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stances, live in concubinage, form irregular marriages, or otherwise come together in a wicked, hasty, and inconsiderate manner, cast off their parents, and leave them to be supported by public charity. Oh! if there were living amongst our people the ancient sense and feeling of filial obligation, would there, think you, be so many aged parents in the workhouse, or living on the parish?-And this is the second great and striking evidence which I give, that disobedience to parents is the characteristic of the times for, can that be an obedient son? can he be a son at all? is he not a son that hath made a bastard of himself, who, having wherewithal to support them, shall suffer his parents to be supported by public charity? It is not that I grudge the charity; for how can money be so well employed, as in supporting the aged and the indigent? but that I lament over, and for your warning do point out to you, the weakening and disruption of the ancient strong bond which bound parents to children, and children to parents. The selfishness of the times, which ministers to enjoyment, hath come in to postpone the affection of the parent to the love of gain, and in process of time it cometh in to work the same evil effect upon the love of children in return. So that the question is, how shall we be at the least trouble, and make the most profit of one another?

The third great fact which I have to present in proof of the position, that disobedience to

parents is a strong and striking characteristic of the present times, is the amazing increase of juvenile depredations and felonies, not only in this city, but over the whole country. Surely no parent would wish his child to be disgraced, tried, imprisoned, banished, or hanged; and yet I am told that parents in this city are found degraded enough to send their children to schools where they may be taught the art and mystery of thieving. But, for the honour of human nature, I believe this is rarely to be found; and that the greater part of parents would rather die for their children than see them brought to such ignominy. Of what then is this present great and growing evil of our land a proof? (to such an extent increased, as to be the subject of grave charges by the Judges of the land, who feel called upon, as it were, to take up 'our office, and point out the failing pillars of society, and the relaxing bonds of moral and religious obligation ;)-of what is it, I say, a proof, but that children have no longer that reverence of their parent's commands, nor parents that command over their children, which in times past was sufficient to keep them from the open ways of iniquity? Is not every juvenile delinquent the evidence of a family in which the family bond is weakened and loosened? Is not every dishonest apprentice an evidence of the same? Is not every trustless servant an evidence of the same; every ruined female, every ruined youth, the infinite numbers of un

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ruly and criminal people who now swarm on the surface of this great kingdom, and inundate the streets of this great city, and fill these huge calendars of crime which our Judges and our Juries can hardly find time to dispose of?

The fourth proof which I have to offer of the disobedience of children, or rather of the breaking up of the family obligations, is the frequency of infant schools and Sunday schools, which are necessary interferences of pious men, in order to do what they can to remedy the evil. As the presence of a physician in a house shews me that there is disease; and the number of the physicians in a place, is the evidence of much disease; so the multitude of infant schools and Sunday schools, with other the like inventions of charity, are proofs to me of a diseased and disorganised state of the family bonds. For why should a third party step in to do that which would be as well done without them? And it certainly is the first and great duty of a parent to give religious instruction to his child, as it is the first duty of a child to receive it at his hands. And when another hath to interfere, it proveth, either that the one is incompetent or indifferent, or that the other is unruly and turbulent. And, whichever way it is, it proves the point which we are now examining. Of Sunday schools, the origin is within these forty or fifty years; of infant schools, the origin is within these ten years. They are both considered as great proofs of the improvement of the age: to me they are the

greatest proofs of its decline, and the perfection of such a system would be to destroy itself; that is, to bring about a state of society wherein they should no longer be needed. I do greatly delight that there should be such remedies existing in the church; but I would delight much more that there were no diseases calling for the remedies. For well am I convinced, that in giving into the hands of a third person those pious offices which belong to the parents in virtue of their baptismal engagements, as well as in virtue of natural affection, you do take away the very seed-bed and nursery of reverence and of obedience. The time was, and that not very long gone bye, that a Sabbath school of any sort was not known in any parish of our Church. And I hope the time is long distant, that the covetousness of parents or the hardness of times shall force mothers so to labour at a distance from their infants, as to make an infant school necessary. Where they are established, and where they are called for, they do shew me a very great remissness on the part of parents, and a very lamentable ignorance, and most neglected state of the children. But I do not discourage or discountenance such undertakings, while I will not allow them to be quoted as signs of the improvement of the times, but do insist that they are the most striking proofs of the deterioration of the times. For remember, by the Church, I do not mean the religious world, but all the baptized; and it is

the condition of the baptized now, as compared with former times, that I am inquiring into.

Such are four great signs of the increasing disobedience of children, and disorganization of families, which I present to you; the interference of the legislature to protect children. from the covetousness of their parents and masters; the increase of aged persons cast upon the parish; the increase of infant depredations; and the increase of the remedies of infant and Sunday schools; but concerning this feature of the times, I have so often felt constrained to discourse, for the sake of the families committed to my charge, that I would not now treat of it at all, were it not the solemn obligation which I feel to go the whole round of my text. From that spirit of liberality-as selfishness, changing names, is now designated; for liberality, in the modern acceptation of the word, is the relaxation of every bond and obligation, that we may follow our own mind, and do our own pleasure; whereas religion, which is the opposite of liberality, is, as its name importeth, the binding of men over to the faithful performance of common duties, according to the will of God, and the authority with which he hath invested the office-bearers of the church and of the state, who are but Christ's functionaries for the fulfilment of certain portions of his kingly and priestly dignity;-I say, this spirit of liberality hath invaded the most sacred and inviolate rela

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