The Westminster Confession of Faith: Edinburgh Edition

“All the world is made of faith, and trust, and pixie dust.” – J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan

This eBook includes the Westminster Confession of Faith and its Subordinate Documents: Preface by Sundry English Divines, Mr. Manton’s Epistle to the Reader, The Confession of Faith, The Larger Catechism, The Shorter Catechism, The Sum of Saving, Knowledge, The National Covenant, The Solemn League and Covenant, The Acknowledgment of Sins, The Directory of Public Worship, The Form of Presbyterian Church Government, The Directory of Family Worship.

The devil hath a great spite at the kingdom of Christ, and he knoweth no such compendious way to crush it in the egg, as by the perversion of youth, and supplanting family duties. He striketh at all those duties which are public in the assemblies of the saints; but these are too well guarded by the solemn injunctions and dying charge of Jesus Christ, as that he should ever hope totally to subvert and undermine them; but at family duties he striketh with the more success, because the institution is not so solemn, and the practice not so seriously and conscientiously regarded as it should be, and the omission is not so liable to notice and public censure.

Religion was first hatched in families, and there the devil seeketh to crush it; the families of the Patriarchs were all the churches God had in the world for the time; and therefore, (I suppose,) when Cain went out from Adam’s family, he is said to go out from the face of the Lord, Gen. 4:16. Now the devil knoweth that this is a blow at the root, and a ready way to prevent the succession of churches: if he can subvert families, other societies and communities will not long flourish and subsist with any power and vigour; for there is the stock from whence they are supplied both for the present and future.