about to consecrate their dwellings into babitations of piety and righteousness will be found in the next and subsequent articles under the same title.

A. C.

FAMILY CULTURE.

CONVERSATIONS AT THE CARLTON HOUSE.

INTRODUCTION TO THE FAMILY CIRCLE.

To foretell the fortune of a family with unerring certainty, is not more difficult than to estimate how much good, present and future— direct and indirect, may be achieved in any neighborhood by only one person of great energy of character, of superior intelligence and moral worth, who sincerely and devoutly undertakes the improvement of society. The excellent Olympas, long resident and master of the Carlton House, in Carmel Place, and his beloved Julia are yet living monuments of the great moral force of well disciplined minds, energetically and affectionately employed in advancing the religious and moral conditions of human existence. Their philanthropy was rational, pure, and fervent; and sought the most natural and capacious channels through which to communicate its blessings to society. While their commiserations and sympathies embraced the Turk, the Jew, and the Indian, they wasted not their time nor their substance in the formation of Utopian schemes for their conversion; but supremely employed their energies in family and neighborhood advancement in the paths of literature, religion, and morality. They felt the impulses of heavenly charity to be warmest and strongest for those at home; and therefore superlatively sought the moral excellence and eternal salvation of their children, relatives, and neighbors. Yet did they not look with a cold indifference on the destitute and wretched of other climes and languages; but, reversing the policy of some of their more popular compeers, they contributed their pence to Hindostan and spent their pounds at home.

But their domestic administration and manner of disciplining and training their own immediate family, is that which at this time most especially interests us, because it very happily exemplifies, in an intelligible and practical form, those principles and rules of family culture which both our theory and experience would commend to those who are supremely devoted to the eternal honor and happiness of their own dear households. To further our aims and wishes we shall be at some

pains to give in detail a few of those lessons in which we had the pleasure to participate under their consecrated roof, around the family altar, at the morning and eyening hour of domestic instruction and social prayer.

The family was large, consisting of nine children, natural and adopted, with some half dozen of domestics, of different ages. All were arranged in classes according to their ages and capacities. The first consisted of three, under 7 years old; the second of four, under 14; and all the rest made up the third class. All that could fluently read, with book in hand sat round the room, and in turn read their several portions of the daily lesson. After the reading of one or two chapters, as the case might be, a free conversation ensued in the form of question and answer, frequently interspersed with practical views and remarks adapted to the capacity of all present, and animated with pious emotions and moral sentiments, fitted to imbue the minds of all with the fear and love of God, and to infix in the youthful heart the solid and enduring principles of pure religion and Christian righteousness.

The morning hour, from 6 to 7, thus became an intellectual and moral feast a spiritual breakfast of the most refreshing and invigorating efficacy to us all. The plan in one important feature soon impresed itself upon my admiration. The infant class, as I may call that composed of those from 5 to 7, was exercised primarily upon the simple facts in the lesson, while the second class explained them; and the third drew the inferences and deduced the practical bearings of the subject as it applied to themselves and society at present.

Another very cardinal view of the whole exhibition immediately arrested my attention. Olympas, instead of calling upon his family to attend family worship, was accustomed to assemble his household to the morning and evening lesson. Family instruction, rather than family worship, was the prominent idea. True, indeed, the praises of God were frequently sung, and prayer and thanksgiving were always offered at the close of the lesson; but as instruction extended to all present, and only a part could properly unite in the worship of God, it was much more apposite to denominate it family teaching than family worship.

Apart from its religious and moral character and influences, contemplated as a literary and intellectual affair-as purely educational in the common acceptance of the term, it was nearly equal to a common school Two hours per day, well and faithfully applied in this way, gave to the whole household of Olympas a literary and intellectual superiority over every other family in the neighborhood who enjoyed in every other respect the same educational advantages.

course.

Hence it was usual for Susan, James, and Henry, of the junior class, to be foremost in the Sunday school-foremost in the primary schoolas it was for William and Mary, Edward and Eliza, of the second class, to gain all the honors in all the classes at the common and high schools of Carmel city. The domestics of the Carlton House were a sort of aristocracy for intelligence and respectability among their coordinates in profession-among all their compeers who attended at the Carlton church. But it would be impossible for any one often to visit this consecrated family-the Carlton Bethel, and not to anticipate such fruits from a system of instruction and moral government so admirably adapted to all the exigencies of humanity in the morning time of its existence. The pre-eminence mentioned was but the proper fruit, the genuine effects of a system of training in perfect harmony with the conditions and wants of human nature.

We can only furnish a few conversations of the many we have had the pleasure to hear during our frequent sojournings under this hospitable roof. These are intended as specimens of the plan which we would most affectionately recommend to all Christian parents who have in their hands the immense responsibilities of rearing a family for the Lord.

CONVERSATION I.

Monday morning, 6 o'clock, being a second reading of the two first chapters of Genesis, containing 52 verses, eleven persons read five verses each, in rotation. After a distinct enunciation of these chapters, Olympas interrogated the junior class in the following manner:Tell me, Susan, who created the heavens and the earth?

Susan. GOD; which, as you told me, means the GOOD BEING.
When, James, did God create the heavens and the earth?

James. "In the beginning."

In the beginning of what, Henry?

Henry. In the beginning of time.

And what, Susan, was before the beginning of time?

Susan. GOD.

Were the heavens and the earth, James, both created at the same time?

James. They were both created in the beginning.

And where, Henry, did God dwell before the heavens and the earth were made?

Henry. I cannot tell.

Can

any of you tell?

Willium. Moses does not tell us; but one of the books says, he dwells in Eternity.

Which of the holy scribes says this?

William. Isaiah calls him "the High and Holy One who inhabiteth eternity."

Olympas. Observe, then, that time is no part of eternity: for as in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, the heavens and the earth are the beginning of time. We would then say that God created time by creating the heavens and the earth. In how many days, Henry, did God create the heavens and the earth?

Henry. In six days.

What was created the first day?

Susan. Light, which God called day.

And who created darkness, Susan?

Susan. I do not know; but I know what God called it. He called it night.

And what made the first day, James?

James. "The evening and the morning made the first day."

Then was not darkness between the evening and the morning, William?

William. It was. Still light is called day; for we have to count darkness in time, and include a portion of it with light, in counting ovents; and thus evening, night, and morning are computed as one day. Olympas. You mean, that while day means light, in time it denotes both a portion of light and darkness.

William. Yes; in computing the week we have to count darkness as a portion of time, and make seven days and seven nights a week. Olympas. Mary, can you tell what darkness is?

Mary. It was not created, and is therefore nothing.

Olympas. It is, indeed, no substance; and therefore was not properly created. But it is spoken of as a thing, and it is figuratively said to be created. God says, "I form the light, and create darkness; I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things." But he creates darkness by removing the light; for darkness is but the privation of light. Do you think, Edward, that light is a substance?

Edward. It strikes my eye with force, and sometimes with pain, which darkness never does; and is therefore a substance.

Olympas. Can you, Eliza, recollect any reference made to the creation of light in the New Testament.

Eliza. Paul, I think, says that "God commanded the light to shine out of darkness."

William. I read in Plato, or some other book, that "light is the shadow of God."

Olympas. But neither Plato, nor the poets, are of any authority here

A beautiful saying and a true saying are not identical. Some have thought that the original term AUR, which represents both fire in general, and lightning or electricity, here refers more to the matter of light than to the display of it, because the luminaries were not made till the fourth day; but this to you is more curious than edifying. Tell me, James, what was done on the second day?

James. God made the firmament on the second day.

Olympas. Nothing else, Susan?

Susan. Yes, he made the waters also, and separated them into two parts.

Olympas. We are not told that he created the waters on the second day. He only separated them by the firmament. Can you, William, explain what the firmament is?

William. God called it heaven; and it would seem as if it were the place where the stars are fixed.

Olympas. The firmament here spoken of, being placed between waters, can only indicate the expanse called the atmosphere, in which we live and in which the birds fly: hence the birds are said to fly in the midst of heaven. The waters floating in the clouds, and in form of vapors through the atmosphere. are said to be separated from those on the earth.

Edward. Father, will you please tell us when the waters were created? They were not created on the first day, nor on the second day, and yet they are spoken of as existing when the expanse or air was created. Olympas. Neither the waters nor the earth are included in the details of the six days. First of all, God created the substance of the heavens and the earth. And before the details of creation are given we learn that "the earth was without form and void," or one confused mass of land, water, and all other things; over which darkness presided, and on which "the Spirit of God moved." Out of this heterogeneous mass of discordant elements, he first created light; and on the second day he created air: and having separated light and darkness, the waters above and beneath the atmosphere, he made a second pause, or completed a second day. And what, Henry, did God create on the third day?

Henry. He said, "Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after its kind." He covered the earth with grass, and herbs, and trees.

Olympas. But was there not before this a farther separation of the waters, Susan?

Susan. He separated on the first day light from darkness; on the second he separated the waters above and beneath the firmament; and