who would erect his church to God;* that God whose altars he was overthrowing, whose name he was vilifying, whose gospel he was extirminating, and the very name of whose Son he had solemnly pledged himself to blot from the face of the earth !

Though it be impossible here to enumerate all those Christian virtues which should be impressed in the progress of a Christian education, yet in this connexion I cannot forbear mentioning one which more immediately grows out of the subject; and to remark, that the principle which should be the invariable concomitant of all instruction, and especially of religious instruction, is humility. As this temper is inculcated in every page of the gospel; as it is deducible from every precept and every action of Christ; that is a sufficient intimation that it should be made to grow out of every study, that it should be grafted on every acquisition. It is the turning point, the leading principle indicative of the very genius, of the very being of Christianity. This chastising quality should therefore be constantly made in education to operate as the only counteraction of that "knowledge which puffeth up." Youth should be taught, that as humility is the discriminating characteristic of our religion, therefore a proud Christian, a haughty disciple of a crucified Master, furnishes perhaps a stronger opposition in terms, than the whole compass of language can exhibit. They should be taught that humility, being the appropriate grace of Christianity, is precisely the thing which makes Christian and pagan virtues essentially different. The virtues of the Romans, for instance, were obviously founded in pride; as a proof of this, they had not even a word in their copious language to express humility,

* Deo, erexit Voltaire, "To God, erected by Voltaire," is the inscription affixed by himself on his church at Ferney.

but what was used in a bad sense, and conveyed the idea of meanness or vileness, of baseness and servility. Christianity so stands on its own single ground, is so far from assimilating itself to the spirit of other religions, that, unlike the Roman emperor, who, though he would not become a Christian, yet ordered that the image of Christ should be set up in the Pantheon with those of the heathen gods, and be worshipped in common with them; Christianity not only rejects all such partnerships with other religions, but it pulls down their images, defaces their temples, tramples on their honours, founds its own existence on the ruins of spurious religions and spurious virtues, and will be every thing when it is admitted to be any thing. Will it be going too much out of the way to observe, that Christian Britain retaliates upon pagan Rome? For if the former used humility in a bad sense, has not the latter learnt to use pride in a good one? May we without impertinence venture to remark, that in the deliberations of as honourable and upright political assemblies as ever adorned, or, under Providence, upheld a country; in orations which leave us nothing to envy in Attic or Roman eloquence in their best days; it were to be wished that we did not borrow from Rome an epithet which suited the genius of her religion, as much as it militates against that of ours? The panegyrist of the battle of Marathon, of Platea, or of Zama, might with propriety speak of a "proud day," or a "proud event,' 66 or a proud success." But surely the Christian encomiasts of the battle of the Nile might, from their abundance, select an epithet better appropriated to such a victory-a victory which, by preserving Europe, has perhaps preserved that religion which sets its foot on the very neck of pride, and in which the conqueror himself, even in the first ardours of triumph, forgot not to ascribe

8

the victory to Almighty God. Let us leave to the enemy both the term and the thing; arrogant words being the only weapons in which we must ever vail to their decided superiority. As we most despair of the victory, let us disdain the contest.

Above all things, you must beware that your pupils do not take up with a vague, general, and undefined religion; but look to it, that their Christianity be really the religion of Christ. Instead of slurring over the doctrines of the cross, as disreputable appendages to our religion, which are to be disguised or got over as well as we can, but which are never to be dwelt upon, take care to make these your grand fundamental articles. Do not dilute or explain away these doctrines, and, by some elegant periphrasis, hint at a Saviour, instead of making him the foundation-stone of your system. Do not convey primary, and plain, and awful, and indispensable truths elliptically-I mean, as something that is to be understood without being expressed-nor study fashionable circumlocutions to avoid names and things on which our salvation hangs, in order to prevent your discourse from being offensive. Persons who are thus instructed in religion, with more good breeding than seriousness and simplicity, imbibe a distaste for plain scriptural language; and the scriptures themselves are so little in use with a certain fashionable class of readers, that when the doctrines and language of the bible occasionally occur in other authors, or in conversation, they present a sort of novelty and peculiarity which offend; and such readers as disuse the bible are apt, from a supposed delicacy of taste, to call that precise and puritanical which is in fact sound and scriptural. Nay, it has several times happened to the author to hear persons of sense and learning ridicule insulated sentiments and expressions that have fallen in their way, which they would have

treated with decent respect, had they known them to be, as they really were, texts of scripture. This observation is hazarded with a view to enforce the importance of early communicating religious knowledge, and of infusing an early taste for the venerable phraseology of scripture.

The persons in question thus possessing a kind of pagan Christianity, are apt to acquire a sort of pagan expression also, which just enables them to speak with complacency of the "Deity," of a " first cause," and of "conscience." Nay, some may even go so far as to talk of " the Founder of our religion," of the "Author of Christianity," in the same general terms as they would talk of the prophet of Arabia, or the lawgiver of China, of Athens, or of the Jews. But their refined ears revolt not a little at the unadorned name of Christ; and especially the naked and unqualified term of our Saviour, or Redeemer, carries with it a queerish, inelegant, not to say a suspicious sound. They will express a serious disapprobation of what is wrong, under the moral term of vice, or the forensic term of crime; but they are apt to think that the scripture term of sin has something fanatical in it; and, while they discover a great respect for morality, they do not much relish holiness, which is indeed the specific and only morality of a Christian. They will speak readily of a man's reforming, or leaving off a vicious habit, or growing more correct in some individual practice; but the idea conveyed under any of the scripture phrases signifying a total change of heart, they would stigmatize as the very shibboleth of a sect, though it is the language of a liturgy they affect to admire, and of a gospel which they profess to receive.

CHAPTER XIII.

Hints suggested for furnishing young persons with a scheme of prayer.

THOSE who are aware of the inestimable value of prayer themselves, will naturally be anxious not only that this duty should be earnestly inculcated on their children, but that they should be taught it in the best manner; and such parents need little persuasion or counsel on the subject. Yet children of decent and orderly (I will not say of strictly religious) families are often so superficially instructed in this important business, that, when they are asked what prayers they use, it is not unusual for them to answer, "the Lord's Prayer and the Creed." And even some who are better taught, are not always made to understand with sufficient clearness the specific distinction between the two; that the one is the confession of their faith, and the other the model for their supplications. By this confused and indistinct beginning, they set out with a perplexity in their ideas, which is not always completely disentangled in more advanced life.

An intelligent mother will seize the first occasion which the child's opening understanding shall allow, for making a little course of lectures on the Lord's Prayer, taking every division or short sentence separately; for each furnishes valuable materials for a distinct lecture. The child should be led gradually through every part of this divine composition; she should be taught to break it into all the regular divisions, into which, indeed, it so naturally resolves itself. She should be made to comprehend