training, it may be proper to notice a fact which is full of encouragement to a performance of the duty. The fact is this, that children may grow up in piety. This is implied. in the numerous injunctions which pervade Scripture respecting the religious education of the young, and is confirmed by numerous instances of early conversion.

Ist, The mind in childhood is peculiarly favourable to religious impressions.

The general opinion seems to be, that the mind must be somewhat matured before it can effectively deal with religious subjects. Now what is this but to say, that a child can grow in depravity when it cannot grow in holiness, and that the faculties of the mind are qualified for vice long before they are qualified for virtue. But is it not the fact that they are capable of the one, just as soon as they are capable of the other? Both Scripture and experience teach that the propensity to sin, if unchecked, grows with our growth. Why, then, not meet the first dawn of intelligence with the corrective and purifying influences of the gospel? Intelligence even precedes language. The first smile of the infant in its mother's face is an intimation that intellect has begun its work. Ere his little feet have touched the ground, he has trod the path of sin or the path of holiness. A child old enough to understand that he ought to obey his parents, is old enough to understand that he ought to obey God. If he can grieve at a father's displeasure, and repose in a mother's love, he is equally capable of faith and repentance. How much does even a child of three years know! We think little of his attainments; how many facts he has mastered; how much he has learned to love and hate, to long for and fear; and is it of no consequence that all this pro

ceed uncontrolled? Why regard the period intervening between the cradle and the school as unsuitable to moral and religious discipline? Why yield up a period so important to the unrestrained influence of depravity? Or if the propensity to sin be stronger at ten years of age than at five, why lose the advantage which early training affords? We admit that fully to grasp doctrines and creeds, mature faculties are requisite, but truth is not always received by the intellect. Truths may impress, even when they are not fully comprehended. Conversion is accomplished, not by solving some problem, to the solution of which power of intellect is required, but by yielding the heart to God and His law; and what child is not adequate to that? A great practical error has originated in misunderstanding the nature of faith. Because some knowledge is essential to its exercise, and because it may comprehend all knowledge, a knowledge of Bible doctrine, facts and precepts, church creeds and systems of theology; and as all this is beyond the grasp of a child, it is concluded that of necessity conversion must be deferred to years of maturity. But is not faith a thing fully as much of the heart as of the head? Converts in heathen lands, often know less of the Bible than do many of our Sabbath-school scholars. The apostles before our Lord's resurrection knew little of His death and atonement, and yet they trusted Christ. Faith in Christ is more a trusting in Christ as a personal Saviour than any belief of abstract doctrine, and a child is as capable of this as is a full-grown man. Let parents remember, that there are committed to their care, not only those who are capable of profiting by religious instruction, but those whose minds are in some respects peculiarly adapted to the reception of the truth. The imagination in childhood is lively; then the heart is susceptible

the judgment alert, the memory retentive, the conscience tender and readily alarmed by the apprehension of guilt. What is the grand obstacle in those of mature life to the acceptance of the Gospel? The pride of intellect, the love of the world, the power of unbelief; but in the child these have no place. The god of the world has not yet blinded the mind; the deceitfulness of sin has not yet beguiled the affections. Such is the depth of religious sensibility in childhood that even a false system of faith, if early inculcated, will retain its hold and wield a mighty influence to the close of life; hence the gospel missionary finds that he can only successfully cope with heathenism, by the establishment of schools, and the religious education of the young. Preach to a child of the guilt and depravity of the soul and he will believe you. Teach him the divinity of Christ, or the inspiration of Scripture, and neither Socinian nor infidel objections will be urged in reply. Exhibit the doctrines of the cross, and to the mind as yet unvitiated by the sophistries of the world they will be regarded neither as a stumbling-block nor foolishness. I do not assert that the truths of the Gospel, when presented to the minds of children, will invariably receive a cordial reception; but this I will assert, that they will not be met by those speculative objections which are the barriers to the truth in minds of older growth. And even when the presentation of the truth is not effectual to salvation, it may take such possession of the faculties that, in after years, the man will be unable to reject the Gospel to which he assented in his childhood. Why then not sow the good seed ere the enemy sows tares?

Were we able to trace back our moral history, we would, in the great majority of instances, discover that our character for life had been formed before our sixth year. Even

when evangelical influences at a subsequent period succeed in forming the character anew, it may be found, that their work has been chiefly in the way of counteracting habits and principles acquired in early life. Suppose that all the Church's efforts for the conversion of the young should be arrested for the next ten or fifteen years, what an advantage would be thereby given to the cause of evil. Those now in the simplicity and susceptibility of childhood would be found in the vigour of matured depravity. If, then, this would be wrong, culpable, sinful, upon the part of the Church, is it less so upon the part of a parent?

But my child is a sinner, you say, and how can I expect him to begin a right life, till God gives him a new heart? Very true; but the way to get for him a new heart is, to fall in with the divinely-appointed method of procedure. The performance of our part, is ever the way to secure the performance of God's. This leads me to remark

2d, That God specially desires the conversion of children.

This is evident from His entire procedure respecting them. Does the covenant not include " you and your children?” and is not that the pledge that nothing shall be awanting on His part to make them partakers of its blessings? The injunctions addressed to parents are to the same effect: "Train up a child." How? For future conversion? No; but, "in the way he should go, that when he is old, he may not depart from it." Again: "Bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord." That is, subject them to such training as the Lord appoints and approves such training as is fitted to beget in them reverence for God, and obedience to His will. Again: "Suffer little children, and forbid them not to come unto Me; for of such is the

kingdom of heaven." Such are the words of Christ, and like Himself, they are full of Divine tenderness. The Christian scheme comprehends children in its gracious scope and design. It claims all souls for its dominion—all ages from the cradle to the grave. It not only claims the children, it expresses its most emphatic condemnation of those who do not aid in bringing the lambs of the flock within its ample fold. Again: "This is the will of God, even your sanctification," and are children excluded from the Divine purpose? (Acts ii. 39; Prov. xxii. 6; Eph. vi. 4; Matt. xix. 14; 1 Thess. iv. 3.)

The Bible is full of such indications of interest on the part of God, in the children of His people. It would certainly be singular, if He had in the scheme of mercy no regard to their salvation, or that His design is to give to Satan, the dew, the dawn, the flower of existence, and only claim the maturity of life for Himself. Why, then, should parents not fall in with the Divine intention? Parents it is admitted, are not in general without solicitude as to the religious character of their children; but it has almost solely respect to the future, whereas the best way to secure the future religious character of a child, is to secure it now.

3d, Children have actually grown up in piety.

Samuel grew up piously, and that in an age of prevailing ungodliness. John the Baptist was "filled with the Holy Ghost, even from his mother's womb," and Timothy from childhood "knew the holy Scriptures, which are able to make wise unto salvation;" but they had all been favoured with a pious ancestry. (Matt. xxi. 16; 1 Sam. i. 27, 28; Luke i. 15; 2 Tim. iii. 15.) These are but representative instances. Any one acquainted with evangelical efforts on