the above on this important subject. "Children," says the apostle, "obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right." How unfriendly to the reception of instruction is a spirit of disobedience? Against this the command recited provides. That they may not mistake the divine design in placing parents over them, they are expressly enjoined to be submissive. And that the relation of parents is one in which they have much interest, and which has high claims upon their gratitude and reverence, they are commanded, "Honor thy father and thy mother," which is a command, by no means the dictate of power, or mere claim of right, but a command commended to whatever is ingenuous in the human heart, by the promise of reward: "Honor thy father and thy mother, that it may be well with thee, and thou mayest live long upon the earth." On the other hand, whatever is attractive, persuasive, or alluring, is to be employed by parents for the end of rendering the duty of the young pleasant and improving. "Fathers provoke not your children to wrath, but train them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord." A fault-finding, impatient, and fretful temper in parents, how very inconsistent with the successful performance of parental duties. And when such caprice is the means of discouraging children in seeking instruction, or of provoking them to decline waiting upon it, how fearfully accountable must parents be to him who is the God of their little ones, and who demands that they train them up for him. The ministry of parents over children, among the means of salvation, is of no common importance. When the religious education of youth is wanting, it cannot be supplied without a diligence which the engagements of life seldom admit, and without an attention which ministers of Christ, engaged to strive for a whole church and for a world, to save them, cannot pay. And rare are the instances, in my apprehension, in which persons, who have reached maturity in ignorance of the doctrines of religion, ever obtain what may be called a well-settled system of divine truth. My heart has often been sorely pained on finding, in certain regions of our country, where the education of children has been neglected—I shall not say from what causes that many persons, amiable and attractive, who showed a fondness for conversing on the subjects of religion generally, were altogether unacquainted with its foundation and all its component parts. I have heard these speak confidently of their saving relation to God, and of their assurance of rest in heaven, while in the same conversation they affirmed that the Scriptures contained contradictions, and that they liked to read them where they did not. I have heard conversations maintained with ardor and zeal which filled me with delight, but how dashed was the cup of pleasure, when on bringing into view some of the important and even most consoling doctrines of the

Bible, I noted on their countenances the marks of surprise, and was left now to address them a silent audience.

It has been urged with great malignity of intention, and with a plausibility which has obtained too much success, That the doctrines of religion are too sublime for the contemplation of the tender mind; that they are too solemn, and that the abuse of them is too dangerous, to risk the presentment of them before the unexpanded and untrained minds of children. Are persons so objecting, willingly ignorant, that the years of childhood often are the seasons of grace. Do they not know, that the opportunitics of grace often close before life has reached its vigor; and that the divine Spirit, for whose gracious influences all faithful parents have reason to look, can sanctify the word to them, by making it effectual to their salvation. Do they not know that we owe to God the whole of our time, and that the love and devotion of youth are peculiarly acceptable. Do they not know, that those points in the system of religion, which outreach the conceptions of men, are not taught that they may be explored, analyzed, or clucidated; but that on God's testimony they may be believed; and that being believed they can share all the influence which they were intended to have by him that taught them. Do they forget that when the human mind is unfurnished with materials for religious thoughtfulness, evil inclinations, corrupt imaginations, a sinful world, and a tempting devil, will fill it to overflowing with an host of pampered inclinations, evil passions, and sinful purposes, which, if it do not render the condition desperate, will surely render it but little hopeful. By the one sin of one man guilt stands charged against all the individuals of our race; pollution has overspread the whole family; out of this all evil passions and propensities do grow, and, when unresisted, flourish. Now I ask, is it the part of wisdom to look on unalarmed at the growth of these, until conscience is silent, the mind enslaved, and a sense of future responsibility buried in the general ruin. God has chosen parents as teachers, that the minds of the young may be pre-occupied on his behalf, by the infusion of divine knowledge, and that thus their minds may possess materials for amending their hearts and directing their lives. Let such enemies of man know, that until they can show that impulses and choices derived from the materials which corrupt inclinations, evil consciences, worldly objects addressed to the senses, and the excitements of the grand enemy of God and man, are the true means of human refinement, and the ordained means of rendering man fit for heaven, no argument can lie against parental instruc tion. It is this that, by the grace of God, has been the means of retaining a place and a church for God in a world lying in wickedness until this time. How just the sentiment of the poet:

"'Tis education forms the human mind;

Just as the twig is bent the tree's inclined."

And how accordant the thought with that of inspiration: "Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it."

If it be asked, by what rule shall parents be guided in preparing the children, which they have received from God, for restoration to him at his call? The answer is: The word of God, as it is able to make parents, who know and improve it, wise unto salvation; so it is qualified to secure to their offspring the same blessedness. It is the full revelation of God to man of all that is to be believed, and of all that is to be done. "It is able to make the man of God perfect, thoroughly furnished to every good word and work." It is plain to the mind of an honest inquirer; except as to the incomprehensible things of God, which it is impossible that man should know, and those wondrous things of his ways and his judgments which it hath pleased him to conceal. The vast diversity of religious systems and opinions which divides the Christian world, is not owing to any obscurity that pervades the sacred volume; but to the dire obliquity given to the intellectual faculties of man through the intervention of sin. Many of these systems, as may be seen by their influence on their votaries, are rather to be regarded as owing their shape and form to the tastes, inclinations, and prejudices of those that have formed and adopted them, than to the prayerful mental research of the Holy Scriptures. But prejudice and passion aside; the great variety of mental endowment, the pressure attendant on many of the unnumbered pursuits in life; the entire privation or the imperfect enjoyment of opportunities of improvement, and many such causes, disqualify the grand mass of mankind for the at once arduous and important work of gathering light from the sacred book that may guide their path to heaven. For this, the God of grace has kindly provided. "He has given some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; for the perfecting of the saints; for the work of the ministry; for the edifying of the body of Christ; till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man; unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ." As many of these offices as are proper to our period of the church and of the world are still continued. There are still evangelists, pastors, teachers. They are not indeed men specially inspired to teach something which the Scriptures do not contain; but they are qualified by the possession of mental endowments, by learning, by personal piety, by a desire to serve Christ in seeking to save souls, and habitual study of the Scrip

tures, to open divine truth before the mind and to enforce it upon the heart. Among the blessings conferred through men like these, the Confession of Faith and Catechisms of the Presbyterian church ought to be regarded as invaluable. Parents, who of you are qualified for sitting down, and gathering together the doctrines of the Bible, and for placing them in the order of mutual dependence? Who of you are prepared to gather the Scriptures around the collected points, should you succeed in collecting them, and fence them in so as to render the citadel of your hope impregnable? Who, if they were in possession of powers equal to the task, could find the leisure, or submit to the labor and self-denial which the work would demand, unless it were one who was set apart to the work of providing food for poor dying souls. The Confession of Faith, in all its parts, claims the admiration of Christians; but, as a short, plain, and comprehensive exhibition of Scripture doctrine, the Shorter Catechism, in my apprehension, stands pre-eminent. Very childhood can embrace and entertain it as matter of memory. And then, the leading work of the parent is, to explain the language and endeavor to impress the sacred sentiments upon their hearts. The child that has on memory that precious summary of divine truth, has obtained a treasure upon which it may draw for direction in every period of life; and which, if the Spirit of the Lord mellow the ground, and warm, and water the precious seed when sown, will not fail of bringing forth fruit to eternal life. We do not ask you, parents, to take our word, as to the soundness of the doctrines it contains. We refer you to the passages upon which every point rests for its support. They are collected for you that at the same glance you may see the truth and the evidence of truth. If you suspect any thing, the whole Bible is in your power, and we ask you to do as the good Bereans did: "search the Scriptures daily and see if these things are so." Strange that there should be any who would endeavor to bring into disuse this useful manual. For I am persuaded that just in the degree in which it is neglected, will truth be undervalued; and discord and disgrace take the place of harmony and order. I firmly believe, that those whose hopes are placed on the system of doctrine contained in the Confession of Faith, are securely built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief cornerstone. I stand for no untried foundation; I would not that any should hazard their own salvation, neither that of the precious children which the Lord hath given them, upon a mere experiment. "To the law and to the testimony" it has often been brought, and I know not that any production of man has ever transmitted so fully the light of heaven shining in God's word without shading its lustre, as the Presbyterian Confession has done. On the sacred volume, the Bible, in the light in

which it is exhibited here, I plant my foot, and take my stand, and risk my all. Parents, I invite you to place yourselves with your children by the side of me and mine; and with the Bible as our sun, shedding light upon us through our Confession, let us hold on our way, and whatever may be the toils or trials of our journey, the end will be glorious.

If our right to the possession of children is founded in the gift of God, then we should not only feel thankful for them, but hold them as at his disposal. Children trained in the fear of the Lord are unspeakable blessings. The attentions due to them, and the expressions of love and regard received in return, not only lessens the tedium of life, but bring with them much positive satisfaction. The performance of the duties wich we owe to them, as tender, helpless, and dependent, improve and soften the finer feelings of humanity, and prepare the heart for the entertainment of those sympathies, the exercise of which is so often called for towards the miserable around us. Who that, as

a parent, has been teaching his children, with the diligence that becomes him, the sacred lessons that open to their view a happy immortality, will not testify that the things of God and religion have risen higher in his own estimation, and that the labors spent on them have terminated in his own benefit? What thanks are due to God for appointing us a task so pleasant as to teach the child, which by nature's laws we so much love, how to obtain and enjoy him and heaven; and for how important an end shall we have lived, if we are blessed as instruments in preparing their souls for a willing and peaceful surrender at his call. To hold our offspring as ours, by a deed of gift, implies God's right to take them when he pleases, and our duty in resigning them when he calls. Resignation to the will of God, when children are taken from our embraces, is arduous and trying. While all may desire to possess it; all lament, while they feel the pungency of wo, that they are so deficient in its exercises, and that they experience so little of the tranquillity it proposes. To what cause is this deficiency rather to be ascribed than to this: that we are accustomed to conceive of our children as exclusively our own. Ask the mother covered with tears, wringing her hands, and pale with sorrow; ask her, why this extravagance of grief? O! the child, the darling child, torn from my bosom, lies there the unseasonable victim of untimely death. Could sympathy for the mourner be suppressed, she ought to be reproved. Inconsiderate woman dry up your tears: you have lost nothing. This child was given you on the express condition that you should surrender it at God's call. He has taken his own heritage, and in doing so has released you from a trust and a labor difficult and precarious. When the train of complicated sorrows, with which Job