ill repose in the
belief that you consider him or her a Christian, and you will thus
increase the number, already unfortunately too large, of those, who
maintain the form and pretences of piety, without its power; whose
hearts are filled with self-sufficiency and spiritual pride, and perhaps
zeal for the truths and external duties of religion, while the real
spirit of piety has no place there. They trust to some imaginary change,
long since passed by, and which has proved to be spurious by its failing
of its fruits. The best way, in fact the only way, to guard against this
danger, especially with the young, is to show, by your manner of
speaking and acting on this subject, at all times, that you regard a
truly religious life, as the only evidence of piety;--and that
consequently, however much interest your pupils may apparently take in
religious instruction, they cannot know, and you cannot know, whether
Christian principle reigns within them, in any other way than by
following them through life and observing how, and with what spirit, the
various duties of it are performed.

There are very many fallacious indications of piety; so fallacious and
so plausible, that there are very few, even among intelligent
Christians, who are not often greatly deceived. "By their fruits ye
shall know them," said the Saviour, a direction sufficiently plain, one
would think, and pointing to a test, sufficiently easy to be applied.
But it is slow and tedious work to wait for fruits; and we accordingly
seek a criterion, which will help us quicker to a result. You see your
pupil serious and thoughtful. It is well: but it is not proof of piety.
You see him deeply interested when you speak of his obligations to his
Maker, and the duties he owes to him. This is well; but it is no proof
of piety. You know he reads his Bible daily and offers his morning and
evening prayers. When you speak to him of God's goodness, and of his
past ingratitude, his bosom heaves with emotion, and the tear stands in
his eye. It is all well. You may hope that he is going to devote his
life to the service of God. But you cannot know; you cannot even
believe, with any great confidence. These appearances are not piety.
They are not conclusive evidences of it. They are only, in the young,
faint grounds of hope, that the genuine fruits of piety will appear.

I am aware that there are many persons, so habituated to judging with
confidence of the piety of others, from some