a genuine desire on the parent's part to make the child feel that he
is loved, and that his natural feelings are respected. This is all
the religious education which a child should have. As he grows older
he will then turn naturally to the waters of life, and thirst after
them of his own accord by reason of the spiritual refreshment which
they, and they only, can afford. Otherwise he will shrink from them,
on account of his recollection of the way in which he was led down to
drink against his will, and perhaps with harshness, when all the
analogies with which he was acquainted pointed in the direction of
their being unpleasant and unwholesome. So soul-satisfying is family
affection to a child, that he who has once enjoyed it cannot bear to
be deprived of the hope that he is possessed in Heaven of a parent
who is like his earthly father--of a friend and counsellor who will
never, never fail him. There is no such religious nor moral
education as kindly genial treatment and a good example; all else may
then be let alone till the child is old enough to feel the want of
it. It is true that the seed will thus be sown late, but in what a
soil! On the other hand, if a man has found his earthly father harsh
and uncongenial, his conception of his Heavenly Parent will be
painful. He will begin by seeing God as an exaggerated likeness of
his father. He will therefore shrink from Him. The rottenness of
stillborn love in the heart of a child poisons the blood of the soul,
and hence, later, crime.

To return, however, to the lady. When she had put on her night-gown,
she knelt down by her bedside and, to our consternation, began to say
her prayers. This was a cruel blow to both of us; we had always been
under the impression that grownup people were not made to say their
prayers, and the idea of any one saying them of his or her own accord
had never occurred to us as possible. Of course the lady would not