ng to His Divine Heart.

It is related in the Gospel that mothers brought to Him little children,
that He might touch them. And the disciples rebuked them that brought
them. And when Jesus saw it, He was much displeased, and said to them:
"Suffer little children to come to me, and forbid them not: for of such
is the kingdom of God; and embracing them, and laying His hands on them,
He blessed them." If Jesus was displeased with those who prevented
little children from coming to Him, what love and tenderness will He not
have for those mothers by whose means they come to Him?

Oh! how consoled will they not be in their last hour, when they shall
see the souls of those whom they prepared for heaven, accompanied by
their good angels, surrounding their bed of death, forming, as it were,
a guard to protect them from the snares and assaults of the enemy!

This is a happiness which those mothers may confidently expect who labor
assiduously to give their children a good religious education. Ah! would
to God, I say once more, that mothers would understand their sublime
mission on earth!

But it is just here that the difficulty lies: how can a mother give the
child these early lessons of piety and devotion, if she has never
learned them herself? How can she train it to raise its young heart to
that Heavenly Father, and ask Him for His continued mercy and blessings,
of whose name or law she has never been informed or instructed in the
Public Schools? How can she impart to her child that knowledge which
she herself has never learned in the Public Schools, and which she has
always been taught to look upon as unnecessary? Can she teach the child
to love God and keep His commandments, to hate sin, and avoid it for the
love of God?--To love, honor, and obey its parents, not from natural
motives alone, but because, in so doing, it would love, honor, and obey
God in the person of its father and mother, and have thus not only a
great reward, and length of days here below, but also the joys of heaven
above? This lesson the poor mother was never taught in the Public
Schools. How can she teach her sweet child that it has an immortal soul,
that God sees even the inmost thoughts of the soul, that it is this soul
that sins by consenting to the evil inclinations of the heart; that when
the child is tempted to pride, gluttony, anger, disobedience, theft,
lies, or any manner of uncleanness, even in thought as well as deed,
that it must call on Go