THE FATHERS AND THE CHILDREN.

SIR, I have read with entire satisfaction the paper in the last Visitor on submission to authorities. I regard it as one of the most fearful " signs of the times," that there is so little of that good spirit abroad amongst us: and I fear that while there is improvement in but few of the rising generation, there is a strong tendency in the greatest numbers towards a worse condition than ever, in that respect. I have often read in the last chapter of Malachi, the promise of God to set things right again, by the preaching of repentance; and I have a notion about the meaning of it which you will excuse my now mentioning. The verse is this-" Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord: and he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse." I suppose that the Elijah here meant was John the Baptist; and that therefore the preaching of repentance (which was John's particular mission)

VOL. XXVI.

may

[JULY, should always have the effect here described. Perhaps it be a fanciful notion, but my idea is that the turning of "the hearts of the fathers to the children," means the conversion of proud man to the humility and simplicity of a little child: and that the turning the hearts of the children to their fathers, is the conversion of the headstrong obstinacy of youth into that submission to authority which was advocated in the Visitor of last month. Our Lord Himself said, "Except ye be converted and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven;" and again, "Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child, he shall in no wise enter therein." The fault of men is that they are proud and haughty, and will not humble themselves to obey the Gospel. When they become spiritually like little children, they believe all that GoD teaches them, bear all that God does with them, and do all that God commands them. The fault of children (in their wicked state) is that they are turned away from their parents, and will not submit themselves. When they are converted they will return to them. This seems to be the effect of repentance, whenever it is sincerely felt. The unruly child becomes docile and kind and obedient. The youth honours his father and mother, whom he thought little of before. The servant (who ought to look upon his master as, in a certain sense, a father) is turned to reverence his master. The subject returns to his allegiance to his sovereign, and learns to "honour the king," and "submit himself to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake." These are the fruits of true repentance, and none is sincere which does not produce them. Unless we see more of this prevailing in the world, we may expect that God will "come and smite the earth with a curse, as He has threatened to do.

Your constant reader,

A WORD TO PARENTS.

V. D.

WHERE do your children learn so much of the evil you see in them, and which you say you cannot check? Is

1 Matt. xviii. 3.

it not from mixing too much with the rest of the boys and girls, many of whom come from the most wicked families in the place; from houses, where they see nothing day by day but sin, and hear nothing but what defiles the ear? How, then, can you ever expect them to escape from corruption? Does not the Apostle say, (and even the heathen wise man said this too,) that "evil communications corrupt good manners?" Let the manners be ever so good, they will be sure to be corrupted if they are mixed up with evil communication. No good man, or woman, or child, ever stood against it. So sure as they did not avoid the wicked, they soon became almost as bad themselves. Now let me observe to you your inconsistency. You don't choose to be very intimate yourselves with thieves and blasphemers. You try to get out of their way. You will not keep company or make friends of such. But do you let your dear little sons and daughters go and mix in the streets with the sons and daughters of those very wicked people, whom you won't mix with yourself? Are your poor little ones stronger than you are to resist temptation, and keep themselves pure, in the company of the profane? Are you not sure that they will be tempted to evil, by hearing evil, by seeing it, by enjoying it? Yet you suffer them to go into any children's company, without inquiring who, and stay as long as they please, and say nothing to them; unless they come home too late, or do something which gives you trouble! Is not this heartless, cruel dealing with the souls of your helpless babes, who are given you to bring up in "the nurture and admonition of the Lord?" But, perhaps, you answer directly, "What can we do? the children come out of school together, and go to play together. We don't see them at all till they come to meals; how should we?" This will be a poor answer, when you see the effect of evil company, and still more when you come to answer for your children's souls to God. I have seen many a parent take no heed what his children did on Sunday evenings. Was he unable to do this? Was he obliged to let them run with all the wicked ones of the village all that sacred Sabbath evening

which God calls His own? I was told that the parents were "gone to chapel!" They, then, were trying to get themselves to heaven, while they let their children run to hell! No! no! they were gone to indulge their own wishes, perhaps to show themselves in their Sunday clothes, or some other foolish thing. If they meant to seek the grace of God, they would not have forgotten their children, nor left them to perish in the wilderness. Oh! how will parents answer for their careless neglect of those immortal ones whom they have brought into the world? What will they have to say to the Judge of quick and dead, when He calls them to account for them? and what will they answer to the cries and lamentations of their children? how will they bear the accusing voices of their own once happy infants, issuing from the depth of hell, and calling them the murderers of their souls? That pang, that self-reproach, will be more bitter than any which the spirits in torment can possibly experience. Would that we might see a change in this most important point, in the population of our villages and towns. How good and happy a sight it would be to see whole families spending their Sunday evenings religiously and peacefully together: spending a large portion of that sacred evening in holy teaching and reading, and if going forth into the fields for innocent and healthful exercise, going all in company together, the young and the old, the father and the youth, the mother and the maiden. The parent would then be satisfied that no evil example was corrupting his family; and that he was at least labouring to give them the blessedness of "the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful." E.

LETTER ON MAIZE.

THE following letter has been sent to a newspaper, called the Cork Examiner, by a celebrated man, Father Mathew, who has obtained great influence among many of the Irish people, and has induced them to leave off their

drunken habits. We ourselves are afraid that the effects of that movement may not be lasting; but we cannot do otherwise than rejoice at the temporal good he has been the means of doing. At all events, his letter on Indian corn is a sensible one, and comes from one who has tried it.

Cork, Jan. 16.

"Dear Sir,-With heartfelt pleasure I send for your inspection specimens of bread, and, to use a familiar name, of stirabout, made of the meal of Indian corn.

"In one of the cakes of bread there is a mixture of one-third coarse wheat flour; in another, one-third oatmeal; and the third is wholly composed of Indian meal. The stirabout is wholly of Indian meal.

"I was induced to make these trials by the contradictory directions I heard given of the best mode of converting this maize meal into nutritious palatable food. Some years since, I received, as a present from Canada, a small parcel of this meal, and by myself and my friends, with whom I shared what I then esteemed a valuable gift, it was considered a luxury. I am of opinion that upon trial you will agree with me, that the bread made wholly of the Indian flour is superior to the mixture. The stirabout is also excellent.

"I have also made what, in America, is called hommony, of the whole grain shelled, and well boiled, and seasoned with salt and onions, and I consider this to be an excellent and simple mode of preparing this grain for human food.

"The best direction to be given to our people is, to tell them to cook the Indian meal as they have been from time immemorial accustomed to cook oaten meal.

"I hope for many ulterior advantages from what at present is a calamity; our people will be deterred from depending solely upon potatoes for food; and I have been long of opinion, that if there was a value set upon the time consumed in the cultivation of potatoes, and in the saving of turf to boil them thrice a-day, and the employment of the entire family in their drudgery, wheaten bread would be found a much cheaper food.

"With the gratifying prospects now before us, of suf