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ferior object alone, misses even that little, and thus becomes poor indeed. The foundation of Samuel's future eminence and usefulness, was thus laid in the early and tender care of a wise and pious mother. The youth had never been respected in the temple, had never been the object of general favour abroad, had the child learned to be froward, petulant, or peevish in his father's house. O woman, would you have the world to think of your darling son as you do, put yourselves betimes in the place of an unconcerned spectator, view him as an entire stranger would do, and let discretion regulate the overflowings of your heart. Ah, had Hannah favoured her child more, Israel had favoured him less! How ample and how sweet, even in this world, are the rewards of self-government, of self-denial, of moderation! Men literally, in many instances, enjoy what they reject, and lose what they gain. He who lendeth to the Lord, lays out his property on the best security, and to the greatest advantage. Samuel is infinitely more his mother's at Shiloh than at Ramah; his worth is multiplied in proportion as it is communicated, and enriches the public fund without impoverishing the private stock. The eyes of a whole people are already to him, the expectation of man keeps pace with the destination of Providence; and the child, ministering in a linen ephod, becomes more gracious, from comparison with the polluted ministrations of ungracious and ungodly men.

Observe, thirdly, Youth's highest praise, the most glorious reward of goodness, the happiest effect of good education, Samuel was "in favour with God." To obtain this ⚫ most honourable distinction, much more was requisite than a regular and modest deportment, much more than promising talents and childish innocence, and the other qualities which attract and captivate the eyes of men. The love of God has been betimes shed abroad in that heart; Hannah has been mindful of her vow, and taught her son to remember his Creator in the days of his youth; and how grateful is early piety to Him who saith, "My son, give me thine heart!" Lo, God has impressed his own image on that tender mind, and sees, and loves, and approves his own work. The great Jehovah has designed this wonderful child for high things, from the very womb, has raised him up to be the "rising again of many in Israel," to purify a polluted church, to save a sinking state, and is fitting him, from the cradle, for his high destination.

The eye of the Lord observes with delight the progress of this plant of renown. He is hastening his own work in righteousness, is ready to perfect, by heavenly visions, the instructions of a pious mother, is preparing to crown the gracious with more grace. The

favour of man is frequently the child of ignorance or caprice. They love and hate they know not why. Sometimes they hate where they ought to love, and love where they ought to hate; but the favour of God is ever founded in knowledge, is undirected by partial affection or personal regards, is the result of reason, the applause which perfect wisdom bestows on distinguished excellence. Samuel must have merited praise, else this praise had not been conferred on him. And singular must that merit have been, which could unite judgments so different, interests which so frequently clash. He who makes it his study to please man, can hardly be the servant of God; and to aim at pleasing God is not always the road to the favour of men. Nothing but genuine, unaffected goodness could have procured this joint approbation of God and man; and there is a charm in true goodness, which is irresistible. It may be overlooked for a season, it may be borne down, it may be obscured, it may be misrepresented, it may be hated and opposed; but it will prevail at length, will force itself into notice, will arise and shine, will command respect, silence envy, triumph over opposition; rejoice the wise and good, and keep the wicked in awe.

What mode of address shall I employ, to engage, for a moment, the attention of young ones; and to impress upon their hearts the importance of my subject? Would to God I could again become a little child, that, with the lessons of experience, I might regulate my own future conduct, and be an useful monitor to the simple and inexperienced. I would in that case say, My little friend, God and nature have made you lovely. The candour, and frankness, and benevolence of your heart shine upon your countenance. Every day discloses some new grace. You are increasing in stature: you are growing in favour with all who behold you. Every one thinks well, speaks well, hopes well of you. Grow on. Preserve that amiable simplicity. Let it be the charm of advancing years, of expanding faculties. Let that blooming face be still raised to Heaven with modest confidence; and those gracious eyes still beam good-will to men. May I never see that open forehead clouded and contracted. shall the horrid traces of vice disfigure that form? Shall every one that passeth by be constrained to turn away with loathing and aversion? Shall the mother who bare thee, have her face covered with a blush when thou art named? Must she be made to mourn the day which was once her joy? Angels will behold your progress with delight; they will rejoice in ministering unto you: they are ready to receive you into their number, when your course is finished. God himself regards you with smiles of complacency; he is ever ready to assist, to counsel, to protect,

What,

to receive you. Let there be joy in heaven a sense of responsibility to God, to their concerning you. Now, now is the season for laying the foundation of useful life, respectable age, comfortable death.

pupils, to their country. The history under review presses one point upon you, as of singular moment, and closely connected with every article of education and consequent improvement; I mean the study of the happy, but difficult medium, between excessive indulgence, and oppressive severity. The steady firmness of Hannah, the mother of Samuel, furnishes an useful example. If ever there was a child in danger of being corrupted by indulgence, it was he. But no symptom of it appears. He is treated as a mere ordinary lad, and from his earliest years, to old age, evinces, by his conduct, the ex cellence of the precepts, and the steadiness of the discipline which formed his character, and laid the foundation of his eminence. He leaves home, and parts with his parents, while yet a child, with manly fortitude. Already under habits of submission to parental authority, he cheerfully transfers that submission to a stranger, to Eli. Untainted by imaginary terrors, the darkness of the night, the solemnity of the house of the Lord, silence and solitude, and sleep disturbed by extraordinary and unseasonable voices, excite in him no silly apprehension, draw from him no childish complaint, deter him from the per

But what do I see? That youthful face already degraded by vice! so young, and so horrid! Unhappy youth, the depravity of thy heart is painted on thy forehead. The sight of thy own countenance filleth thee with horror. Shame and remorse are preying on the marrow in thy bones. In the hours of solitude and retirement, stretched on thy bed to which sleep is a stranger, thou art constrained to reflect on the wretchedness of thy condition; thou feelest thyself unworthy of the praises bestowed upon thee, by the partiality of those who know thee not; thou blushest in secret, and art filled with indignation against thyself, on calling to remembrance the innocence and simplicity of happier days. Thou givest up thyself as lost. No, young man, do not abandon thyself to despair: add not this to thy offences; there is help for thee, let it reanimate thy courage. Though "cast down" thou art "not destroyed." However debased that face, it is in thy power to amend, to ennoble it. Thou wert not destined always to remain an innocent child, nor couldest thou: by stumbling and falling thou wert to be in-formance of no duty. In all this we cannot structed how to walk and run. Wert thou wounded and bruised; wert thou plunged into the abyss? There is an arm nigh thee, which is able to raise thee up, to strengthen and to heal thee. Multitudes like thyself have been recovered, restored, established. "As a father pitieth his children, so the Lord" will have mercy upon thee, and forgive and receive thee. The impure, the profane, the blasphemer, the chief of sinners, have repented, have returned, have found favour; there is hope also concerning thee. Only for the Lord's sake, and for thy soul's sake, proceed no farther, persevere no longer in an evil course. One step forward may be fatal; to-morrow may find thee in the place where there is no hope. "Behold now is the accepted time, behold now is the day of salvation." "Seek the Lord while he may be found, call upon him while he is near.' "The wind is boisterous," the sea rages, thou art "beginning to sink," thou art ready to perish; but shalt not, whilst thou art able to exclaim, "Lord save me:" for behold "a very present help in trouble;" that helping hand which snatched Peter from the roaring gulf. "And immediately Jesus stretched forth his hand and caught him, and said unto him, O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt ?"*

I conclude with calling upon parents, and guardians, and instructers of youth, seriously to consider the importance of the trust committed unto them; and to discharge it under

* Matt. xiv. 31.

but recognize the wisdom, the constancy, the fortitude of his excellent mother. Had she been foolishly fond, he had been peevish, and petulant, and timid, and discontented. Take a lesson from her, ye mothers of young chil dren. If you would have these children happy, they must betimes be inured to subjection, to privation, to restraint. To multiply their desires by unbounded gratification, is the sure way to multiply their future panS and mortifications. Reduce their wants and wishes to the standard of nature, and you proportionably enlarge their sphere of enxyment. Let them contract no fear but that of offending God, and of committing sin. Let them learn to consider all places, all seasons, all situations as equal, when duty calls. Inpress on their opening minds the two great precepts on which "hang all the law and the prophets," to love the Lord their God, and their fellow-creatures. Lead their infact steps to the Friend of little children, to the Saviour of mankind; to the knowledge, the belief, the love, the hope, the consolations of the gospel, and thereby preserve them “from paths wherein destroyers go."

The profligate character and untimely end of Eli's sons, on the other hand, afford a solemn admonition of the inevitably ruinous effects of unbounded indulgence to the pas sions and caprices of youth. Had they been early habituated to the wholesome restraints of piety, decency, and justice, they could not have become thus criminal, nor would have perished thus miserably. In the excesses

So long as God "waiteth to be gracious," surely it well becomes man to "put on bowels of mercies, kindness, meekness, longsuffering, forbearance, forgiveness, and charity, which is the bond of perfectness."

Thus have I finished what I proposed, in attempting to delineate the female character, by instances taken from the sacred record. In these, and in the case of every virtuous woman, we see the great Creator's design fully justified, in making for man "an help meet for him." That which is necessary cannot be despised; that which is useful ought to be valued; that which is excellent

which they committed, we clearly see the relaxed government, the careless inspection, the unbounded licentiousness of their father's house. Neglect, in this case, occasioned the mischief. And the neglected field will soon be overrun with noxious weeds, though you sow, designedly, no poison in it. Fathers, see to it that your instructions be sound, that your deportment be regular, that your discipline be exact. Account nothing unimportant that affects the moral and religious character of your son. Precept will go so far, example will go farther; but authority must support and enforce both the one and the other. You cannot, indeed, com-commands respect; that which is improvemunicate the spirit of grace, but you can certainly form youth to habits of decency and order: and habitual decency is nearly allied to virtue, and may imperceptibly improve into it. Do your part, and then you may with confidence" cast all your care" on God.

able calls for cultivation. Bad men only revile and undervalue the other sex: the weak and ignorant idolize and worship it. The man of sense and virtue considers woman as his equal, his companion, his friend, and treats her accordingly; for friendship excludes equally invective and flattery. In the education and treatment of females, too much attention has, perhaps, been paid to sex. Why should they be for ever reminded that they are females, while it is of so much more importance to impress upon their minds, that they are reasonable beings, endowed with

sion or of improvement, and that they are accountable to God for them? Wherefore obstruct to them one path to useful knowledge, one source of rational improvement, or of harmless enjoyment? If they are despised they will become despicable. Treated either as slaves or as angels, they cease to be companions. Prize them and they will become estimable; call forth their intellectual powers, and the empire of science will be extended and improved.

May it not be necessary to throw in a short word of caution against the opposite extreme, that of excessive severity to offending youth? This indeed is not so common as corruptive indulgence; but this too exists. How many promising young men have been forced into a continuance in an evil course, have been driven to desperation, have become "harden-human faculties, faculties capable of pervered through the deceitfulness of sin," because the first deviation could find no mercy, because a father armed himself with inflexible, unrelenting sternness, for a slighter offence? Alas, how many amiable, excellent, promising young women have been lost to God, to their families, to society; have been dragged into the jaws of prostitution, and infamy, and disease, and premature death, because a father's door was shut, and a mother's heart | hardened against the penitent: because her native refuge was no refuge to the miserable? She returned to her own, but her own received her not. Instances, however, might be produced of wiser conduct, and happier consequences; of mercy extended, and the wanderer reclaimed; of human parents working together with "the Father of mercies," and succeeding in rekindling the sacred flame of virtue, in restoring peace to the troubled breast, in recovering the fallen, to reputation, to piety, to comfort, to usefulness.

And let them learn wherein their real value, importance, and respectability consist. Not in receiving homage, but in meriting approbation; not in shining, but in useful employment; not in public eminence, but in domestic dignity; in acquiring and maintaining influence, not by pretension, vehemence, or trick, which are easily seen through, and always fail, but by good temper, perseverance in well-doing, and the practice of unfeigned piety.

HISTORY OF JESUS CHRIST.

LECTURE CVIII.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life; and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness: and the darkness comprehended it not. There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. The same came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all men through him might believe. He was not that Light, but was sent to bear witness of that Light. That was the true Light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not. He came unto his own, and his own received him not. But as many as received him. to them gave he power to become the sons of God; even to them that believe on his name: which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.-JoHN i. 1–14.

"This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye Him."

THE idea of a beginning involves that of antecedent existence, from which that beginning originated. The beginning of a We are now therefore to comtemplate man's life implies parentage; the being of a "him, to whom all the prophets gave wittower of a city, necessarily supposes a pre-ness, ," in his own person, doctrine, and existent head to plan, and a hand to execute. mighty works; and, as the order of things The vast frame of Nature must have had its prescribes, our contemplation must comcommencement from a preceding skill to con-mence in what he was in the beginning, trive, and a power to perform. The Mosaic account of the Creation is the only one that sound reason can admit. If God created the heavens and the earth, GoD was before the heavens and the earth. Moses the historian, and John the evangelist carry us back to one and the same era, carry us up to one and the same all-wise, all-powerful Being. Nature and Grace issue from the same source, and tend toward the same grand consummation. The prophet and the apostle employ the selfsame terms to describe the same objects. "He that built all things is God."

prior to the lapse of time, for "he is before all things, and by him all things consist." John, "the disciple whom Jesus loved," long survived the rest of his fellow-disciples. He knew what some of them had written. He lived to see the progress of the truth as it is in Christ. He saw the divine origin of Christianity demonstrated by its success, and he became a joyful martyr to the truth which he published to the world. A "brother and companion in tribulation, and in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ," in common with other saints, he retired into exile in

It has been remarked that the four Evan-"the isle that is called Patmos," a cheerful gelists introduce their great subject in a victim to "the word of God, and the testimony retrogade series of representation. Mat- of Jesus Christ." In that sacred retirement, thew's gospel opens with a display of the more to be prized than all the blessings of Saviour's humanity, and presents us with society, he is visited with the visions of the his descent as a man. Mark conveys us back Almighty, and becomes the highly honoured to the age of prophecy, and "the beginning minister of unfolding the character, offices, of the gospel of Jesus Christ the Son of God" and work of his divine and beloved Master, is traced up to the predictions of Malachi and from the days of eternity to the final conIsaiah. Luke the beloved physician refers summation, when He who sitteth upon the us to the Levitical priesthood, to the altar of throne shall say, "Behold I make all things incense, and the services of an earthly sanc- new." The Gospel, according to St. John, tuary, "a shadow of good things to come." ." and the Revelation of St. John, may therefore But John soars above all height; he recurs be considered as together forming an abstract to the birth of nature, and ascribes that birth of the plan of Providence from the first dawnto a pre-existent, omnífick WORD, which in ing of light upon the world of nature to the "the fulness of time was made flesh, and perfect day of "the restitution of all things." dwelt among us." We have beheld his glory And one and the same Agent is represented displayed in the ages before the flood, in the as the animating principle which is before all, persons and predictions of patriarchs and pro- and through all, and in all. phets, by whom "God at sundry times and in divers manners spake unto the fathers." But Moses and Elias have disappeared; the "voice crying in the wilderness" is heard no more; it is lost in a "voice from heaven," saying,

In the beginning. The mind, with all its powers, loses itself in surveying the works and the ways of God. I have a dark, indistinct recollection of my first emersion into thought. I can remember some of the im

pressions made, of the sorrows and joys felt, when I was a little child. Soon after I began to exist, I began to perceive that I did exist, but for the knowledge of all that preceded I stand indebted to a father's intelligence, to a mother's tenderness. They were to me the beginning of days and the oracles of truth. Their own pittance of illumination flowed in the same channel. But there must have been a point when thought began. There must have been an intelligence which could communicate the power of comprehension; there must have been a spirit which could breathe into man's nostrils the breath of life; there must have been one without a beginning to make a beginning. And who He was the evangelist unfolds.

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In the beginning was the WORD. Let us not contend about the import of a Greek term. If cur evangelist has not an intention to mislead, but one idea can be affixed to that term. He is evidently describing God the creator, in the view of leading us to know and to acknowledge the Redeemer of mankind as one and the same with him. Who "was made flesh and dwelt among us?" Who" came to his own and his own received him not?" Who was despised and rejected of men?" The WORD that was in the beginning, and who has revealed himself by a display of so many glorious attributes. "Without controversy, great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh." Is this proposition to be rejected because it is mysterious! For the same reason the system of nature, in whole, and in all its parts, is to be rejected. All is mystery; and all is revelation and discovery, from the insect too small for sight swimming in a drop of water, up to yonder flaming orb which revolves at an immeasurable distance over our heads. Is not man a great mystery to himself? But is he to renounce his being because he is unable to explain it? Is he to call the union of matter with mind an absurdity, because their mutual influence escapes his penetration? How many combinations actually exist of which we have no perception, and which we would pronounce to be impossible! In all the ways and works of the Most High there is a wonderful mixture of luminousness and obscurity, of minuteness and magnitude, of complexness snd simplicity. And Scripture exhibits the connexion of extremes similar to that which is apparent in the world of nature and in the ways of Providence. This is a presumption at least, if not a proof that they have all one original; and who can that original be but the divine person emphatieally, called THE WORD, which existed in the plenitude of power, wisdom, and goodness "before the world was," but of whose pre-existent state very general ideas only are communicated. Indeed none other can be communicated, for when the mind launches

into infinity it is overwhelmed and lost. If the wisdom which cries, and the understanding which puts forth her voice in the writings of Solomon, be the same with the WORD which was in the beginning, as a comparison. of the two passages will render highly probable, we shall have a sublime and interesting idea of this pre-existent state. The evangelist says,

The word was with GOD, as the deliberative, active, determining principle of the Eternal mind. The wise man expands the thought, and represents the plans of eternal Wisdom as digesting; the framing, arranging, supporting, governing, redeeming of a world, as in contemplation. As if admitted into the counsels of peace, he thus unfolds the purpose of Him who worketh all things after his own will, that all should be to the praise of his glory: "The Lord possessed me in the beginning of his way, before his works of old. I was set up from everlasting, from the beginning, or ever the earth was. When there were no depths I was brought forth; when there were no fountains abounding with water. Before the mountains were settled; before the hills was I brought forth; while as yet he had not made the earth, nor the fields, nor the highest part of the dust of the world. When he prepared the heavens I was there; when he set a compass upon the face of the depth; when he established the clouds above; when he strengthened the fountains of the deep; when he gave to the sea his decree, that the waters should not pass his commandment; when he appointed the foundations of the earth; then I was by him, as one brought up with him; and I was daily his delight, rejoicing always before him: rejoicing in the habitable part of his earth; and my delights were with the sons of men." Thus was the Word with God from eternity taking pleasure in the prospect of the fabric which he was about to rear; of the creature whom he was going to frame, and whose nature he was in due time to assume; that he might make the children of men "partakers of the divine nature," an union as mysterious and incomprehensible as that of soul and body, as that of the persons in the Deity, and as evidently matter of truth and revelation as these are.

And the Word was GOD. Here "the disciple whom Jesus loved" recognizes in his Master, on whose bosom he leaned at supper, "all the fulness of the godhead dwelling bodily." Lest the expression, the Word was WITH God might be supposed to imply separation, difference, as a man who sojourns with his friend is nevertheless a different being from that friend, the evangelist speaks out fairly, fully, unequivocally, the truth which he himself believed, and which he was divinely inspired to deliver to mankind, that they also might believe. If St. John be not

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