may be the religious information to which the girls attain, it is undeniable that the advantage is greatly on the side of our female population. In higher life, excepting so far as depends on parental instruction in infancy, (and that parent commonly is the mother,) it is equally certain that the advantage of education, in a spiritual point of view, is generally on the same side. Little of any real moment is commonly taught on religious subjects in our great public schools, unless they have undergone a happy change since I was young. High classical attainments are to be acquired n an equal degree nowhere else; but to qualify the pupil to pass creditably or profitably through the part he has to perform in this world, forms a far more prominent feature in the education of youth in our great national establishments, than to give them a knowledge of spiritual truths, to teach them diligently the Book of Life, or to impress upon them those high and holy things which belong to God, to their souls, and to eternity. Added to which, principles are imbibed and fostered there, which in their practical character on the great emergencies of life, if not in the daily course of it, are diametrically opposed to the principles and precepts of the Gospel. They too go out, like the boys of our village schools, into the fields of a busy world at enmity with God. Whilst the tendency of every secular engagement and profession, under the corrupt bias of our fallen nature, carries them away still further from the walk of faith, the control of the passions of the natural man, the daily self-denial prescribed by the revealed Word of God,

and the admission of grace into the heart, or its gradual influence and development. I mention these things here only as they bear on the relation in which woman stands as an help-meet for her husband, and on the exercise of the influence which she possesses over him. And carnal indeed must her affections be, and cold and faithless her heart, if his spiritual and eternal welfare be not her chief care and anxiety. Fervently will she pray for him; and having prayed, she will act. By her influence in every possible way, (and who shall define the ways, or the workings, or the power of that influence under the impulse of pure affection, and the guidance and blessing of the Spirit of God?) she will lift up his thoughts and his cares, amid the turmoil and troubles of the world, to higher and better and enduring things. Every sickness, every disappointment, every affliction of mind or of body, she will make instrumental to this end. And the great practical inference to which she will lead him from all this will be, that, since this cannot be the place of his rest, he should with her seek a better rest to come; that, since here he can have no continuing abode, he should with her set out on his journey to that better land, where has been promised "a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." "In her tongue is the law of kindness; without this she will never win. But exerted as it should be, the gentle, affectionate, persevering influence of a religious and prudent wife would reclaim many a husband from a worldly and irreligious course; would lead him to seek the true riches of virtue and

holiness; teach him in simple sincerity to sue for grace through the ordinances of religion; cause him to honour the Lord's name and His Sabbath; bring family prayer into his house; gradually wean from the world; and draw him in heart and affections to the God who made, and to the Saviour who redeemed him. But in proportion to the influence of the wife, is the responsibility attached to it. She knows how to employ that influence in the attainment of what she wishes. And if she exert it not to her utmost to promote the eternal welfare of him, who ought to be the nearest and the dearest to her heart, of all things upon earth, she has proved faithless to her high trust. She has been careless of her husband's soul; and how then shall she save her own?

II. But there is a second position which woman holds, no less important than the first for time and for eternity; that of a mother. We will suppose the former influence of the wife to have been virtuously and successfully exerted; the husband won over to the truth by her "chaste conversation coupled with fear," that is, fear of God and respectful demeanour towards himself; and both uniting their efforts to order their household together according to the rule of faith. Still I shall speak principally of the wife in her new relation of mother, for her place more than his is in the midst of her children. His duties probably call him abroad into the busy world; she, for many hours of the day, is nearer to her chamber and her Bible. It is the good wife who makes the good mother. The

same pious principles, the same Christian qualities and endowments, the same consistent walk in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord, the same self-control, the same influence discreetly exercised, are alike necessary in respect of the children and the husband. And, to speak of any woman as a good wife but a bad mother, or a bad wife but a good mother, would be a contradiction in terms; it would be to confound things which must ever be distinct; it would be to suppose a fellowship between righteousness and unrighteousness, a communion of light with darkness, a concord of Christ with Belial.

Who, then, shall calculate a mother's importance? Her influence for good or for evil is extended and multiplied, not simply in proportion to the number of her children, but spreads over a circle continually expanding with every connexion which they form, every position in which they are placed, and every circumstance with which they, and perhaps their descendants after them, are brought into contact. A mother's influence is like the small acorn, which grows up to be a great tree, and every year puts forth fresh shoots, and spreads itself over a wider space, and many shelter themselves beneath its covering, and in the meantime generations and centuries are passing away. "For the Lord thy God is a jealous God, visiting the iniquities of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate Him; and showing mercy unto thousands of them that love Him, and keep His commandments."

A good mother, like the mother of the infant

Samuel, devotes her child to the service of the Lord before he is born into the world; and when the Lord has fulfilled her desire, she remembers her vow, and the child is educated for Him. He is trained up here as one who is to live hereafter. From his earliest infancy she vigilantly watches in him what may require to be corrected; and, as the mind opens, she endeavours to counteract the natural bias to evil by introducing that which is good. Again, "in her tongue is the law of kindness." She has none of that morbid feeling, arising from pride in herself and fostering pride in her child, which encourages the wayward disposition to grow up uncurbed and unsubdued for fear of breaking the spirit. She keeps her own temper, and regulates his. She diligently instructs him in the Bible, as the inspired Word of God. "The fear of the Lord" is the beginning of the wisdom which she teaches him; and she gradually opens to him the mysteries of redeeming love, as he is able to receive them. Having thus grounded him in the faith, and impressed upon him a veneration for sacred things, love of the truth, the performance of religious and moral duties, and regular and diligent habits, she has fitted him, so far as her own industry and ability could go, for a more public scene when she can no longer watch him with her eye, or guide him with her hand. But she commits him with confidence to the protection and guidance of Him to whose service she has endeavoured to rear him, for whose blessing on her own efforts she has always prayed, and to whose aid she has alone trusted. He goes to school, and a mother's cares and anxieties