LAYING UP FOR CHILDREN. "For the children ought not to lay up for the parents, but the parents for the children."-PAUL.

YES-this is the natural order. As a general rule, parents are under much better advantages to lay up for their children, than children for parents. In passing down the stream of time, legacies accrue to a much greater number of persons who will live to enjoy them, than if they were to flow in the opposite direction.

Yes-but suppose the parents are poor. Suppose it is as much, and more, than they can do, to feed, and clothe, and educate their children? This is no uncommon case, and God requires of parents "according to what they have, and not according to what they have not."

Yes-parents ought to lay up for their children, but how much? As much as they can? There is such a thing as leaving children too much property more than they need-more than it is safe for them to inherit;-enough to injure, to ruin them. This cannot be the duty of any parent, however much he may possess. To hold that he is bound to leave his children rich, independent, because he is able to do it, is nearly equivalent to saying, that he is bound, in his last will and testament, to inflict upon them a far greater injury than if he were to cut them off without a shilling.

Where a father has a family of children, and has property over and above what is necessary to educate them well, and give them a start in life, the question is how much do they need-how much, how many hundred or thousand pounds is it best they should receive? It may be difficult, sometimes, for the wisest and most conscientious parent to answer the question definitely. I suppose it is. But it is entirely safe to say, that children ought never to receive so much from their parents, or in the settlement of their parents' estates, as to take away all the incentives to industry and frugality. When a son is brought up to expect, because his father is rich, that he shall have enough to maintain him in style without any earnings of his own, and still more, when at an early day he comes into possession of an estate, which he thinks abundantly sufficient to support him as a gentleman of fortune, the chances are more than ten to one-I mean what I say, more than ten to one-that his money will do him infinitely more harm than good. If he does not become a spendthrift, and squander it all, the fearful probability is, that it will cut him off from "the inheritance of the eaints in light." It will be a miracle, almost, if he does not say, "Soul take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry, for thou hast much good laid up for many years."

Perhaps there is no mistake which rich men of the world, and even Christian men of the same class, oftener fall into, than laying up too much for their children. Having ample means, they want, if possible, to guard against all contingencies. They want to feel sure, when they die, that their children will never come to want; and so they leave them more than enough to support them handsomely, whether they do any thing for themselves or not..

491

Now, if this were right in itself, if it was acting the part of a good steward, it would show, it does show a great want of that worldly wisdom, for which they With few exceptions, these are so distinguished. men have made their own fortunes; and all experience proves, that the heirs of the rich have no advantage, in the long run, over the children of the poor, who are brought up in virtuous and industrious habits. Any patrimony, however large, may be squandered in a generation or two; there is every reason to expect it will be, when wealthy fathers attempt, as it were, to take their children out of the hand of Providence, and make them independent. The Lord is a jealous God. While he takes care of the fatherless, who are left with him, and who trust in his promise that they "shall not want any good thing," he frowns upon those who withhold from him what he has put into their hands to do good with, that they may hoard it up for their children. A little to encourage and aid them, when they begin in the world, is better than great riches.

Nor need any man of substance at this day be at a loss how to dispose of his money, if he does not bequeath it to his children. Whatever the amount may be, over and above what they really need, the Lord has treasuries enough, into which he may cast it, with every prospect of its doing good to the bodies and souls of those who are ready to perish. The only question will be, how to distribute it where it is wanted most. And here, "If any man lack wisdom, let him ask it of God, who giveth unto all men liberally, and upbraideth not."

I will only add, that in saying the children ought not to lay up for the parents, the apostle could not have intended to take away from children in prosperous circumstances the privilege of providing for poor parents by will or otherwise: for he says in another place, "But if any provide not for his own, and especially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel;" including, I doubt not, his poor parents if they have need, as well as his children.

THE PRAYING SAILOR BOY. THE Cornelia was a good ship (said one of the West India chaplains of the 'Seamen's Friend Society'), but at one time we feared that she was on her last voyage. We were but a few days out from the harbour, when a severe storm of five days' continuance overtook us.

I must tell you of a feat performed by a sailor boy at the height of the storm. He was literally a boy, and far better fitted for thumbing Webster's Spelling-Book than furling a sail in a storm. But his mother was a widow, and where could the boy earn a living for himself and mother better than at sea? The ship was rolling fearfully. Some of the rigging got foul at the mainmast head, and it was necessary that some one should go up and rectify it. It was a perilous job. I was standing near the mate, and heard him order that boy to do it! He lifted his cap and glanced at the swinging mast, the boiling wrathful seas, and at the steady determined counte

nance of the mate. He hesitated in silence a moment, then rushing across the deck, he pitched down into the forecastle. Perhaps he was gone two minutes, when he returned, laid his hands on the ratlines, and went up with a will. My eyes followed him till my head was dizzy, when I turned and remonstrated with the mate for sending the boy aloft. He could not come down alive! Why did you send him? "I did it," replied the mate, "to save his life. We've sometimes lost men overboard, but never a boy. See how he holds like a squirrel. He is more careful; he'll come down safe, I hope."

Again I looked till tears dimmed my eyes, and I was compelled to turn away, expecting every moment to catch a glimpse of his last fall.

In about fifteen or twenty minutes he came down, and straightening himself up with the conscious pride of having performed a manly act, he walked aft with a smile on his countenance.

In the course of the day, I took occasion to speak to him, and asked him why he hesitated when ordered aloft? "I went sir," said the boy, "to pray." "Do you pray?" "Yes, sir; I thought that I might not come down alive, and I went to commit my soul to God." "Where did you learn to pray? "At home: my mother wanted me to go to the Sabbath school, and my teacher urged me to pray to God to keep me; and I do." "What was that you had in your jacket?" 'My Testament, which my teacher gave me. I thought if I did perish I would have the Word of God close to my heart."--Christian Intelligencer.

THE LITTLE GIRL AND THE MINISTER. A PIOUS English clergyman, calling one day, in the course of his pastoral visits, at the house of a friend, affectionately noticed a child in the room, a little girl about six years old. Among other things, he asked her if she knew that she had a bad heart, and opening the Bible, pointed to the passage where the Lord promises, "I will put a new spirit within you, and I will take the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh." He then entreated her to plead this promise in prayer, and she would find the Almighty faithful to his engagement.

Many years after, a lady, at the age of twentythree, came to him to propose herself for communion with the Church, and how inexpressible was his delight, when he found that she was the very person with whom, when she was a child, he had so faithfully conversed on the subject of religion, and that the conversation was blessed, and made the means of her conversion to God. Taking her Bible, she had retired as he advised, pleaded the promise, wept, prayed, and the Lord heard her, and answered her prayer. He gave her what she most anxiously desired, a new heart.

Let all ministers learn from this, the importance of being faithful to children. Let no child ask, "Why don't the minister speak to me?"-S. S. Messenger.

"NOT MY WILL BUT THINE BE DONE." In the cares, and troubles, and disappointments of life, let this prayer be ours. Have we been rich and now are poor? Have our dearest friends been taken from us? Are we so bowed down by disease that life is a burden to us? Have we daily petty trials that provoke us; and are we fretting and murmuring at our lot in life? Let us then think of the prayer of our Saviour, and against whom we are complaining, and the petition, "Not my will but thine be done" will comfort us. And as we pray so must we act? with a spirit of faith fully in our hearts, with a perfect trust in God that his will is ever best; and the more we make his will ours, the better shall we see that all things are ordered right.

GOOD RULES.

THE longer I live, the more I feel the importance of adhering to the rules I have laid down for myself in relation to such matters :

1. To hear as little as possible whatever is to the prejudice of others.

2. To believe nothing of the kind till I am absolutely forced to it.

3. Never to drink into the spirit of one who circulates an ill report.

kindness which is expressed towards others. 4. Always to moderate, as far as I can, the un

5. Always to believe, that if the other side werel heard, a very different account would be given of the matter.-Simeon.

cup

his with enmity and wrath, he shall drink it. As he delighted only in evil, and returned only evil for good, evil and only evil shall be his portion to all eternity. As he has worked hard at sin, he shall receive its full wages, which is death. As he has treasured up in his bosom elements of ruin and wrath, no hand shall hold him back from utter and everlasting destruction.

It matters little whether a man believe in a hell of material fire or not. There is foreshadowed in what we see and know of the nature and effects of sin, as an element of misery, a hell of more intense suffering than material fire or judgments can possibly create a state of moral depravation of spiritual abandonment and suffering-having its foundation in the constitution of one's own being, and fed and fanned by every element of thought, and feeling, and experience that goes to make up that being, as endless as the laws which govern it. Just finish the work which sin here begins; let the tide of enmity, impurity, evil desire, evil thinking, evil indulgence, rise and swell till it reaches the grave; then let all restraint, all motives to good, all holy associations, all mercy and grace, all barriers to evil, be swept away for ever, and the soul be thrown back upon itself, and its deathless energies left to play in the open field of its own ruin; every sin a serpent; every habit a tyrant; every indulgence a burning thirst; the memory an upbraider; conscience a whip of scorpions; thought a frightful ghost of the murdered past; the future crowding its images of all that is gloomy and fearful on the mind; and you have the most awful idea of hell which it is possible for the mind of man to realize.

as

Hell is moral aberration from God, just heaven is moral approximation to God; at every step the lost recede from God, their horror and misery must be augmented, and the possibility of return diminished; just as at every step the saint approximates to God, his joy and peace and happiness must be increased. And therefore the sentence pronounced upon the ungodly is merely, "He that is unjust, let him be unjust still; and he which is filthy, let him be filthy still:" and the sentence pronounced upon the righteous is, "He that is righteous, let him be righteous still; and he which is holy, let him be holy still." Hell is just the impress of a centrifugal power on man's soul, that carries him farther and farther from God and from happiness; and heaven is a centripetal power imparted to man's soul, that draws him nearer and nearer to God and to joy.

THE GREAT WORK, AND THE WAY TO DO IT.

BY H. P. TAPPAN, D.D.

OUR attention has recently been called to a great Peace Convention, which held its sitting in Paris. ing the liberties of Rome, and the combined armies At the very time when the French army was crushof Austria and Russia were treading the Hungarians into the dust, this Convention was in session. Men of different nations, of different sects, of different professions, of every variety of talent, were there. Even M. Victor Hugo, and M. Coquerel, and the Archbishop of Paris, were there; the first fresh from extension of the French territories to their natural his work Le Rhin, in which he had advocated the boundaries by the power of the sword; the second fresh from his defence of the suppression of Roman liberty by warlike intervention; the third even then contemplating with complacency the work which was going on in the Eternal City. M. Victor Hugo made a beautiful and eloquent speech. Many beautiful and eloquent speeches were made. It was resolved, without a dissenting voice, that war was an enormous evil; that nations, like individuals, ought to settle their disputes deliberately, rationally, and justly, before a properly-constituted tribunal. The great idea of a Congress of Nations was advocated and unanimously approved. And then the Convention separated.

It is a pleasant thing to sentimentalize. Universal love, universal peace, universal brotherhood!-glorious themes are these for orators and poets. But have we got any nearer to the grand achievement ? Peace Conventions are certainly harmless things; they may even do good, as all rational discussion and all dissemination of fine sentiments do good. But is the city of Paris any the less eager for revolution, any the less ready to send out its thousands on the old mission of war and bloodshed. Kings, and priests, and statesmen, can sentimentalize, too, in private; but they will still find strong necessities for going on with their wonted work.

Suppose we could get so far as to establish a Congress of Nations, have we any reason to believe that its adjudications would be submitted to by any discontented party, when the first opportunity for evasion should offer? Would not this Congress require armies to enforce its decisions? And might there not arise out of the conflicts of interest and opinion, attendant upon all deliberations, occasions for à general war under the very decisions of such a body? Can we put an end to war until we have removed its causes? While the people remain ignorant, irreligious and corrupt-while evil governments exist and despots rule--how can there be peace? You may cry Peace, peace, and yet there will be no peace.

The abolition of the slave trade by the decrees of great nations was a noble work. But has the slave trade ceased? Is it not at this day carried on as extensively as ever, and under forms still more barreally abolished, while Africa remains so benighted and degraded as to make sale of her own children to the black ships which hover about her coasts, and which the naval power even of England cannot drive away? Will it ever cease while there are men who will sell, and men who will buy, and nations who will legalize slave labour.

baric and atrocious? Will the slave trade ever be

The temperance reformation is a great cause. The benevolent associations which have sprung up under its wing have rescued many individuals, diffused much light, and introduced important social changes. But see we not, notwithstanding, how brisk the manufacture and trade in alcoholic drinks still con