pastor seldom feels happier than when a child meets him in the street with a joyous face and a kind, respectful greeting. How Christ must love those young friends of his when they go in secret and pray to him, and sing his praise. He said that it would be better that a millstone should be hanged about the neck of any one, and he drowned in the sea, than that he should offend one of these little ones that believe in him.

Some parents greatly err who omit to teach and pray with their children, looking only to the act of conversion to make them religious. While instruction will be useless without a change of heart, the surest way to secure that change for the child is, to surround it with a pious example and every Christian influence; and, besides, its conversion will then be the perfecting of a progressive preparation for intelligent piety, stability, and usefulness. A quaint preacher once said to parents, as an encouragement to instruct their children in the knowledge of God and spiritual things, "Fill the water pots with water, and Christ may turn it into wine." But let us seek and expect the early acknowledgment, by every child, of its obligations to God, and its acceptance of the gospel. What sorrow and misery we may prevent, in ourselves and others, if we are faithful as Christian parents. It is a fearful thing for parents to send forth into society a family of unconverted children

Their last account will be rendered, not with joy, but with grief.

II. CHRISTIAN PARENTS, IF THEY ARE FAITHFUL,

SHOULD BE ENCOURAGED AND COMFORTED WITH REGARD TO THEIR CHILDREN, IN VIEW OF THE SAVIOUR'S POWER AND GRACE.

Have any of us a child grown beyond our control, disobedient, wicked, a candidate for ruin? While we weep, perhaps, over our sad mistakes or neglect, let us not be discouraged. Pray with the child, again and again; it will help your efforts; it will secure the help of Christ. The creature on which Christ rode in triumph to the place where the children sung hosanna to him, was one on which never man sat. So Christ can break or tame the uncurbed spirit of a son or daughter with infinite ease, and make that child the honored instrument of glorifying him.

What steed, with his caparisons of royal wealth, ever bore such a king, or walked in such triumph, as that young, untamed colt which bore Christ so gently amid shouts and over branches thrown down into his path. Let every unbridled, untamed spirit be brought to Christ, with implicit and obedient faith. He can make it willing in the day of his power.

Some of you have representatives among those children whom Christ has gathered into his kingdom.

Could you have seen the reception of your child in heaven, and heard the words that were spoken concerning it, and concerning you, could you behold it in some circle of the redeemed; the leader of some little choir, or awakening love and wonder at the development of no common power, or the youngest, sweetest singer there; a servant of Christ, doing his commandments, hearkening to the voice of his word; sitting among good men and angels, as Christ sat, at twelve years of age, hearing, and asking questions, -you would cease to weep, except for joy.

What a contrast there is between such a child and you, unconverted parent; for, without doubt, many an unconverted parent has a child in heaven. How much worse than at the dying pillow, and the little grave, will the separation be, when you see the child in the kingdom of God, and you yourself shut out. O miracle of sin; a parent, with a child in heaven, going to hell. Dreadful scenes await us at the judgment seat of Christ. There will be scenes of bliss there, when parents meet their long-lost ones, and find themselves standing in the relation of parents to youthful seraphs, who, in heaven, during these years of parental sorrow, have been growing wise, and excellent in beauty. They will make their parents feel more than old Jacob did, when they told him, Joseph is yet alive, and is governor over all Egypt.' Your Joseph,' whom they cast into a pit,

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is yet alive, and sees the face of the King; he thinks of you, and, perhaps, inquires for you, of those who come to heaven, as Joseph did concerning his father. If your bereavement shall be the means of making you a Christian, it will prove that God, in his kind and wise providence, sent the child before you preserve life,” in the sense of saving your soul.

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Have your children ever heard you sing, or repeat, a hymn in praise of Christ, or seen you bow the knee to him? You love your children, and, it may be, idolize them. What if you be bereaved, in the other world, of parental joys; what if you fail to look on that heavenly society, where the young now make it perpetual morning and spring; where children are not unlike flowers and birds to the earth, and where the redemption which was bestowed upon millions of them will pour forth treasures of its love forever, on the happy spirits of the redeemed. Childhood, with some of you, is gone, and Christ had no worship from you. Youth is gone, and the Saviour had no dew of your youth. Ripe years, with you, are falling into the sere and yellow leaf,' and you are without Christ. You have a great work to do, and much time to redeem, if you would be found in the number of those who will, at last, appear before Christ, and say, "BEHOLD, I AND THE CHILDREN WHICH GOD HATH GIVEN ME."

SERMON VII.

THE WOMAN WITH THE ALABASTER BOX.

LUKE VII. 37, 38.

AND BEHOLD, A WOMAN IN THE CITY, WHICH WAS A SINNER, WHEN SHE KNEW THAT JESUS SAT AT MEAT IN THE PHARISEE'S HOUSE, BROUGHT AN ALABASTER BOX OF OINTMENT, AND STOOD AT HIS FEET BEHIND HIM, WEEPING, AND BEGAN TO WASH HIS FEET WITH TEARS, AND DID WIPE THEM WITH THE HAIRS OF HER HEAD, AND KISSED HIS FEET, AND ANOINTED THEM WITH THE OINTMENT.

HERE is a scene and a transaction, expressing the most intense love, in which not a word is spoken by the principal character. Her feelings were too deep for words. The whole occurrence will appear natural and easy, if we transfer it to our own times.

Suppose that you are sitting at your table, with a company of friends. A stranger glides into the room, with an air of deep grief, earnest, negligent in apparel, yet interesting and striking in her whole appearance. Passing round to one of your guests, and standing behind him, with a look that indicates love blended with sorrow, she bursts into a flood of tears.

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