Imatges de pàgina
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the good state of his circumftances in a variety of refpects, and the welfare of society, in an eminent degree depend upon it; and the more civilized men are, and the more they are connected with each other in fociety, the more important is virtue to their common happiness. Having it more in their power to contribute to each other's comfort, it is the more defirable that they fhould have a difpofition to do it.

No parent, attentive, as all parents ought to be, and naturally are, to the happiness of their offspring, will neglect this article of instruction in his care of his children. He will endeavour to educate them in fuch a manner as to infpire them with an abhorrence of vice, and a love of virtue; and his whole fyftem of difcipline refpecting them, every thing that he propofes in the form of rewards, or punishments, will have this for its principal object; because in no other way can he lay fo good a foundation for their fuccefs and happiness in life. They will then be prepared to conduct themselves in the most proper manner, fo as to derive the greatest advantage from all the circumstances

in which they can be placed. Adversity will give them the leaft pain, and profperity the greatest enjoyment. They will be happy in themfelves, and be most difpofed to contribute to the happiness of others, which, by reflection, will moft eminently contribute to their own.

But this great object is not to be attained without attention and labour. Naturally every man, like every other animal, wishes to gratify the present appetite, whatever it be ; and it is only fome inconvenience arifing from it, or apprehended to arise from it, that leads any perfon to refrain from immediate indulgence. And in the power of forbearing to indulge the natural appetites, with a view to avoid future evil, orfecure future and diftant good, confifts the great fuperiority of men over brutes, and of fome men over others. This is the difference between the wife man and the fool, the virtuous and the vicious. All perfons,

therefore, who attend to the

proper education of their children endeavour, as much as poffible, to give them the benefit of their own experience, and of the knowledge they

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have by any other means acquired in this respect; and thus fome perfons enter the world with much greater advantage than others. They have lefs to learn from their own experience, the teaching of which is often dear bought, and frequently comes too late; the evils in which they have involved themselves being irremediable.

We may therefore take it for granted that, if the Divine Being, the true parent of mankind, vouchsafe to give them any inftruction at all, he will attend to this moft important object in the first place, and that every thing in a fyftem of truly divine revelation will be made fubfervient to this; fo that this confideration furnishes no unfair teft of the truth of fuch a revelation.

Accordingly, we find that, whereas the heathen religions had no connection with morals, and were rather calculated to encou→ rage the worst vices that men are subject to, it appears to have been the primary object of the religion taught in the Scriptures to guard men againft vice, as the greatest of evils, and to inculcate the principles of moral virtue, as the greatest good of man;

while every thing of a ritual and ceremonial nature in it is always reprefented as a thing of fecondary confideration, and only fubfervient to this. And as it may be useful to us both to confirm our faith in divine revelation, and to imprefs our minds more strongly with a fenfe of the importance of virtue, I shall take a review of the general plan and object of revelation with refpect to this fubject. In this retrospect the fame confi derations will frequently come before us, but fuch repetitions will not be without their ufe. What the Divine Being did not think too much to teach, and to repeat, giving, as the prophet fays (Ifaiah xxviii. 10.) line upon line, and precept upon precept, we cannot think too much to learn, and give repeated attention to.

The first moral leffon, and the most neceffary of all others to a child, is that of obedience to its parents, and submission to all proper authority; for they are not capable of understanding the reafons but of very few things. And this we find, in the hiftory of our first parents, whatever there may

be of fable or allegory in the account, was the first leffon that was taught them, viz. by the prohibition to eat of the forbidden fruit, and at the fame time they were apprized of the inconvenience that would follow their tranfgreffion of the command of their maker.

In the history of Cain and Abel, mankind were taught not only an abhorrence of the crime of murder, (though in that state of things it was not punished with death) but in general, that if they behave well, they will be accepted of God, and that if he frown upon them, or punish them, it is al ways on account of fin. God fays to Cain, Gen. iv. 7. If thou doeft well, fhalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doeft not well, fin lieth at the door. After the murder, God faid to him, What haft thou done? The voice of thy brother's blood crieth to me from the ground. And now art thou curfed from the earth, which has opened her mouth to receive thy brother's blood from thy hand. When thou tilleft the ground it shall not henceforth yield unto thee her ftrength. A fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou be in the earth. So

much

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