spring of joyful obedience cannot long exist. If the child finds or even fancies his parent hard to please, he will soon lose his best incentive to effort, and sink to the worthlessness, because to the misery, of a slave. And this he will soon find or fancy, if often provoked to anger by the parent. And if he cannot please his own parent, whom will he hope to please? He therefore becomes discouraged, likewise, in his general purpose of well-doing. The bright morning of hope is overcast. He feels alone in the world, "with none to bless him, none that he can bless." And, "this," will he reiterate from a poisoned heart that once felt all its blasting wo, "this, this is to be alone," though "amid the shock and hum of men." Alienated from his kind, and the hope of pleasing gone, all desire and effort to please are abandoned. it 5. Not only does it endanger the happiness and usefulness of the child in this life, but also his future salvation. When and how the cord is struck that hardens fatally the heart against the calls of the Gospel, we may not know till the final judgment. But, in many instances, it may be much sooner than we should imagine, and by a hand we should least suspect. And can it sometimes be by the hand of even a fond parent? Shocking as is the thought, may be so. And if so, by what blow is it more likely to be inflicted than by one of this kind? Suppose you were roused, by some special cause, to seek earnestly the conversion of your child within the compass of one week, should you not be exceedingly cautious not to provoke that child to anger during the week? and were you, by some ill-judged word or deed, to excite his rage, would not your hopes be dashed? Is not this the dictate of nature, or rather of your knowledge of the human heart? If one instance, then, would mar your efforts for a week, what would be the result of a frequent repetition of such instances in marring your efforts and hopes for a whole life? It is the goodness of God that leadeth to repentance. This some are charged by the apostle with "not knowing." And how often is it likewise the fact that the remembered kindness of a pious mother, long after her death, is found, like a live coal, in the bosom of a wayward son, the only thing to rekindle his con victions, and to impart a saving power to her long-resisted admonitions. But where would have been that undying power of hers, if she had often provoked that son to wrath? And where, as a consequence, would have been his soul? And not only may our own salutary influence be thus destroyed, but also the influence of others, and of the whole Gospel, on our children. Make a child a misanthrope, and you have well nigh sealed his doom for both worlds. In another passage already quoted from the apostle, he warns us not to provoke our children to wrath, but to bring them up the nurture and admonition of the Lord. Here he sets the one course over against the other in the attitude of an alternative. Both we cannot pursue. If we provoke them to wrath, we cannot train them up for God, and may never meet them in heaven. If such, then, may be the evils of provoking our children to anger, where is the mother in a christian land who will not be anxious to know how she may avoid these evils? But this branch of the subject must be deferred to a future number. (To be continued.) For the Mother's Magazine. THE YOUNG MOTHER. No deeper emotion can touch the human heart than thrills through every nerve when the young mother looks on her first born. A cord is struck before untouched. As the boy sleeps quietly in his cradle she gazes on him with feelings to which she had before been a stranger. She has loved her husband-her affections have been warm towards father, mother, brothers and sisters. But now her emotions are of a new class-a different order-strange-undefinable-so tender that her eye fills with tears while she gazes-so rapturous that her blood dances in wild yet soft delight through her veins. In its strength it may be felt again—in its strange novelty it never returns. A mother knows it now, or remembers it as past, but both pen and tongue are utterly powerless to describe it. T From infancy to romping childhood, when sickness and fears are absent, what an incessant source of delight is found in every new indication of intelligence! The first smile-how sweet! The first manifested recognition of its mother-how it makes her heart to dance! The first attempt to walk-the first effort to speak-the young mother cannot reason herself into the belief that ever child was before so deeply interesting. To her it is such a being as never before existed. It is indeed most wise and kind in the good Author of our being to implant such deep affection in the parental heart. The cares and anxieties of rearing our offspring are compensated by present pleasure, instead of waiting a distant reward. If every day has its toils, it brings also rich present enjoyment. That heart is cold-it is not a parent's heart, that can sneer at a mother's fond partiality for her child. Let her feel that no other child ever presented such claims to a mother's love. It is her privilege to feel this, and to taste all the pleasure that such a feeling, unrestrained by cold and heartless reasoning, can give. Indeed no reasoning can clothe another child to her with any portion of the interest which hers presents. She sees and admires the beauty and the sportive smiles and gambols of another's infant-but these in her own reach a deeper fountain-they strike at once on the heart's finest cords. It would seem scarcely possible that a mother should not be a religious woman. The deep affection and tender solicitude for her offspring lead her to look for some higher power than her own to shield and protect its helplessness, and looking to the future she desires some sure and ever-present guide to accompany her child amidst the temptations and vicissitudes of life. She must look up-she must feel how weak her arm-how impotent her best skill. Knowing, as every one in a christian land does, that there is an abounding fountain of wisdom-a power unrestricted by time or place or circumstance-she cannot, when she looks on her infant, and her full heart is overflowing-she cannot but look up with gratitude, and offer up her prayers for that protection and for those blessings which an infinite Being only can bestow. E. W. C. For the Mother's Magazine. LITTLE ELLEN. "Sanctify me, oh Lord"-this simple petition I. had often uttered and pondered in my heart, but I can never hear it now without a still sweeter association and remembrance-memory recurs to a winter at the south only a few months since. The family group were gathered in the parlor for the evening, and the mother of little Ellen and Henry, after bidding them good night, had left them, saying, "Be kindly affectioned one to another." The elements without were stirring with the approach of a winter's storm, the winds beat fitfully against the mansion, and the thunder was rumbling in the distance. It grew still nearer, but yet in our closed apartments the lightning had not been visible, till with startling power the whole room was filled with a glare of lightning, succeeded almost instantly by a terrific peal of thunder. The mother sprang to the bedside of little Henry and Ellen, her children lay calm and quiet, while Ellen repeated "Sanctify me, oh Lord." It was a scene for a painter!—for a lover of the beautiful and sublime! but more than all for the christian mother, who loves the Savior's words, "Suffer little children to come unto me, and forbid them not." Little Ellen was but five years old, and it is not supposed that she could understand, in its fullness and richness of meaning, the words "Sanctify me, oh Lord," her comprehension and petition only extended to take care of me, and make me good, oh Lord. But here was already the fruits of a pious mother's instructions, already her child, in an hour of fear and danger, looked up, calmly trusting her heavenly Father, with the confidence of the Psalmist when he exclaimed, "Therefore will not we fear though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea." TO MARY H. H. For the Mother's Magazine. TO MARY H. H., AGED EIGHT MONTHS. I saw thee, Mary, lovely one, I saw thee pale and suffering, I saw thee lone and silent laid I long'd to fold thee in my arms I saw them bear thee slow away- It bade me turn an eye of faith I dried my tears-how bright the bliss I saw thee happiest of the throng I heard thy own unfettered tongue Mary, how strange! but yesterday I see thee still, dear, lovely one, Unchanged thou art, save that the clog For ever loving and beloved, How swift thy moments glide! I wish thee joy, I wish thee joy, Speed thee-immortal is the race- S. |