a matter of course, in the lips of many, no longer implies religious information. But, notwithstanding this alteration, never did we hear so much of the value and advantages of education, and of its connexion with happiness and virtue. But of what is this affirmed? Of "a thing of shreds and patches;" splendid and many-coloured it may be; yet not worthy of a better appellation, because not connected with any principle, or directed to any end worthy of our being. To open the mind to human science, to awaken the pleasures of taste, and to decorate the external man with the adornings of civil and refined life, might be sufficient to occupy the office of education, were there no God, no Saviour, and no future being. Were this life not preparatory, and man not hurrying on to the presence of his Judge; had he no pardon to implore, or law to obey, then this would. be education: "but most affectingly deficient will the knowledge of that youth be found, and negligent in the highest degree must his Parents be considered, if his mind is left unoccupied by other objects, and unfamiliarized to higher considerations. Thus they may rear a whited wall, or build a whited sepulchre, but they enclose an uncorrected corruption within. Perhaps they do worse; they give play and activity to the powers, without directing their movements, and abandon instruments of an energy not to be calculated, to the stimulus of principles and passions, which employ them only for the purposes of destruction.”1 1 Richard Watson. Besides, the very substance of proper education is the establishment of good habits, the provision for which is so eminently conspicuous in the Domestic Constitution-" habits extending alike to the body and the soul, and influencing equally the thoughts and the affections, the language and conduct. Without these, nothing in the human character or human life can be efficacious, or permanent, or useful. To establish these, therefore, in the morning of life, is the great business of education. Habits, however, are formed only by the frequent and long-continued repetition of the same measures; and nothing ever becomes habitual, except that which has been long and often repeated." But, for the formation of these, no school can provide, nor can any voluntary society ever be formed. "To accomplish such repetition, nothing will suffice but the steady affection of married Parents: a manifest and striking proof of our Creator's design in their union."1 No, but for this institution, the children of a nation can never be habitually trained to industry and economy, to submission or good order—never to sweetness of disposition or tenderness of affection, to amiableness of manners or offices of kindness.2 Respecting the best form of national government, mankind have been contending for ages: but, whatever be the form of political arrangements, let the family constitution once be neglected, then will the blessings of rational freedom and good government, with all the superior blessings of morality and religion, vanish from 1 Dwight. 2 Additional proof of this will be found under the title of Family Instruction, the obligations to which are untransferable. that land. Nay, in time, it must become one vast den, and its inhabitants, if not destroyed, would change into animals the most ferocious and terrible on earth. Such is the merciful preservative, the simple but efficacious and mighty check, involved in this small and unpretending, but invincible constitution! Other ends might be illustrated, and will occur in the course of these pages: let these, for the present, suffice; but in illustration of the danger and folly of interference, as well as the vanity of artificial arrangements proposed by man, I must not omit to notice one peculiar facility thus afforded by God, for the accomplishment of his own purposes. 3. By the Family Constitution, the Almighty has himself marked out the only proper and effectual division of labour,-a division which past ages shew he is not only determined to preserve, but will not suffer to be invaded with impunity, and the only division, for the ends in view, on which man can warrantably expect his blessing. God made man upright: since then " he hath sought out many inventions," and thus often been involved in a labyrinth. Infidel philosophy writes on human perfectability, and sees no evil, but good, in promiscuous intercourse. To meet the demoralizing inroads of commercial speculation, or relieve the feelings of many while engaged in amassing wealth, another may propose parallelograms of the species,-but all localities, all territorial arrangements, of whatever description, whether for the gratification of appetite or the acquisition of property, nay, for the promotion of benevolence, or even religion professedly, which disre gard or officiously intermeddle with the Family Constitution, must not only, sooner or later, break down, but they will bring their own punishment along with them; and man at last must submit to begin and go *on with man, where God begins, and as he goes on with him. Such a line of things being made ready to our hands, though it should be mortifying to human vanity, is it any hardship that an authoritative stop should have been put by the Almighty to any other? Let but the peculiar, the absolutely inimitable features of this division of labour be once understood, man will not only be afraid to touch with it—he will pause, nay, admire it, as he well may, and work only in cautious and perfect subordination. Labour is the appointment of Heaven, though man naturally is averse from it, and though it be divided, except he is brought generally to feel so far voluntary, our finest proposals are abortive. "But here is a division of labour which is perfectly voluntary: the employment being ordinarily chosen by the individual for himself. The situation in which he stands as a Man and a Parent, and the partner with whom he is connected in life, are both the objects of his choice; and these facts, united with the common rewards of industry, furnish all the reasons which can usually exist to render it cheerful and efficacious." "The minuteness of this division of labour is eminently conspicuous. To preserve the order of an apostate world required the wisdom of God. The great task of establishing it among such beings as we are, selfish, revolting, and refractory, he has assigned to an innumerable multitude of hands: a multitude suffi ciently great to receive it in such portions, so small and so circumstanced, as to ensure both the ability and the inclination to accomplish it effectually. These portions are so small as to involve only the Children of a single family. To this little flock are given regularly two Rulers, taking them all in all, better disposed and better qualified, in almost all instances, than any other persons found in the world. The circumstances in which those are placed who are to be governed are more favourable to the accomplishment of the end than any other can be. Their infancy, childhood, and youth, in succession; their feebleness, dependence, and ignorance; the affection and superiority, the care and kindness of the Parents, the instinctive love and reverence of the children, together with their necessary and long-continued residence, during their earliest years, under the parental roof: all these present to the contemplative eye a combination of things which display, by their singular adaptation, one of the most remarkable proofs of infinite wisdom. Fewer hands could not possibly accomplish this mighty task: a task which cannot be accomplished by proxy, nor could substitutes be found. All the wisdom of legislation, all the energy of despotism, would be spent upon it in vain. It is beyond calculation a greater and more arduous work than all the labours of all Rulers, whether legislative, executive, or judicial, united." "This division of labour is, in short, the best, because it is the simplest and easiest possible, the best, because it has been thoroughly tried, and has always been able peacefully and happily to accomplish the ends in view, the best, because it is the established order of the universe, the result of Divine wisdom and |