uture happiness. It is of far more consequence, then, that parents
should be intelligent, social, affectionate, and agreeable, at home, and
to their friends, than that they should earn money enough to live in a
large house, and have handsome furniture. It is far more needful, for
children, that a father should attend to the formation of their
character and habits, and aid in developing their social, intellectual,
and moral nature, than it is, that he should earn money to furnish them
with handsome clothes, and a variety of tempting food.

It will be wise for those parents, who find little time to attend to
their children, or to seek amusement and enjoyment in the domestic and
social circle, because their time is so much occupied with public cares
or benevolent objects, to inquire, whether their first duty is not to
train up their own families, to be useful members of society. A man, who
neglects the mind and morals of his children, to take care of the
public, is in great danger of coming under a similar condemnation, to
that of him, who, neglecting to provide for his own household, has
"denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel."

There are husbands and fathers, who conscientiously subtract time from
their business, to spend at home, in reading with their wives and
children, and in domestic amusements which at once refresh and improve.
The children of such parents will grow up with a love of home and
kindred, which will be the greatest safeguard against future
temptations, as well as the purest source of earthly enjoyment.

There are families, also, who make it a definite object to keep up
family attachments, after the children are scattered abroad; and, in
some cases, secure the means for doing this, by saving money, which
would otherwise have been spent for superfluities of food or dress. Some
families have adopted, for this end, a practice, which if widely
imitated, would be productive of extensive benefit. The method is this.
On the first day of each month, some member of the family, at each
extreme point of dispersion, takes a folio sheet, and fills a part of a
page. This is sealed and mailed to the next family, who read it, add
another contribution, and then mail it to the next. Thus the family
circular, once a month, goes from each extreme, to all the members of a
widely-dispersed family, and each member becomes a sharer in the joys,
sorrows, plans, and pursuits, of all the rest. At the same time,
frequent