while they feel as deeply, have not the clear perceptions of what is right that others have. Much has been written on the subject of guiding and governing children-much that is good, and much that is of doubtful utility. I will here present, from the pen of an English lady, whose work has not, we believe, been re-printed in this country, a most excellent series of precepts. They deserve to be written in letters of gold, and hung up in every nursery. She says

"The moment a child is born into the world, a mother's duties commence; and of all those which God has allotted to mortals, there are none so important as those which devolve upon a mother.

More feeble and helpless than any thing else of living creatures is an infant in the first days of its existence-unable to minister to its own wants, unable even to make those wants known: a feeble cry which indicates suffering, but not what or where the pain is, is all it can utter.

But to meet this weakness and incapacity on the part of the infant, God has implanted in the heart of the mother a yearning affection to her offspring, so that she feels this almost inanimate being to be a part of herself, and every cry of pain acts as a dagger to her own heart.

And to humanity alone, of all the tribes of animated beings, has a power been given to nullify this feeling. Beast, bird, and insect, attend to the wants of their offspring, accordingly as those wants require much or little assiduity. But woman, if she will, can drug and stupefy this feeling. She can commit the charge

of her child to dependants and servants, and need only to take care that enough is provided to meet that child's wants, but need not see herself that those wants are actually met.

But a woman who does this is far, very far, from doing her duty. Who is so fit to watch over the wants of infancy as she who gave that infant birth? Can a mother suppose, that if she can so stifle those sensibilities which prompt her to provide for the wants of her children, servants and dependants, in whom no such sensibilities exist, will be very solicitous about their charge?

How many of the infant's cries will be unattended to, which would at once have made their way to the heart of a mother! and, therefore, how many of the child's wants will in consequence remain uncared for!

No one can understand so well the wants of a child as a mother-no one is ever so ready to meet those wants as she; and, therefore, to none but a mother, under ordinary circumstances, should the entire charge of a child be committed, And in all countries in which luxury has not so far attained the ascendency, that in order to partake of its pleasures a mother will desert her offspring, the cares and trials of maternal love are entered upon as the sweetest of enjoyments and the greatest of pleasures. It was a noble saying of a queen of France, "that none should share with her the privileges of a mother;" and if the same sentiment found its way into every heart, a very different aspect would soon be produced. How many, through ill-treatment and neglect in childhood, carry the marks to their

dying day in weak and sickly constitutions! how many more in a distorted body and crippled limbs! These are but the too sure consequences of the neglect of a mother, and, consequent upon that, the neglect of servants, who, feeling the child a burden, lessen their own trouble; and many a mother who, perhaps, now that her child has grown up, weeps bitter tears over his infirmities, might have saved his pain and her own sorrow by attending to his wants in infancy.

"Can a mother forget her sucking child?" asks the inspired penman, in a way that it would seem to be so great an anomaly as almost to amount to an impossibility. Yet modern luxury not only proves that such a thing can be done, but it is one even of common occurrence. But if done, surely some great stake must be pending-something on which life and property are concerned -that a mother can thus forget the child of her bosom? Alas! no; the child is neglected, that no interruption may take place in the mother's stream of pleasure. For the blandishments of the theatre, or the excitements of the dance, is a child left to the charge of those who have nothing of love for it-no sympathy for its sufferings, no joyousness in sharing in its pleasures.

A woman forfeits all claim to the sacred character of a mother if she abandon her offspring to the entire care of others: for ere she can do this, she must have stifled all the best feelings of her nature, and become "worse than the infidel" -for she gives freely to the stranger, and neglects

her own.

Therefore should a woman, if she would fulfil

It is not

her duty, make her child her first care. necessary that her whole time should be spent in attending to its wants; but it is necessary that so much of the time should be spent, that nothing should be neglected which could add to the child's comfort and happiness. And not only is it needful that a woman should show a motherly fondness for her child, so that she should attend to its wants and be solicitous for its welfare; it is also necessary that she should know how those wants are best to be provided for, and how that welfare is best to be consulted: for to the natural feelings which prompt animals to provide for their offspring, to humanity is added the noble gift of reason; so that thought and solicitude are not merely the effects of blind instinct, but the produce of a higher and nobler faculty.

As we have already adverted to this point, we shall only say, that without a knowledge of how the physical wants of a child are to be met in the best manner, a mother cannot be said to be performing her duty; for the kindness which is bestowed may be but the result of natural feeling, which it would be far harder to resist than to fulfil; whereas the want of knowledge may have resulted from ignorance and idleness, and the loss of this knowledge will never be made up by natural kindness and love: it will be like trying to work without hands, or to see when the eyes are blinded.

But there is yet a higher duty devolving upon woman. She has to attend to the mental and moral wants of her offspring, as well as to the physical. And helpless as we are born into the

world if reference be made to our physical wants, we are yet more helpless if reference be made to our mental and moral. We come into the world with evil passions, perverted faculties, and unholy dispositions: for let what will be said of the blandness and attractiveness of children, there are in those young hearts the seeds of evil; and it needs but that a note be taken of what passes in the every-day life of a child, to convince that all is not so amiable as at first sight appears, but that the heart hides dark deformity, headstrong passions, and vicious thoughts. And to a mother's lot it falls to be the instructress of her children-their guide and pattern, and she fails in her duty when she fails in either of these points. But it may be said, that the requirement is greater than humanity can perform, and that it would need angelic purity to be able fully to meet it; for who shall say that she is so perfect that no inconsistencies shall appear between what she teaches and what she practises?

It would be, indeed, to suppose mothers more than human to think that their instructions should be perfect. The best of mothers are liable to err, and the love a mother has for her child may tempt her frequently to pass over faults which she knows ought to be corrected. But making due allowance for human incompetency and human weakness, still will a mother be bound to the utmost of her power to be the instructress of her child, equally by the lesson she inculcates and the pattern she exhibits.

There is, indeed, too much neglect shown in the instruction of children. Mothers seem to