ADDRESS TO A SUNDAY SCHOOL. John iii, 4.-“I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth.' It would be a useless task for me to enumerate and enlarge upon the different causes of joy: suffice it to say, that all do not joy in the same thing. Some joy in earthly possessions, as in goods or money; some in pleasure; and others in their cup, that is, in wine or strong drink, and many other things too well known amongst men, and which usually end in dissipation and misery. David says, on this subject, "Some put their trust in chariots, and some in horses; but (he adds) I will remember the name of the Lord our God;" which is certainly the wisest and most satisfactory of all our choices. And the Apostle John tells us in the text, that nothing gave him so great pleasure as to hear that his children, that is, those whom he had been the means, under God's blessing, of turning from the error of their ways, and bringing to the knowledge of the truth-nothing gave him so great pleasure as to hear that they walked according to truth, or according to the commands of God as expressed in the Bible. To walk in truth may be considered under the two following heads: 1st, To love the truth; and, 2dly, To make the truth, or the Scriptures, the rule of our life. In the first place, you must love the truth. Before a person can obey a command acceptably, he must first love the command, and know the result of his obedience; and he cannot love the command unless he finds it will be for his good to obey it. All the commands of God are holy, just, and good," and are given for our present good and everlasting welfare. To love the truth, is to reverence and respect it. If ever the truth is spoken ill of or scorned at by men, he who loves it will endeavour to persuade them of their error, and strive to bring them to the love and knowAUG. 1825. ledge of the truth. It is love of the truth which makes men give up the things of the world, and take plear sure in the things which accompany salvation. It was love of the truth which made the Apostle Paul say that he counted all things but dung and dross, that he might win Christ and be found in him. It was love of the truth that made the Apostles, and other good men, sacrifice their lives to their cruel enemies, rather than live in the pleasures of sin for a season. A person who loves the truth delights in hearing or reading the Bible, because he knows that it contains the words of eternal life, and testifies of Jesus, who is the author of all truth. He knows that what is necessary for his present or eternal happiness is contained in this "word of truth." The Bible tells us of the mercy and love of God to sinners; it shews us how we may be reconciled to him, how to obtain pardon and peace with God, and fellowship with his Son Jesus Christ; and, finally, by following its directions, will lead us to a land of happiness, which I am not able to describe, or you able to conceive. And here let me ask you if you love the truth. Would you give up your pleasures and amusements for the sake of devoting some time in reading God's word ? When you see others going on in a course of sin, heedlessly pursuing the downward road to destruction, do you endear vour, either by your actions or warning voice, to bring them to a sense of their danger ? Do you read your Bibles at home as well as at school? Do you pray at home by yourselves, as well as at school with your teacher? Do you keep from quarrelling with your school-fellows? Do you strive to keep holy the Sabbath-day? Are you obedient to your parents ? And, in short, paying attention to the good instruc you tion you are continually hearing from your minister and myself? "If do these things, happy are you." But, 2dly, You must walk in truth; that is, you must make the truth, or the Scriptures, the rule of your life and actions. So to walk with God, is the same as to obey God, or to keep his commands. To walk uprightly, is to live honestly. To "walk in love," is to walk in brotherly love one with another, and to do all the good we can by acts of love and kindness. Again, to "walk in Christ," or "in the light," is to follow Christ, or to govern our lives and conduct by the light of his Gospel, to imitate his example, and to obey his laws. And surely there can be no greater joy to parents, and to all who have the care of children, than to see them, as the text expresses it," walk in truth"-to find that the pains bestowed upon them is not in vain, but that they have had the desired effect, in causing them to lead virtuous and holy lives. This, my dear boys, is the great end and design of the establishment of this school, and of educating you herein. It is for the love and regard we have for your never-dying souls-the anxiety we have for your temporal and spiritual welfare, that the instruction you receive may be the means, under God's blessing, of your growing in grace, and in all the fruits of righteousness. The object which your benefactors have in subscribing to the support of this school is, that those who are engaged as your teachers should prevent your doing evil, and teach you to do well. Ignorance and idleness is the sure way to lead to wickedness and misery. Ignorance of religion and our duty is the worst sort of ignorance; and idleness on the Lord's day is the worst sort of idleness. The design of setting up this school was to prevent or remove those dreadful evils, by instructing you in religious knowledge, and by keeping you well employed on the One day set apart for religious exercises. Your minister saw, with great concern, a number of poor children in this parish loitering about on Sundays, instead of going to church and doing their duty; some talking idly, or worse than idly, and others playing as upon a working day: now if he had not loved you, and been concerned for your eternal welfare, he would and might have spared himself the trouble he has taken, and still takes, with you; but he willingly undertook the arduous and unpleasant task of soliciting subscriptions and donations from the rich of the parish towards the fitting up of this school, which many of you know was a ruinous building, and required much money to make it into the comfortable place it now is. And what was all this pains and expense for? why, to promote the salvation of your souls. soul saved will recompense us for all our labour. Already a great change has been made in your persons *. Those among you who used to loiter about idle and dirty have now become much better: you are more decent and orderly; you read your Bibles, I trust, at home as well as at school, and other good books, which before you knew not how, neither had a desire to do. You attend at church, as required; and some of you, I am happy to say, give evidence that you attend to what is spoken by your minister. What a happy change is this! how thankful ought you to be; how pleasing must it be to your parents; and how peculiarly so to us your instructors, to see you thus attend to the interest of your immortal souls! Go on, my dear boys, as you have begun. Ever keep the fear of God before your eyes. Seek the Lord while he may be found; When the school was first established, many of the children came to school barefooted, with ragged smock-frocks, &c.; but, ere long, a great change in their appearance took place, and both parents and children are anxious to appear neat and decent. un But you must remember, that all the good instruction you receive will be of little or no profit to you unless you endeavour to retain it in your mind, and let it influence your life and conduct. You will not always be at school; you will not be always children, " der tutors and governors:" but if you live you will one day enter upon the wide world, to procure all necessaries for yourselves; and if you have not God for your friend, your lot will be miserable, and your case desperate. Remember, that it is a good thing to begin well; but the great matter is to go on so; to continue improving in knowledge and goodness, to be diligent in the performance of your several duties, and not only to spend the Sabbathday well, but every other day in the week also. Above all, you should pray to God every day of your lives for his help and protection, particularly in these your younger days, because you are more likely to be ensnared in that trap which Satan has laid for your destruction. The devil is compared to a roaring lion, who daily goeth about seeking whom he may devour. Take care, then, to secure yourselves under the mighty hand of God, and then you will be safe. Remember in your prayers to thank God for the blessings already bestowed upon you. Be always well employed, remembering that the idle tempt Satan, and not Satan them. Make yourselves as useful as possible to your parents and all your other relations and friends; and shew your gratitude to your benefactors, your minister, and teacher, by making good use of the instruction you have received in this place. This is the return we expect and desire for the time and money and labour we bestow upon you; and great will be our joy and comfort to receive it: but it will be a sad disappointment and grief to us, if, after all, we find that we have been labouring in vain, and spending our strength for nought. And now let me persuade you, my dear boys, that to walk in truth is, of all others, the most pleasant and the most joyful way: it affords the most satisfaction to the mind, and procures the greatest esteem amongst men. We may talk of the pleasures of one thing, and the pleasures of another; but you will find that the ways of religion are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are paths of peace: those who walk in them enjoy that peace which the world can neither give nor take away. Pray earnestly to Almighty God, that he would give you understanding to know and grace to perform your duty; that he may keep you stedfast, immovable in the truth of the Gospel; that so both you who are taught, and we who teach, may improve in our most holy work, and hereafter be made partakers of that immortal crown which God the righteous Judge will give to all who love and fear him. Amen. ACCOUNT OF E-M———. PERCEIVING, Mr. Editor, in one of your late numbers, a short obituary of "Little Benjamin," aged eleven years-which adds another instance to the many recorded in the present day of the operations of Divine grace upon the hearts of the young, and which stamps a value upon Sunday Schools which no human MAGISTER. mind can properly estimate-I venture to send you some account of a little girl of the same age (one of our Sunday scholars), whom 1 visited in her last illness. And, as Christians, I think we cannot but rejoice at these instances of juvenile piety becoming more and more frequent; for when we see the Spirit's influence extending its benign operations to almost infant minds, we may surely infer that it indicates a more enlarged outpouring upon the church in general. For my own part, I have hitherto been somewhat sceptical in receiving accounts of the religious experience of children and young persons; and this unbelief arises in a great measure, I trust, from an increased acquaintance with the deceitfulness of my own heart. If persons advanced to something like maturity, find that they have hitherto known but little of that depth of depravity and wickedness which exist in the human heart, how apt are they to look upon children as being almost entirely ignorant of this innate defilement and proneness, to sin! Consequently we are in danger of judging-of harshly judging the promising appearances which they may manifest, of a religious nature, to spring solely from inexperience of the world and ignorance of their own hearts. This, I am afraid, we are disposed, in our first thoughts of these cases, to do; without remembering that we thus restrict the Spirit's operations, as if He were not as capable of influencing the mind of a child as that of a grownup person. However, one real case of this kind, coming immediately under our actual observation, is more likely to cure us of our scepticism than all the reasoning which might be employed upon the subject. This I have found by experience; for-though I hope it has been far from me to suppose that these cases have never occurred, when I read that "Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings Thou hast perfected praise;" "Those who seek me early shall find me;" "He shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom;" and when I discover in the sacred records such characters as Josiah, Jeremiah, and Timothy, all of whom have been decided evidences of the triumphs of Divine grace over the tender minds of the young; — yet, notwithstanding, I have generally received such cases in the present day with some reservation; an instance how long we are in laying aside our unbelieving habits. Thus I have formerly regarded them as a kind of precosity of talent, which gives no indication of future eminence and usefulness, but rather, on the contrary, forebodes approaching decline and entire failure. But the case which I purpose laying before your readers has, I hope, gone far towards rectifying so great an error in my former belief, or rather unbelief; and most gladly do I stand convicted of a fault; and I bless God for so graciously shewing it to me. And I am the more anxious to impart to your readers the case I allude to, because, as many of them are teachers, or otherwise connected with Sunday schools, they will, I hope, derive from it an additional stimulus to prosecute with ardour their "work and labour of love." Such, I hope, has been the effect produced upon myself; and with regard to the teachers, who kindly volunteer their services to our school, I think I can perceive the same kind of operation: and as to the school itself, it has certainly received a kind of eclat which it did not before possess. E-M, of S-, near Guildford, was the daughter of respectable parents in humble life. She became known to me from first attending our Sunday school; but I was totally unacquainted with the peculiar excellence of her character for some time, and regarded her merely as an interesting and amiable child: for, during my catechising at the school on a Sunday evening, I never remember her answering me one question-and, indeed, I did not know that she took any delight in these exercises, until one day her mother requested to know from what chapter I should ask the questions on the following Sunday, as her daughter wished to know, in order that she might read it over first. I believe I answered her, that it would be, according to my custom, one of the First Lessons for the day. I then asked her if her daughter gave much attention to these things; and I think she answered in the affirmative. My observation was, "I am very glad to hear it." Nothing more occurred for some months; and, indeed, I had forgotten the incident just mentioned when the information was given at the school that E. M. was very unwell. Accordingly, I promised to go and see her; but this promise was not performed immediately; for, not being accus. tomed to look to her for any answers to my questions, another Sunday arrived, and I did not observe her absence. I was then again admonished of her illness, and two days afterwards I went to see her. I shall not for a long time forget the very affectionate manner in which she received me; and, what was still better, she instantly adverted to the purport of my visit, and, having a book of devotion in her hand, she pointed out to me some passages which had been a great comfort to her. I then for the first time perceived the decidedly pious state of the child's mind. I saw that I had overlooked her in the number of children, and had not appreciated her according to her real worth for, though she did not answer my questions at the school, yet I found that she was much better enriched than with mere headknowledge, that her heart was under the influence of Divine grace ; of that grace which creates all things new, transforms the soul into the Divine image, and makes it "meet to be a partaker of the inheritance of the saints in light." I moreover thought I saw a feeling, a depth, in every thing she spoke, which, in her case, as a child, agreeably surprised me. She conversed about Divine things like one who was not merely seeking for information, but who was already privileged to have the happy experience of them. There was a kind of maturity, that seemed to stamp a reality upon her religious experience, and which made me think within myself, "This is a tangible case-here is substance." I then asked her how long her mind had been in this devout frame, and found that it had not been of long standing-about a year-and, from what I could learn, seemed to have derived its origin from an illness which occurred about that time. Of course, after this first interview, so agreeable in its nature, and likely, in its effects, to be so useful to myself and others, I took great interest in her case. Her complaint was a consumption; and, though there was every thing to fear, yet it was thought, that, by the Divine blessing, if she were well nursed during the winter, she might live for some time, if not recover. But these hopes of her friends (for, in consequence of her piety, she had many kind and Christian friends, who otherwise would probably never have visited her) were to be blighted; for her complaint speedily turned to a dropsy, and then terminated her life. I have already intimated, that my attendance upon her during her last illness has removed many doubts, and given me, I hope, clearer views of those operations of Divine grace by which the Great Head of the church saves the perishing sinner; but before entering upon the state of her mind during that period, it may be advisable to go back little, and inquire what her previous character was, when she could have no particular fears respecting death, Ministers are so accustomed to witness religious deportment in the immediate prospect of death, and, when that is over, those pleasing appearances, which began to raise the most delightful sensations in the |