idea of the Divine beneficence.

This natural, this instinctive operation of the imaginative faculty, is
often observed in children. Numberless are the stories told by fond
mothers of the wonderful things uttered by their babies, shortly after
they have left their cradles. The most striking peculiarity running
through them all is the astonishing audacity with which the child treats
the most sacred things. He or she seems to have no sense of awe. All
children are taught to believe that God resides above them in the sky;
and I shall never forget the shock of surprise I felt at the answer of a
boy of five years--whom I found glorying over the treasures of his first
paint-box--to my question: "Which color do you like best?" "Oh," he
carelessly replied, "I like best sky-blue,--God's color." And the little
rogue went on, daubing the paper before him with a mixture of all
colors, utterly unconscious that he had said any thing remarkable; and
yet what Mrs. Browning specially distinguishes as the characteristic of
the first and one of the greatest of English poets, Chaucer, namely, his
"familiar grasp of things Divine," could not have found a more
appropriate illustration than in this chance remark of a mere child,
expressing the fearlessness of his faith in the Almighty Father above
him.

Now in all these instinctive operations of the imagination, whether in
the mind of a child or in that of a grown man, it is easy to discern the
mark of sincerity. If the child is petted, and urged by his mother to
display his brightness before a company of other mothers and other
babies, he is in danger of learning early that trick of falsehood, which
clings to him when he goes to school, when he leaves the school for the
college, and when he leaves the college for the pursuits of professional
life. The farmer or mechanic, not endowed with "college larnin'," is