110 ENGLAND'S BEST HOPE. fractions of virtues ; for there is no integral virtue where there is no reli- gion. Pleasing manners will attract popular regard, and worldly motives will produce popular actions ; but genuine virtue proceeds only from Christian prin- ciples. The one is efflorescence, the other is fruit. After all, though you cannot by your best exertions, seconded by the most fervent prayer, without which, exertion will neither be rightly directed nor suc- cessfully prosecuted, command success ; yet what a support will it be under the possible defeat of your fairest hopes, that you strove to avert it ! Even if, through the prevalence of temptation, the per- verseness of his own nature, and the malignity of his corruptions, the bar- barous son should disappoint the best founded hopes of the careful parent ; what a heart-felt consolation would it afford you, under this heaviest of all trials, that the misconduct of the child is not imputable to the neglect of the 7
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