catching their _death a' cold_? Indeed, was not the sanction of bundling
in such cases a tacit admission, on the part of the parents, of their
perfect confidence in the young folks, which necessarily acted upon the
latter as, at once, a strong restraint from wrong, and a strong
incentive to right doing? The influence of early religious training, the
powerful control which the church had obtained upon the social and
domestic life of the people, and the superstitious aspect which, in
those days, the gospel was made to wear, must also be taken into the
account. And, moreover, is it not probable that the universality of the
custom, which certainly cleared it from anything like odium or reproach,
would naturally tend to preclude, in a degree, any improper ideas in the
minds of those who practiced it? Such, then, we consider the _status_ of
the custom in the earlier history of the colonies, and among the _first
generation_ of settlers.

"But," if the reader will allow us to quote from a previous work, "the
emigration from a civilized to a new country,[31] is necessarily a step
backward into barbarism. The _second generation_ did not fill the place
of the fathers. Reared amid the trials and dangers of a new settlement,
they were in a great measure deprived of the advantages, both social and
educational, which their parents had enjoyed. Nearly all of the former
could write, which cannot be said of their children. Neither did the
latter possess that depth of religious feeling, or earnest practical
piety which distinguished the first comers. Religion was to them less a
matter of the heart than of social privilege, and in the _half way
covenant_ controversy we behold the gradual _letting down of bars_
between a pure church and a grasping world.

"The _third_ generation followed in the footsteps of their predecessors.
Then came war; and young New England brought from the long Canadian