EDITORIAL JOTTINGS.

A HEAVENLY REUNION.-"The death of an old man's wife," says Lamartine, "is as if his right hand was withered." How forcibly was that idea impressed upon our mind one bland and peaceful evening during the progress of the pestilence last summer, when we visited the chamber of death! One who, for half a century, had been a wife and a mother, whose head had been whitened by the snows of more than seventy winters, fell before the destroyer. Her end was peace. She had long been patiently and devoutly waiting for the coming of her Lord. "I shall be with you soon," said the fond husband, as he pressed her hand for the last time, and felt that its pulses were ebbing fast. "I shall be with you soon." Three days afterward we sought for the old man, but his spirit had fled. God had taken him. He

had rejoined his cherished companion in a better world.

TO CORRESPONDENTS.-We respectfully invite those who can write acceptably for the press, to send us original communications adapted to our pages. Our list of permanent contributors is, it is true, larger than formerly, but it will give us pleasure, notwithstanding, to hear frequently from others who are interested in our enterprise.

NEW YORK CITY TRACT SOCIETY.-This excellent institution, which employs twenty missionaries of various religious denominations, is at all times doing much for the poor and destitute; but at this season of the year, the devoted men who labor in this important vineyard are truly angels of mercy in their visits to the abodes of the poor and the perishing. How like CHRIST, to see Christians forgetting their peculiar tenets, and laboring unitedly for the promotion of his cause! This is Evangelical alliance practically illustrated. Happier would our fallen world be, if we had more of it.

CURE FOR HYPOCHONDRIA.-Hypochondria is a strange disease, whether it be viewed in its connection with the mind or the body; and perhaps we ought to leave to the doctors the application of appropriate remedies for it. But we have found out a nostrum which works admirably well in some cases, and at the risk of being dubbed a quack, we must let out the secret. It is for the patient to force himself out of doors, and to hunt up some poor, suffering family, and see if he cannot relieve them.

DOMESTIC AMUSEMENTS.-It has often seemed to us, while watching the operation of the machinery in some family circles, that the wheels would work a great deal better, if, when all improper amusements were abolished and forbidden, some innocent and proper ones might be allowed to take their place. To teach children to go without amusement of any kind whatever, is about as absurd as to teach them to go without food.

Editorial.

THE CHILDREN OF THE COVENANT.

THE relation of God's people, in all ages of the world, to the covenant made with Abraham, is a subject in which we have ever taken a deep and lively interest. If there is any one truth which, more than any other, we wish to impress upon the minds of parents, it is that obligations of the most solemn nature rest upon them in regard to the proper training of their covenanted children.'

It is a sentiment too often forgotten by the people of God, but not the less true on this account, that through Abraham's faithful discharge of his duty to his family, the Church are blessed to this day. "I will bless thee," said Jehovah to that pious patriarch, "I will bless thee, and thou shalt be a blessing." "In thee," said the Lord, on another occasion, "shall all the nations of the earth be blessed." There can be no doubt as to the reason why Abraham and his posterity were to be blessed in this signal manner. God himself gives the reason: "I know Abraham," such is his language, "that he will command his children and his household after him; and they shall keep the way of the Lord, to do justice and judgment; that (here we have the reason) the Lord may bring upon Abraham that which he hath spoken of him." There was nothing arbitrary in God's dealing with Abraham, and his subsequent dealing with his natural and spiritual offspring. The blessings which descended upon him and his seed-blessings which are vast as the world, and rich and precious as the storehouse of heaven-are expressly represented as coming through the obedience and faithfulness of him with whom the covenant was made.

What a consoling thought it is to those parents who, with much fear and trembling, are endeavoring to train up their offspring for heaven, that God has established such a connection between the faithful discharge of family duties and the spiritual welfare of the family! So that such parents, if they are the children of God, have a two-fold ground of encouragement. They VOL. XVIII.-NO. II.-3

have reason to be encouraged, because they are promised, as the spiritual descendants of Abraham, a share in the covenant made with him; and, also, because their own faithfulness in the family relation brings its reward with it.

We are well aware that to most of those who read these remarks, a word by way of enforcing the claims of this covenant is ` more acceptable and necessary than learned and labored disquisition, even if this latter mode of treating the subject were within our power. It is too late in the day for most of our readers to need arguments to convince the understanding, in relation to the connection between believers and their children in the blessings of the Abrahamic covenant. Few of us, indeed, need these. But may we not need, do we not need, a more active, hearty, lively faith in it? Are our souls sufficiently impressed with its reality and value? It is one thing to subscribe to a doctrine in words, and with the understanding, and it is quite another thing to receive that doctrine into our hearts, and to allow it to pervade our very being, and to influence our conduct, every day and every hour.

We ought never to appear in the presence of our heavenly Father, to plead for his blessing to rest upon our children, without distinctly recognizing this covenant, and founding upon it, to some extent, our plea for these blessings. It ought to give color to all our intercessions, in the closet and in the family circle. Our devotions around the domestic mercy-seat are robbed of much of their fervor and spirit, if they lack such a recognition of this covenant. Then, too, in our efforts to lead the feet of our children in the path that conducts heavenward, the recollection of God's promise to Abraham, and through him to us, ought to fill us with earnest zeal, and strong faith, and confident hope.

Is it thus with you, reader? Do you welcome this truth to your heart, as one with which you and your children are intimately concerned? As you press that darling child to your bosom, and imprint on his forehead the tokens of a mother's love -as you see him growing up to boyhood, surrounded by a multitude of sinful influences from which he cannot escape as you kneel with him at the Bethel you have erected in your dwelling,

and commend him to the God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob, does the thought that he is a child of the covenant inspire you with gratitude and faith? Do you seize the promises made to the father of the faithful, and appropriate them, as you may, to your own individual circumstances, as a casket of the richest pearls ?

Christian parent, if your efforts for the spiritual welfare of your children are thus characterized, they will not, they cannot be in vain. Blessings, rich and invaluable, will descend upon those for whom you feel so lively an interest, and you will realize in your own experience the truth of the Divine promise, that "he who watereth others shall be watered also himself."

THE UNWARY YOUNG MAN.

He comes forth into the world unacquainted with its snares and dangers. He thinks all is what it seems to be. He finds on every side his associates professing to be devoted to his good, and he believes they are. With such professions they obtain an influence over him, which he has not the power nor desire to throw off. Parents warn him against his associates, telling him that "all is not gold that glistens," that the butterfly which flutters so sprightly, and shines so beautifully with its painted wings in the summer of his prosperity, will disappear when the biting frosts of his adversity approach. But thinking himself too firmly fixed to be led astray, he disregards this friendly advice, and listens to the counsels of his young associates. They begin their work of death, perhaps, by endeavoring to create in his mind a contempt for religion, for the Sabbath, and for its duties and privileges, until, step by step, he is drawn into their snare, and in some fatal moment his integrity is gone. Pause, then, young man, and consider. Never associate with those who scoff at religion. They are laboring to destroy your best protection in this life, and your only hope in the life to come.

Original.

A MOTHER'S GRAVE.

THE grave is a hallowed place. It is there that ten thousand associations with the departed come as freshly up to memory as if they were the creatures of yesterday, to comfort or torment us with their presence. We linger about it as we do by the side of a dear friend, when it takes us back to a past which is bright with the sunshine of unbroken friendship and sacred joy; but we fly from it as from the worst of foes, when it revives deep sorrows, almost forgotten, and carries us back over life's pathway to review some of its dark and barren spots. To stand by the grave of a friend, whom we have loved and cherished with true fidelity, is a privilege. It is true that it is a privilege of which sorrow is an element; but it is a sacred sorrow, and one which soothes instead of torturing the chastened heart.

We remember the lonely walk which we so often took with the departed one, to mingle our common joys and sorrows, away from the noise and bustle of a selfish world. We remember, perhaps, the. heaven-blest hours which we spent with him before the mercyseat, in laying our wants before a common Father; and those moments come up freshly to mind, sweet as ever in recollection, yet darkened by a shade of sadness, because they are gone forever. Glances like these, from the silent grave, into the scenes of the past, often bring the unbidden tear, when we remember that we are but comforting our stricken hearts with bright pictures of joys which can never again bless, with their verdure, this world's barrenness.

But there are other thoughts, over the grave, than these; and thoughts which grow in preciousness with the lapse of time. A kind word, a sympathizing tear, an act of love which, in the hurry of busy life, passed almost unnoticed, when we linger over the relics of their departed object, speak, through the past, to us, more solid comfort, and more holy joy, than they conveyed when uttered. Like stars in the night, they shed light through the gloom which is occasioned by more painful recollections, and bless