this fpiritual care! The fponfors, at baptifin, are too apt to confider this holy facrament as a mere form of words, a ceremony; but if, perchance, they do ever think at all of their engagements, they excufe the violation, by alledging, that the parents are chriftians, that they are bound by the most cogent motives, to inftruct and to direct their own children, and that if they were even to attempt to execute their truft, they might be ill fpoken of, and, perhaps, evil entreated. But can any fuch argument or apology excufe the violation of a plain, folemn, and most useful inftitution; and in which the fponfors, at baptifm, do voluntarily, and deliberately, and openly, in the face of the church, become parties? If it be a mere ceremony, it is a mockery of God; but if it be a pious truft, for the benefit of children, the fponfors are bound, by every tie of honour and religion, to execute that trust with fidelity and care.

The expediency of an early education in religion will further appear, if we look, even at a distance, at the many evils and snares that are in the way of unguarded minds through this mortal life. To fuffer our ten

der

der offspring to walk abroad, naked and unadvised, among the briers and thorns of this evil world, is most horrible even in fpeculation! If they know not how to refuse the evil and chuse the good, they will be feduced by the gaudy appearance of fome dire phantom; or bewildered in the depths of misery and ruin; without the fear of God before their eyes, without a firm trust and confidence in his protecting care and grace, they will call vice virtue, and virtue vice;

driven on by their paffions, which are fierce, raging, and tumultuous, they plunge into varieties of woe; fwiftly defcending down the broad way that leadeth to destruction, they never reflect on the dreadful gulph that will foon stop their career, and put an end to their fancied pleasure. The gorgeous appearance of their fellow-travellers, whether they dazzle the eyes of the inconfiderate crowd by their riches or their power; the gloffing and deceitful arguments of wicked and base companions, who can easily perfuade to that which, of itself, is too agreeable; and the alluring blandishments of fin, do all, forcibly, contribute to the fatal overthrow and downfal of the young, untutored mind. Cruel then, most inhuman are those parents

and

and fponfors, who leave their moft wretched wards to the guidance of their own will, without any religious principles or moral reftraints! But as he that thus permits wrong is, juftly, chargeable with that wrong, fo he will furely moft dreadfully be punished for it at the avenging day of the Lord!

Further, a religious education is expedient, because the welfare of fociety depends, entirely, upon the good morals of its individuals. If irreligion and an unrestrained licentioufnefs pervade a nation, mifery and confufion must be the confequence, in proportion to the importance of the stations which unworthy perfons fill, and in proportion to the duties which they neglect; but when a nation thrives, there good principles, religion, and integrity do abound. But these flourish only in a foil that hath been early prepared for their growth; Train up a

child in the way he should go, and he will not depart from it." It is by custom, by habit, by example, by a well-judged difcipline, by regular culture, that a good citizen can only be formed; but where there be a general difregard to the right education of children, that nation, muft, gradually, de

cline, because nor fhame, nor honour, nor the most rigid laws can reftrain a people that felt not the curb in their youth; nay, the habit of profligacy, like all other habits, will exert its controuling power in long progreffion; and generations, yet unborn, shall look with horror and dismay on the inevitable ruin of their country, which began, indeed, in the old times before them, but which hath been accelerated by their own imitative vices. If then fo much depends on religious education, let every parent, henceforth, confider that the welfare of his country depends upon his just attention towards his children: fo shall we become a virtuous and good people, zealous of good works. It is surely no difficult matter to fix in the mind of a child a firm belief of God, and of a future state of rewards and punishments; to teach him his duty towards God, and his duty towards his neighbour; to rivet upon his confcience the fear of doing ill, and the delight of doing well. Is it a difficult matter to impress, upon the tender mind, a fixed belief and truft in the mediatorial power of Jesus Christ the Lord? furely not. But there is a fort of men who tell us that their children fhall,

in their infancy, imbibe no prejudices; that when their reason be ripe, it will be time enough to discourse to them on religious fubjects! O fools! and blind! to mistake the glorious, the demonftrative truths of the gofpel for vulgar prejudices! Nay, if they were prejudices, they are fuch as every wife and good man would wish to settle on the minds of his countrymen; they are such as every affectionate and judicious parent would wish to imprefs on the minds of his children. For, by well-rooted religious principles, they will, although they may fometimes fall, at laft rise fuperior to the ftorm, and then how glorious the elevation! how fublime the vir tue! But if the mind be untutored, if it be unprejudiced by religious and moral obligations, how feeble will be the barrier of reafon against the inroads of the paffions! how unequal to the force of the rulers of the darkness of this world! Nothing truly great or noble can be expected from irreligious men; for we become great and noble, only as we fublime towards the Deity, in awful adoration of his immenfe perfections, whofe goodness is as vaft as his very being !

But,