Atten. Therein, I think, the old man was out. Had I been his Father, I would have held him a little at staves-end, till I had had far better proof of his manners to be good; (for I perceive that his Father did know what a naughty boy he had been, both by what he used to do at home, and because he changed a good Master for a bad, &c.) He should not therefore have given him money so soon. What if he had pinched a little, and gone to Journey-work for a time, that he might have known what a penny was, by his earning of it? Then, in all probability, he had known better how to have spent it: Yea, and by that time perhaps, have better considered with himself, how to have lived in the world. Ay, and who knows but he might have come to himself with the Prodigal, and have asked God and his Father forgiveness for the villanies that he had committed against them. {66d} Wise. If his Father could also have blessed this manner of dealing to him, and have made it effectual for the ends that you have propounded; then I should have thought as you. But alas, alas, you talk as if you never knew, or had at this present forgot what the bowels and compassions of a Father are. Why did you not serve your own son so? But ’tis evident enough, that we are better at giving good counsel to others, than we are at taking good counsel our selves. {67a} But mine honest neighbour, suppose that Mr. Badmans Father had done as you say, and by so doing had driven his son to ill courses, what had he bettered either himself or his son in so doing? Atten. That’s true, but it doth not follow, that if the Father had done as I said, the son would have done as you suppose. But if he had done as you have supposed, what had he done worse than what he hath done already? {67b} Wise. He had done bad enough, that’s true. But suppose his Father had given him no Money, and suppose that young Badman had taken a pett thereat, and in an anger had gone beyond Sea, and his Father had neither seen him, nor heard of him more. Or suppose that of a mad and headstrong stomach he had gone to the High-way for money, and so had brought himself to the Gallows, and his Father and Family to great contempt, or if by so doing he had not brought himself to that end, yet he had added to all his wickedness, such and such evils besides: And what comfort could his Father have had in this? Besides, when his Father had done for him what he could, with desire to make him an honest man, he would then, whether his son had proved honest or no, have laid down his head with far more peace, than if he had taken your Counsel. Atten. Nay I think I should not a been forward to have given advice in the cause; but truly you have given me such an account of his vilianies, that the hearing thereof has made me angry with him.