Theobalds,
June 18.
1715.
PREFACE
To all that are concerned in the Education of Children.
My Friends,
It is an awful and important charge that is committed to you. The
wisdom and welfare of the succeeding generation are intrusted with
you beforehand, and depend much on your conduct. The seeds of misery
or happiness in this world, and that to come, are oftentimes sown
very early, and therefore whatever may conduce to give the minds of
children a relish for vertue and religion, ought in the first place
to be proposed to you.
Verse was at first design'd for the service of God, tho' it hath
been wretchedly abused since. The ancients among the Jews and the
Heathens taught their children and disciples the precepts of
morality and worship in verse. The children of Israel were commanded
to learn the words of the song of Moses, Deut. 31. 19,30. And we are
directed in the New Testament, not only to sing with grace in the
heart, but to teach and admonish one another by hymns and songs,
Eph. 5. 19. and there are these four advantages in it:
1. There is a greater delight in the very learning of truths and
duties this way. There is something so amusing and entertaining in
rhymes and metre, that will incline children to make this part of
their business a diversion. And you may turn their very duty into a
reward, by giving them the privilege of learning one of these songs
every week, if they fulfil the business of the week well, and
promising them the book itself when they have learned ten or twenty
songs out of it.
2. What is learnt in verse is longer retained in memory, and sooner
recollected. The like sounds and the like number of syllables
exceedingly assist the remembrance. And it may often happen, that
the end of a song running in the mind may be an effectual means to
keep off some temptation, or to incline to some duty, when a word of
scripture is not upon the thoughts.
3. This will be a constant furniture for the minds of children, that
they may have something to think upon when alone, and sing over to
themselves. This may sometimes give their thoughts a divine turn,
and raise a young meditation. Thus they will not be forced to seek
relief for an emptiness of mind out of the loose and dangerous
sonnets of the age.
4. These _Divine Songs_ may be a pleasant and proper matter for
their daily or weekly worship, to sing one in the family at such
time as the parents or governors shall appoint; and therefore I have
confin'd the verse to the most usual psalm tunes.
The greatest part of this little book was composed several years
ago, at the request of a friend, who has been long engaged in the
work of catechising a very great number of children of all kinds,
and with abundant skill and success. So that you will find here
nothing that savours of a party: the children of high and low
degree, of the Church of England or Dissenters, baptized in infancy
or not, may all join together in these songs. And as I have
endeavoured to sink the language to the level of a child's
understanding, and yet to keep it (if possible) above contempt; so I
have designed to profit all (if possible) and offend none. I hope
the more general the sense is, these composures may be of the more
universal use and service.
I have added at the end an attempt or two of _Sonnets_ on _Moral
Subjects_ for children, with an air of pleasantry, to provoke some
fitter pen to write a little book of them. My talent doth not lie
that way, and a man on the borders of the grave has other work.
Besides, if I had health or leisure to lay out this way, it should
be employ'd in finishing the _Psalms_, which I have so long promised
the world.
May the Almighty God make you faithful in this important work of
education: may he succeed your cares with his abundant graces, that
the rising generation of Great Britain may be a glory amongst the
nations, a pattern to the Christian world, and a blessing to the
earth.