He covers such topics as preparations to a godly life, general rules to be remembered in the manner of doing all good duties, rules that concern the preservation of our love to God, and how we should carry ourselves in God’s house. He also deals with rules that order us about hearing of the word, of baptism, of the Lord’s Supper, of prayer, of reading the Scriptures, of singing psalms, of vowing and swearing, of fasting, of keeping the Sabbath, and much much more.
This is an astoundingly helpful work, not to turn the Christian into one that “follows rules,” but one that desires to see his life reflect God’s holy prescription of being more like Jesus Christ through living out the Bible’s truth.
This is not a scan or facsimile, has been updated in modern English for easy reading and has an active table of contents for electronic versions.
Not many Christians today are familiar with Nicholas Byfield (1579–1622). This is a tragedy. Byfield was a Calvinistic puritan divine with a sweet preaching and writing style akin to that of Thomas Watson with the practicality of Jeremiah Burroughs. He was an extremely popular puritan in his day who wrote many treatises and was widely respected as a theologian and preacher.