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and consequently each will require a different treatment. The same correction that will answer the desired end in the meek and gentle, will have no effect upon the stubborn and perverse mind. The mode of correction should, therefore, be suited to the disposition of the subject of it. This cannot be known till the disposition of the child is understood; and hence it becomes parents to study the tempers of their children with great attention.

Coercive measures are frequently employed by parents, but rarely with success. Measures of severity are most generally resorted to by the tyrannical, and those who are strangers to human nature. An eminent author observes that "Oppression and terror necessarily produce meanness and deceit, in all climates and in all ages; and wherever fear is the governing motive in education, we must expect to find in children a propensity to dissimulation, if not confirmed habits of falsehood. When individuals are oppressed, or when they believe they are oppressed, they combine against their oppressors, and oppose cunning falsehood to power and force; they think themselves released from the compact of truth with their masters, and bind themselves in a strict league with each other; thus schoolboys hold no faith with their school-masters, though they would think it to be dishonourable amongst one another. We do not think that these maxims are the

peculiar growth of schools; in private families the same feelings are to be found under the same species of culture; if preceptors or parents are unjust or tyrannical, their pupils will contrive to conceal from them their actions and their thoughts."

Parents should indeed first rule by authority, and convince their children that they will be obeyed. But children may be reasoned with much sooner than most parents suppose; and therefore this mean ought to be

next used. Even a child of four years of age, feels its native prerogative, and resists the hand that would force it into motion, like an insensible machine. We naturally revolt from oppression, and as naturally wish to know why we are to do this, and not to do that. Reason with your young charge as soon as it can understand your language, and you will most generally succeed. Point out the evil of the action you are condemning; place it in various lights till you see that it is felt; then a remorse will follow which the keenest pains occasioned by the rod would never produce.-A pious friend of mine has four sons. Like other children, they often do wrong. The father used to employ the rod; but a better acquaintance with human nature taught him to lay it aside, and to adopt other measures infinitely more effectual. The little offender is called into his father's closet, and the door is shut, that no one may over-hear what is said; for we naturally resist the reproof that is given before others, and feel a propensity to justify ourselves. The pious father begins to inquire the reason of his conduct, in order that he may show that circumstances were not sufficient to justify the crime. He then informs him how sinful the action is in the sight of God; when he has silenced the young offender, he falls down upon his knees, and makes his son to do the same; and there he confesses the sin before the all-seeing God, and implores mercy for his son, and weeps over him, till his heart begins to relent, and he bursts into tears also, and feels his crime most acutely. This method is most effectual. It secures the two grand ends at which parents ought always to aim,-I mean, filial fear, and filial love. Many parents are dreaded, but not loved. But it is difficult to say whether my friend is more feared or

venerated--for their love rises to a sort of veneration. Such a mode of treatment suits all dispositions. This

will awe the most inflexible mind, and affect the ten61 Go ye and do likewise."

derest.

D. Tyerman.

OLD AGE.

THE religion of Christ affords the noblest employments for all your remaining talents and your attainments. In a vineyard, persons of every description may find employment: from the earliest periods of childhood, to the latest stages of old age; from the ignorant rustic, to the intelligent philosopher; from the man who possesses but one talent, to him who has ten. The weak may weed, the strong may dig; the vulgar, and the man of the most refined taste, may here find scope for their different powers;-and so that they are employed, who conceives that they are irrationally employed? Let us apply these remarks. By this vineyard, is intended the religion of Christ, which proposes to you-First,-Investigations the most interesting;-here is exercise for all your mental powers. Such is the structure of the human soul that it must be active; to render it otherwise, some great change must be effected upon its essential properties. Every object in nature, every department of science, and every occurrence in life, offers it matter for remark and examination. But where shall we find subjects which combine importance and amusement, equal to those which are exhibited by the religion of Jesus? If what relates to the character of God, possesses any attractives, where will you find such a discovery of his perfections as this religion affords? The works of nature, indeed, proclaim something of his "eternal power and godhead;" but say nothing of his mercy, or his jus

tice, or his love to sinners,-attributes, which it is essential to their happiness they should know belong to him to whom they are responsible. Revelation, therefore, takes up the cheering theme where nature becomes

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silent, and so describes "the blessed God," as to charm the soul of youth, and to enkindle the sacred glow in the bosom of old age. Hear him proclaim his own perfections: The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity, and transgression, and sin."-If the most singular facts can delight you, the sure records of this religion present to you a singular diversity. The creation, the deluge, the events of the Jewish history, the incarnation, the miracles, the labours, the sufferings, the death, the resurrection and ascension of the Son of God; the occurrences which took place in the world, in the politics of nations, and in the lives of the best and the worst of men when the Christian church was first planted,-comprise an assemblage of facts, at once vast and instructive. If doctrines of heavenly origin, and which embrace the deepest mysteries, while they lay a solid basis for human hope, can charm you, you cannot fail to be charmed by those which are comprehended in the pages of the oracles of God. A Trinity of co-equal persons in the one undivided essence of the Deity;-the atonement which was offered to divine justice by the Redeemer, and by virtue of which sin is pardoned, God reconciled, and the enslaved sinner restored to a state of spiritual liberty;-the renovating, enlightening, and purifying operations of the Holy Spirit, these are some of those doctrines which "bring life and immortality to light," while they constitute some of the remarkable peculiarities of this divine religion. If" angels desire," with the greatest solicitude, "to look into these things," and employ their vast powers

to obtain a knowledge of them, will you think it beneath your dignity to investigate their meaning, seeing that your eternal happiness depends on an experimental acquaintance with them? Allowing that your understandings and judgments have now reached their full maturity, and retain their highest vigour, they cannot be more consistently, and rationally employed, than in an implicit regard to the command of him who said, "Search the Scriptures, for in them ye think ye have eternal life, and they are they which testify of me.”

Were

Secondly-Duties the most imperious;-here is employment for all your energies. I shall now confine my remarks principally to those duties which relate to personal religion. Real religion does not consist only in a belief of the doctrines of revealed truth. this all that is requisite to form the Christian character, the infernal spirits might make high pretensions to this dignity; for "devils believe and tremble," but remain devils still. The faith of a true Christian "purifies the heart, and works by love." It "teaches him to shun all ungodliness and worldly lusts, and to live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present evil world." In mentioning the duties of personal piety, allow me to enforce an impartial and serious enquiry into the state of your hearts before God. O my aged friends, you have lived long enough to obtain a deep conviction of the truth of the prophet's declaration, that "the heart of man is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked." Your hearts have often betrayed the confidence which you have reposed in them; and they are capable of crimes which render inevitable your eternal misery. You may flatter yourselves till your iniquity prove your ruin; and vainly say, Peace, peace, when there is no peace. A fallacious hope may be indulged, till the soul drop into endless flames. To discover your real state, exercise a holy

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