Useful to the Sabbath School teacher. First means of doing good,-visiting.

tolerable preacher. It is from the fact that these various duties are connected so as to relieve tedium, and to call different powers and sympathies into exercise, that the pastoral office perfects the character of a minister, making all parts more symmetrical and well-proportioned, than any other station in the ministry.

These remarks apply in their full force to the duties of the Sabbath School teacher. His great duty is to instruct his class, but collateral with this, there are other duties equally necessary, and equally important to render his character complete, and the sphere of his usefulness full. They will add equally to his happiness and usefulness. I propose, then, in this chapter, to mention some of the collateral means of doing good, which the teacher has in his power.

1. A regular system of visiting the families to which the scholars in your class severally belong.

You have seen friends become cold, distant, and finally break away, and never again become reconciled to each other. You have seen husband and wife change, revile and hate each other, separate, while every year only seemed to render their enmity more intense. The link once broken between husband and wife can seldom be mended. But you do not often see children and parents becoming enemies. Let the child be deformed and diseased, and it does not wean him from the love of his parents; let him become an idiot, and their love will not change; let

A powerful principle brought into exercise. Trust committed to the teacher.

And even when

him become vile, and they will throw the mantle of charity over him, and still encircle him in the brightness of hope; let him leave his home and herd with the vile, and throw away all that is lovely or valuable, and they will still cling to him. he is so degraded that he feeds with the swine in the field, on the first appearance of his return, however poor and wretched, the father sees him afar off, and runs to meet him,—to fall on his neck, and to call him his son. It is hardly possible to wear out or to annihilate this heaven-planted love between parent and child. And it is the existence of this love which gives the Sabbath School teacher such power. In committing his children to you, the father commits his highest hopes,-the mother her richest treasure. It is like a deed by which they commit their all to you. Does not the Apostle recognize this principle, and appeal to it, when he says, that God, who spared not his only-begotten Son, will with him freely give us all things? By having the children put into your hands, you have a means of doing good to those parents and to their family, unspeakably great. You wish to know the influences, under which, this and that child has thus far been placed. A visit to his parents will help you to understand them. You wish to have this and that trait of character corrected. The parents either do not see the faults, or know not how to correct them. A few hints from you may aid them greatly. Perhaps the family are not in the habit of

Usefulness of visits.

Illustrated by a physician.

going to the house of God. You may, by a careful use of your influence, lead them there. They may have notions and impressions concerning your school, or concerning religion, which counteract all that you can do on the Sabbath. A few visits may remove all these impressions. They may be bringing up their children in idleness, ignorance, and sin: and your counsels may alter the whole course of conduct in this respect. You can see their condition, and shortly, can place in their hands a tract, or something of the kind, which will exactly meet the evil which you wish to correct. Knowing the habits of the family, you can aid the child in selecting such books as will be useful at home, and encourage him to read, or to have them read at home. If you can once gain the confidence of the child, the way is open, and it will be easy to gain the confidence of the parents; and when that is gained, it will add to your former influence over the child. A physician once said to me, that he had a patient in whose cure he could make no progress. Every visit found him in a new condition, and with new symptoms. Every medicine prescribed seem to work by a new and unheard-of rule. At length the physician set himself to work to find out the difficulty. It was this: the mother of the patient took it into her head that the prescriptions of the physician were too powerful for the constitution of her child, and in order to counteract their mischievous tendency, she gave some powerful nos

Visiting should be done regularly.

A caution.

trum soon after taking the medicine, as an antidote. It is just so with many children. Their parents are constantly neutralizing all that you do on the Sabbath. This evil can be met and removed only by your visiting the family. I would recommend that you visit regularly once a month, every child in your class, even if your call is but short. It should make no difference with you whether the parents are rich or poor,-high or low. All who are willing to commit their children to you will be glad to see you, and will be grateful for the interest you take in the welfare of their children. In addition to this, you ought to call upon every child who is absent, before the Sabbath following. The child may be sick, and in that case he will be glad to see you. He may have fallen into bad company, and in that case you ought at once to see him. He may have deceived his parents, and in that case they ought to know it. I have never known other than a good school, where the rule was invariably practised, that every child who is absent from the school, shall be visited during the following week. I cannot too strenuously urge its importance. But be careful not to have these calls to inquire after delinquencies, seem like duns, as a creditor calls upon a debtor, when the visit is disagreeable to both parties. Let there be so much of heart in all your intercourse with parents, that they shall see that you seek only the real welfare of their child. If possible, always have some

Plea of not having time,-considered.

Get the good-will of the family.

thing on your mind interesting to communicate, and let all your conversation, if practicable, be in the presence of the children. After one or two visits, you will never feel at a loss how to make your visit interesting. For the convenience of these visits, the Superintendent ought to have regard to the propriety of having the same class dwell in the same part of the parish, as nearly as possible.

Unless you are really conscientious in all that you do, you will be in danger of neglecting this system of visiting under the plea that you have not time. In nine cases out of ten, this plea will not be received by the Great Head of the church. A Superintendent, speaking of his school, says, "visiting, in many instances, is faithfully attended to; but in a few instances, almost entirely neglected. One teacher, who is an apprentice, and has to labor till nine o'clock every evening, manages to visit nine scholars a week, —while others, who are not half so much confined, plead that they have no time to do so. Need I say he has a full and interesting class? Oh! that there were more whose hearts were as much in the work! We should no longer hear of empty seats and drooping schools." Were all our teachers equally prompt and faithful, what a spectacle would our schools present! But does each, on an average, afford one such teacher?

On making these visits, the first thing desirable, is to get the good-will of the parents. This you will