became a sincere and devoted Christian, and, disciplined by trial, was eminently faithful in service. But who can doubt that this Divine change and life of service were the result and reward of parental training and parental prayers?

Examples of a similar character might be greatly multiplied. There is scarcely a Christian biography that does not, in some form or other, bear testimony to the value of Christian home-life, to the power and the blessed results of early Christian teaching and training. Here the father, there the mother, or perhaps a pious servant or sister, has been the means of implanting in the heart of the child the germ of truth, which God in secret and silence has preserved and nurtured to everlasting life. Newton says of his mother, "She made it the chief business and pleasure of her life to instruct me, and bring me up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord." Was not his life, after years of such strange wandering and rebellion, her reward? Cecil bears testimony,-" I find in myself another evidence of the greatness of parental influence. I detect myself to this day laying down maxims in my family, which I took up at three or four years of age, before I could possibly know the reason of them." Again: "The implantation of principles is of unspeakable importance, especially when culled from time to time out of the Bible. The child feels his parents' authority supported by the Bible, and the authority of the Bible supported by his parents' weight and influA man can very seldom get rid of these principles. They stand in his way. He wishes to forget them, perhaps; but it is impossible. Where parental influence does not convert, it hampers. It

ence.

1

hangs on the wheels of evil." Bishop Hall's mother is described as "a woman of extraordinary piety." Of Richard Hooker, the learned author of "Ecclesiastical Polity," it is said, "These seeds of piety were so seasonably planted, and so continually watered with the daily dew of God's blessed Spirit, that his infant virtues grew into such holy habits, as did make him grow daily into more and more favour both with God and man." The names of George Herbert, John Howe, Dr. Watts, John Foster, Robert Hall, men of very diverse intellectual character, and occupying very different positions in the church of God, will readily occur to many as proof of the high value of parental influence and teaching. In all these cases, and in many others which might be cited, either the father or the mother-often both-have been faithful to their duty in seeking to lead their children in the way of the Lord. And God has, in all ages, proved himself faithful to his promise, faithful to the gracious arrangements of family life, by giving them the reward of their pious solicitude, and making them, through their children, a blessing to all generations.

1 Cecil," Remains."

2

Life, by Walton.

80

CHAPTER VI.

THE FORMATION OF CHARACTER PERSONAL HABITS.

THE formation of character is, after all, the great object of education. What a child is, will always, to the right-thinking parent, be a more important consideration than what he knows, even though the question relate to religious knowledge. Nothing is done if this be left undone. No amount of learning or accomplishments can compensate for serious defects here. The wise man teaches us the relation of both these important aspects of parental duty when, addressing his own son, he says, "I have taught thee in the way of wisdom; I have led thee in right paths."

1

In this, as in all other things pertaining to our moral life, God graciously puts the highest blessing within our reach, even where he sees fit to deny those which, though more sought after, are really inferior. Who, on serious consideration, would prefer the material good to the spiritual? Who would not rather desire for his children that they should belong to

"A virtuous household, though exceeding poor,"

than that they should possess riches or greatness without the virtue? Who is not convinced that to educate his children in honesty, truth, industry,

1 Prov. iv. 1.

usefulness, is of unmeasurably greater importance, even as to this life, than to secure for them, irrespective of these things, the highest positions earth could give? "If the fellow turns out well," writes John Foster on the birth of his son, "I shall not so much mind about his being extra clever. It is goodness that the world is wretched for wanting."

These considerations press with greatest force upon the child's spiritual relations and destiny. The formation of character for eternity is the most sacred and the noblest work which God has intrusted, instrumentally, to man. This is the work of parents. They are called upon, by the position they hold, to train immortal souls for the enjoyment and service of God for ever. They have these souls intrusted to them from the earliest period of their existence, so that they may seize the first opportunity of commencing their stupendous task. Every appliance for the work is theirs in the natural affection of the parent for the child, and the child for the parent. Every facility is given for it in the free and constant intercourse of home-life. Children naturally look to their parents for instruction and example; and of all influences to which they are subject, save that of the almighty Spirit of God, that which parents exert upon them is the deepest and most lasting. With such a duty, and such means for discharging it, the wisest and holiest may well feel burdened with responsibility. None will faithfully fulfil the duty but those who seek wisdom and strength from Him who has committed it to them.

In this view of the duty there is one most important consideration to be premised,-the absolute necessity

G

of the Holy Spirit's influence in order to that renewal, without which the formation of a Christian character is impossible. The parent who should exclude this from his thoughts in his highest wishes for his children's welfare has never truly discerned what their highest welfare is. And to attempt to form a Christian character by any mere human agency or influence, even by the wisest and most constant skill and watchfulness, apart from His gracious power, is the most egregious folly, and an insult to the Divine majesty. He may, it is true, in the exercise of his sovereign power renew the heart and form the character of the child whose parents have only been concerned to give an externally moral training; just as he may, in the exercise of the same sovereignty, make the most unlikely means effectual to conversion, and the most unlikely persons, according to human estimate, to become new creatures in Christ Jesus: but it is where earnest, faithful effort is combined with humble, watchful, believing prayer for the operation of his Divine Spirit on the heart, that we may look for the largest results. In such cases, the promise supports our prayer and justifies our highest hopes.

The absolute necessity of the Divine power to renew the heart, and the gracious promise of God to those who seek his Holy Spirit, cannot be too constantly recognised in the formation of character. Comparatively little observation and experience will show us the deep-rooted corruption of our sinful nature, and will scatter to the winds the figment of the native purity of childhood. Innocent, children are, inasmuch as they have neither the power nor the temptation to commit crime or to indulge