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But when we look abroad, and see the present mode of bringing up children, can we be surprised at the increasing profligacy and dissipation among our youth, that threaten, as a mighty torrent, to overflow the land?

Instead of that wholesome discipline, and salutary restraint, which our fathers have often told us, they, in their younger years, were forced to undergo, we see the children and young people nowadays indulged in every thing their hearts can desire. Would the too fond parent reflect for a moment, he might see that none of all the sons of Adam, can pass through life without meeting with troubles and disappointments: -and how unfit does he render his offspring for calmly meeting these, when he accustoms them from childhood to such unlimited indulgences.-What gives the veteran soldier the superiority over the raw and undisciplined recruit, but his familiarity with hardships, dangers, and death, in all their varied forms? and what would more enable a man to bear up under the "whips and scorns of time," than to have entered the lists at an carly period of life, and to have been taught in youth, that sorrows and troubles are the lot of mortal man upon earththat even the most prosperous have their trials. I mean not from hence to infer that it is right to subject children to unnecessary disappointments, merely to fit them for encountering those they may meet with in their journey through life; far from that, I would wish them to have every possible indulgence, consistent with their duty as children, and their dignity as immortal creatures. It is only that blinded affection in parents, which tends to cherish the young passions, and foster the pride of their children, that I condemn; that mistaken fondness, which is always the source of more real vexation to its objects even in childhood, setting aside its baleful consequences, than

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those children are acquainted with, who are under the control of more rational parents.

What pleasure do we feel in visiting a family where the younger branches of it are in due subordination; every thing in such a family moves on smoothly, like a well regulated machine, of which the parents are the mainspring : they say, like the centurion of old, to one child, "Go, and he goeth ;" and to another, "Come, and he cometh." Joy sits smiling on every countenance; and the whole is a scene of sweet domestic happiness. But let us enter the dwelling of one of the opposite cast, even suppose the father be esteemed sober, intelligent, and religious, (and amongst such I am afraid there are too many mistaken parents,) and see the order of his family. From an overweening fondness, the dear creatures, his children, must have what they ask for. They must not be allowed to cry, for crying would spoil their tempers: and thus they are generally suffered to go on, till, from being so much indulged, they have acquired such a degree of pertness, as, to people unconnected, is truly disgusting. If, however, in a fit of passion, (and the children of such parents are never corrected but in a passion, which always does more ill than good,) at any time the dreadful resolution should be taken of subjecting the favourite child to the well-merited correction, his cries soon melt the fond relenting heart, and intreaties and bribes are the purchase of a speedy reconciliation. The pernicious tendency of such conduct to the temper, minds, and morals of youth, we have every day too many opportunities of witnessing. Nor do the parents altogether escape the punishment of their mistaken fondness: how often have we seen such parents put to the blush before strangers, and obliged to have recourse to the most despicable shifts, in forming excuses for the petulance of their children, when

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the circumstances of the moment precluded their being indulged, and the high spirits, as it is generally called, of the children could not bear up under the disappointment: Nor does the evil end here; for it is very evident, even to a superficial observer, that children who have been too much indulged in their youth, have almost uniformly been the most ungrateful to their parents, when their grey hairs required comfort and support; and, on the contrary, those children who have early been taught their duty, have rarely failed to be blessings to their parents, and useful members of society. What a stimulus then ought this consideration be to parents in general, to bestow a greater degree of attention on the training up of their children in the paths of duty. Good impressions cannot be too early made on the mind, and the sooner habits of virtue are formed there is the less risk, under the blessing of God, of their afterwards wandering into the mazes of iniquity. But even admitting it sometimes to happen, that, after the strictest discharge of parental duty, some children should turn out a reproach to their parents, there is still one comfort left, and that not a small one, viz. the happiness arising to a virtuous mind from a consciousness of having performed its duty.

One great point to which I would desire, particularly, to call the attention of parents, is, to instil into the minds of their children a greater veneration for the Sabbath-day. If we really believe that the Bible is the word of God, which I fondly hope none of my readers will deny, we must also believe that the fourth commandment is an express declaration of the Lord God Almighty. And how vain is it for mortals to strive against their Maker! How can we expect to escape the dreadful vengeance denounced by Jehovah against those who trample upon his laws, if we continue to profane that blessed day which he has wisely

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and kindly set apart, not only for a day of rest, but also as a day whereon we may prepare ourselves for a happy immortality, when this world and all its vanities shall disappear from our eyes.

The profanation of the Sabbath has justly become a reproach to our country; and were I disposed to presage calamitous events to her, that would be the principal data on which I would form my account.

Instead of children being kept in the house on that day, and taught to read their bibles and learn their questions, which formed part of the discipline of our fathers, alluded to above, they are now suffered to stroll about the fields, and like the Israelites of old, when they wanted a king, to do every one that which is right in his own eyes-which is generally mischief; for there is not a farmer in the country, but will declare, that he loses more of his pease, turnips, &c. on the Sabbath-day, than all the rest of the week.— What good can be expected to result from such beginnings as these? Nay, are not the consequences already too conspicuous; for to what cause can those numerous crimes be attributed, which Scotland, in her better days, was unacquainted with, but to the fashionable disregard among all. ranks for the Sabbath and every thing sacred? -Hath not almost every unhappy criminal who hath forfeited his life to the laws of his country, almost uniformly declared, that the profanation of the Sabbath was the beginning of his misfortunes?and shall parents give no heed to these things? Surely if the beginning of strife be like the letting out of water, so is the beginning of crimes :-once overstep the slender barrier between right and wrong, and it is difficult to say how far you may wander from the right path.

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How imperious the call upon parents to ponder these things, and early to teach their children the commandments of the Lord; and by the bright light of their own good example conduct them in safety through the thorny paths of life, that they may be enabled to say with joy, through the merits of the blessed Jesus, at the final day of retribution, "Lo, here are WE, O Lord, and the children whom thou hast given us."

North banks of the Tyne, 20th April, 1813.

On the Duties of Schoolboys. QUINTILIAN includes almost all the duty of scholars in this one piece of advice, which he gives them: To love those who teach them, as they love the sciences which they learn of their instructors; and to look upon their teachers as fathers, from whom they derive not the life of the body, but that instruction which is in a manner the life of the soul. If they possess this sentinrent of affection and respect, it suffices to make them apt to learn during the time of their studies, and full of gratitude all the rest of their lives.

Docility, which consists in submitting to the directions given them, in readily receiving the instructions of their masters, and in reducing these to practice, is properly the virtue of scholars, as that of masters is to teach well. The one can do nothing without the other: and as it is not sufficient for a labourer to sow the seed, unless the earth, after having opened her bosom to receive it, encourages its growth by warmth and moisture; so the whole fruit of instruction

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