been conned over and over to weariness in the committing to memory of its unexplained passages, and not unfrequently associated in the mind with sobs and tears and bodily chastisement, that most of the dislike and repugnance which a child entertains towards it have been engendered. Or it may be, that some of its sublimest passages, or of those essential to salvation, have been given to be committed to memory as a punishment for some offence; an error which has only its counterpart in the penances of the Church of Rome, or the repeating of so many prayers a certain number of times as an imaginary atonement for sin. The Bible contains strong meat for men, as well as milk for babes, with food for those of every intermediate stage. If, then, this natural process be reversed, and abstruse points of theology, with their difficult and unexplained terms, be given to children, it is no more to be wondered at that they should turn away from these, than from that which is disagreeable to their natural palate. But let a proper and judicious selection be made of what doctrines and passages are suited to their capacity, and let them see their way through, and properly understand these, and let them be communicated in the spirit of the Gospel, and there is no fear but they will find a ready access to their affections. The Gospel is the "power of God unto salvation," and it is an omnipotent moral lever power; but in order to a proper application of it, it must rest upon the understanding as its fulcrum.

Another, though an inferior motive, in the inculcating of morality is, to give a greater prominence than is usually done to the temporal consequences attached to a virtuous life. Godliness is profitable for the life that now is, as well as for that which is to come. This is, therefore, a perfectly legitimate motive, and

one which immediately appeals to the child's observation and experience. The happiness of virtue and the miseries of vice are visible on every side of him; and if, in accordance with this, it be shown how great is the actual amount of happiness conferred upon an individual, IN the keeping of God's commandments, the understanding at least acknowledges the fact, and, other things being equal, will act upon it. It is, therefore, the duty of the trainer, as well as the preacher, to appeal to every legitimate motive; in order to gain his end, he must be "all things to all." It is by these means, then, that the foundation of Christian morality must be laid, and in which process the same system is pursued, as in the secular division of the intellectual department; that is, by analogy, illustration, and picturing out, enabling a child to deduce the principles and ideas of Christianity, previously to his being put into possession of its difficult terms. Nor should a single term be employed before it be analysed, explained, and broken down to the level of the child's comprehension. The shell of the nut must be broken, and the kernel presented; or rather, the casket must be unlocked, and the gems taken forth by the instructor, before the child can either relish the taste of the one, or admire the beauty of the other.

Let it once be granted that the acquisition of knowledge is a pleasure, when the mind is trained to observe and reflect, whether that knowledge be secular or sacred, and whether the object of it be the man or the boy; and the cause of both moral and mental ignorance prevailing to such an extent must, in a great measure, be acknowledged to be the want of having information sufficiently popularized, and the reasoning faculties properly developed. Our land is filled with universities, and churches,

and schools; and a liberal provision is made by government for the support of these; yet scanty indeed are the offerings laid upon the altar of popular and elementary education; but without which, much of the machinery of the former is too often found to be superfluous. The grand error has always been to consider children as incapable of reasoning, to have them treated as so many automata, the guidance of whose education any one might undertake. Now it is doubtless true, that children cannot reason so accurately or so extensively as men and women, but neither can they walk so far, nor endure so much bodily fatigue; and it would therefore be as reasonable to deny them the liberty of using their limbs until they arrived at manhood, as the pleasure of exercising their reason until a similar period. On the whole, therefore, it seems the more onerous and responsible duty of the two rightly to manage the education of children; and that it is at least equally the duty of a government to take this department of instruction under its patronage and to make as liberal a provision for it, as for the instruction of adults, is no less obvious than its vast importance in the economy of a nation's prosperity.

CHAPTER XIV.

THE last division of education is that of the moral faculties of man. In comparing the structure and physical arrangements of the globe with the different kinds and degrees of life pervading nature, a very singular analogy may here be instituted. In the primary and secondary formations, no traces of organic remains are to be found. In the tertiary, fossils of a simple kind only are to be met with; but as we ascend through the upper strata, these memorials of extinct vitality assume a more elaborated appearance and finished mechanism, until we arrive at the surface, peopled with living tribes, at the head of which stands man, the last but noblest work of the Creator. So is it in the vegetative, sentient, intellectual, and moral worlds. All vegetable nature is pervaded by a living principle of the humblest kind, which may be considered the basis, or primary formation, of life. Higher in the scale, the inferior tribes exhibit a different kind of existence, in their possession of sensation and voluntary motion; while above this, or in a manner agglomerated to it, and serving as a link between their nature and that of man, they are also endowed with instinct, which in man expands into what is called intellect. But beyond these different strata, and having nothing of mere animalism in it, there

is a higher principle still, as far transcending the vegetable, instinctive, and intellectual existences, as the atmosphere in its ethereal purity surpasses the grovelling attributes of earth. This is a principle of moral vitality, a purely heaven-descended life; and like the atmosphere resting upon the earth as a basis, but in proportion to its altitude becoming attenuated, and vanishing far into the realms of ether, this moral life, though sustained by material elements, yet reaches from earth to heaven, and forms a link between the nature of man and the spiritual existence of the inhabitants of another world.

It is also found in many stages of advancement to perfection in the human race. In savages it may be called a mere fossil, indicating that, in ages long gone by, it was co-extensive with the existence of the human family, until destroyed and buried under a deposit of grosser matter. In civilised life, much of this superincumbent soil has been removed, and an intellectual vitality being communicated, the plant has sprung to some maturity; but it is only in the pure atmosphere of Christianity, that it has ever produced its heaven-born fruits. Yet by the light of history, a universal process of redemption from this moral death may no less plainly be seen in operation, than by the light of science may be traced the gradual evolving of that life, and light, and beauty, which now everywhere surround us in the material world. The savage, therefore, in whom this moral principle is extinct or imperfect, is little above one of the lower tribes. The germs of a moral existence may be within his breast, but they cannot pierce the stony soil under which they are deposited. A glimmering of reason may guide him in providing for his selfish wants and appetites, even as instinct guides an humbler