pressive in a Parent's voice ;-then will they remain, and produce impressions more indelible than any of their successors; nay, even when he becomes his own master, and can range abroad, and receive instruction from teachers and companions of his own selection, then indeed, if you have done your duty, will he ascertain, that you stood in such a relation to him as no one else ever can occupy. In this sense it may with truth be said, though he should have ten thousand instructors in future life, yet can he have but one Father.*

* Here I am fully aware, that there is scarcely a more common complaint in regard to a disobedient child, than that he will not listen to advice, to remonstrance, or entreaty. But this complaint, I am afraid, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, is very far from being fair. As well might the negligent keeper of an orchard complain, that his branches will not yield to be trained. In such a case you would say " My friend, all this is idle talk; your season is over and gone; you have been absent, or unequal, or negligent, at a former period. Where were you when these branches were twigs? Where, when they might have been trained with a hair, and when they bent at your breath? So is it in general with these inattentive or regardless Children, now indeed so loudly complained of. They are proofs of some previous delinquency on the part of their ordained guardians-assuredly not proofs of the powerlessness or inefficacy of parental instruction."

But is there no contrast to all this? Certainly there is-many a triumphant one; and many more there might be. Observe that Parent who assiduously improves his earliest opportunities; his family illustrates the truth of all that has been said: for what is the reason that the Parent has such a hold of the Infant and Child, and so little of the Youth? And what the reason, that his instructions or warning are so marvellously powerful in the one case, and so powerless in the other? Why, because in the latter case, the season of God's appointment had in some way been disregarded; in the former, it had been seized and improved, when instruction was easily taken in and hardly lost again. Hardly, did I say? I may go farther than this, and with great safety. If due care is taken, to your joy you will find, that, so far from your early impressions on your Child failing, subsequent impressions serve rather to indent the former, than to efface them. Other instructions may be contained in the mind, and be of great service, but those of the

Now, with a power such as this in possession, should Parents prove, I do not say disobedient, but merely inattentive to the order of heaven and the appointment of the Almighty; surely, surely, you can feel no surprise if you see the curse scatter itself from them by virtual contact and the channel of relationship-no surprise when you see such Parents leave behind them a series of crimes, with their appropriate punishments, to be divided, by entail, among their Children; ay, and if these Children approve the deeds of their Parents, I may safely add, among their Children's Children! Nor, however much this sad entail may be lamented by other relations, and they may somewhat mitigate its pressure, can even their united efforts ever entirely break it! An appeal to the Almighty himself alone, on the part of such Children, becomes absolutely necessary. "Be ye

not as your Fathers," said Zechariah, "unto whom the former prophets have cried, saying, Thus saith the Lord of hosts, Turn ye now from your evil ways and from your evil doings; but they would not hear, nor hearken unto me, saith the Lord. Your Fathers, where are they? and the Prophets, do they live forever?"-Oh, what questions! how cutting and heartsearching to these their Children!" Our Fathers,” say they, "alas! many of them lie buried in the ruins of Jerusalem; the bones of others, if not bleaching in the desert, or if not to be seen rising, in many a mouldering heap, on either side of the way; lie

Father and the Mother were imbibed. That which comes first, takes almost absolute possession, and carries with it all the autho rity you could wish; there being no antecedent notions to dispute the title or call the truth in question.

entombed, far from Judea, within the broad walls of Babylon." And the prophets, do they live for ever? "For ever, say they; alas! our Fathers either would not suffer them to live, or embittered all their days." Well then, Jehovah, by the Prophets, replies-" But my words and my statutes, which I commanded my servants the Prophets, did they not take hold, or overtake, your Fathers? and they returned and said, Like as the Lord thought to do unto us, according to our ways, and according to our doings, so hath he Idealt with us."

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Thus it is, as an old writer would tell you,* that, as from the eyes of some individuals, and the tongues of others, there issues an evil influence; as between the vital spirits of friends and relatives there is a cognation, and they refresh each other like social plants; so in Parents and their Children, there is so great a society of nature and of manners, of blessing and of cursing, that an evil Parent cannot perish in a single death! neither can holy and consistent Parents eat their meal of blessing alone; but they make the room shine like the fire of a holy sacrifice;" and the fire, thus kindled, will propagate itself, and shine upon other walls, long after their pilgrimage is ended. Well, therefore, may the voice of rejoicing and salvation be heard in the tabernacles of the righteous.

2. And now what shall I say of the peculiar blessing of the Almighty, which has ever rested on the head of those Parents who have fulfilled their natural, and reasonable, and incumbent obligations; and in ex

act proportion as they have fulfilled them? For although it is true, that Jehovah never will reject the forecast or the labour of man, but calls him to be heedful and diligent; still, if he is defrauded of his due honour, and if Parents will adventure on any thing, only upon trust in their own wisdom and strength, all their toil is vain. "Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it: except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain." For a Parent especially, in such a case, "it is vain for him to rise up early, or sit up late ;" he, and, it may be, his Children, will, in the end, only "eat the bread of sorrows:" while, on the contrary, the Father and Mother who seek supremely the divine favour, not only sleep with serenity, but secure just as large a portion of earthly good as is consistent with their real advantage, and that of their Children after them. Any man, it is true, of a careless or indifferent character, may leave wealth behind him, but there is one important question which follows-Will, it prove beneficial, or a source of true enjoyment? For this, he had made no provision. When toiling on from day to day, all the while he had forgotten that blessing, which "maketh rich, and bringeth no sorrow with it;" though there is not in Scripture one single passage, which regards not this as a material ingredient, in all hereditary possessions. On the other hand, whatever be the rank of the good man, they represent him as standing on the highest ground, with regard to his legacy. As far as his family is concerned, he requires not the intervention of wealth, as it is called, to die well. Has he been pious, and industrious, and generous? and has he paid re

gard to his family, not as being to survive him only, but as bound, with him, for immortality, and soon to follow him? Then all is right. Rich or poor, such a man must leave an inheritance to his Children's Children."

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Here, however, in reference to the divine blessing, it seems impossible to forget one singularly-affecting passage in the evangelical history:

"And they brought young Children unto him, that he should touch them;" or, as Matthew has it, "that he should put his hands on them and pray; and his disciples rebuked those that brought them. But when Jesus saw it, he was much displeased, and said unto them-Suffer the little Children to come unto me, and forbid them not; for of such is the kingdom of God."

Christian Parents, who dwell upon such a scene as this, and these heavenly expressions, must surely derive, not only instruction, but the greatest encouragement from both.

In contemplating the scene, you cannot overlook the parties who brought these Children, and their purpose in so doing, however dim and indistinct their views. Luke, in somewhat amplifying this clause, says, "they brought to him also infants;" as though he had said, 66 having seen in how many ways He could remove the diseases of riper years, and infuse vigour into the decayed limb, or the decaying frame, they hoped that Children also, who had before them the whole journey of life, might not be sent away empty, should he but condescend to touch them, or lay his hands upon them."

What though the apostles themselves might frown, or censure, and forbid, or imagine that it were below the dignity of the Son of God, to notice little Chil