whence then shall her superiority come? From richer || to ladies. Whether they deserve it or not, I do not silks, costlier furniture, more splendid equipage, a state-pretend to decide; but it is certain they are more culier mansion, and a more numerous train of domestics, rious, more communicative, and more imitative than no one of which is essential to real comfort or convenience. The ship sails well while the sky is clear and the breeze blows fair; but when the storm of adversity comes she is overwhelmed. The expense is too great for the income, and by her misguided ambition she is doomed to perpetual poverty.

But extravagance is not the only way in which this misguided ambition develops itself. It seeks distinction in affectation of superiority, more ridiculous than extravagance or poverty. In the estimation of shallow observers, whatever is grotesque requires but little puffing to make it superior. In this way the veriest butterflies in the world seek and often find distinction, while real merit passes to the grave unnoticed. Whether our understanding or our education is at fault, I do not pretend to say; but one thing is certain—we are in this respect the most hoaxable people on earth.

men, and consequently more likely to be benefited or injured by the influence of society. A city is too large and unwieldy for observation. In the country the population is too sparse. But go to a village where you can take in society at a single glance, and there make your practical observation. Let some intrigue exist, or some deed of darkness be committed, no matter with how much secrecy, and you might as well attempt to "hide the sun with a blanket, or put the moon in your pocket," as to conceal it from their scrutiny; and when it is found out, it rests like sin on the conscience of the discoverer, until she has communicated it to every friend she has in the village. But she is imitative. Let some new example of taste, elegance, or fashion make its appearance, and it runs round the circle with almost the speed of electricity; and the thought of being left behind is painful in the extreme.

Let some European scullion abjure her mistress' Mrs. Brocade appears at Church in a new-fangled kitchen, put on an air of singularity, and appear dress, and instantly all the ladies in the neighborhood amongst us bedecked with tawdry tissue, and in four follow suit. Mrs. M'Fiddle sends her little daughter and twenty hours a hundred gallant skulls are thumped to dancing school, and in four and twenty hours half together to do her homage. She converses with thril- the matrons in the village inquire of the parson whethling eloquence in some language which no one of them er it would be a sin to send their little daughters too. understands, and the lineaments of Thaddeus Pulaski,|| Miss Exquisite has been to the city, and meeting with or Americus Vespucius brighten in her countenance; an improvement in the strait-jacket, has compressed while the beautiful, the lovely, the learned, the simplehearted buckeye blushes unseen like the desert rose, because she is indigenous to the soil and unobtrusive in her manners.

Several years ago I conversed with a gentleman who had just returned from Europe, after performing the duties of minister to a foreign court. In speaking of the English nobility, he remarked that the ladies were || plain and simple-hearted in comparison with ladies of wealth and fashion in our country. I asked him how he accounted for this, seeing that our institutions were based on the principle of human equality. "They rely, sir," said he, "upon their rank, and have no need of affectation to sustain them." In our country there is no such rank as that on which they rely. It is not desirous that such rank ever should exist. But is there no rank in the republic of letters-is there no eminence in the field of science-is there no elevation in the art of doing good on which the ambitious fair one might rely for distinction, without resorting to the miserable extremes of extravagance and affectation?

But woman should not be educated with reference to her individual happiness alone; she is a social being, and as such, is destined to have her influence on all around her; and you cannot educate one, without to a certain extent educating every other in the neighborhood. They act upon each other like the reeds in the fisherman's flambeau-the moment you light one, it communicates the fire to another, and another, and another, until the whole unites in a flame.

The old adage, that "it is better to be out of the world than out of the fashion," has often been applied

her beautiful form to the thickness of a spade-shaft, and "live or die, survive or perish," and in spite of Dr. Muzzy's lecture,* in one week every young lady in town is compressed to the same model. And think you, sir, that this anxiety to know-this eagerness to communicate-this tendency to imitate, was implanted in the breast of woman to poison and make war on the nobler spirit of sympathy and benevolence? No, sir, no such thing. They are the wild luxuriant growths of a noble soul, fallen down from their native bower, and tangled and interwoven with briars and noxious weeds. Only let the hand of education lift them from the ground, disentangle them from the thorny maze, prune away the rubbish, fasten the tendrils to the bower, and teach them to aspire to nobler objects; and trust me, sir, they will become the ornaments of the sex, and make society redolent of moral sweetness. These very qualities which have so long and so often been the topics of ridicule, are the evidences of mind admirably suited, if properly cultivated, to give and take the blessings of society.

But the influence of woman as a social being, is not confined to her own sex. She wields a powerful influence over the other sex, and especially over her own husband; and very much of his success or disappointment in life depends upon her. Let a man of genius and enterprise be linked for life with an ignorant woman, whose thoughts aspire not with his thoughts— whose sentiments mingle not with his sentimentswhose heart beats not in unison with his heart; and all

*Dr. Muzzy, at the same session, delivered a lecture on the injurious effects of tight lacing.

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his energies, like a living victim chained to a body of" that the touch of a ruder hand might snap them from death, will sicken, gangrene, and die. The man of the tiny stem, and blast them for ever. Those very genius requires both the sympathy and approbation of feelings of the mother which men call female weakthe other sex to aid him in his efforts, and without them ness, act upon the incipient intellect like the volatile his exertions, however great, will be misdirected. He oils and the rainbow colors of the blossom on the emmay be ambitious; but his ambition will be for glory bryo fruit, distilling and refining the dews of heaven, and not for good. His actions in themselves may be and reflecting and softening the rays of light, until it noble; but philanthropy will not be their moving spring, swells into strength and vigor, to be matured by the He may acquire knowledge, but it will not be devoted redundant showers of summer, and ripened in the powto the benefit of mankind. He may accumulate erful bearns of the sun. The stern philosophy of the wealth; but it will not be used for the purposes of be- father smiles at the sleepless vigilance and thrilling nevolence. A few examples to the contrary may be anxiety with which the mother watches the sleeping found; and those examples are striking, because they infant, and her distracted wildness when its toppling are singular; but frozen-hearted selfishness is the com-, footsteps carry it beyond her sight; yet the actions of mon motive of men alienated from the sympathy and the mother under these circumstances make an impres influence of the softer sex. sion on the infant mind never to be erased, by time, or change, or circumstances; and by an association of ideas, too mysterious to be explained, but too palpable to be denied, the moral lessons inculcated under these circumstances can never be forgotten; and many a heartless rake has been reformed, and many a reckless renegade reclaimed by the recollection of a mother's precepts, after she had gone to her grave. This pow erful influence is happily illustrated in one of those speeches of John Randolph, in which that eccentric orator was wont to wander over the whole universe. In denouncing a certain quality of atheists for the mischief they had done, “Once,” said he, "they had wellnigh robbed me of my religion; but when the last spark was nearly extinguished, I remembered that when a child, my good old mother called me to her side, and taught me to say, 'Our Father who art in heaven.””

In the age of chivalry, when a young and valorous knight, clad in complete steel, entered the tournament, he knew that the eye of beauty marked his deeds, and that the hand of beauty would reward his success; and as if the fire of Minerva inspired his bosom, and the spirit of Minerva nerved his arm, he poised the weapon, warded the thrust, and dealt the blow. And when in quest of adventures, he went up and down, fearless of danger, and despising repose-as he slept beneath the spacious sky, it was not the star that beamed on his helmet, nor the dew-drop that glittered on his breastplate, but the eye and the tear of his lady-love that inspired his dreams of glory, and steeled his heart for the day of battle. And in the rigorous combat, when he covered his breast with his shield, and braced his lance in its rest, he invoked the spirit of his lady-love to aid him in the desperate conflict. Nor were his expectations blasted. When he returned in triumph from the field and laid the trophy of victory at her feet, as if the victory had been her own, she unbuckled his armor, and acknowledged him the champion of her honor, and the lord of her heart. But after the youthful votary of science has sacrificed ease, and pleasure, and wealth, to fit himself for usefulness, if he enters the arena of life, with no eye to brighten at his triumphs-no cheek to blush for his fall-no bosom to sympathize with his fortunes

"If beauty blunts on fops her fatal dart,

Nor claims the triumphs of a lettered heart," what motive has he for excellence? why should not he kneel at the shrine of Mammon, side by side, with the mercenary fair one, much more likely to be enamored of his wealth than his learning?

' If then the mother is to be the instructor of her children, and if the precepts of the mother are of such lasting consequence, how important is it that she herself should be well educated—that her head, and her heart, and her hands should be educated; so that her example may teach where her precept fails, and that her life may stand a monumental preacher to her offspring, pointing its hand to the domestic duties of life, and lifting its eye to "the recompense of reward” in another world.

Is there any other consideration which can add to the importance of female education? Yes, there is one other consideration which is most important of all— the influence which it is to have on her future existence. Were she, according to the religion of Mohammed, a soulless creature of the dust, doomed to fret out a few But there is another relation of life in which woman short years on the stage of existence-alternately the appears more interesting than in any of the former, and toy and the slave of man-and then lie down like a log, in which her thorough and substantial education seems in the hopeless and dreamless slumber of the graveto be more important than that of man-it is the rela-, why should any thing else employ her thoughts but tion of a mother. Such is the nature of the father's meat and drink, and the butterfly decorations of the business engagements, that if he were ever so well body? But Revelation steps in and proclaims her imqualified to be an instructor, children, during the earlier mortality, and lifts her thoughts to enjoyments beyond period of life, when they are most susceptible of im- the reach of mutability and decay. pressions, are almost exclusively under the control of the mother. To her belongs the nurture and training of the moral sentiments, while they are yet so tender, soul, and fit it for a higher destiny! The ancients re

How vain and empty, then, are all her accomplishments which do not tend to enlighten and elevate the

MARRIAGE.

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Original.

FEMALE INFLUENCE.

ON FEMALE INFLUENCE. DEAR BROTHER HAMLINE,-It will be borne in mind that in my last number on this subject, I dwelt more particularly upon the effects of maternal influence during the period of childhood; noticing, somewhat in detail, the pernicious consequences of a mistaken, and misapplied indulgence on the one hand, and too much severity on the other. So many generous natures have been seriously injured, and so many more have been utterly and irreclaimably ruined by these opposite modes of proceding, as to give to this view of the subject so much importance, that I scarcely know how to give it up, without detaining the reader with a few additional observations upon it. And this I am the more inclined to do, because many of those who practice upon these systems, respectively, are so firmly persuaded that their course is not only correct, but highly commendable, that it requires "line upon line, and precept upon precept," to convince them to the contrary.

welfare of the child, that it will soon come to be hated and shunned, as a most grievous and intolerable infliction, and by no means sought after and prized, as a gratifying proof of parental tenderness and love.

And in relation to harsh and oft-repeated personal chastisements, they seem to be altogether ignorant, or most criminally reckless of the important truth, that if even virtuous precepts are habitually enforced by a resort to this expedient-so powerful is the principle of association--that virtue itself, instead of appearing, as it really is, the offspring of Heaven, robed in all the itself to the imagination of the child, with an aspect as habiliments of majesty and beauty-will soon present hideous and repulsive as the frown of a demon. The two ideas will be so intimately and invariably co-existent in the mind, that there is great danger that ere long they will be regarded as equally hateful and revolting.

And then as it respects those mothers who err, in being excessively lenient or indulgent, it is almost impossible to convince them that their course is not the most amiable and praiseworthy that can be imagined. They flatter themselves that if others should take exceptions to their conduct in this particular, it cannot fail to secure to them an indissoluble hold upon the confidence, gratitude, affection and esteem of those children, whom they thus pamper and indulge. But

For example, those who err on the side of severity, are frequently heard to recount, with manifest selfapplause, the many occasions on which they gave their children the most sage and wholesome advice; and to show that they must have been in earnest, they will let you know how often, and how feelingly they enforced their advice, by the use of that wonder-working instru-alas for them! in this supposition they are most egrement, of which we spoke in the preceding number. giously mistaken. Such mothers as these, more freAnd that so many and such powerful appeals as these, quently than any others, are compelled to feel—

"How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is

To have a thankless child."

should all be resisted and rendered abortive, is what they cannot possibly comprehend. In speaking of any And we may very properly add, that of all children unpromising traits, that may happen to attach to the under heaven, such as these have, in reality, the least characters of their children, they are wont to console to be thankful for. They have been permitted to folthemselves by observing, that if they should ultimately low, unrestrained, the promptings of their evil propengo to destruction, it will not be because they have not sities and passions, until their insufferable petulence done their duty in giving them a plenty of good advice, and waywardness, have rendered them a burden to and of sound bodily correction. They very comforta-themselves, and caused them to be hated by some, debly conclude, that whatever else they may have to an-spised by others, and loved by nobody. And when in swer for, their consciences are clear in this matter. It moments of calm and sober reflection, they are led to has never occurred to them for a moment, that the very things for which they take so much credit to themselves, may be the very cause, to no inconsiderable extent, of all the mischief which they so deeply deplore. It would seem that, in their apprehension, the value of advice and correction, is to be estimated more by their quantity than their quality; not reflecting that too much advice is often worse than too little; nay, worse than none at all. They appear, moreover, to have fallen into the error of those who give advice as if they thought that nothing was necessary but that it should be good as to the matter of it, entirely losing sight of the fact that much, and indeed, that almost every thing depends upon the manner in which it is conveyed, as to whether it will be effectual or not, in the accomplishment of the object proposed. In short, they are, to all appearance, totally unaware that it may be given so frequently, at such unseasonable times, and in such unsuitable places—and, withal, may be accompanied with such an air of authority and reprehension, and such an evident want of affectionate solicitude for the

bewail their miserable enslavement to vice and folly, inexpressibly bitter, indeed, are the reproaches which they heap upon the heads of those parents, who "knew their duty but performed it not ;”—whose imbecility of mind, and deficiency of moral principle or moral courage, were such as to suffer their children to follow unadmonished and uncontrolled, "the devices and inclinations of their own hearts," to the manifest peril of body and soul, both in time and in eternity. Respect for such culpably delinquent mothers, they cannot have; and where sentiments of respect have ceased to exist, those of rational and sincere affection, will not long survive. And when such children go beyond the circumscribed limits of the domestic circle and find, that the hasty and ungovernable temper superinduced by too much maternal indulgence, subjects them to perpetual inconvenience and insult, we may be sure that they remember with any thing but pleasure, the instruments of so much perplexity and unhappiness. And should they be so unfortunate, (which is not at all unlikely,) as to be drawn into associations, or habits of

such a nature as are calculated to blast their reputation || and Christianity of rather a dubious character as to in society, their feelings of indifference or disrespect, how it would finally terminate; but that since the gen

eral introduction of Sabbath schools, he had given up the cause of infidelity as utterly and absolutely hopeless. He remarked, in substance, that previous to that, Christians had permitted the devil to get the start of them by pre-occupying the minds of children; but that now, having by means of these simple instrumentalities, dislodged his Satanic majesty from this important position, his kingdom must inevitably come to nought; that Christians have at last discovered the very valuable secret, and one which it is strange they should ever have overlooked, that in order to be fully and triumphantly successful, in the propagation of the Gospel, they should begin at the beginning; that is, should begin in good earnest to operate upon the mind, as soon as it emerges from infancy into such a state as to be capable of rational reflection, and a well-defined sense of moral responsibility.

Now the reader need not be told that female influence has a very large, not to say a paramount share, in cultivating, training, and preserving these interesting and invaluable nurseries of virtue and piety-nurseries from which there are annually transplanted into the 'garden of God," thousands upon thousands of the most lovely and beautiful scions, that are soon recognized by all who behold them as "trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord;" bringing, by the fruits which they so abundantly yield, "glory to God in the

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are soon changed into those of the deepest execration, while they reflect that had not their mothers permitted them to live as they listed during their childhood, they would, in all probability, have been effectually saved from their downward, disgraceful, and ruinous career. The solemn obligations that mothers are under to instill into the minds of their children the principles of purity and rectitude, and to discountenance and correct in the most prompt and unqualified manner, the slightest deviation therefrom, may be familiarly and most impressively illustrated, by a reference to an account that I have somewhere seen of a boy and his mother; the substance of which my readers will excuse me for recalling to their recollection, as by no means inappropriate to the subject in hand. Having for years been addicted to an infamous course of life, he was at last apprehended, tried and executed. And when on the point of expiating his crimes upon the scaffold, he begged to be permitted to speak to his mother; and while in the act of doing so, is represented as having bitten off her ear; assigning as the reason for the perpetration of this shocking and unnatural deed, that had it not been for her connivance at some trivial aberration from truth and rectitude, during his childhood, he would not then have been doomed to atone to the violated laws of his country, by a painful and ignominious death. This account and numerous others, to the same purpose, that might be adduced from the records of well-authentica-highest, on earth peace, and good will to men." Time ted history, not only show the immense importance of would fail us to enumerate all the burning and shining noting with the utmost vigilance and circumspection, lights, for which the world is indebted to the agency of and restraining with the most unshrinking and uncom- Sabbath school instruction. The translator of the promising firmness, the first and slightest departures in sacred Volume into the language of China-a country children, from "the good and the right way;" but, in that contains an entire third of the population of the addition to this, they most affectingly teach this lesson-globe-owes the commencement of his momentous and that nothing so certainly tends to entail upon mothers glorious career, to the instrumentality of Sabbath the ingratitude, and even the execrations of their off-schools. So fraught are they with good to mankind spring, as for them to allow them during their child-and with honor to God, that their preservation and prohood to do as they prefer, without a firm, habitual, un- motion might appropriately fill an angel's heart, and flinching, and, at the same time, an affectionate inter- do fill the hearts and hands of many of those who are position of maternal influence and authority. frequently flattered with the name of angels, and who, in performing the quiet and unostentatious, but inestimahle duties of the Sabbath school, are doing that upon which angels look down with ineffable delight, and which assimilates them as much, perhaps, as any other course of action could, to those celestial beings.

In speaking of female influence in the formation of character during childhood, we have directed our remarks almost exclusively, to that exercised by mothers. But there are very many occasions on which others of the sex, have opportunities to exercise a most happy and beneficial influence over the minds, the moral With many people the idea seems to be, that because characters, and final destinies of children. For ex- the enterprise of which we are now speaking has to do ample, what an admirable field is afforded for this pur- with little children, principally, it is a very small or pose, by those wise and benevolent institutions-the unimportant business. But until it can be shown, that Sabbath schools-institutions which, next to the preach- it is a small or unimportant business to imbue with ing of the Gospel itself, have probably done more proper principles, and to give a proper direction to towards the suppression of vice, and the advancement minds, that are destined to have an extensive and of the great interests of morality and religion, than any||mighty influence, in giving character to the rising and of the numerous moral causes with which the world succeeding generations, we must take the liberty to has ever been blessed. I shall never forget a remark conclude, that the business itself is not small, but that which an intelligent infidel is said to have made, not those who think it is have very small ideas; and that long since, in relation to them. He said that, for some- while they are engaged in schemes and enterprises, time, he had considered the contest between infidelity which, in their estimation, are of the greatest imagina