Part 4

True it is, indeed, that some of God's most eminent servants--as St. Paul and St. Augustine--were converted in manhood, after a wasted youth of sin and crime; yet such instances are no real exceptions to the rule, that God directs the training of his servants from childhood, shaping his instruments by every act of his providence. St. Paul was thoroughly educated in the rabbinical learning of his day, and well acquainted with Greek literature and Greek philosophy, and so far prepared for his Christian apostleship to both Jews and Gentiles; and the logical and rhetorical studies of St. Augustine unconsciously made him the great Christian dialectician that he was, while the sensual indulgences of his earlier years intensified his knowledge both of the power of sin and the efficacy of divine grace which he was to preach to others. Generally, the Lord's most honored servants, like Samuel, have been chosen from their childhood, and nourished up for their special ministry under the hallowed influence of his truth and worship. Some of them, it is true, were afterward for a while occupied in other callings, before they went to their divinely appointed labor. Moses was a shepherd in the very wilderness through which he was to lead the Lord's beloved, and on the very mountain where he was to receive for them a law from the lips of God. David also was a shepherd, and a musician, and a warrior, and a fugitive, and an outcast from his country; and by all these conditions and experiences was he trained for his future pre-eminence, as the king of Israel, and the psalmist of the sanctuary, and the man after God's own heart. And Chrysostom was a lawyer, and Ambrose was a civilian and a prefect, and Cyprian was a professor of rhetoric, before they entered upon their nobler life-work for Christ and the Church. In all these cases, to which many others might be added, God's good providence wisely ordered the discipline of his servants, through knowledge, and sorrow, and conflict, and a great variety of experiences, out of which were developed those characters and qualities which were essential to their success in the high calling for which they were designed. And so with the holy Baptist, chosen to be the immediate harbinger of the Messiah; and the Galilæan fishermen, whom he afterward ordained as his apostles; and Timothy, appointed the first bishop of Ephesus; and Luther, the destined sword of Heaven to Papal Rome. And so it was with Samuel, from his very birth consecrated to God, growing up in the house of the Lord, becoming the prophet and judge of his people, the invincible champion of truth and righteousness; with such heroic energy maintaining the authority of the divine law, rebuking iniquity in high places, withstanding the current of the national degeneracy, and like an angel of God pronouncing the doom of a fallen monarch, that "all Israel even from Dan to Beersheba knew that Samuel was established to be a prophet of the Lord."

To return to Eli and his sons. The father's fault seems to have been too much indulgence, too much tenderness, perhaps too much timidity, to restrain his consecrated lads from their wicked practices. The power he had, but would not assert it. The father's authority in his family at that age of the world was absolute and unquestionable. This fact leaves Eli's conduct without excuse. He remonstrated with the offenders, but far too feebly. Their crimes were of the very worst character, and aggravated by their sacred profession and holy environments; yet he had for them but a few soft and gentle words, scarcely strong enough to be called a reproof, without any assertion of authority as father, high-priest, or judge. One of our best biblical critics renders the text: "His sons made themselves accursed, and he frowned not upon them."

But while we animadvert upon the guilty negligence of Eli, let no parent plead the different customs of our day, the higher civilization of the race, or the diminished degree of parental authority, as an excuse for his own delinquency. Every father and mother are responsible for the moral restraint of the children that God has given them, and fearful beyond all estimate must be the consequences of disregarding the duty. Such is the tendency of human nature to evil, that it begins to show itself ordinarily at a very early period of life, and the utmost care should be taken to check it in its first manifestations. For this purpose it may be necessary to interpose the strength of the parental will in curbing the will of the child. Those who are taught from their infancy to submit their own will to the will of father or mother are more likely in later life to yield themselves to the will of God. The wise mother of the Wesleys has left on record these words for our guidance in this important matter: "In order to form the mind of the child, the first thing to be done is to conquer the will and bring it into an obedient temper. This is the only strong and rational foundation of a religious education, without which both precept and example will be ineffectual. As self-will is the root of all sin and misery, so whatever cherishes this in children insures their after wretchedness and irreligion, and whatever checks and mortifies it promotes their future happiness and piety." Who will presume to question this statement? And if correct, is not Robert Hall's remark equally true--that "indulgent parents are cruel to their children and to posterity"?

But who can calculate the consequences? The fallow ground left unsown is soon sown by the winds with every vagrant seed of evil. One sin leads to another, the less generally to the greater; and by the inception of a single wrong principle in childhood, the young man who might have been a model of virtue becomes a curse to society, and the young woman who ought to have proved a priceless jewel turns out a mere package of dry goods if not something worse. True, these moral wrecks may possibly be recovered by converting grace; but such cases are extremely uncommon, and when they do occur they are regarded as miracles of mercy; and often, alas! the effect is as evanescent as the morning cloud and early dew. Generally, those who have grown up without religious restraint go on still in their trespasses, living without God and dying without hope.

"As in individuals, so in nations," writes the Rev. Charles Kingsley, "unbridled indulgence of the passions must produce, and does produce, frivolity, effeminacy, slavery to the appetite of the moment, a brutalized and reckless temper, before which prudence, energy, national feeling, any and every feeling which is not centred in self, perishes utterly. The old French _noblesse_ gave a proof of this law which will last as a warning beacon to the end of time.... It must be so. The national life is grounded on the life of the family, is the development of it; and where the root is corrupt, the tree must be corrupt also." A fearful truth for the contemplation of Christian patriotism! Imagine an utter indifference to the morals of the rising generation all at once to prevail throughout the country, and all efforts for the spiritual culture of the young suddenly to cease; would not the frightful ruin rush over the land with the rapidity of an avalanche and the ubiquity of a deluge, instant and everywhere, in your highways and your byways, at your altars and your hearths, sweeping before it every thing pure and lovely--every thing valuable to existence, precious to recollection, or cheering in the visions of hope?

This side of the subject is not pleasing; let us look at the obverse. No moral maxim is sounder than that of the royal sage: "Train up a child in the way that he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it." The principles of virtue early implanted insure the future saint and hero. A thoroughly good character impressed upon youth cleaves to the man forever.

Exceptions, indeed, there may be--very saddening and disheartening exceptions. It does sometimes happen that those who seem at least to have been brought up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord subsequently decline from the way of wisdom and become vicious in their lives. But such cases are too rare to affect the rule. And in these instances, is it not likely that we are deceived often by appearances? May not the religious culture have been radically defective in its principle or culpably incomplete in its process? Was not the child committed to incompetent hands, that marred the character they should have made; or abandoned to the influence of an evil world, and exposed to the contagion of bad example, before his virtuous principles were sufficiently confirmed and fortified? An accurate knowledge of all the facts would no doubt develop some capital defect in the education; would show something essential omitted, or something of evil mingled with the good, some base alloy blended with the pure metal, some infant viper coiled unseen among the buddings and bloomings of spring.

But I have the confidence to affirm that apostasy from the principles of a good Christian education very seldom occurs--so seldom, indeed, that the instances might almost be pronounced anomalous. It is a maxim attested by general if not universal experience, that upon the qualities acquired in childhood depends the character of manhood and old age. Childhood is the period of docility and impressibility, when habits of thought and feeling are formed with the greatest facility; and such habits, once formed, are extremely difficult to destroy; and the good wrought in the soul at that tender age, growing with its growth and strengthening with its strength, is almost invariably retained to the latest hour of life.

Ordinarily, no doubt, we are guided more by habit than by reason. To walk in the old way is much easier than to strike out a new. In this respect, taste follows the same law as thought and action. If the child has formed a taste for virtue, the potent law of habit insures its perpetuity. The virtuous taste prompts to virtuous deeds, and the virtuous deeds confirm the virtuous taste. Thus, by a reflex action, virtue proves its own conservator. Daily the habit grows stronger and the motive more efficacious. Daily the heart is more and more fortified against the assaults of temptation. Daily the world loses something of its fascination, its false maxims something of their plausibility, its apologies and solicitations something of their persuasive power.

As with the body, so with the spirit. Habitual inaction enfeebles the faculties, and renders their occasional operation inefficient and fruitless. On the contrary, by habitual exercise one becomes capable of performing with ease what were otherwise laborious and difficult, if not quite impossible. Thus the young, accustomed to resist their evil passions, will afterward keep them in due control without any very strenuous struggle; and the seeds of a pure morality, sown in early life, will strike their roots deep into the soil, and spring up in perpetual blossom and fruitage. The person is thenceforth virtuous, not without effort, but certainly with less effort than if he had never accustomed himself to virtue. The habit of virtue has made virtue amiable, and her service becomes a labor of love, her yoke easy and her burden light.

In speaking thus of the power of habit, which has been called "a second nature," I would not exclude from the process of education the agency of divine grace, nor lose sight of it as a necessary factor to the best results. Divine grace, indeed, has much to do with the formation of the habit, and must co-operate with every agency employed in the work. Without divine grace, there is nothing wise, nothing strong, nothing holy; and after all the efforts of parents, pastors, teachers--however great or however small the measure of success attained--we lift our hands to Heaven and sing:--

"Thou all our works in us hast wrought, Our good is all divine; The praise of every virtuous thought And righteous word is thine.

From thee, through Jesus, we receive The power on thee to call; In whom we are, and move, and live-- Our God, our all in all."

An infidel objected to sending his little daughter to the Sunday school, "because," said he, "they learn things there which they never forget." The infidel was a philosopher. Knowledge is indestructible. The fact or the principle once acquired is never lost. The soul's past thoughts, feelings, impressions, and operations, are its inalienable property. They are engraven upon an imperishable tablet, and no power can efface the record. Though some parts of our experience may be but dimly and vaguely remembered, and much that we have learned may seem to be irrevocably forgotten, yet the mind is in possession of a law which, when brought into action, will completely restore the entire train of its former phenomena. They are not dead, but sleeping; and we know not what event at some future day may be the trump of their resurrection. The seed that lies buried in the earth through the long and dreary winter will germinate in spring-time and fructify in summer. Therefore let us not be weary in well-doing, for in due season we shall reap if we faint not.

Christian parents! it is yours to begin at the cradle a work whose blessed influence shall extend beyond the tomb. By the principles you impart to your little ones, you insure the virtue and the Christianity of generations to come; you kindle lights to burn amidst the world's darkness when the faint glimmering of your own is gone; you adorn the living temple of the Lord with pillars of strength and beauty which shall challenge angelic admiration when all the colonnaded glories of earth's capitals are calcined by the fires of doom. To such an achievement, what are all the treasures of monarchs, and all the splendors of empire, and all the applause of heroism, and all the renown of authorship, and all the fascination of eloquence, and all the entrancing power of song?

Who has any fear of God, any love of country, any affection for his children, any regard for the welfare of posterity? By all these I implore you, and by every other consideration that ought to move the heart of man, awake to the work which Heaven enjoins and every instinct of nature urges upon you! Your time, money, knowledge, influence--how can they be better employed than in the Christian culture of the young immortals committed to your care? In the beautiful form you cherish, there is something far more beautiful--a jewel worth immeasurably more than the casket which contains it--a spirit that must live and think and feel when this planet shall have become a chaos, when out of that chaos shall have arisen the new _cosmos_ over which Christ is to rule in righteousness forever. Shall this precious thing perish through your faithlessness to so sublime a trust? Shall harps be wanting in heaven, and white-robed ministrants before the throne, through the recreancy of any bearing the Christian name and honored with the title of father or mother? What is reason's estimate of the parental tenderness which provides so laboriously for the body, but totally neglects the soul--which regards so sedulously the interests of time, but utterly overlooks the concerns of eternity? To see your little ones wandering unrestrained in the broad way to ruin, or trained for this world only, as if there were not another beyond--oh! is it not enough to make their guardian angels turn away their faces and weep beneath their wings?

The Church is here to help you, but she requires your co-operation. The Sunday school is here to second your endeavors, but little can that do without your countenance and contribution. Men of Israel, help! Christ calls upon you from his cross to help. Juvenile vice and blasphemy through all your streets seem imploring you to help. Will you respond to the appeal? The result may be a blessing to your own house. The recollection will warm your heart amidst the chills of death. Sweet little minstrels with crowns shall rehearse the story to you when the cemetery and the sea are delivering up their dead. Not less, perhaps, than the eloquent preacher in the great congregation, the humble teacher of an infant-class may be shedding light into the dark places of the earth--may be scattering flower-seeds and raindrops over the face of the desert. Even more, it may be, than the consecrated minister at the altar of God, the liberal contributor to this beneficent agency is kindling a holy fire which shall burn when the stars have gone out--is touching the strings of a harp that shall send its melodies through eternity. O merciful God! when the seventh trump is sounding, and the quickened dead are gathering before thy throne, let it not be said of any in this assembly--"His sons made themselves vile, and he restrained them not"!

[1] Preached at a Sunday-school convention, 1840.

VI.

JOY OF THE LAW.[1]

In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying--If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink.--John vii. 37.

At three great annual festivals all the men of all the tribes of Israel were required to appear before the Lord in Jerusalem. One of these was the Feast of Tabernacles, kept in commemoration of the sojourn of their fathers in the wilderness, and as a special thanksgiving to God after the ingathering of the autumnal harvest. Its duration was strictly seven days, from the 15th to the 22d of the month Tisri; but it was followed by a day of holy convocation, distinguished by sacrifices and peculiar observances of its own, which was sometimes called the eighth day. During the seven days the people dwelt in booths formed of the branches of the palm, the pine, the olive, the myrtle, and other trees of thick foliage; and these temporary huts lined every street of the city, and covered all the surrounding hills. The public burnt-offerings, and the private peace-offerings as well, were more numerous than those of any other of the great national festivals. The bullocks sacrificed were seventy; but besides these were offered every day two rams, fourteen lambs, and a kid for a sin-offering. The long lines of booths everywhere, and the sacrificial solemnities and processions, must have furnished a grand spectacle by day; and the lamps, the torches, the music, the joyful gatherings in the temple-courts, must have given a still more festive character to the night. No other feast of the Hebrews was half so joyous as the Feast of Tabernacles; and therefore it was eminently fitting that it should be observed, as it was, with much more than its ordinary interest at the dedication of Solomon's Temple, again by Ezra after the restoration of the sacred structure, and a third time by Judas Maccabæus when he had expelled the Syrians and re-established the true worship of Jehovah.

The seven days accomplished, the eighth was ushered in with the glad sound of trumpets, summoning the multitudes to the holy convocation. During the seven days they had offered sacrifices for the seventy nations of the earth, as well as for themselves; the eighth was Israel's own day, and the sacrifices offered were exclusively for the people of the covenant, adding to the daily offerings already mentioned a bullock, a ram, seven lambs, and a goat for a sin-offering. As soon as the morning trumpets sounded, the booths were all dismantled, and the thronging thousands from every quarter hastened to the temple. The sacrifice was already on the altar, and the high-priest stood by in his more than regal array, with his numerous white-robed ministers. A priestly procession entered at the Water-gate, bringing water in a golden vessel from the neighboring Pool of Siloam. Approaching the altar, the bearer ascended the sacred slope, and delivered his burden into the hands of the high-priest; while the trumpets sent forth a joyous peal, to which the people responded with a shout that shook the city. Part of the water, mingled with wine, was then poured into the grooves of the altar around the morning sacrifice, and the rest was distributed among the attendant priests, who drank it amidst the grateful acclamations of the multitude; and finally the great choir, chanting to every instrument of music, poured forth the song of Isaiah--"With joy shall ye draw water from the wells of salvation!" This was called "the Joy of the Law;" and there is a rabbinical proverb to the effect, that he who has never witnessed it has never seen rejoicing. It was intended as a commemoration of the miracle of the smitten rock in Horeb, which the apostle tells us prefigured Christ; and it must have been just after this grand solemnity, or in connection with its impressive evening compline, that "Jesus stood and cried, saying--If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink."

Here are four things full of instruction for us--the time, the speaker, the manner, and the invitation. In these we shall find the very marrow of the gospel, worth more to our souls than all the revelations of science and all the speculations of philosophy. Let us give them earnest and devout attention, and may God grant us the aid of his grace!

First, the time is to be noticed. "In the last day, that great day of the feast"--when there was present a vast concourse of the people. Three million have been counted in attendance at the Feast of Tabernacles. What an audience, what an inspiration, for an orator! How would Cicero have triumphed before such an assembly! Jesus needed no such impulse. His mind was ever full of light, his heart overflowing with love. He wanted but the opportunity to pour forth his divine speech upon the people, and surely he never had a better than now. How did his doctrine distil as the dew, as the small rain upon the tender herb, and the showers upon the grass! Great lesson for his servants, who ought to make their Master their model, and let no good occasion slip for pouring the light of life into benighted souls!

"In the last day, that great day of the feast"--when they were occupied with the most interesting observances of the national solemnity. Another might have said: "They will not hear me; they are too much absorbed to listen." Jesus was a better philosopher. Conscious of his own power, he knew perfectly the hearts of men. Never could his hearers recall the Joy of the Law, without recollecting the voice, the figure, the beaming countenance, of the strange young rabbi from Galilee, who stood forth in the midst of the great congregation, and dropped such heavenly words into their hearts. "Who was he? What meant he? Could any mere mortal have spoken so? Is the Messiah at length come? Let us seek him again, and hear more from those marvellous lips!" Another grand lesson for his servants, who ought to study to environ their teachings with associations which cannot fail, with every happy hour, by every happy memory, to recall the truths they have uttered and revive the impressions produced by their preaching.