the earth, can convey the sound to them all. Only breathe the primitive spirit of the apostles, and you may "speak with tongues" to a large portion of the heathen nations, and they will hear, and come to Christ and live.

LETTER TO THE EDITOR.

THE following communication, though elicited, was not designed for the public eye, yet we trust, by giving it a place upon our pages, we shall receive the sanction of the writer, especially if this example of maternal faithfulness should excite other mothers to become more importunate for the salvation of their children, and awaken in parents a deeper solicitude to secure to their young families, a "children's minister."

My dear Madam,—Who that contrasts the means of moral instruction now employed in the education of children, with those possessed forty years ago, can forbear to exclaim with grateful emotions-" blessed are our eyes for" what "they see, and our ears for" what "they hear."

At this happy period of the world, surely God is emphatically gracious. I feel constrained to add my testimony to that of multitudes, that he is the hearer of prayer; and I trust you will excuse my trespassing upon your time, by the recital of a few circumstances in confirmation of this blessed truth.

A year ago last fall, the condition of my children, as exposed to be taken out of the world without a change of heart, pressed with painful weight upon my feelings.

With an aching heart I went to the throne of grace, and also besought my Christian friends, especially my dear Mrs. S., whom you mention in your letter, to aid me by their prayers.

I have since been led to apply this passage of the holy scriptures, "While they are yet speaking, I will hear."

A most remarkable spirit of prayer soon pervaded (I believe simultaneously) almost every young member of my family, consisting of nine or ten of sixteen and seven. persons, between the ages

We were, at this time, at our summer residence in the country, three miles from the city.

A haystack was the temple whither the boys resorted-and by their earnest importunity I was often present, and a witness to their fervent, solemn supplications.

My daughter of sixteen, and her cousin of the same age, were, in the course of a few weeks after our return to town, added to the Presbyterian church; and they still feel that Christ's " yoke is easy, and his burden light."

My eldest son, then ten years old, established a little boys' prayer meeting, which he continued without intermission for more than six months. One Saturday afternoon, the boys were later than usual in collecting. I said to him, suppose they do not come? "We will have a little meeting then, by ourselves," he replied, meaning himself and three younger brothers." Christ hath said, 'where two or three are gathered together in my name there am I

1

in the miast of them.' I think if they do come, I will say something to them against getting discouraged, I am afraid they will get discouraged." Soon after this conversation, however, the expected boys came.

I have been led, my dear Mrs. Whittelsey, to reflect how desirable it is that such impressions should be nurtured, and matured, not only in the family, and in the school, but in the house of God. These young hearts, I doubt not, have been touched by the Holy Spirit. They go to church,-sit under the preaching of the profound and eloquent Dr., but (excepting the eldest boy, now twelve, and who has recently attempted to take notes from the sermons,) the discourses are unintelligible, and the necessity of sitting still, and at the same time of keeping awake, makes the worship of God not • a "delight," as it should be, but a weariness.

My little boy of eight years said to me this winter, " Ma, Mr. K. talked to us so good at the Sunday School, he made us cry. I wish we had a minister who would talk to us so that we could understand." I replied-in some cities they have ministers for the purpose of preaching to children by themselves, and they speak so that they can understand all they say. "OI wish, we had such a minister here," said he. I told him he must pray God to send such a one.

He frequently tells me, "Ma, I pray God to send a children's minister, and for the millenium to come, as regularly as I pray.”

For the Mother's Magazine.

A HYMN:

Composed for Maternal Associations, whose meetings will be held on the last Thursday of February, the day set apart for special prayer in behalf of Schools, Colleges, and Seminaries of learning.*

Wake Mothers in Israel! O hasten to plead

For the spirit of grace to descend;

The word has gone forth, and the faithful have need
Of your prayers, the great cause to defend.

Let pure clouds of incense be wafted to heaven
From hearts all united in one;

That wisdom and grace to our youth may be given,

And strength for the race they must run.

O'er the green hills of science, O Spirit, preside
And send down thy heavenly showers;

Let holiest dews on those tendrils abide,

And moisten the germs and the flow'rs.

Pour salt in these fountains, shed light in these halls,
Bid Shiloh's pure waters arise;

Till the tide of salvation surrounding these walls,
Rolls high in the breezes of prayer.

From the youth of our country shall armies arise

The gospel of peace to proclaim,

O'er the lands and the seas, the glad message that flies,
Shall re-echo Immanuel's name.

Wake, Mothers in Israel, O wrestle and pray,
While incense is wafted on high;

For the hands that in faith are uplifted to day,
Shall prevail with the realms of the sky.

MONICA.

This article was not received in season for February Number. It is now inserted in the Magazine, in the belief that it will be appropriate to other seasons.

THE

MOTHER'S MAGAZINE:

FOR JUNE, 1834.

For the Mother's Magazine

MY MOTHER.

A child of prayer, he knew a mother's worth;
Knew well the silken cords she round him flung,

To hold him back from crime, and wo, and death.

The extent of female influence, and its worth when exerted in the cause of God, cannot be easily described by an ordinary mind, nor fully known till the mighty host of mothers, with their train of redeemed descendants shall be seen happily arranged about the marriage supper of the Lamb. It sometimes generates an impulse that is not spent for ages, that produces its mightiest effects at the remove of many generations from its origin. How much the pious Sarah, and after her, Rebecca and Rachel, might contribute to the high distinction of their offspring, and the building up of the throne of David, which stood till Shiloh came, it will be curious to inquire out in heaven; and how many other families and kingdoms may have prospered long, as the result of female influence, that great day may tell.

To this very influence, for aught we know, is to be attributed that expanded benevolence which is now operating the redemption of the world. As woman at the first achieved its ruin, she may have been destined to be the instrument of its recovery. When her influence is put forth, we know by innumerable facts, that it can work mightily, even beyond what we conceived.

It would be instructing to know how she acquires that influence, and why its durability and might? Let me say here, that nature has furnished her with a soft and mild address. She can win upon the hearts around her by a kind of stealth secreted in her very voice. Her tones and accents have been generated in seclusion, and have not been rendered harsh by the gratings and discords of coarse commercial life. Hence her mere whisper carries her meaning to the mind; and her emotions to the heart. There is a charm in her language that is irresistible, and she steals upon the mind, like the soft breeze of summer upon the external world.

Her countenance too, can be lighted up to a graciousness peculiar to her When she pours her soul into her face, and spreads her emotions over

sex.

her features, it can through their flexibility, be better seen, than when man would make his face legible. Her look disarms rebuke and wrath and contradiction. The logic that could answer her reasonings, cannot resist her smiles, cannot argue down her loveliness. She enforces her argument by her kindness. There is a string about the heart which she touches, and it yields, because it has no power to resist.

This may partially be the result of that seclusion from the noise and tumult of the out-door world, peculiar to her circumstances, and which exempts her from the passions which the other sex are tempted to indulge. She makes her approach in silence and man listens because he would not be rude. She commands him like the judge, whose sedateness and impartiality give weight to his nod, and importance to his softest whisper. She can look through the case and then decide, while had she been herself in the whirlwind of the passions, she would be rough in her address, and overbearing in her manners. She of course disarms the passions by the mild and gentle influence of her temper, and thus accumulates moral power.

Moreover she can select her own time to assail the hearts about her. She need waste no time in stemming the torrent of the passions, but may wait till they are still can choose the Tempora mollia fandi, the mild moment of address. An appropriate kindness will disarm the spirit she would control, and give her a safe approach and an easy victory. Aware that she achieves nothing in the edge of battle, she exerts her kind control in the camp and the cabinet. Her victories are sure and bloodless, or if otherwise, her retreat calm and deliberate.

And besides all this, in her efforts at acquiring influence, her physical weakness contributes to her moral power. It must be a savage that would wound a creature who has no weapons, either of annoyance or of defence. There is nothing in woman, unless her nature has been perverted, that savors of the mighty and the terrible; hence in the only conflict in which she may exercise her prowess, man gives her every possible advantage, and she yields to conquer, and the vanquished is glad of the defeat. When she has acquired influence, it is durable; and this because of the very means by which it is won. The old proverb, Nothing violent is lasting, has its origin in fact. The tempest quickly expends itself, while the breezes of summer may blow from the same point weeks together. Revolutions in states and empires, are durable, only when achieved by the gradual revolutions of public sentiment. Estates stay longer with the proprietors, when gradually accumulated. Woman in acquiring influence, undermines the passions, that would wrest it again from her hands. The subjugated are admitted to her warmest fellowship, she pours no contempt upon the mind she conquers, prompting it to cast off her yoke. She secures her victories by acquiring them no faster than her power grows; no faster than she can hold them. Moreover she has more patience and is more persevering in her efforts than man, and can again and again, as often as need be, assail successfully the same mind, over which she once extended her conquests. Thus her untiring character, associated with her mildness, renders her influence abiding. It will even outlast life itself, and may be propagated through many generations.

EVIDENCES OF CHRISTIANITY.

Let us now inquire what that influence can do?

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When its character is bad
The woman seduced the
Thus a world was

it desolates a world. It was early tried in Eden. man; she took, she ate, earth felt the wound," &c. ruined. How disastrous the influence of Jezebel. It first destroyed her power, and stayed not till it overthrew the kingdom, and still in her, impious Athaliah contributed to send Judah into a dark and long captivity. When we read of her son, that "His mother became his counsellor to do wickedly," we augur evil to his empire, and the history of many other kingdoms tell the same story. Mary queen of Scots, and Mary of England put forth a mighty influence to ruin the kingdoms they governed, and the history of. France will tell. Infidelity may stand foremost in claiming the honor of achieving her bloody and memorable revolution, but it must not be forgotten that her females had become infidels, and pushed on that nation to misery as no other influence would have done. When some of her most polished women seized with their teeth the mangled bodies of those who had fallen a prey to the popular fury, that single act told to a listening world the disastrous story of perverted female influence. Her monarchs had been governed, each by his favorite female, and these had not only given law to the empire, but character to its female population, while infidelity, like a scintillation, electrive from the incumbent tempest, kindled the war and blew up the empire. we could tell how other kingdoms have been devastated in like manner. would be easy to trace from Herodias downward a disastrous track, like that in the rear of a tempest. In her butchery of John she read the world an appalling lecture on the very theme I discuss. When the historian would draw the character of any man, let his first sentence tell the character of his mother and his wife: I can "think the rest." More of evil, and more of good have resulted from female influence, than any human mind can compass. The royalty it can misdirect, it can direct; the kingdom it can overthrow, it can establish; for the family it can pluck up, it can build a sure house forever; and when well directed, can be as salutary, as when ill, disastrous. D. A. C.

To be continued.

And
It

For the Mother's Magazine.

EVIDENCES OF CHRISTIANITY;

OR,

THE GUILT OF IGNORANCE.

It is indeed a humiliating fact, that comparatively few mothers are acquainted with the reasons by which the Christian religion is proved to be from heaven. To examine the evidences of Christianity is too generally supposed to be the peculiar work of ministers of the gospel. To them it has been cheerfully and almost exclusively committed by the vast majority of Christians and especially of mothers whose time, they affirm, is occupied