To noble and religious imitation,
Receive the greater glory after death
As sin must needs confess; what may they feel
In height of torment, and in weight of vengeance,
Not only they themselves not doing well,
But set a light up to show men to hell?"

We see a similar inducement to this duty in the blessings and rewards of a
pious example. Its blessings are unspeakable both here and hereafter. The
temporal and eternal welfare of your home, the hope of meeting your
children in heaven, and receiving there the promised reward of your
stewardship, depend upon this duty. That family is happy as wall as holy,
where the parents rear up their children under the fostering influence of a
Christian example.

"Behold his little ones around him! they bask in the sunshine of smile;
And infant innocence and joy lighten these happy faces;
He is holy, and they honor him; he is loving; and they love him;
He is consistent, and they esteem him; he is firm, and they fear him.
His house is the palace of peace; for the Prince of peace is there.
Even so, from the bustle of life, he goeth to his well-ordered home."

A serious obstacle to the efficacy of a good example is, the too frequent
want of agreement in the example of the parents. That of the father often
conflicts with and neutralizes that of the mother. They are not one in
their example. This the children soon see, and disregard the good rather
than the bad example. "How can two walk together except they he agreed?"
The child cannot follow the pious father in the way of life, when the
ungodly mother secretly and openly draws him back. Operated upon by two
opposite influences, he will move between them.

We are here taught the imprudence, and we might add, sin, of pious persons
forming a matrimonial alliance with wicked and ungodly persons. In the
choice of a companion for life, we should consider an agreement in
religious as well as in social character. How many unhappy matches and
homes and children and parents have been made by disobedience to the divine
precept, "Be ye not unequally yoked with unbelievers?" Isaac and Rebecca
showed their appreciation of this precept in the care they took to procure
a pious wife for Jacob. "I am weary of my life," says Rebecca, "because of
the daughters of Heth; if Jacob take a wife of the daughters of Heth, such
as these, what good shall my life do me?" This should be the solicitude of
every Christian parent. Parents shoul