did I see and feel more deeply, by contrast, the folly of trusting to a
death-bed repentance, to repair the errors of a wasted life. It is a
deliberate attempt at fraud upon the Most High; it is folly; for the
risk is fearful, and could we obtain salvation, how mercenarily!--and
what a memorial would it be in heaven of loss, instead of being "a crown
of righteousness!" They who are all their lifetime ignorant, being
unfortunately deprived of opportunity for religious instruction, may
with wonder and joy accept the surprising news of pardon, through
Christ, on a dying bed, and soar to the same heights with apostles in
their praises of redeeming love. But if we hear of salvation by Christ
all our life long, and know our duty, but prefer the pleasures of sin
for a season, and think that in the swellings of Jordan we shall find
peace and safety, our conduct deserves all the opprobrious names which
are heaped upon it by inspired tongues and pens. We who are parents must
teach our children that religion does not consist merely in being
pardoned, and, if pardoned, no matter whether early or late; but that it
is the first, the constant, the all-pervading rule of life, God and his
service the chief end of man, and that the pleasures of religion are the
sweetest pleasures, hallowing all others which are innocent, and leading
us to reject those, and only those, which would be unsuitable or
injurious, even if religious custom did not forbid them. We must know
this, and practise upon it, ourselves; else, how can we expect the
children to believe it?

The exceeding relief which a timely preparation for death by an early
consecration of herself to God, imparted to this child and to us, was
felt in this, that she and we had no distressing thoughts at her total
inability, for a long time, to join in prayer with others, or to be
conversed with in any way that excited much feeling. The diseased
throat, where, as we all know, our emotions, even in health and