shall be blessed.” “The promise," said the Apostle Peter to the Jews, "is to you and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord your God shall call."

That these promises were amply and literally fulfilled under the Jewish dispensation, is well known to all who are conversant with Scripture history. "I have been young," saith David, “and now am old, yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread. He is ever merciful, and lendeth, and his seed is blessed." Though the Christian revelation, in directing our views to another and a better world, renders the vicissitudes of this life less marked and less momentous, still an attentive observer may discern the fulfilment of this gracious declaration in the ordinary and general course of human affairs. You daily feel with esteem and admiration, the influence of that integrity and benevolence, that upright and affectionate spirit which has been fostered by a careful, enlightened, and Christian education. You see the unsullied fame of the parent descend on the son and recommend him to notice, confidence, and employment. You see the friend of the father, in the beautiful spirit of the king of Israel, who in the hour of his most splendid triumphs, in the fullest tide of his prosperity enquired, Is there one of the house of Saul yet alive, that I may shew him kindness for Jonathan's sake? you see him seeking out the family,-perhaps withdrawn from the world, and apparently destitute-of him to whom his soul was knit, drawing them forth into notice, relieving their necessities, encouraging

their efforts, and setting them forth with a fair prospect of success in the paths and duties of active life. Were it given you to enter more deeply into the counsels of the Almighty, and to trace more accurately than you now do, the ways of his providence, you might behold proofs still more decisive of his righteousness to the children of his servants, in soothing their afflictions, in supplying their wants, in rescuing them from danger, in raising up to them friends, in prospering their labours, and crowning their exertions with that happy termination which he only can bestow.

Such views of the divine procedure, slightly and imperfectly as their outline has been traced, must fill our minds with admiration of the wisdom of Him by whom our souls and bodies were formed, and who governs and conducts us by laws and motives adapted to every branch of that nature in which He hath created us. In filling the hearts of parents with an indelible attachment to their children, he not only prompts them to those exertions which contribute so largely, as we have seen they do, to the happiness and improvement of mankind, but renders them capable of appreciating, and disposed to comply with those inducements to obedience which are suggested by his promise of a blessing on their posterity. What parent who reflects can resist their influence? who, with a heart to feel, would not endeavour to keep his covenant and remember his commandments to do them, when assured that his mercy is from everlasting to everlasting on them that fear him, and his righteousness to children's children? In what an amiable aspect do we here behold our

heavenly Father portrayed! Well is it said, that he draws us with the cords of love and the bands of a man. He addresses himself to every exalted, every kind, every endearing affection in leading us to serve and obey him. He reveals the glories of his character that men may reverence and fear him. He loads us with benefits that gratitude may attach us to his service. He giveth us exceeding great and precious promises that hope may exalt us above temptation; and he works on the resistless power of parental affection, that we may strive to secure, for those whose welfare we hold far dearer than our own, the blessings which he hath promised to the offspring of the righteous. Let those who prize the fruits of this affection, those who feel its power and desire its gratification, unite in loving and praising him by whom its value is so graciously recognized, and its most fervent aspirations so amply, fulfilled.

If there be one branch of Christian conduct in which, more than in another, it becomes you to be followers of God as dear children, it is in doing good to the children of those who have loved and served him. In so doing you imitate those dispensations of his providence in which his unerring wisdom is most conspicuously displayed. You copy the most amiable and affecting manifestation of his fatherly benevolence. You repay, in some measure, the benefits which good men have conferred during their lives on that society of which you are members, and perhaps on yourselves as individuals. You confer on them a boon which they desire more earnestly, and prize more highly, than any personal favour,

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the anticipation of which would have cheered the lingering spirit, and banished the last remnant of earthly anxiety from the bed of death. You contribute to perpetuate on earth the principles, the feelings, the habits by which they were governed, and encourage the race to come to put their trust in God and honour all his precepts. Than this no occupation can be more truly honourable. You follow, in however humble and remote a sphere, the footsteps of Him whose name is holy, whose wisdom is unerring, and whose tender mercies are over all his works. You are associated with him, if I may use the expression, in following out the purposes of his wisdom and his love. You become the honoured instruments of his mercy and righteousness. You are entrusted with the charge of administering a portion of his treasures and dispensing a share of his bounty. You are enabled to apply to purposes, which you know are well pleasing in his sight, a part of that substance and those talents with which he has endowed you. You find an opportunity of expressing, in a manner more forcible than by words, your grateful sense of his goodness, and you are permitted to make for his bounty the only return in your power, and one of which he hath solemnly declared his acceptance. Above all, you thus approve yourselves the true friends of that divine Saviour, whose mission on earth was an errand of love, and who went about continually doing good to the bodies and souls of

men.

You can be at no loss, my brethren, to discern the direct application of what has been said, to the occasion on which you are now assembled. If you admit the

obligation which lies on you as men and Christians, to show kindness to the children and the children's children of those who fear God, you must own that no charity has a more powerful claim on your beneficence than that which is conducted by the Society on whose behalf I have been selected to address you this day.. The object of their association is to procure for the orphan children of ministers of the Church of Scotland the benefits of education-opportunities of exercising a liberal profession—and aid in their struggles with the hardships and difficulties, whether of early, or of more advanced life. It would be superfluous to trace here the progress of this institution. It has sprung up in the midst of you, and every step of its progress has been open to your inspection. It is equally unnecessary to prove, that their application for your support and aid has some title to attention. Yet, as the whole extent of that title has not been always considered or appreciated, perhaps you will bear with me a little longer while I endeavour to state, as I trust I shall be enabled to do, without undue professional assumption, some of the services for which you stand indebted to the fathers, and which it becomes you to acknowledge by liberality. to their children.

It may be thought that I go too far back in referring the introduction of religious truth and religiousliberty into our land, to the labours of the Scottish clergy. Yet true it is, that the glorious Reformation was chiefly brought about, under God, by the exertions of the early ministers of that Church, and that its principles are still supported mainly by the labours of