CHAPTER XIII.

OUR party being once more assembled, the conversation seemed to be suggested by a remark of my friend, Mr. Conway, whose love of discipline was frequently manifested by the nature of his observations.

I will freely confess to you, my dear friend, he said, that you have given me altogether a new view of the duties of parents, and in doing so, have turned my mind with very serious reflection on that dependence we ought to have on the Lord, and which I have hitherto little understood: my only wonder is, how I have had so much success with our dear girl, whose obedience has been of that prompt and uniform nature which would scarcely leave room for the question whether it were from love.

It makes me happy to hear these sentiments, my friend, because it shows the very thing to be working you for which I have so often longed; and as to your dear child, she is one of those few characters,

in

which we may, in Scripture terms, call "upright." She has imbibed from your example, a respect for discipline, and a conscientious desire to do right; but she has had, I trust, a savor of grace beyond this, which made her heart restless for something else; and I think you will find henceforth, a tone and manner in her obedience of a much higher cast, because of being graciously taught the love of God, and that the delight of duty is in that love. She is one of those instances in whom we see the Scriptures verified, he that will do the will of the Lord, shall know of the doctrine. She has had, besides, another great advantage in that conformity of precept and example which subsists between you and your wife. She has had a uniform system; the obedience to one parent was obedience to the other, and thus she has been strengthened in habits of duty by the double care of both.

I must confess again that I am a friend to discipline, and should be sorry if this addition of love to honor should be found to weaken its effect.

That it never can, if it be the love of God. There is perhaps a remarkable proof, in that which is said of Abraham, whose love of God was so fully displayed, in Genesis xviii. 19; where the Lord says of him,

"For I know him, that he will command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of the Lord, to do justice and judgment; that the Lord may bring upon Abraham that which he hath spoken of him." There can be no stronger discipline than such as is here described, and yet this love, we know, was of that intense kind, which would not withhold anything from God.

Mrs. Conway observed, I think I see a new system of education springing up amongst us; and it has caused me much reflection,-because I am not thoroughly persuaded whether to approve or condemn it. May I be permitted to point it out?

We shall be grateful for any observations which may tend to give us clearer ideas on this important subject.

It is this: I find among many of my friends, a determination not to exact from their children any act of obedience, but by the power of reasoning with them. I have seen them spend an hour at a time, perhaps, to convince a child that it ought to do what is desired, for such and such reasons, ultimately to issue in advantages to itself. I certainly have seen the child yield in the end, but I have also seen a pertinacious adherence

to the first feeling which prompted a refusal. I have watched the effect, and it appears to me that it does not succeed in obtaining that kind of obedience which is due from a child to a parent.

I quite agree with you; for I also have been an observer of this system, and the fact is, that by it the parent's authority is altogether put into the background, and the child's reason set up as the idol; and where the reason fails to co-operate with the desire of the parent, most assuredly, the point is yielded to the desires of the child. It is a most dangerous and alarming system, tending to put down all authority and all rule, and training up the child to a height of self-esteem and self-will, to be controlled by no authority, human or divine; and soon the child takes his own course, acting altogether according to his own mind, be it right or be it wrong; for even the right and the wrong, come to be put under the judgment of his own reason. How can a child be thus trained to honor his parents? for he feels his parents subjecting themselves to him. If he yields, it is because he thinks it is right, and if he does not yield, it is because he is not persuaded it is right, and that he acknowledges no authority. The Scripture directs no such plan: command, restraint,

nurture, admonition, are the rules, but they must be in love. Honor, obedience, submission, are the duties of children, and they must be in love, because all the law of God is love.

And yet one wishes to see children understand rationally that what they do is a right and proper thing.

And so they will; the very habit of obedience, once obtained, brings out such obvious benefit and happiness, that it becomes a certain knowledge of a certain result, and as reason strengthens, it will reflect upon these things, more especially if trained to form the true judgment from the word of God. Men forget that reason, however cultivated, is, like all our other gifts of nature, corrupted by sin. Reason itself wants tuition, and it should be formed to judgment by experience, and by the precepts of the word of God. Besides which, before it can be submitted to God, it must come under a sanctifying operation of the Holy Ghost, for by the affections of the heart and the reason of the mind, the will is formed. To be a right will, it must therefore be renewed in grace, and without that, it will be either altogether perverse or mistaken: for the natural or carnal mind "is not subject to the law of