530 ON THE EDUCATION OF YOUTH. prudence of those who have the conduct of them : and some forward vices may be nipped in the very bud, which in three years time might gain too firm a root in their heart and practice, and may not easily be plucked up by all the following care of their teachers. But I begin with ,children when they can walk and talk, when they have learned their mother tongue, when they begin to give some more evident discoveries of their intel. lectual powers, and are more manifestly capable of having their minds formed and moulded into knowledge, virtue and piety. Now the first and most universal ingredient which enters into the education of children, is an instruction of them in those things which are necessary and useful, for them in their rank and station, and that with regard to this world and the world to come. I limit these instructions'(especially such as relate to this world) by the station and rank of life in which children are born and placed by the providence of God. Persons of better circum- stances in the world, should give their sons and their daughters a much larger share of knowledge and a richer variety of in- struction, than meaner persons can or ought. But since every child that is born into this world bath a body and a soul, since its happiness or misery in this world and the next, depends very much upon its instructions and knowledge, it bath a right to be taught by its parents, according to their best ability, so much as is necessary for its well -being both in soul and body here and hereafter. It is true, that the great God our Creator hath made us reasonable creatures : we are by nature capable of learning a million of objects : but as the soul comes into the world, it is unfurnished with knowledge ; we are born ignorant of every good and useful thing : we know not God, we know not our- selves, we know not what is our duty and our interest, nor where lies our danger ; and, if left entirely to ourselves, should pro- bably grow up like the brutes of the earth : we should trifle away the brighter seasons of life in a thousand miseries, and at last we should perish and die without knowledge or hope, if we had no instructors. All our other powers of nature, such as the will'and the various of etions, the senses, the appetites, and the limbs, would become wild instruments of madness and mischief, if not govern -' ed by the understanding ; and the understanding itself would run into a thousand errors, dreadful and pernicious, and would employ all the other powers in mischief and madness, if it hath not the happiness to be instructed in the things of God and men. And who is there among all our fellow- creatures so much obliged to bestow this instruction on us, as the persons who by divine providence, have been the instruments to bring us into life and being ? It is their duty to give their young offspring this benefit
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