nience, nay the mere wantonness of blind caprice itself, will, on their part, dissolve the most sacred obligations. Neither fearing God, nor regarding man, they only consider how far their personal interests can be promoted, or their froward humors indulged. What inconvenience you may feel, what loss you may sustain, seems not to merit from them, a serious reflection. You have put yourselves within their power, and they enjoy a malicious satisfaction in considering, that superiority does not imply independence that the right of opposition, as well as concurrence, is lodged with theinşelves-and that, by the exercise of this right, they can diminish the happiness of which they do not, immediately, partake. I would not be understood to speak with unrelenting, and undistinguishing severity of their principles, and their morals; I would not even mention their faults, without intending their reformation: but your own experience will, I presume, by melancholy evidence, confirm my assertions. Now, if it be necessary to guard against the fickle dispositions, how much greater is the necessity of moderating those outrageous passions, which rage in the minds of the ignorant and unenlightened, with sway almost uncontrolled? What spectacle is more offen. sive than the furious excesses of him, who, from boy. hood to youth, and from youth to manhood, has not been taught to throw the rein on the violence of his anger? who, upon every trifling occasion, whether chagrined by disappointment, or exasperated by inconvenience, involves both you and himself in the most provoking embarrassmenis ? Much, however, as we may lament the troubles to which we are exposed from our immédiate intercourse with such men; have we principles of integrity and virtue? But how can such principles be implanted, if they are abandoned to the care of parents, born in ignorance, and hardened in profligacy? Make a provision for them, and receive them into your School; eradicate from their minds malignant tempers, and vicious propensities; nurture them with amiable virtues, and furnish them with that instruction which they can easily comprehend, and readily apply. They will make you a most gracious return. They will undertake your business with cheerfulness, pursue it with vigor, and execute it with fidelity: they will know how to estimate themselves: they will know how important a link they form in the chain of society, and how the happiness of the community is, inseparably, blended with their own. What will be the consequence? The savage manners and brutal excesses which deform a very large part of the moral creation, "will not so much as be "named among us." Regularity will take place of disorder, docility of stubbornness, industry of sloth, and probity of low, and malicious, cunning. The last advantage I shall mention, arising from the institution of Charity Schools is, that the children are brought up in the true faith and fear of God. * A religious education is the greatest of all bless ings; for children, having "been brought up in the way they should go, will not," easily, be induced to "depart from it." It is, in your school, a part of the business of every day, to impress upon the scholars a See this whole subject treated with the most profound learning, and the most brilliant eloquence, by the Rev. Dr. PARR.--It is entitled, A Discourse on Education, and on the Plans pursued in Charity Schools. Printed for Mawman. strong strong sense of their duty to Almighty God; to lead them to the practice of all the virtues, civil, moral, and religious, contained in the Catechism of our Church; to teach them to read with delight, and comprehend with clearness, the invaluable Book wherein "life and immortality are brought to light." This your work and "labor of love shall be written for those "that come after, and the people that shall be born "shall praise the Lord." Surely this constitutes the sublimest part of charity-this is "becoming eyes to "the blind, and feet to the lame"-this is, indeed, sustaining the part of "a father to the poor:" it is not, merely, providing food and raiment for the body, which is soon to perish; but it is by far a nobler act of charity it is "filling the hungry soul with goodness" -it is entailing Salvation, if we might dare to say so, on their latest posterity. Will you allow me to trespass a little longer on your patience, whilst I exhort you to contribute to the support of an Institution, the obvious tendency of which is, to repress vice, and to promote virtue, in the rising generation ? It were, indeed, unnecessary to detain you, if what is, generally said, be true, that every person, before he comes to Church, has determined in what propor tion he will give, however solid the discourse may be in its arguments, however pertinent in its topics, and however earnest in its exhortations. If such be the determination of this assembly, I pray God that you may have, with one mind and one heart, determined to give liberally-to give, I do not say "beyond, "but according to your power." If you have made such determination, you have not, I trust, forgot that "God Ee & "God loveth," and loveth only," a cheerful giver," Do you want motives to your charity? Observe the pleasing, the delightful, spectacle now before you. It is only a very little while since some of these children, whose appearance is now so decent, whose behavior is so conciliating, whose improvement is so conspi cuous, were a local nuisance, and a national disgrace. "Their tongues, the best members that they have," instead of lisping oaths, and imprecating curses, are now employed in " singing hymns, and psalms, and "spiritual songs, and making melody unto the Lord." You saw them, in the affecting language of Scripture, "fainting, and scattered abroad, as sheep ACKNOW "LEGING no shepherd, and ye had compassion on "them." It is to you they are indebted for their knowlege of God, and for their practice of Religion -to your charity it is owing that they will be worthy citizens, honest neighbors, religious Christians. "You "have been eyes to the blind, and feet to the lame "you have been fathers to the poor." And can you want encouragement to persevere in this labor of Christian love? Can ye feel any indisposition to so good a work, when the observation and experience of every day must convince you, how the greater part of these children-were such indisposition, unhappily, to be prevalent--would be useless from idleness, or dangerous from profligacy? To whom, if ye withhold your assistance, "can they flee for succor?" Some of them are without parents, all of them without protectors; how then can they be habituated to labor, or established in virtue, or even reclaimed from vice? Shall they be turned loose upon the community? God forbid! Many Many of these little children will, it may be presumed, at a more advanced age, go down to the sea in ships, and occupy their business in the great "waters." And, permit me to observe that, in the characters of sea-faring persons, there are some striking peculiarities, which deserve your attention. Incessant labors leave them little time for spiritual improvement-coarse debauchery extinguishes in them serious reflection-repeated escapes familiarize to them the ideas of a blind chance, or an inexorable fate-inveterate habits and helpless ignorance expose them to the dreadful, and contrary, extremes of profaneness and superstition. In the splendor of day they will "make a mock at sin ;" and yet, amidst the darkness of the night, they tremble and fear "where 66 no fear is." Conscious of present safety, they defile the holy name of God with oaths and execrations, But when unexpected and extreme danger overtakes them, they are, at one moment, agitated by terror, and, at another, overwhelmed in despondence, at the prospect of His just, and impending, wrath, Destitute of that firm and resigned spirit which is produced by an early, and a rational, sense of Religion-they wring their hands, and strike their bosoms-they hope wildly, and suddenly despair-they pray, and they blaspheme -they sink into the merciless ocean, and are seen no more. Be it, therefore, your praise to furnish these little ones with the knowlege of the doctrines of Christianity, and to train them up to the observance of its precepts, that when," at the word of the Almighty, "they are carried up to the heaven, and down again to the deep, so that their souls begin to melt away "because Ee 3 |