ide: and
what an end! Oh, what an end! Listen to the sorrowful outpourings of a
fond, too fond, unfaithful parent: "My son, oh, my son Absolom,--would
to God I had died for thee, oh, Absolom, my son, my son!"

Take another example, and may it prove a warning to such indulgence and
such neglect! Eli had sons, and they grew up, and they walked in
forbidden ways, and he restrained them not; yet he was a good man: but
good men are sometimes most unfaithful fathers, and what can they
expect? Shall we sin because grace abounds? Shall we neglect our
children in expectation that the grace of God will intervene to rescue
them in times of peril? That expectation were vain while we neglect our
duty. That expectation is nearly or quite sure to be realized if duty be
performed.

But I must insist no longer; I will only add, then, in a word,--that it
were far, far better that your children should occupy a more humble
station in life--that they should be dressed in fewer of the "silks of
Ormus," and have less gold from the "mines of Ind," than to be neglected
by a father in regard to their moral and religious training. Better
leave them an interest in the Covenant than thousands of the treasures
of the world. Your example, fathers,--your counsel--your prayers, are a
better bequest than any you can leave them. Think of leaving them in a
cold, rude, selfish world, without the grace of God to secure them,
without his divine consolation to comfort. Think of the "voyage of awful
length," you and they must "sail so soon." Think of the meeting in
another world which lies before you and them, and say, Does the wide
world afford that which could make amends for a separation--an eternal
separation from these objects of your love?

* * * * *

Original.

FAULT-FINDING: ITS EFFECTS.

"What in creation have you done! Careless boy, how could you be so
heedless? You are forever cutting some such caper, on purpose to ruin me
I believe. Now go to work, and earn the money to pay for it, will you?
lazy fellow!"

Coarse and passionate exclamations these, and I am sorry to say they
were uttered by Mr. Colman, who would be exceedingly indignant if any
body should hint a suspicion that he was, or could be, other than a
gentleman, and a _Christian_. His son, a bright and well-meaning lad of
fourteen, had accidentally hit the end of a pretty new walking cane,
which his favorite cousin had given him a few hours before