Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1893-03-23

who, as a result Of the story, became a
| Christian, and from her own lips-my
| mother's-I have received the incident.
The story of that converted household
ran through NIL the neighhorhood, from
family to family until the whole region
was whelmed with religious awakening
and at the next communion in the village
| church ut Somerville over 200 souls stood
up to profess the faith Of the gospel My
mother, carrying the memory Of this scene
from early womanhood into further life, in
after years was resolved upon the salvation
of her children, and for many years every
week she met three other Christian moth
ers to pray for the salvation Of their fami-
lies think that all the members of those
families were saved-myself, the youngest
and the last
GRANDMoTHER's PRAYER.
There were ~ of us children. / trace the
whole line of mercy back to that hour when
| my Christian grandmother sat in her room
imploring the blessing of God upon her
children. Nine Of her descendants became
preachers Of the gospel. Many of her de-
scendants are in heaven, many of them still
in the Christian conflict Did it pay for her
TO spend the whole evening in prayer for
her households Ask her before the throne
of God surrounded by her children. In the
presence Of the Christian church today |
make this record Of ancestral piety. Oh,
there is beauty and a tenderness and a
sublimity in family religionl
There are but four or five pictures in the
old family Bible that l inherited, but Dore
never illustrated Bible as that book is
illustrated to my eyes. Through it ] can
see into marriages and burials, Joys and
sorrows meetings and partings, Thanks
giving days and Christmas festivals era
dies and deathbeds. Old, old book speak
out and tell of the sorrows comforted and
of the dying hours irradiated Old old
bookl the hands that held thee are ashes,
the eyes that perused thee are closed.
What pillow thou wouldst make for
dying head l salute all the memories Of
the past when press it to my heart and
when press it to my lips.
THE OLD FAMILY BIBLE.
Oh, that family Biblel The New Tesla
mcnt in small type is not worthy Of being
called by that name. Have a whole Bible
in large type, with the family record of
marriages and births and deaths. What if
the curious should turn over the leaves to
see how old you arei You are younger now
than you will ever be again. The curious
will find out from those with whom you
have played in your childhood how old you
are. Have n family Bible. 1t will 90 down
from generation to generation full of holy
memories. 4 hundred years after you are
dead it will be II bcnediCtion to those who
come after you. Other books worn out or
fallen apart will be flung to the garnet or
the cellar, but this will be inviolate, and it
will be your protest for centuries against in
Equity and in behalf of righteousness.
Oh, when we see what family religion
did for our fathers household, do we not
want it to come into the dining room to
break the bread, into the nursery to bless
the young, into the parlor to purify the
socialities, into the library to control the
reading, into the bedroom to hallow the
slumber, into the hall to watch our going
out and our coming INF Aye, there are
hundreds of voices in this house ready to
cry out: "Yesl Yesl AS for me and my
house, we will serve the Lord"
There are two arms to this subject. The
one arm puts it's hand on all parents. 1t
says to them: Don't interfere with your
children welfare. Don't interfere with
their eternal happiness. Don't you by any
thing you do put out your foot and trip
. them into ruin. Start them under the shell
ter, the insurance, the everlasting help of
Christian parcntage. Catechisms will not
save them, though catechisms are good.
The rod will not save them, though the rod
may be necessary. Lessons of virtue will
not save them, though they are very i'm
pIrtant. Becoming a through and through,
up and down. out and out Christian your
self will make them Christians"
The other arm of this subject puts its
hand upon those who had pious bringing
up, but who as yet have disappointed the
expectations excited in regard to them. l
said that children brought up in Christian
! hon l,r1I tlnty i,,lt al =,
wide curve, were very apt to come back to
the straight path. Have you not been
curving out long enough, and is it not
most time for you to begin to curve in?
'Oh," you say, they were too rigid"
Well now, my brother, think you have a
pretty good character considering what you
say your parents We're. DO not boast too
much about the style in which your parents
brought you up Might it not be possible
that you would be an exception to the gen
eral rule laid down, and that you might
spend your eternity in a different world
from that in which your parents are spend,
ing theirs?
CHRISTIAN soLICITUDE.
feel anxious about you: you feel anx.
ious about yourself Oh, cross over into
the right path! If your parents prayed for
you twice day-each Of them twice a day
for 20 years-that would make 90, 900 pray
ers for you. Think of them!
BY the memory Of the cradle in which
your childhood was rocked with the foot
that long ago ceased to move by the crib in
which your own children slumber night by
night under God 5 protecting care; by the
two graves in which sleep those two old
hearts that beat with love so long for your
welfare, and by the two graves in which
you, now the living father and mother, will
find your last repose, urge you TO the dis
charge of your duty.
Though parents may in covenant be
And have their heaven in view,
They are not happy till they see
Their children happy too.
Oh, you departed Christian ancestry
fathers and mothers in glory, bend from the
skies today and give new emphasis to what
you told US on earth with many tears and
anxieties Keep place for us by your
blissful side, for today, in the presence of
earth and heaven and hell, and by the help