Page:Prayer book for families and private persons (2).pdf/21

 greatest pleasure, and their highest honour, to be teaching their children the sacred truth, when they sit with them in the house, and when they walk by the way, when they lie down, and when they rise up. Give them to observe with hearts sensibly affected, the natural depravity too apparent in every one of their offsprings, and to be solicitous to bring them by early discipline and instruction to him who alone can deliver from it. Make them vigilant to check the first sallies of their vile affections, to furnish them with the means of knowing God and Jesus Christ whom he hath sent, and to habituate them from their childhood to some profitable employment of their time, and their understanding, as they are able to bear it. Keep all parents from setting a bad example before the eyes of their children, and so teaching them an evil lesson against themselves. And may they dread nothing more than the insupportable doom of being condemned as accessaries to the damnation of their own children by their worldliness, sensuality and neglect of their souls. And as thou knowest that no parents are of themselves sufficient to educate their children according to thy will, O! do thou fill them with wisdom and discretion. Guide them continually with thine eye, between the extremes of shewing a false indulgence or an irksome severity to the fruit of their own bodies. Bless altogether the relation thou hast established between them, so that parents may have the joy of seeing their children growing up as pleasant plants before thee, and children have reason to rise up and call their parents blessed, and to praise God for them in time and in eternity.

And thou, O God, so influence and form the minds of all children, and turn their hearts towards their parents, that they may behave towards them with all reverence, obedience and love; not stubborn when corrected for their faults, not heedless when instructed, not ungrateful to forget how much they are bound to administer to the comfort of their parents and to requit them.