need not fear that I mean to put the Spade or Hammer into their hands, to require them to become either Husbandmen or Mechanicks; my whole design is founded in their distinction from these, namely in those things; wherein either in kinde or degree they excel them. That many such things there are, they will need no Monitor at another time, when the Question is onelyonly of the Reverence and Respect due from such their Inferiors: In such cases every one can m…ke large Scrolls and Catalogues (written, like …kiel's Roll, within and without) of his Advantages and Prerogatives, and stretch them to the exacting the very last mite of Tribute they can possibly pretend to But let them remember, that God is as jealous of his Ho…r, as they can be of their own; and therefore as th…y make those Pre-eminences, instruments of attracting Glory from those below them, so they must also of reverberating and returning it home to that divine Power above them, who bestowed them to that end, and will not finally be deluded; but if they will disappoint his primary intention, that of having his Grace glorified in their faithful managery of those Talents, they shall not be able to defeat his secondary, that of having his Justice magnified in the fatal doom of such slothful Servants; if they will envy him the more agreeable satisfaction of bestowing rewards, they cannot defraud him of that (though inferior) of executing vengeance.