THE NURSERY WALL-PAPER. "Lulled in the countless chambers of the brain, IR BENJAMIN BRODIE tells us that, when fifteen years of age, he stopped with his parents one day at an inn where he had never been before; but no sooner had he entered the parlour than he found himself surprised by a flood of childhood's recollections, or rather shadows of recollections. Whichever way he turned his eyes, faint pictures of persons familiar to childhood, and feeble outlines of events long passed away, came crowding into his brain. The impressions could not be shaken off, and he was greatly at a loss to account for them. His mother solved the mystery by observing that the wall-paper of the room was the same as that of his own nursery, which he had not seen since a child four or five years old. The incident shows us the nature of our childhood's memories. "Wax to receive, but marble to retain" impressions, whether good or bad. What an encouragement to the religious teacher there is in this thought. Only let the truth be distinctly impressed on the mind, let there be line upon line engraven on the young heart,and, though in after years it may be overlaid and apparently buried, it will, in some unthought-of moment, start forth again with all the vividness of new truth. A remembered lesson, or a mother's prayer; a single verse of Scripture; a sweet hymn of long ago: how often have these memories been blessed in leading the wanderer back to his early faith, the prodigal to his Father's door again! UNCONSCIOUS FRUIT. OT all the good done in the world is done intentionally and knowingly. There are no sweeter or higher influences than those which flow out unconsciously from good lives. A really good life is one to which truth and kindness and nobility have become habitual. The whole nature may become so charged with these qualities that they affect even the smallest acts, and their beauty is present in the most trivial and unconsidered word or deed. Such a person goes surrounded with a moral atmosphere as constant as the perfume which a rose sheds round itself. People meeting such a one are made happier, hardly knowing why. Every one of any moral worth wishes to be of use in the world; and it is the grief of many that they seem shut off from opportunities of usefulness. But simple growth in right life is growth in usefulness. Just as fast as we acquire in ourselves the spirit of purity and love, we send out an influence of purity and love upon others, whether we know it or not. Indeed the greatest moral force in the world is of the silent and secret kind. As the child grows up, its character is shaped in some small degree by what it hears in the way of set instruction at home, or school, or church; but in a far greater degree by the qualities in father or mother and companions with which it is brought in ceaseless contact. So it is with all of us. "No man liveth to himself." As we ourselves are pure or base, selfish or loving, so do we give our own colour to those about us. PRUDENCE AND ECONOMY. T is written of the wise man, that "he foreseeth the evil and hideth himself," (that is, provideth against it,) but the simple" (thinking only of the present moment) "pass on and are punished" (Prov. xxii. 3). No one can reasonably hope to be happy, or to escape from future misery, without self-denial, and without giving up present indulgence for future advantage. Mothers, let this be strongly impressed on the minds of your children; lead them to look beyond the passing moment, and to make present sacrifices for the sake of future good. Remember, too, that it is by little things you must at first teach them this useful lesson. A boy, for example, who lays out every halfpenny he gets in cakes or useless toys, will be so much the more likely to spend his shillings at the ale-house, when he becomes a man: and the girl who is allowed to wear a new frock every day, when the old one neatly mended might have spared it, can scarcely be expected to turn things to the best account when she shall be placed, in her turn, at the head of a family. The penny clubs and savings banks, so generally established in the present day, are useful institutions, not only for heads of families, but for young people and children. In conversing lately with one of the neatest and most industrious of my poorer neighbours, she said to me, "Ma'am, I have six of 'em at home, but they are all very good children; my eldest boy, James (15 years old), never was idle, and always brought me every sixpence he got by fetching water, running errands, or cleaning knives between school hours; so, Ma'am, he had in the savings bank £3 15s. of his own towards his apprentice fee, and he is now saving all the money his master gives him, for tools against he has learnt his business. My Edward (11 years old) often gets a penny or twopence by running errands for the ladies near us, and never has used himself to spend them in apples or cakes. He began by putting a shilling or two into the bank, and now he has 30s. there. The sixpence Mr. gives him every Wednesday, he brings to me to lay up for clothes for Christmas, and by that time he'll want them sadly." From experience like this, we learn that young people, when properly directed, will take pleasure in laying up a little stock for themselves, and that by kindness and encouragement, added to the example of their parents, they may be brought, even from their earliest years, to habits of prudence and frugality. Their little savings will soon become an assistance to their parents: but this is a trifle compared with the lasting benefit to the children themselves; for habits of prudence and foresight are not only valuable, as promoting their comfort and well-being in this life, but, under the Divine blessing, may lead them to exercise that Christian selfdenial, without which our blessed Lord hath declared no man can be His disciple ! Let it not be supposed that prudence is recommended at the expense of charity, or that these virtues are in any degree opposed to each other. On the contrary, the very habits of foresight and economy, which contribute so essentially to the temporal well-being of a family, will, at the same time, afford the opportunity for imparting something to others; and thus even the indigent may enjoy the privilege of sparing their mite as an offering to the Lord, and of knowing for themselves that, "it is more blessed to give than to receive." MY MOTHER'S HAT sainted mother now I owe her much for her In patient teaching, thousand cares, For me and mother in her prayers. snares, Pray, and remember mother's prayers." PRAYERS. The memories of her careful way GLEANINGS. RAY IN YOUR FAMILY.-Says Dr. Macleod-"I shall never forget the impression made upon me, during the first year of my ministry, by a mechanic whom I had visited, and on whom I urged the paramount duty of family prayer. One day he entered my study, bursting into tears, as he said, 'You remember that girl, sir? she was my only child. She died suddenly this morning. She has gone, I hope, to God. But if so, she can tell Him what now breaks my heart-that she never heard a prayer in her father's house or from her father's lips! Oh that she were with me but for one day again!'" HOME COURTESIES.-" I am one of those whose lot in life has been to go out into an unfriendly world at an early age; and of nearly twenty families in which I made my home in the course of about nine years, there were only three that could be designated as happy families; and the source of trouble was not so much the lack of love, as the lack of care to manifest it." The closing words of this sentence give us the fruitful source of family alienations, of heart-aches innumerable, of sad faces and gloomy home circles. "Not so much the lack of love, as the lack of care to manifest it." What a world of misery is suggested by this brief remark! Not more than three happy homes in twenty! And the cause so manifest, and so easily remedied! Ah! in the "small, sweet courtesies of life," what power resides! LETTERS. McCheyne is said to have had a holy skill in dropping a word for his Master upon all occasions. He wrote few letters in which the name of Jesus was not mentioned, or something of His spirit breathed forth. Writing to a member of his family, he says: "The Tay is before me now like a resplendent mirror glistening in the morning sun. May the same sun shine sweetly on you; and may He that makes it shine, shine into your heart, and give you the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ." Saith Bernard: "If thou writest to me, thy letter doth not please me, unless I read therein Jesus." "THE GOOD WIFE is none of our dainty dames, who love to appear in a variety of suits every day new; as if a good gown, like stratagem in war, were to be used but once. But our good wife sets up a sail according to the keel of her husband's estate; and if of high parentage, she doth not so remember what she was by birth, that she forgets what she is by match."-FULLER. ROMISH IDOLATRY." The idolaters of antiquity and the Papists of modern times are much upon a footing. The Church of Rome is at this day a corrupt Church, a Church corrupted with idolatry; with idolatry very much the same in kind and in degree with the worst that ever prevailed among the Egyptians or the Canaanites."-BISHOP HORSLEY. |