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MEANS OF DOING GOOD.

direct our mortal pilgrimage. Meek Spring of heavenly Wisdom, boundless Ocean of universal, ardent, unprovoked, and undiscouraged charity, pour thy Spirit into my breast, and into the breasts of all thy servants whom I here address. Teach them to interest themselves in this blessed work, as becomes men, who are distinguished by thy venerable name, and honoured by the ministration of thy glorious Gospel! Baptize us all with the fire of that love which is stronger than death! Delightfully oppress our gratitude with the everlasting mountains of thy benefits, until every sentiment of frail mortality be suppressed,—until faith give us the victory over the world,-over life and death,—until love compel each of us to exclaim, Yea, doubtless, and I count all things but dross that I may win Christ; and I am willing not only to suffer bonds, but to die for the sake of my Lord Jesus Christ, by whom I am crucified unto the world and the world unto me."

CHAPTER V.

OTHER MEANS OF DOING GOOD BESIDES TEACHING.

It is no dim mark of the wisdom of God, that since he has planted in the human soul a love of variety and a desire of change,-the present never satisfying the heart, he has made abundant provision in all the departments of life to meet these wants. The employments of life, so wearing upon the spirit, must be checked and broken up every day by sleep,—the cares of life must be laid aside for food, and to supply the wants of the body; the change of seasons must change the employments, and, in some measure, the dress of every family. From childhood to the grave, provision is made for us to pass through changes almost infinite. The farmer, whose employment is more necessary to the suste

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nance of the world than any other, would find it drudgery, and life itself a dreary, prolonged misery, were it not for the constant changes in his business. As it is, this constant change, the new objects continually coming up, render his employment one of the most delightful and bewitching possible; and I doubt not that Washington had more happiness and saw more charms in life while making his experiments, inventing his tools, and managing his farms, than while he occupied the chair of state, the admiration of his country and of the world. This variety, incidental and necessary to every kind of business, ought to be regarded as one of those decided marks of the wisdom and goodness of God, which he has devised to keep the mind from being too weary, and the habits of the soul from becoming monotonous, and itself torpid. Is it not an admitted fact, that when a man does but one thing,—such, for example, as grinding the glasses for the lens of a telescope, from sun to sun, and from year to year, from childhood to old age, that such a man is not cheerful, intelligent, or, in our sense of the word, happy. All elasticity of the soul is naturally destroyed by monotonous labour. The more laborious and responsible the duties and station, so much greater is the need of variety to relieve the mind and feelings. A minister of the Gospel would wear out shortly, were it not that God has connected variety with his office. Were he to write all the time, he would become exhausted and nervous. Were he to speak all the time, he would either destroy the mind by keeping it strained up too high, or become insufferably dull. Were he to visit all the time, his mind would be too undisciplined to allow him to be even a tolerable preacher. It is from the fact that these various duties are connected so as to relieve tedium, and to call different powers and sympathies into exercise, that the pastoral office perfects the character of a minister,

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MEANS OF DOING GOOD.—VISITING.

making all parts more symmetrical and well-propor tioned, than any other station in the ministry.

These remarks apply in their full force to the duties of the Sunday-school teacher. His great duty is to instruct his class, but collateral with this, there are other duties equally necessary, and equally important to render his character complete, and the sphere of his usefulness full. They will add equally to his happiness and usefulness. I propose, then, in this chapter, to mention some of the collateral means of doing good, which the teacher has in his power.

I. A regular system of visiting the families to which the scholars in your class severally belong.

You have seen friends become cold, distant, and finally break away, and never again become reconciled to each other. You have seen husband and wife change, revile and hate each other, separate, while every year only seemed to render their enmity more intense. The link once broken between husband and wife can seldom be mended. But you do not often see children and parents becoming enemies. Let the child be deformed and diseased, and it does not wean him from the love of his parents; let him become an idiot, and their love will not change; let him become vile, and they will throw the mantle of charity over him, and still encircle him in the brightness of hope; let him leave his home, and herd with the vile, and throw away all that is lovely or valuable, and they will still cling to him. And even when he is so degraded that he feeds with the swine in the field, on the first appearance of his return, however poor and wretched, the father sees him afar off, and runs to meet him,— to fall on his neck, and to call him his son. It is hardly possible to wear out or to annihilate this heavenplanted love between parent and child. And it is the existence of this love which gives the Sunday-school

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teacher such power. In committing his children to you, the father commits his highest hopes,-the mother her richest treasure. It is like a deed by which they commit their all to you. Does not the Apostle recognise this principle, and appeal to it, when he says that God, who spared not his only-begotten Son, will with him freely give us all things? By having the children put into your hands, you have a means of doing good to those parents and to their family, unspeakably great. You wish to know the influences, under which this and that child has thus far been placed. A visit to his parents will help you to understand them. You wish to have this and that trait of character corrected. The parents either do not see the faults, or know not how to correct them. A few hints from you may aid them greatly. Perhaps the members of the family are not in the habit of going to the house of God. You may, by a careful use of your influence, lead them there. They may have notions and impressions concerning your school, or concerning religion, which counteract all that you can do on the Sabbath. A few visits may remove all these impressions. They may be bringing up their children in idleness, ignorance, and sin; and your counsels may alter the whole course of their conduct in this respect. You can see their condition, and shortly can place in their hands a tract, or something of the kind, which will exactly meet the evil you wish to correct. Knowing the habits of the family, you can aid the child in selecting such books as will be useful at home, and encourage him to read, or to have them read at home. If you can once gain the confidence of the child, the way is open, and it will be easy to gain the confidence of the parents; and when that is gained, it will add to your former influence over the child. physician once said to me, that he had a patient in whose cure he could make no progress. Every visit

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found him in a new condition, and with new symptoms. Every medicine prescribed seemed to work by a new and unheard-of rule. At length the physician set himself to work to find out the difficulty. It was this: the mother of the patient took it into her head that the prescriptions of the physician were too powerful for the constitution of her child, and in order to counteract their supposed mischievous tendency, she gave some powerful nostrum soon after taking the medicine, as an antidote. It is just so with many children. Their parents are constantly neutralizing all that you do on the Sabbath. This evil can be met and removed only by your visiting the family. I would recommend that you visit regularly once a month, every child in your class, even if your call is but short. It should make no difference with you whether the parents are rich or poor,-high or low. All who are willing to commit their children to you will be glad to see you, and will be grateful for the interest you take in the walfare of their children. In addition to this, you ought to call upon every child who is absent, before the Sabbath following. The child may be sick, and in that case he will be glad to see you. He may have fallen into bad company, and in that case you ought at once to see him. He may have deceived his parents, and in that case they ought to know it. I have never known other than a good school, where the rule was invariably practised, that every child who is absent from the school, shall be visited during the following week. I cannot too strenuously urge its importance. But be careful not to let these calls to inquire after delinquencies, seem like duns, as a creditor calls upon a debtor, when the visit is disagreeable to both parties. Let there be so much of heart in all your intercourse with parents, that they shall see that you seek only the real welfare of their child. If possible, always

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