not delight your hearts, to think that you may be the honoured instruments of making your households happy? Of spreading the savour of the knowledge of Christ through your dwellings? Of calling down blessings upon all your circles of beloved objects? And of training up your rising charge for an endless state of glory?-But let it never escape your recollection, that all the inmates of your dwellings, all the members of your households, are heirs of immortality; and that ere long they will be "either with the damned cast out, or numbered with the blest." 66 And, what will parents," saith Tillotson, "be able to say to God at the day of judgment, for all their neglects of their children, in matters of instruction, and example, and restraint from evil? How will it make your ears to tingle, when God shall arise terribly to judgment, and say to you, Behold! the children which I have given you; they were ignorant, and you instructed them not; they made themselves vile, and you restrained them not. Why did you not teach them at home, and bring them to the public ordinances and worship of God, and train them up to the exercise of piety and devotion? But you did not only neglect to give them good instruction, but you gave them bad example; and, lo! they have followed you to hell, to be an addition to your torment there. Unhappy wretches! that have thus neglected, and by your neglect destroyed those, whose happiness by so many bonds of affection you were obliged to procure. Behold! the books are now open, and there is not one prayer upon record that ever you put up for your children: there is no memorial, no, not so much as of one hour, that was ever seriously spent to train them to a sense of God, and a knowledge of their duty. But on the contrary, it appears that you have many ways contrived their misery, and contributed to their ruin, and helped forward their damnation. How could you be thus unnatural? How could you thus hate your own flesh, and hate your own souls? How much better had it been for them, and how much better for you, that they had never been born?"

3. Every man should seek to bless his household for the sake of so ciety. The world, morally considered, presents a most melancholy picture. Abroad, superstition, idolatry, and vice in all its multiform and execrable shapes, hold their unmolested reign; and at home, boundless ambition, insatiate avarice, insufferable pride, and hardened infidelity, with every sensual, lewd, and vicious enormity, pollute the mass of society. Much indeed has been recently done to meliorate the moral condition of the world. An era of benevolence has commenced. Schools, for the salvation of youth from ignorance and vice, have been: established. Bibles, by millions, and in almost all languages, have been put into circulation. Missionaries, charged with the ministry of recon ciliation, have gone to the farthest verge of this green earth. Tracts, on all subjects connected with Christian theology, have been widely and

industriously disseminated. But useful and laudable as all these efforts most certainly are, it yet remains for us to do something more in our families. We should begin at home, and make our houses nurseries for religion; we should travail in birth for the souls of all our domestics; and

"Try every art, reprove each dull delay,

Allure to brighter worlds, and lead the way."

What a monstrous incongruity for a man to show an excess of zeal in subscribing his property for the erection of temples for the worship of Almighty God, and yet to permit his own house, over which he has the sole dominion, to remain without an altar, a priest, or a sacrifice! to offer up fervent prayers for the conversion of Heathens, and yet suffer his own children to remain unconverted! Families are plantations divinely established to be seminaries for religion. "God setteth the solitary in families." (Ps. lxviii. 6.) Marriage is his ordinance; His will is, that single persons should come together, be united in the bond of matrimony, "for the procreation of children, to be brought up in the fear and nurture of the Lord, and to the praise of his holy name." And the design of this institution and relation is, that a godly seed might be produced. "The Lord," saith Malachi," hath been witness between thee and the wife of thy youth, against whom thou hast dealt treacherously yet is she thy companion, and the wife of thy covenant. And did he not make one? Yet had he the residue of the spirit. And wherefore one? That he might seek a godly seed." (Mal. ii. 14, 15.) Hence marriage was instituted, not merely that there might be a descent of human beings, but that religion might be transmitted from age to age, and piety perpetuated through all generations. And the most effectual way of benefiting the world, and promoting the welfare of society, is by the establishment of family religion. The world is composed of families, as the ocean is of drops; and to change the condition of the whole, we must begin with the component parts of which that whole is composed. He who blesses his household, contributes personally, in his proportion, to the happiness of the world; his children, emulating his example, and treading in his steps, rise up, and call him blessed, and in process of time they themselves become the fathers and the heads of families; and thus religion, like an hereditary patrimony, is transmitted from one generation to another. Let no man think that this is merely an ideal picture, or an unfounded expectation; it is the doctrine of Revelation. "The Lord," saith the Psalmist, "established a testimony in Jacob, and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers that they should make them known to their children: that the gene-' ration to come might know them, even the children which should be born, who should arise and declare them to their children, that they' might set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God, but keep

his commandments." (Ps. lxxviii. 5, 6.) O how much does the welfare of the world depend upon the heads of families! They may cast their bread upon the waters, and find it after many days. They may sow the seed, which in succession may produce a thousand harvests. They may raise up a godly seed, a noble, a legitimate offspring, who shall honourably fill important stations in society, and shine as the lights of the world, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation. Or they may, by neglecting to bless their households, induce them to sin by their example, and not only contribute, with fiend-like dispositions, to their individual ruin, but lay the foundation for infinite mischief and misery in the world; swell the enormous mass of moral contagion upon earth; perpetuate the existence of crime; and act a more mischievous part than the madman who casts around him "firebrands, arrows, and death."

4. Every man should seek to bless his household for the Lord's sake. "The Lord hath made all things for himself." (Prov. xvi. 4.) He is the author and end of all beings. "For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things." (Rom. xi. 36.) The members of your households are all God's offspring. His fiat gave them birth; His providence feeds, sustains, and defends them; His Son died for their sins, His Spirit strives with their souls, His Ministers warn them of their dangers, His Gospel encourages their hopes, His judgments awaken their fears, His church invites them to her arms, and His heaven is prepared for their reception. And because God does so much for your households, it cannot be unreasonable for him to expect much from them. Much of love, and reverence, and homage, and obedience, and adoration; yea, a revenue of glory. O, for the Lord's sake, help them to accomplish this noble purpose, to fulfil this high vocation! that "one may say, I am the Lord's; and another call himself by the name of Jacob; and another subscribe with his hand unto the Lord, and surname himself by the name of Israel; " until all the inmates of your habitations join themselves unto the Lord, in a perpetual covenant that shall not be forgotten. And remember, you are bound to do this, by virtue of your relation to your household. "Every head of a family has so much of the power of God lodged in him, that it is treachery and falsehood to the great Ruler of the world, to let his authority wherewith he has invested him be neglected, and slighted, and trampled upon, or not executed, and put forth to the uttermost, for the ends for which he hath so seated it." Hence good men have been jealous, lest God should be dishonoured by their families. Job, after his sons had been feasting, sent and sanctified them, and rose up early in the morning, and offered burnt offerings, according to the number of them all; for Job said, "It may be that my sons have sinned, and cursed God in their hearts: thus did Job continually." (Job i. 5.) Of Moses, it is said, that he "was faithful in all his house;" which refers no less to his family, than to his nation. And

his illustrious servant and successor, profiting by his example, records his resolution in these memorable words: "As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord." Let us copy the example of these holy men, and "be followers of them, who through faith and patience inherit the promises." In conclusion, suffer me to make my appeal to you who are fathers, masters, and heads of families. Do you bless your households? Are they households of faith, and families of God? Is the Lord wor shipped, and are his sabbaths honoured and hallowed, and his testimonies kept, by your domestics? Are your houses regulated, your children instructed, your servants governed, and all your affairs managed in the fear of the Lord? Perhaps you are seeking to excuse yourselves by the multiplicity of your avocations, which swallow up all your time. But is family-religion no part of your avocation? Is the whole of your duty comprised in buying and selling, and getting gain? Does the homage which you pay to Mammon, supersede the necessity of devotion to God? Has the Being to whom you owe your all, left it optional with you, whether you worship him in your families or not? No; it must be à duty, and a duty of universal and indispensable importance, since Abraham, Moses, Job, Joshua, David, Cornelius, and all the excellent of the earth, have conscientiously practised it. Nay, the very Pagans had their Lares and Penates, household gods; the former of which was supposed to preside over housekeeping, the servants in families, and domestic affairs; and the latter were deemed the protectors of the masters of families, their wives, and their children. Laban also had his household gods, which Rachel stole from him; and Micah had an idol, and a domestic priest to manage its worship. And may you not infer from all this, that duty binds you to worship God in your families? You may have your worldly business. So had David; he was a King, and governed a kingdom, and ruled over a great people, that could not be numbered or counted for multitude; and his avocations were highly important, and amazingly diversified; yet he returned to bless his household.

But you are perhaps ready to say, "Had I David's abilities, I also would bless my household." But will you do nothing because you cannot do every thing? "If any man minister," said the Apostle, " let him do it, as of the ability which God giveth." This applies to any office of kindness, for the good of others; your personal ability is the rule of your duty; you can do all that God requireth, though you cannot perhaps do all that David did. But remember, God often blesses the weakest instruments, and crowns with success the feeblest efforts; for the excellency of the power is of God, and not of us. Arise, therefore, and be doing, and the Lord be with you! Do his work, seek his blessing, and be confidently assured, that your labour shall not be in vain in the Lord.

But you, probably, anticipate opposition in attempting to establish the

worship of God in your families. And had David no opposition? Did all the members of his household approve of his devotions? Did his wife applaud him? Was she pleased to behold the expressions of his fervent zeal for God? No: she eyed him with a scowl of contempt; and accosted him in a strain of insulting and sarcastic impiety: "How glorious was the king of Israel to-day, who uncovered himself in the eyes of the handmaids of his servants, as one of the vain fellows shamelessly uncovereth himself!" Such was the impudent and irritating language in which David was addressed, when he was returning to bless his household. And what, if you meet with similar treatment? Marvel not at it. The godless spirit of Michal has lived in many a wife since the days of David, and obloquy as foul and taunting has been cast on many a saint, in the discharge of his duty. But heed it not: the voice of duty must never be silenced by the tongue of slander; nor the salvation of a family from the eternal torments of the damned, ever be sacrificed to a sheer of contempt, or even a whole volley of rank abuse. "Fear not, therefore, the reproach of men, neither be afraid of their revilings," Remember how much more easy it is to bear insults in the discharge of duty, than the curse of God for the neglect of duty; and there is no alternative. The curse of the Lord is already in the house of the wicked; and the effects of this curse will be terribly realized, when God will pour out his fury upon the Heathen that know him not, and upon the families that call not upon his name; a fury that will "come forth like fire, and burn that none can quench it;" and when the wicked will be as *** stubble before the wind, and as the chaff that the storm carrieth away.” O ye heads of families, flee from the wrath to come, secure your own personal salvation, by faith in Jesus; and then for the sake of your wives, of your children, and of your servants, hold not your peace; restraîn not your prayers, suspend not your entreaties, until they also shall "obtain like precious faith with you, through the righteousness of God and our Saviour Jesus Christ!" He who invites you to return to him, is waiting to pardon your past neglects, to save you from all your sins, and to qualify you for the discharge of every religious and moral duty, And while you are admonished to govern your families in the fear of God; and to train up your children in the instruction and discipline of the Lord, you have the encouraging assurance that your labour shall not be in vain. In answer to the prayer of faith, and in connexion with your pious exertions, God will " pour his Spirit upon your seed, and his blessing upon your offspring:" For the promise of the Holy Ghost, in his quickening, renewing, and comforting energy, "is unto you, and to your children, and to them that are afar off; and to as many as the Lord our God shall call," by the word of truth, the Gospel of our salvation. Amen.