and its fears, and to direct, control, and point
them to noble aims and ends.

Oh! not alone is it needful that a mother be solicitous for the
health and happiness of her child on earth: a far higher and more
important thought should engage her attention--concern for her child
as an immortal and an accountable being.

To all who bear the endearing name of mother, thus would we speak:

That child with whom you are so fondly playing--whose happy and
smiling countenance might serve for the representation of a
cherub, and whose merry laugh rings joyously and free--yes! that
blooming child, notwithstanding all these pleasing and attractive
smiles, has a heart prone to evil. To you is it committed to be the
teacher of that child; and on that teaching will mainly if not
entirely depend its future happiness or misery; not of a few brief
years--not of a life-time, but of eternity; for though a dying
creature, it is still immortal, and the happiness or misery of that
immortality depends upon your instruction.

Will you neglect or refuse to be your child's teacher? Shall the
world and its pleasures draw off your attention from your duty when
so much is at stake? or, will you leave your child to glean
knowledge as best it can, thus imbibing all principles and all
habits, most of them unwholesome, and many poisonous? You can
decide--you, the mother. You gave it life, you may make that life a
blessing or a curse, as you inculcate good or evil; for if
through your neglect, or through bad example, you let evil passions
obtain an ascendency, that child may grow into a dissolute and
immoral man; his career may be one of debauchery and profaneness;
and then, when he comes to die, in the agonies of remorse, in the
delirium of a conscience-stricken spirit, he may gasp out his last
breath with a curse on your head, for having given him life, but not
a disposition to use it aright, so that his has been a life of shame
and disgrace here, and will be one of misery hereafter. That child's
character is yet untainted; with you that decision rests--his
destiny is in your hands. He may have dispositions the most dark and
foul--falseness, hatred and revenge; but you may prevent their
growth. He may have dispositions the most bland and attractive; you
can so order it that contact with the world shall never sully them.
Yes, you--the mother--can prevent the evil and nurture the good. You
can teach that child--you can rear it, discipline it. You ca