50 Sermon Illustrations on Family Discipleship

Whenever I think about this subject, two fathers come before me. One lived on the Mississippi river. He was a man of great wealth. Yet he would have freely given it all could he have brought back his eldest boy from his early grave. One day that boy had been borne home unconscious. They did everything that man could do to restore him, but in vain. "He must die," said the doctor. "But, doctor," said the agonized father, "can you do nothing to bring him to consciousness, even for a moment?" "That may be," said the doctor; "'but he can never live." Time passed, and after a terrible suspense, the fathers wish was gratified. "My son," he whispered, "the doctor tells me you are dying." "Well," said the boy, "you never prayed for me, father; won't you pray for my lost soul now?" The father wept. It was true he had never prayed. He was a stranger to God. And in a little while that soul, unprayed for, passed into its dark eternity. Oh, father! if your boy was dying, and he called on you to pray, could you lift your burdened heart to heaven? Have you learned this sweetest lesson of heaven on earth, to know and hold communion with your God? And before this evil world has marked your dearest treasures for its prey, have you learned to lead your little ones to a children's Christ?

What a contrast is the other father? He, too, had a lovely boy, and one day he came home to find him at the gates of death. "A great change has come over our boy," said the weeping mother; "he has only been a little ill before, but it seems now as if he were dying fast." The father went into the room, and placed his hand on the forehead of the little boy. He could see the boy was dying. He could feel the cold damp of death. "My son, do you know you are dying?" "No, am I?" "Yes; you are dying." "And shall I die to-day?" "Yes, my boy, you cannot live till night." "Well, then, I shall be with Jesus to-night, won't I, father?" "Yes, my son, you will spend to-night with the Saviour." Mothers and fathers, the little ones may begin early; be in earnest with them now. You know not how soon you may be taken from them, or they may be taken from you. Therefore let this impression be made upon their minds--that you care for their souls--a million times more than for their worldly prospects.

When I was in London, there was one lady dressed in black up in the gallery. All the rest were ministers. I wondered who that lady could be. At the close of the meeting I stepped up to her, and she asked me if I did not remember her. I did not, but she told me who she was, and her story came to my mind. When we were preaching in Dundee, Scotland, a mother came up with her two sons, 16 and 17 years old. She said to me, "Will you talk to my boys?" I asked her if she would talk to the inquirers, as there were more inquirers than workers. She said she was not a good enough Christian--was not prepared enough. I told her I could not talk to her then. Next night she came to me and asked me again, and the following night she repeated her request. Five hundred miles she journeyed to get God's blessing for her boys, Would to God we had more mothers like her. She came to London, and the first night I was there I saw her in the Agricultural Hall. She was accompanied by only one of her boys--the other had died. Toward the close of the meeting I received this letter from her:

"DEAR MR. MOODY: For months I have never considered the day's work ended unless you and your work had been specially prayed for. Now it appears before us more and more. What in our little measure we have found has no doubt been the happy experience of many others in London. My husband and I have sought as our greatest privilege to take unconverted friends one by one to the Agricultural hall, and I thank God that, with a single exception, those brought under the preaching from your lips have accepted Christ as their Savior, and are rejoicing in his love."

That lady was a lady of wealth and position. She lived a little way out of London; gave up her beautiful home and took lodgings near Agricultural Hall, so as to be useful in the inquiry room. When we went down to the Opera House she was there; when we went down to the east end, there she was again, and when I left London she had the names of 150 who had accepted Christ from her. Some have said that our work in London was a failure. Ask her if the work was a failure, and she will tell you. If we had a thousand such mothers in Chicago we would lift it. Go and bring your friends here to the meetings. Think of the privilege, my friends, of saving a soul. If we are going to work for good, we must be up and about it.

There was a time when our little boy did not like to go to church, and would get up in the morning and say to his mother, "What day is to-morrow?" "Tuesday." "Next day?" "Wednesday." "Next day?" "Thursday;" and so on, till he came to the answer, "Sunday." "Dear me," he said. I said to the mother, "We cannot have our boy grow up to hate Sunday in this way; that will never do. That is the way I used to feel when I was a boy. I used to look upon Sunday with a certain amount of dread. Very few kind words were associated with the day. I don't know that the minister ever put his hand on my head. I don't know that the minister even noticed me, unless it was when I was asleep in the gallery, and he woke me up. This kind of thing won't do; we must make the Sunday the most attractive day of the week; not a day to be dreaded; but a day of pleasure." Well the mother took the work up with this boy. Bless those mothers in their work with the children. Sometimes I feel as if I would rather be the mother of John Wesley or Martin Luther or John Knox than have all the glories in the world. Those mothers who are faithful with the children God has given them will not go unrewarded. My wife went to work and took those Bible stories and put those blessed truths in a light that the child could comprehend, and soon the feeling of dread for the Sabbath with the boy was the other way, "What day's to-morrow?" he would ask, "Sunday." "I am glad." And if we make those Bible truths interesting--break them up in some shape so that these children can get at them, then they will begin to enjoy them.

The late Dr. Henry Ware, when once asked by a parent to draw up some set of rules for government of children, replied by an anecdote: "Dr. Hitchcock," he said "was settled in Sandwich; and, when he made his first exchange with the Plymouth minister, he must needs pass through the Plymouth Woods, a nine miles' wilderness, where travellers almost always got lost, and frequently came out at the point they started from. Dr. Hitchcock, on entering this much dreaded labyrinth, met an old woman, and asked her to give him some directions for getting through the woods so as to fetch up at Plymouth, rather than Sandwich. 'Certainly,' she said, 'I will tell you all about it with the greatest pleasure. You will just keep right on till you get some ways into the woods, and you will come to a place where several roads branch off. Then you must stop and consider, and take the one that seems to you most likely to bring you out right.' He did so, and came out right." Dr. Ware added, "I have always followed the worthy and sensible old lady's advice in bringing up my children. I do not think anybody can do better: at any rate, I cannot." Good common sense, doubtless, is often better than all set rules; but the thing is to have it.

622-623. CHILDREN, Deaths of. A delicate child, pale, and prematurely wise, was complaining, on a hot morning, that the poor dewdrops had been too hastily snatched away, and not allowed to glitter on the flowers, like other happier dewdrops that live the whole night through, and sparkle in the moonlight, and through the morning, onwards to noonday. "The sun," said the child, "has chased them away with his heat, or swallowed them in his wrath." Soon after came rain and a rainbow; whereupon his father pointed upwards. "See!" said he, "there stand thy dewdrops, gloriously reset, a glittering jewelry in the heavens; and the clownish foot tramples on them no more. By this, my child, thou art taught that what withers on earth blooms again in heaven." Thus the father spoke, and knew not that he spoke prefiguring words; for, soon after, the delicate child, with the morning brightness of his earthly wisdom, was exhaled, like a dewdrop, into heaven. Richter.

Near the top of one of the loftiest summits of the Rocky Mountains, more than ten thousand feet above the level of the ocean, are two fountains, so near, and so nearly on a level, that it would be no great stretch of the power and art of man to divert the streamlet which issues from either fountain into that which issues from the other. If you follow the course of one of these infant rivers, you find it, from some slight inclination of the plain, taking an easterly direction, and after traversing, for some distance, the broad plateau in which it rises, descending from valley to valley, receiving every few miles a fresh impulse from some tributary stream, until at length, uniting with a thousand others, it finds an ocean home in the Gulf of Mexico, through the mouth of the great "Father of Waters." If now, retracing your steps to the point of departure, you follow in like manner the course of the other stream, you find yourself descending gradually in a westerly direction, until, by a process exactly the counterpart of the former, you are led through the mouth of the Columbia, into the bosom of the great Pacific. To go from the terminus of one stream to the terminus of the other, you must overcome an ascent of more than ten thousand feet, and travel not less than five thousand miles. Yet in their outset these two streams were neighbors. Neither of them seemed to have any positive or determined bias one way or the other. A very ordinary amount of effort would seem to be sufficient to make the easterly stream run west, or the westerly stream run east.

As for ourselves, we tried the rod on our own children, but are now trying the sugar-plum with our grandchildren. Thus far, our success is remarkable. Family government has risen in popularity. Children cry for it. Our children used to look with aversion on the spot where we locked up the switch; but now there is not in the whole house a place so favorite as the drawer where is stored the sweet moral suasion. Good conduct thrives; obedience is at a premium; the will is broken; the children are governed without knowing it. Blessings on sugar-plums!

Men cannot be developed perfectly who have not been compelled to bring children up to manhood. You might as well say that a tree is a perfect tree without leaf or blossom, as to say that a man is a man who has gone through life without experiencing the influences that come from bending down, and giving one's self up to those who are helpless and little.

The ancient Romans were accustomed to place the busts of their distinguished ancestors in the vestibules of their houses, that they might be continually reminded of their noble deeds. They supposed that a recollection of their illustrious virtues would lead to the imitation of the same by all the living members of their households. There is no doubt that the influence of this practice was most happy upon the living, awakening in many breasts high and noble aspirations. At any rate, history records the names of many renowned Romans, who descended from the families in which this custom was observed. The young grew up to reverence the worthies whose statues they daily saw, and to emulate the virtues which gave their ancestors such lasting fame. In these days, we have no busts of honored ancestors in the porches of our dwellings; but we have something more impressive. The characters of living parents are constantly presented for the imitation of children. Their example is continually sending forth a silent power to mould young hearts for good or ill; not for a single month or year, but through the whole impressible period of childhood and youth, the influence of parental example is thus felt. If it be constituted of the highest and purest elements, the results will be unspeakably precious. Sons and daughters will become patterns of propriety and goodness, because their parents are such.

A very small girl whose mother was dead, and whose father had married again, but had not resumed family worship, soon after the event, accosted him, "Father, is God dead?"—"No, my child," said he: "what makes you ask that question?"—"Why, you used to pray to him night and morning when my mother was alive; but you don't now. I did not know but God was dead too."

A well-to-do and intelligent farmer, who had eight grown-up children, was powerfully convicted for sin, but would not yield to be saved. Being asked what the nature of his difficulties was, he said, "If I become a Christian, and make a profession of religion, I must have family worship. But I cannot take my Bible, read a chapter, and then kneel down and pray, in the presence of my family. Had I commenced when I was young, as I ought to have done, it would have been comparatively easy; but now most of them are grown up around me, and I cannot do it; I cannot do it." And he did not.

A little girl of five years visited her grandfather's, and so much enjoyed the family prayers there, that, on her return, she besought her father to read and pray as grandpa did. Night after night she urged her father with tears, till he yielded to her desire, and became an active and useful Christian.

Philip Henry was most exemplary in his practice of family devotion. Besides the regular plan of reading and expounding the Scriptures morning and evening, he used strongly to recommend singing; saying that it was a way of exhibiting godliness, like Rahab's scarlet thread, to such as pass by our windows. His children and servants used to take notes of his expositions; and the foundation of Matthew Henry's "Commentary" was laid from these notes. Besides this, on Thursday evening, instead of reading, he used to catechise his children and servants upon the Assembly's Catechism, with the proofs, or sometimes in a smaller catechism; or else they read, and he examined them in some other useful book, as Mr. Poole's "Dialogues against the Papists;" and on Saturday evening they gave him an account of what they could remember of the chapters they had read through during the week, each a several part in order. Besides this, he had also days of humiliation with his family. The consequence was, that, in addition to the blessings resulting to his own children, many who came to live with them dated their first impressions from these services, and gave God thanks that they ever came under his roof. Bowes.

It was a source of much trouble to some fishes to see a number of lobsters swimming backwards instead of forwards. They therefore called a meeting; and it was determined to open a class for their instruction, which was done, and a number of young lobsters came: for the fishes gravely argued, that, if they commenced with the young ones, as they grew up they would learn to swim aright. At first, they did very well; but afterwards, when they returned home, and saw their fathers and mothers swimming in the old way, they soon forgot their lessons. So, many a child well taught at school is drifted backwards by a bad home influence.

— Bible Class Magazine

The wives of Luther, Jonathan Edwards, Burke, Fennimore Cooper, Mill, and Hitchcock, have shown how greatly educated women may aid their husbands in literary pursuits. Educated mothers are qualified to instruct their children, and to awaken in them a taste for learning. The mother of Miss Maria Mitchell was much distinguished in her youth for her fondness of books. The distinguished and wise-hearted Duchess of Kent was able to arrange and superintend the whole manner of the education of her daughter, the illustrious Queen of England; and she did this, making it her great purpose to train her to be worthy of the crown which she now wears. "I was mainly educated by my mother," says Sarah Josephia Hale. Alfred's mother "made him all he was in his own age, and all that he is to ours." Felicia Hemans had an accomplished mother. The mother of the great John Quincy Adams was a woman of rare attainments and of a bright genius. Cuvier's mother was pious, a lover of Nature, and used to accompany him to and from school, and to point out the interesting natural objects they met, and to excite in him a taste for the study of the works of God. She stimulated his passion for reading, and judiciously selected his books; and he acquired in childhood an accurate and extensive historical knowledge. At the age of fourteen, he formed a society of intelligent lads. Says M. Girardin, "There is no instance of a mother who can read and write whose children are not likewise able to read and write."

— Pittsburg Gazette

A man once received from his own child, an infant of three years old, one of the most severe reproofs he ever met with. Family prayer had been, by some means, neglected one morning, and the child was, as it were, out of its element. At length, he came to his father as he sat, and just as the family were going to dinner, the little reprover, leaning on his father's knee, said, with a sigh, "Pa, you were used to go to prayer with us, but you did not to-day." "No, my dear," said the parent, "I did not." "But, pa, you ought; why did you not?" The father had not a word to reply, and the child's rebuke was as appropriate and natural, as if it had been administered by the most able minister in the land; and, it may be said, was as permanently useful.

A Christian minister calling at the house of one of his friends, found him and his wife in deepest distress, from the sudden death of their only child. He attempted to console the distracted parents; but the mother replied, "Ah, sir, these consolations might assuage my grief for the loss of my child, but they cannot blunt the stings of my conscience, which are as daggers in my heart. It was but last week I was thinking, 'My child is now twelve years of age; his mind is rapidly expanding; I know he thinks and feels beyond the measure of his years, and a foolish backwardness has hitherto kept me from entering so closely into conversation with him as to discover the real state of his mind, and to make a vigorous effort to lead his heart to God.' I then resolved to seize the first opportunity to discharge a duty so weighty on the conscience of a Christian parent; but day after day my foolish deceitful heart said, 'I will do it to-morrow.' On the very day that he was taken ill, I had resolved to talk to him that evening; and when he at first complained of his head, I was half pleased with the thought, that this might incline him to listen more seriously to what I should say. But Oh, sir, his pain and fever increased so rapidly, that I was obliged to put him immediately to bed, and as he seemed inclined to foze, I was glad to leave him to rest. From that time he was never sufficiently sensible for conversation; and now he is gone into eternity, and has left me distracted with anxiety concerning the salvation of his precious soul! Dilatory wretch! had it not been for my own sin, I might now have been consoling myself with the satisfactory conviction of having discharged the duty of a Christian parent, and enjoying the delightful assurance of meeting my child before the throne of God and the Lamb. Oh, the cursed sin of procrastination! Oh, the ruinous delusion that lurks in the word 'o-morrow!'

It is related of Mrs. Doddridge, that, when her son Philip was quite a little boy, she used to teach him Scripture history from the Dutch tiles of the fireplace, on which there were pictures of subjects taken from the Bible. Philip never forgot those early instructions, and probably to them, under God, his future usefulness may be traced.

In the vicinity of Philadelphia, there was a pious mother, who had the happiness of seeing her children in very early life, brought to the knowledge of the truth; walking in the fear of the Lord, and ornaments in the Christian church. A clergyman, who was traveling, heard this circumstance respecting this mother, and wished very much to see her, thinking that there might be something peculiar in her mode of giving instruction, which rendered it so effectual. He accordingly visited her, and inquired respecting the manner in which she discharged the duties of a mother in educating her children. The woman replied, that she did not know that she had been more faithful than any Christian mother would be, in the religious instruction of her children. After a little conversation, she said, "While my children were infants on my lap, as I washed them, I raised my heart to God, that he would wash them in that blood which cleanseth from all sin; as I clothed them in the morning, I asked my heavenly Father to clothe them with the robe of Christ's righteousness; as I provided them food, I prayed that God would feed their souls with the bread of heaven and give them to drink of the water of life. When I have prepared them for the house of God, I have pleaded that their bodies might be fit temples for the Holy Ghost to dwell in. When they left me for the week-day school, I followed their infant footsteps with a prayer, that their path through life might be like that of the just, which shineth more and more unto the perfect day. And as I committed them to the rest of the night, the silent breathing of my soul has been, that their heavenly Father would take them to his embrace, and fold them in his paternal arms."

"In a college of —," says a correspondent of the N. Y. Evangelist of 1831, "there has lately been an extensive revival. Having myself a praying mother, it occurred to me to inquire of the subjects of the revival, whether their mothers were pious. I did so, and found that scarcely one sinner was brought into the fold of Christ, who was not blessed with a pious, prayerful mother. This is a fact, and oh! that mothers would let it make the proper impression on their hearts."

The chaplain of the prison at Weathersfield says:

"A man of fifty, who has been a wanderer over almost the whole earth, and a partaker in almost every sin that can be named, and who has also met with much which we should think was calculated to make him solemn, told me that nothing in his whole life has ever made him feel serious, but what his mother said to him just before her death. She resided in Trenton, New Jersey, and was a sincere, warm-hearted Christian. When she found herself dying, she sent for her son, then a lad of twelve years old, to come to her chamber. As he approached her bed, she took his hand, and spoke to him with maternal tenderness and fidelity. Telling him she must soon leave him, she earnestly besought him by every moving consideration, so to love the Savior, and so to take care of his soul, as to meet her in heaven. She continued to clasp his hand until hers became cold in death. For nearly half a century afterwards, this man was pressing onwards through a course of crime, too revolting for description. Yet he assured me, that amidst his lowest and darkest descents into the vortex of sin, he could never utterly drive from his mind the last words of his mother, and was never able to think of them without solemn emotion. This struck me with some surprise, and appeared to me a remarkable proof of the deep and lasting impression a pious mother may make upon the mind of her child."

# MURDERERS.

moak to the banks of the Forth, on his way to Edinburgh, was, with several others, prevented by a storm from crossing that frith. Thus obliged to remain in Fife during the Sabbath, he was employed to preach, it is believed, in King horn. Conformably to his usual practice, he prayed earnestly in the morning for the Divine countenance and aid in the work of the day; but suddenly missing his note-book, he knew not what to do. His thoughts, however, were directed to the command, "Thou shalt not kill;" and having studied the subject with as much care as the time would permit, he delivered a short sermon on it in the forenoon. Having returned to his lodging, he gave strict injunctions to the servant that no one should be allowed to see him during the interval of worship. A stranger, however, who was also one of the persons detained by the state of the weather, expressed an earnest desire to see the minister; and having with difficulty obtained admittance, appeared much agitated, and asked him, with great eagerness, whether he knew him, or had ever seen or heard of him. On receiving assurance that he was totally unacquainted with his face, character, and history, the gentleman proceeded to state, that his sermon on the sixth commandment had reached his conscience; that he was a murderer; that being the second son of a Highland laird, he had some time before, from base and selfish motives, cruelly suffocated his elder brother, who slept in the same bed with him; and that now he had no peace of mind, and wished to surrender himself to justice, to suffer the punishment due to his horrid and unnatural crime. Mr. Erskine asked him if any other person knew any thing of his guilt. His answer was, that so far as he was aware, not a single individual had the least suspicion of it; on which the good man exhorted him to be deeply affected with a sense of his atrocious sin, to make an immediate application to the blood of sprinkling, and to bring forth fruits meet for repentance; but at the same time, since, in providence, his crime had hitherto remained a secret, not to disclose it, or give himself up to public justice. The unhappy gentleman embraced this well intended counsel in all its parts, became truly pious, and maintained a friendly correspondence with Mr. Erskine in future life.

My father, says Prof. B., was one of those still men who, much as he thought of company, carried on his part of conversation in brief questions and monosyllabic answers. He had deceived himself into the belief that his talents were not such as to make it his duty to conduct family worship. With this view, he had lived for more than forty years, in every other respect a consistent Christian. A son, who, at the time referred to, was preparing for the ministry, and already licensed to preach, was spending a vacation at home—the last evening of his stay had arrived—the family Bible, as usual, is placed before him on the stand, with a request to lead in prayer. The thought occurred, that now for a year or more, whatever devotion might be felt, no voice of prayer could be heard in the family, except from the lips of strangers who should turn in for the night. The thought affected him, and endeavoring to use such a manner as would become him in addressing a father almost three-score years and ten, he said—"Father, I delight to lead in this exercise when at home, but I am affected with the thought that there is to be no more prayer here, until I shall return. How is it that you have never established family prayer? I know the diffidence of your nature—I know that it would be hard to overcome it—but would it not have been attended with satisfaction to yourself, and a blessing to the family worth a far greater sacrifice? You can ask a favor of a neighbor—to do the same thing with God, is prayer: and he greatly mistakes, who thinks that the best prayer is that clothed in the most fluent language." The old man was affected—said he knew that it was so—and then gave an account of his feelings and practice in this respect since the commencement of his Christian 398.

PRAYER.

course. Tears glistened in the eyes of some unaccustomed to weep for sin, and the father's expression gave encouragement to hope that the suggestion would not be in vain, and that an altar would still be erected, whence incense and a pure offering should daily rise to Heaven. On the day following, before leaving, the son mentioned the scene of the previous evening to the minister of the place, who took an opportunity to add his influence to what had been said, and it proved effectual. The man whose voice, though for forty years a professed Christian and a father, had never been heard in prayer by his children, at the age of threescore years and ten, commences the discharge of that duty in his family, and so far as I know never ceases until the infirmities of age render it impossible. His children, ten in number, who had not before, have since professed the religion of Christ, though I cannot say how much the father's prayers had to do with this result.

A man in the western country removed into a new town and took the first measures to establish religious meetings. The Lord blessed his exertions; a church 338.

PRAYER.

was formed of which he was chosen deacon, and a minister was settled His family grew up around him, but none of his children were converted, and he felt great anxiety lest family prayer should cease after he should be removed. He lived to be upwards of seventy years old, and all the time his constant prayer was, that God would have mercy on his children and not suffer the lamp of piety to go out in his house. One of the sons moved into the family mansion to take care of the old man, as his wife was dead. He still kept up family prayer as usual, never forgetting to pray for his son, that he might be converted and take his place at the family altar. A revival commenced in the town and the minister heard that there was something unusual at the old family mansion. He called to see them; in one room he beheld six or seven persons weeping, distressed for their sins, and the old man kneeling in one corner with his eyes and hands lifted up to heaven, crying to God to have mercy on his children. The minister attempted to address them, but found every thing he attempted to say far beneath the subject. God was there doing his own work—to this God he kneeled and prayed and then left them. The result was that the son, and several of his children were converted, and the good old man could say with Simeon, "Now Lord lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, for mine eyes have seen thy salvation."

# 3.9. Giving Thanks at Meals.

A little girl went to the Peter-street, Wardour-street, Sunday school, Westminster, for about two years: her conduct and conversation were always very exemplary. Her parents paid little or no regard to religion; but when, on a Sunday, her father was going out to take his pleasure she would often say, "Father, the people are going and coming out of church, why do you not go?" and such like expressions. Her death was caused by an accident, some boiling liquid being thrown over her, on the 20th of November, 1821. She lingered until the next day, and then died, aged eight years. She bore the anguish with great patience and resignation; and about two hours before her death, she said to her father, "I am going to heaven; I hope you will go to chapel, that you may go to heaven when you die;" and he solemnly promised to do as she requested. He accordingly attended public worship, and the first discourses he heard all seemed to be directed only to and for him. He then had reason to remember his dear child, and her words; and a radical change ensued. He constantly attended there; the word of eternal life was blessed to his soul, and he became a communicant. There was also a change at home; the mother generally attended with her husband. Thus, through the instrumentality of this little girl, a whole family was brought near to God.

I can state, says Mr. Wilderspin, that a man discontinued drunkenness from the simple prattle of his infant. He was in the habit of frequently getting drunk; there were two or three children under seven years of age, and they all slept in the same room, though not in the same bed. The man came home one night drunk; his wife remonstrated with him, when he struck her. The woman cried very much, and continued to cry after she got into bed: but a little creature, two or three years old, got up, and said, "Pray, father, do not beat poor mother;" the father ordered it to get into bed again: the little creature got up again, and knelt down by the side of the bed, and repeated the Lord's prayer, and then concluded in this simple language: "Pray, God, bless dear father and mother, and make father a good father. Amen!" This went to the heart of the drunkard; the man told me he covered his face over with the bed-clothes, and that the first thoughts he awoke with in the morning, were thoughts of regret, that he should stand in need of such a remonstrance from such a young child, and it produced in him self-examination and amendment of life. The family became united to a Methodist chapel in that neighborhood, and I have learned that they are useful and valuable members of that society.

The Rev. Mr. Solomon Carpenter held a religious meeting in Sussex county, Mass., at the house of a man who was awfully addicted to swearing, and the minister took occasion to reprove this and other vices. A little girl belonging to the family withdrew, and placed herself behind the door, and began to weep very bitterly. Her father particularly asked her the cause of this, and she told him she was afraid he would go to hell on account of his swearing. He at length promised her that if she would refrain from weeping he would never swear any more. The child was now quiet, and in an ecstasy of joy afterwards told her mother of the promise she had obtained from her father. The unexpected reproof the father had thus received from his daughter was lastingly impressed on his mind; he became a humble penitent, and lived to be a shining light in the Christian community conduced to my health." He answered, "I believe it has. But did you not do it likewise to save money?" I said I did, "for what I save from my own meat, will feed another, that else would have none." "But, sir," said he, "if this be your motive you may save more. I know a man that goes to market at the beginning of every week; there he buys a pennyworth of parsnips, which he boils in a large quantity of water. The parsnips serve him for food, and the water for drink, during the ensuing week, so that his meat and drink together cost him only a penny a week. This he constantly did, though he had two hundred pounds a year, to pay the debts he had contracted before he knew God!" And this is he whom I set down to be a covetous man!

# DREN.

with which he was afterwards connected.