Eight Treatises on Marriage, Children, and the Christian Household — William Gouge
Originally published 1622 · Complete and unabridged · 742 pages
Hardcover with dust jacket and ebook coming soon.
“A family is a little church, and a little commonwealth.”
First published in London in 1622, Of Domestical Duties is the most systematic Puritan treatment of marriage, parenting, and household life ever written. Across eight full treatises, William Gouge works through Ephesians 5:21–6:9 and brings every relationship of the home under the light of Scripture.
The scope is immense. Gouge treats the duties husbands and wives share, the particular duties of each, the duties of children and parents, and those of servants and masters. He writes about money and speech, sickness and correction, education and callings, wages and working conditions, family worship and prayer. The result is not a collection of inspirational excerpts but a complete theology of the early modern Protestant household.
This edition gives Gouge's argument in full, in a form made to be read rather than merely consulted: moderately modernized without paraphrase, freshly typeset, and furnished with translations of his foreign-language notes. It also includes the family prayers he added in 1626—material absent from most editions and digital texts.
“A family is a little church, and a little commonwealth, at least a lively representation of it … as a school wherein the first principles and grounds of government and subjection are learned.”
— William Gouge, Of Domestical Duties
Paperback · ISBN 979-8-953911-00-9
Hardcover with dust jacket · ISBN 979-8-953911-01-6
Ebook
About the Author
William Gouge (traditionally 1575–1653) was a Puritan minister, author, and one of the most diligent members of the Westminster Assembly. He served St Anne Blackfriars in London for more than forty-five years, preaching twice each Sunday and maintaining a weekly lecture for thirty-five years.
A husband and father of thirteen, Gouge wrote Of Domestical Duties after preaching its substance to his own congregation. His other works include The Whole Armour of God (1616), God's Three Arrows (1631), and a vast commentary on Hebrews.
Read the full biography of William Gouge →It is Gouge's systematic exposition of Ephesians 5:21–6:9. Its eight treatises examine the mutual and particular duties of husbands and wives, children and parents, servants and masters, placing the whole household under the authority of Scripture.
Yes. It contains all eight treatises—more than 280,000 words—together with Gouge's Patterns of Prayers for the Several Members of a Family first printed in the 1626 second edition and set here from the 1634 third edition.
Moderately, but never paraphrased. Spelling, letterforms, obsolete verb endings, selected archaic words, and light punctuation are updated. Gouge's argument, structure, order, and theological sense are preserved.
As a primary historical and theological text, not as a modern handbook stripped of context. Gouge writes within the legal and social world of seventeenth-century England, including its master-servant household. He nevertheless insists throughout that authority is accountable to God, gives extensive duties to those who hold it, and requires justice, care, and reciprocal good. Our article on Puritan teaching about family provides a guided introduction.
The paperback (742 pages, 6×9) is available now on Amazon. The hardcover with dust jacket and the ebook are coming soon; links will appear here when those listings are live.
