God has so ordered the circumstances of infantile development that parents cannot avoid imparting to their children peculiar and permanent impressions which go very far to make up their character for life. This is emphatically true of mothers. A greater amount of influential knowledge is usually acquired by a child during the first five or six years of its existence than at any subsequent equal period. Habits of thought, of investigation, and of industry, or of mental and physical slothfulness, have their origin in early childhood. The same is true of the disposition, and to a great extent, of the propensities to good or evil. Who but a mother can gain a sufficiently early access to the minds and hearts of her children to secure for them a right direction? Maternal influence in the formation of character is far more efficacious than is the paternal; and if it be true that God has instituted family government as a part of his moral administration, as has been already shown, how immensely important is it that all mothers should rightly understand its nature and the principles upon which it is to be administered?

It is believed that scarcely any department of human duty is so much insisted upon and so fully explained in the Bible as that now under consideration. To both parents and children God has given, upon this subject, "line upon line, and precept upon precept." Not only so, but he has fully depicted the fearful consequences of parental unfaithfulness. Whoever will compare what the Bible teaches on this subject, with the state of society as it now actually exists, will be startled by the conviction that nine-tenths of all the evils which now afflict the race are justly attributable to the neglect or mal-administration of family government. By many this whole subject is treated as a matter of very little moment. Others, admitting its importance in theory, almost entirely neglect it in practice. While others still, from the want of the proper investigation and of established principles of action, so grossly pervert the institution as to render it utterly inefficient.

Every parent, as the governor of his household, holds his commission from the court of heaven; and if it were not for the fact that he also holds clear and specific instructions from the same

unerring source, his position would be deplorable. If he were to be held responsible for the results of his administration, without having any guidance as to the nature and duties of his trust, he might well adopt the lamentation, "O that I had never been born." But, blessed be God, his duties are made as clear as is his authority; and if he proves himself in all respects true and faithful, he may go on his way rejoicing in the assurance that his "children are an heritage from the Lord." An unfaithful parent, however, must abide the consequences of his folly. Brooklyn, N. Y.

THETA.

FILIAL TRIBUTE.

The following acknowledgment of John Quincy Adams was made in a reply to an allusion to his mother, in a complimentary address of Hon. George N. Briggs, in Mr. Adams' late tour:

"Allusion has been made to the instructions of my mother, and honorable mention has been made of her as a mother in Israel. What man-that can be called man-would not, must not be affected, at the commemoration of his mother's virtues before such an assembly of his fellow-citizens? It is true, she was renowned even in that period of renowned men of our country. And is it not due to the occasion, to this numerous witness of the declaration made by my friend, as to the nurturing care of my mother-is it not due to gratitude, to nature, that he should in this audience of his fellow-citizens acknowledge and avow that such as I have been, whatever it was, that such as I am, whatever it is, and such as I hope to be in all futurity, must be ascribed, under Providence, to the precepts and examples of my mother."

For the Mother's Magazine.

WE MUST KNOW AND LOVE OUR BIBLE MORE.

This is an age of perversion, when the effervescence of things float about us, when we are tempted from every quarter to read

every thing but the Bible, and when no persecution drives us to the word to live on its promises; but we have our feet in the little streams that murmur and gurgle about us, and we neglect to bathe our whole souls in the pure fountain which would make us entirely clean. Without this blessed book how can we be clad in the whole armor of God, or lay hold upon the "sword of the Spirit," which is the word of God. On a sick and dying bed I doubt not among our deepest regrets will be that the living word does not dwell in us richly.

If then this is an age when the Bible is neglected in one sense, it is an age when the Bible is most emphatically needed, even the very words of our Bible to controvert the subtle errors abroad in our land. Let us begin with ourselves, and be Bible christians in heart, in knowledge, in doctrine, and in practice; let our children live as it were in a Bible atmosphere, where there is no dimness to cloud the mind, but where the only telescope of truth presents the past, present and future more vividly and distinctly before us than any thing else. We little know the forms of delusion that may assail our children, but we know of no greater safeguard to throw about them as a shield and buckler, or more noble impress to stamp upon their young hearts, than the very words that were written by holy men of God that spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. We shall not then find children of pious parents far advanced in the higher branches of learning (as they are called) and spending hours of each day in attaining accuracy and perfection in some accomplishment, conversant perhaps with the mythology of the ancients, yet deplorably ignorant of the Scriptures. We have reason indeed to condemn ourselves that this knowledge is not made paramount to every other acquisition, when we remember that it is in direct disobedience to God's definite command: "Therefore shall ye lay up these my words in your heart, and in your soul, and bind them for a sign upon your hand, that they may be as frontlets between your eyes. And ye shall teach them to your children, speaking of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, when thou liest down and when thou risest up." It was important that the Jewish children should know of the way of the.

Lord and his past dealings, and so it is for ours, who are gathered from among the Gentiles. We, too, often attach trifling importance to this precise, literal information, and yet there is not an incident in the Old Testament but either throws some light on the New Testament, or the New reveals some explanation of its more concealed mysteries. This knowledge will give a distinctness to our ideas of the character and attributes of God, and shed light upon God's providential dealings.

An awakened soul feels the power and significance of every scriptural term as it fastens on the conscience, and asks for no other proof of its inspiration. Were our own hearts filled with them we could not have such a dearth of ideas, such a mere miscellany as we often find drawn from epitomes of divine truth, for we should be ushered into a new world with grand reefs of thought to dwell upon. We could then grasp eternal truths with strength and vigor, while there would be a freshness in our piety, and with the influences of the Holy Spirit a blessed and luminous reality. We could not then be satisfied with gathering flowers, but should acknowledge that we had erred and strayed from rich pastures like lost sheep, and that hereafter we will not wander from a fold that is fraught with that inspiration that is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction and for instruction in righteousness. Our devotional reading will still furnish drink for our thirsty souls, while searching the Scriptures as for hid treasure will be the filling our nets with a large draught.

If there is any thing in the "mother's face," so is there in the mother's manner, and if the whole word of God is engrafted in her soul it will impart that unction of manner which cannot fail to impress her children. And while the little group, of different ages, gather about her, she should be able to dispense to each one in proportion to their capabilities, from time to time, and continually and accurately, that narration of those wonderfully interesting details concerning the creation of the world and the succeeding events, and then the Lord's dealings with the Israelites and his people; the deep devotional strains of the Psalmist the prophecies that are plain before us-and the story of our Savior-Paul's interesting history, and of the things new and old from the

Epistles. How ennobling to form the taste of the young aspirant who thirsts for the images of the beautiful and sublime, from the lofty strains of Isaiah and Jeremiah, and to inspire the mind of the lisping one, as he hears the simple words, "Suffer little children to come unto me," to

"Wish that his hand had been placed on my head,

"That his arms had been thrown around me, "And that I had seen his kind look when he said "Let the little ones come unto me."

Let us then be mindful of the things that were written afore time for our learning, and keep them as a perpetual token of remembrance.

Our purpose will be gained if this little volume and all else is laid aside really to catch the Inspiration of the Bible-Inspiration-how electrical the word, no other volume of the past or present can claim it, or carry such conviction of its power and truth to every conscience.

HABITS OF READING.

Character is formed more as the result of habits of daily reading than we are accustomed to think. Scarcely less depends on these than on the character of the books read. One man will glance over a dozen books, gaining some general conception of their contents, but without mastering a single thought and making it his own; while another in the perusal of a single work will gather materials of thought and conversation for a lifetime. Grimke, of South Carolina, an eminent scholar and orator, attributed his distinction to the influence of the thorough reading and study of a single book-Butler's Analogy: while thousands, if they would confess the truth, might ascribe their mental dissipation and imbecility to the indiscriminate and cursory reading of whatever comes in their way.

There is an evil in this direction that lies back of the character