FOR CHILDREN IN ORDINARY
CIRCUMSTANCES.

(All the Petitions need not be used at the same time.)

-O GOD, Thou art the lovely Father of all mankind; Thou hast implanted in us the parental instincts; and commanded us to train up our children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord-we feel our awful responsibility, and often exclaim, Who is sufficient for these things? But Thou givest wisdom to the ignorant, and power to the faint. Aid, O aid us, in discharging the duties we owe to those, whom Thou hast given us, and continued to us.

We give them up to Thee, who art able to fulfil all our petitions. Rescue them from the numberless accidents and diseases to which they are exposed. Let their tempers be lovely, and meek, and kind. Let their manners be simple and engaging. May they be respectful towards their superiors; obliging towards their equals; and condescending towards their inferiors.

Let not envy, and pride, and censoriousness, render them disdainful to others, and wretched in themselves. May they speak evil of no one-but upon their tongue, may there dwell the law of kindness. May they hate and abhor lying-with all deceit and hypocrisy.

May they be always willing to receive instruction; and be diligent in acquiring all the knowledge and improvement, that may render them the blessings and ornaments of society.

Keep them from evil company. If sinners entice them, may they never consent; but early may they take hold of the skirt of him that is a Jew, saying, I will go with you, for I have heard that God is with you.

We seek not great things for them as to this world— but O, let them live in thy sight: let them be numbered with thy saints in glory everlasting: let them be blessed with all spiritual blessings, in heavenly places in Christ.

Instead of multiplying riches, and leaving them incentives to pride, and vanity, and idleness, and sensuality; and augmenting a thousand fold all the difficulties of their salvation-May we lay up for them treasure in heaven; may we be concerned to leave behind us, a large inheritance of prayers and instructions, and examples-with the blessing of God, that maketh rich, and addeth no sorrow with it.

If their parents should be taken away from themwhen father and mother forsake them, may the Lord take them up. If they should be deprived of their father-be Thou the Father of the fatherless: or should they be deprived of their mother-as one whom his mother comforteth, so do Thou comfort them.

Should they be removed from us—in early life, may the heavenly shepherd gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom; and may we be prepared to resign them. And, if, as we submissively implore, their lives should be prolonged-may they grow up, and prove our comfort and honour; serve their generation according to thy will; and walk before Thee in the land of the living.

ADDRESSES

FOR

PARTICULAR SEASONS.

SPRING.

-THOU art the fountain of life; in Thee we live, move, and have our being-and the prerogative of that being is, that we are able to contemplate thy perfections, and rise from thy works-to thyself.

Thou sendest forth thy Spirit; and renewest the face of the earth and, from apparent death, all nature starts into re-animated vigour and joy. In what myriads of productions art Thou displaying afresh, the wonders of thy wisdom, power, and goodness-the whole earth is full of thy riches.

While we partake of the general sympathy and delight, may we join with all thy works to praise Thee. And O Thou God of all grace, bless us with the renewing of the Holy Ghost, in all the powers of our souls. May old things pass away, and all become new in Christ : may the beauty of the Lord be upon us and the joy of the Lord be our strength.

May the young remember, that they are now in the spring of life and that this spring, once gone, returns no more. May they, therefore, eagerly seize, and zealously improve, the short, but all important season, for the

cultivation of their minds, the formation of their habits, the correction of their tempers, their preparation for future usefulness, and their gaining that good part which shall not be taken away from them.

-000-000

SUMMER.

-WE hail Thee in the varying aspects of the year, and bless Thee for all their appropriate influences and advantages. O let us not view them and enjoy them as men only, but as christians also: and ever connect with them, the better blessings of thy grace.

How wise, and useful, and necessary, are these intermingled rains and sunbeams-may Jesus as the Sun of righteousness arise upon us, with healing under his wings; and may He come down as rain upon the mown grass, and as showers that water the earth.

When we walk by the cooling brook-may we think. of that river, the streams whereof make glad the city of God.

When we retire from the scorching warmth of the day, into the inviting shade-may we be thankful for a rest at noon, a shelter from the heat, the shadow of a great rock in a weary land.

May thy servants behold the moral fields, that are already white unto harvest, and be all anxiety to save the multitudes, that are perishing for lack of knowledge.

The harvest truly is great, but the labourers are few; we therefore pray, that Thou wilt send forth labourers into thy harvest.

Now

He that gathereth in summer is a wise son; he that sleepeth in harvest, is a son that causeth shame. is our accepted time, now is our day of salvation.

O let

us not waste our precious privileges, and in a dying hour exclaim,―The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved.

-000-000

AUTUMN.

-HOW fleeting, as well as varying, are the season's of the year. How insensibly have the months of spring and summer vanished: and nature has no sooner attained its maturities, than we behold its declension and decay. The fields are now shorn of their produce; the beauties of the garden are withered: the woods are changing their verdure, and the trees shedding their foilage-we also never continue in one stay. Many of our connexions and comforts have already dropped away from us; and the remaining are holden by a slender tenure—while we ourselves, do all fade as a leaf, and in a little time, our places will know us no more.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, for the announcement of an inheritance that fadeth not away. O for a hope full of immortality—for a possession of that good part, which shall not be taken. away from us.

·000-000

WINTER.

O THOU God of nature and providence; manifold are thy works, in wisdom hast Thou made them all; and all are full of thy goodness. The welfare of thy creatures, requires the severity of winter, as well as the pleasures of spring. We adore thy hand in all. Thou