Page images
PDF
EPUB

all the ceremonials of Divine worship, and bad the lively oracles of salvation in their hands, and, as the prophet Zephaniah expresses it, "were baughty because of God's holy mountain!" Would these things profit them in that day when the secrets of all hearts shall be revealed, and each individual of mankind shall be judged according to the deeds done in the body; and when, moreover, he who knew his Lord's will and did it not, shall be beaten with many more stripes than his less privileged neighbour? The Prophet forcibly points out the extreme folly and delusiveness of such expectations: "Go," he says, "unto my place which was in Shiloh, where I set my name at the first; and see what I did to it for the wickedness of my people Israel. And now, because ye have done all these works, saith the Lord, and I spake unto you, rising up early and speaking, but ye heard not; and I called unto you, but ye answered not; therefore will I do unto this house which is called by my name, wherein ye trust, and unto the place which I gave to you and to your fathers, as I have done to Shiloh." The temple of Jerusalem, however glorious its appearance, however dear, if we may so speak, to Jehovah, if wickedness were found in it, should soon be made like that tabernacle of which it is recorded, that" God forsook it ;" and which probably remained in ruins to future ages, a monument of the Divine displeasure against sin, even in the very seat of professed sanctity, and the place which he had selected for the visible emblems of his presence. Truly, to use the words of St. Paul (Gal. vi.15)," with God neither circumcision availeth any thing, nor uncircumcision ;" that is, no outward form, or profession, or privilege; but "a new, creature," or, as the Apostle expresses it in the fifth chapter, faith which worketh by love."

Having thus considered the extreme folly of trusting to external privileges, while the heart is unrenewed and the life unholy, we are, Secondly, to shew,that this folly is too common in all ages; and that we ourselves, perhaps, are guilty of it.-We have already seen how prone the Jews were, at every period of their history, to take refuge from the denunciations of their Prophets in the excellence of their public worship, and the presumed favour of God towards them; and this, notwithstanding that his promises were inseparably joined with an exhortation and command to walk in his laws, without which they were to expect no protection at his hands. And thus it is to the present hour. How many pride themselves in being zealous Protestants, or strict members of the Established Church, or regular attendants on public worship, while they live in the spirit of the world, and without any scriptural evidence of being in a state of favour with God! How many trust to the supposed orthodoxy of their faith; or to their zeal against infidelity, enthusiasm, or superstition; while they are ignorant of the scriptural way of salvation, and indifferent to the great concern of making their calling and election sure! How many cherish a secret hope from the prayers of religious parents, the zeal and piety of their ministers, the remaining good effects of a Christian education, or the signal mercies of Divine Providence in their behalf; while they are destitute of any principle of love to God, and have no desire to live to his glory! How many boast of the extensive circulation of the Scriptures; of the many symptoms of a revival of religion in the land; of the efforts, in particular, of their own sect or party to extend the knowledge of Christianity throughout the world; or of the invaluable religious privileges of our highly favoured country; and yet, like the self-deceivers in the text, are wholly unconcerned

themselves to lead a life consistent with their professed hopes and privileges! How many, again, contend earnestly for the purity of Christian doctrine; or trust to some change of sect or sentiment, or to some impression on their imagination, which they mistake for true conversion of heart, without being at all nearer the kingdom of God than the Jews, with their boasted zeal for the temple and the ritual of Divine worship! In short, innumerable are the ways in which persons deceive themselves on these subjects; fancying that the temple of the Lord is among them; and on this vain surmise remaining content and careless in their sins, and ignorant of all true religion.

Now let us ask ourselves, in conclusion, whether such is our own case. On what are we placing our hopes for eternity? Are we resting upon any thing superficial or external; upon any thing short of genuine conversion of heart to God, a simple reliance upon the merits and grace of our Saviour, accompanied by a life of holy obedience to his commands? It is nothing that we were born in a Christian country; that we received a pious education; were taught the Scriptures from our infancy; were accustomed to attend public worship and family prayer; were trained to take an interest in the benevolent labours of religious and charitable institutions; were instructed accurately to detect and warmly to exclaim against false doctrine, and to comply with every usage and ceremony of the church; if to this fair outward form be not added the life and spirit of religion in the soul. True piety is not any thing that can be done for us; it must be engrafted in us; it must dwell in our hearts, and shew its blessed effects in our conduct. We must devoutly love and reverence our Creator; we must come as helpless sinners to the cross of our Saviour; we must trust alone in his all-sufficient sacrifice for salvation; we

must give up ourselves body and soul to his service; we must make it our chief object to know and to perform his will; we must renounce every known sin for his sake; we must endeavour to love and serve our fellow-creatures, even as He also loved us. Every thing short of this true devotion of heart and life to God, is but the shadow of Christianity: it is but erying, "The temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord are we :" whereas the only earthly temple in which God dwells by his spiritual presence is, that of a new and contrite heart. "The temple of God is holy, which temple ye are." "Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in you, which ye have of God? And ye are not your own, for ye are bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's."

To the Editor of the Christian Observer. THERE is no topic which has been more frequently and ably discussed in the pages of the Christian Observer, than the duty of renouncing the world; and I feel greatly indebted to many of your correspondents for their valuable remarks on this subject, scattered up and down your twenty volumes. În practice, however, there is frequently found great difficulty in accommodating general rules to the daily occurrences of life, and on no point more so than that of worldly conformity. I will take the liberty, therefore, of requesting from some of your contributors, a well-weighed answer to the following query; a query which relates to a subject of great interest to no small number of persons at the present period, and on which the opinions of many excellent practical casuists are greatly divided. The query is as follows:

What is the proper line of conduct to be pursued by pious and conscientious parents providentially

situated in places where the society of persons of kindred sentiments in religion cannot be obtained, except by breaking the established gradations of life, and mixing intimately with individuals whose station, education, or habits render them in many respects, notwithstanding their piety, undesirable companions for their children? Ought religious parents in such cases

entirely to prevent young persons enjoying the advantages of society? or may they allow them to mix, to a certain extent, with casual acquaintances in their own circle of life? and how must they act as respects their intercourse with religious persons in subordinate stations?

QUERENS.

MISCELLANEOUS.

To the Editor of the Christian Observer. THERE is no class of persons in whose welfare I have taken a more lively interest, than that of domestic instructors, both male and female, resident in the families of the nobility and wealthy commoners of this country. Accustomed, in many instances, in early life, to the refinements of feeling and taste arising from a liberal education; to the comforts of a happy domestic fireside; and to the interchange of that pre-eminent human blessing, family affection; they are perhaps, by means of some unforeseen calamity, removed into a wealthy family, to undertake the charge of several young persons with whom they have never previously had the least in tercourse, and in whom they can of course feel, at least at first, no peculiar interest, except as their instructors. Regarded by the elder members of the family as unwelcome, though necessary, intruders, and by the younger ones as persons whose only object is to instil into their minds knowledge which they probably hate, and to enforce the necessity of overcoming many propensities which the want of discipline has rendered habitual to them; destitute of the social comforts enjoyed even by the servants of a well-regulated household, and unrepaid by the kind enCHRIST. OBSERV. No. 243.

couragement of friendly and affectionate esteem, they are expected to have mental energy and bodily health to persevere in the arduous duties of an office the most laborious, most anxious, and most responsible. Can we be surprised that so many persons thus circumstanced become early the victims. of lingering disease; or, what is yet more distressing, are deprived, by over exertion, of that mental elasticity which might have been the solace of their declining years, and the delight of a happy circle of affectionate friends? They are expected to be intimately acquainted with all the subjects which constitute a well-conducted and accomplished education, and to possess the power of communicating knowledge with ease and pleasure to their pupils; and yet with such large demands on their time, and intellect, and talents, they are not only often worse remunerated than many an upper servant, but are subjected to numerous mortifications from which the latter are exempt.

A little serious thought would teach persons of intelligent and reflecting minds, even from pure selfishness, unassisted by any higher principle or better feeling, to pursue a more liberal plan of conduct towards the instructors of their children. For, can they expect that well-educated persons of any

U

feeling or delicacy, can possess that affectionate interest, that unremitting energy, so necessary for

the fulfilment of the duties of a conscientious domestic instructor, if oppressed by the pride or formal coldness of their employers, and without any opportunity of exercising the better feelings of the human heart? Or can they hope that their children should shew that affectionate respect for their instructors which is necessary to enable the latter to acquire a suitable influence over their tempers, and to direct their understandings? Were these remarks applicable only to persons of mere hackneyed character, who lose every good feeling in the selfishness of worldly pursuits; or to the gay and dissipated, who expend all their sensibilities in the haunts of folly; I should have been less anxious to urge the subject in the pages of the Christian Observer: but unhappily I have seen the portrait which I have sketched too accurately exemplified in the houses even of persons who profess to be consistent followers of that meek and humble Saviour who "went about doing good." I have witnessed it in the dwellings of some valuable and much respected friends, to whose hospitality I have been greatly indebted, and who, I believe, were quite unconscious of the pain they were occasioning. Often have I met with instructors of both sexes, secluded from every domestic enjoyment, from every social comfort,labouring incessantly month. after month, for the benefit of those who, when the daily task was ended, were encouraged to fly from their instructors in pursuit of pleasures in which the latter were not permitted to join; being left, unnoticed or forgotten, to struggle in solitude with feelings of weariness and mortification, feelings which the united strength of reason and religion, was often insufficient to overcome. Others I have seen allowed-I cannot say invited to pay a formal visit

to the drawing-room in the evening for an hour or two, to be silently neglected by half the party, if not bantered by the other half, and then to retire weary and dispirited with their irksome visit of ceremony, to draw in solitude a painful contrast between the comforts of their lost home and the oppression of thoughtless selfishness. Surely persons to whom an indulgent Providence has given the power of contributing to the comfort of such useful, and, in very many instances, truly valuable, members of their family, should endeavour to keep in mind that heavenly injunction to "do to others as they would that others should do to them." Let them place themselves in idea in the situation of those whom they unfeelingly neglect, or unnecessarily mortify; and then, unless selfishness and a life of folly have hardened their heart, they cannot but feel an honest regret at their want of Christian benevolence, and an earnest desire in future to obviate their past errors.

[ocr errors]

To those who are struggling with the difficulties and trials alluded to, I would say, Happy are you, if you have learned in the school of affliction to set your affections on things above;' and, though, deprived of many earthly comforts, to

[ocr errors]

Rejoice in the Lord.' Be not weary in well doing,' however great your discouragements; for in due season ye shall reap, if ye faint not.'"

I turn from this painful retrospect, to one which has always afforded me great pleasure; for among the list of my friends, I am happy to say I can number some who act a very different part. Blessed with great affluence, and in several instances with high titles, their heartfelt pleasure consists in diffusing happiness to all around them. In their houses I have seen the instructors of their children admitted with the most friendly hospitality into the domestic circle,

treated with uniform respect and attention by the elder branches of the family, partaking with them of every social repast, and withdrawing only from those large and formal entertainments in which they would not have felt at home, if invited to them, and which would have encroached on the hours and habits and duties of their station. Thus affectionately treated by their employers, they have acquired a powerful influence over the dispositions and understandings of their pupils, and have had the satisfaction of forming them, through the blessing of God upon their labours, to "whatsoever things are just, true, lovely, and of good report." Several persons thus circumstanced have candidly owned to me, that the salutary influence they have enjoyed over their young friends has been chiefly owing to the kindness with which they were distinguished by the parents; and all with whom I have been acquainted (with the exception of one ungrateful individual whose wrong propensities no kindness could subdue) have laboured in return with unremitting attention and cheerfulness, to devote every faculty and talent they possessed to the service of their benefactors and their children, firmly resisting more lucrative offers, and becoming, in after life, the friends and advisers of those whom they had trained to early habits of industry, piety, and social virtue.

...I am far, however, from asserting, that in the unhappy cases to which I have before referred, all the blame was on the side of the employer. The habits and tempers of many individuals concerned in domestic education are too much of a character to excite some degree of reserve and distance on the part of the heads and the friends of the families in which they reside. I have known instructors, both male and female, who though fully qualified for their station by competent Jalents and information, and per

haps by a spirit of piety, have so grievously failed in some of the domestic virtues, or have cherished so little reverence for the minuter forms of well-ordered society, that their employers have found it difficult to incorporate them as they could have wished in the select family circle. It would be doing a considerable service to the younger race of tutors and governesses, and through them to many families, if some of your correspondents, conversant with the details of the subject, would draw up a counterpart to the foregoing remarks, and would affectionately point out, with a view to correct, those faults or failings of the class of persons in question which prevent their ordinarily obtaining that degree of estimation in society to which their mental and moral qualifications, generally speaking, entitle them. In many cases, these faults or failings are unknown and unsuspected by the individual, and would be readily corrected if kindly pointed out.-I will only just glance at the kind of specification which I mean. For example; I have occasionally observed, in families of highly polished habits, governesses or tutors, whose early education and acquaintance had been of so very unpropitious a kind, that whatever their value as teachers, it was impossible even for their pupils not to observe such defects in their speech, or manners, or behaviour, as would render it very difficult for a judicious parent to know how to act on the occasion. These cases are the more painful, because they may occur where there is the greatest merit in the individual. Other defects are of a less excusable kind;-such as hastiness of temper; unreasonable discontentedness with the station assigned by Providence; a morbid habit of viewing almost every thing as intended for a personal slight; pedantic habits in conversation; the indulgence of a satirical spirit; the love of disputation; vanity in

« PreviousContinue »