hat
the treasure thus lent could not become her own. Then the wife told
him that on that very day He who had lent the treasure had returned and
claimed it. "Ought I to have kept it back, or repined at restoring the
loan?" she asked. The Rabbi was astonished that she could ask such a
question, and again enquired anxiously for his two boys. Then the wife
took him by the hand, and turning back the sheet upon the bed, showed
him the two boys lying dead. "The Lord who gave hath taken. They are
dead."

My brethren, we who are parents should learn to look upon our children
as a precious loan from the Lord. They are God's treasures, His
jewels, and He lends them to us for a little while. Now, to-day, I
have to speak to you about schools, and the duty of supporting a
_Christian_, as opposed to a mere _secular_ education. But, first, I
want to speak about another kind of education, the teaching of home. I
would speak most earnestly to you mothers, because as you are the
earliest, so are you the most powerful teachers of your children. It
is a tremendous responsibility which God has laid upon you. He has
lent you a precious jewel, an immortal soul, which will be saved or
lost mainly through your influence. Well says a writer of the day,
"Sometimes mothers think it hard to be shut up at home with the care of
little children. But she who takes care of little children takes care
of great eternities. She who takes care of a little child, takes care
of an empire that knows no bounds and no dimensions. The parent who
stays at home and takes care of children is doing a work boundless as
God's heart." O mothers! never grow weary in well-doing, never think
the children a trouble and a weariness, but a precious loan which God
will ask one day to have restored. May none of you ever have to say--

"I wonder so that mothers ever fret
At little children clinging to their gown,
Or that the foot-prints, when the days are wet,
Are ever black enough to make them frown.
If I could find a little muddy boot,
Or cap, or jacket, on my chamber floor;
If I could kiss a rosy, restless foot,
And hear it patter in my house once more;
If I could mend a broken cart to-day,
To-morrow make a kite to reach the sky,
There is no woman in God's world could say
She was more blissfully content than I.
But ah! the dainty pillow next my own
Is never rumpled by a shining head;
My singing birdling from its nest is flo