Knowing of whom thou hast

Not from a stranger, No, it was the best, the the MOTHER, whose love

source whence the guidance came. learned them." Of whom had he learned? nor a doubtful friend, nor a mere hireling. kindest friend that ever blessed his life, is the sunshine from the cradle to the grave, who had taught him in the things of God, who had hallowed her teachings by prayers and tears, and the warm affections of a heart all wrapped up in her boy. Could he fail to cherish assured faith in all she taught him? Would he doubt her wisdom, or count her pious counsel but woman's weakness? -Man, in his pride of intellect, may sometimes do it; but the heart will cling to a mother's memory, and the remembrance of her prayers sway as a silver cord the deep affections of the soul. The wayward, conceited boy, puffed up by his fancied powers of argument, not yet sobered by experience and sound judgment, may proudly break away from the womanly influence, and count it manly to put off a mother's restraints and prayers. But the man knows better; and the sweetest communion he ever enjoys is when memory carries him back to a mother's knee, and his heart bows in reverent faith, as in childhood's hour, to a mother's teaching of God and heaven. Timothy had never been guilty of this folly, even in boyhood's rash, impetuous hour. He could not doubt a mother's wisdom, for she had led him to the oracles of God, and the counsel of her lips was drawn from the word of truth. From a child she taught him the holy Scriptures. What an union of the two mightiest instrumentalities is here! God and the mother teaching one lesson, speaking out of one book,- God's wisdom the fountain, the mother's love the channel, by which the water of life flows in upon the heart of the child. If there are two whose wisdom never deceives, whose love never fails us, these are the two. There is a combination of light and love, before which darkness and doubts flee away, and mind and heart kindle to assured faith and confidence. Well might Paul write thus to the youthful disciple of Lystra: "Knowing of whom thou hast learned them, and been assured of." There was firm ground for assurance in a mother's love and God's wisdom united. We do not wonder that Timothy had "unfeigned faith." He must have been false to the highest affections and impulses of his nature, had he doubted.

We commend the example of Timothy to all who have shared in the same privileges as himself. God, in his allotment of blessings

to the household of, men, never confers richer gifts than the pious, praying mother, and the Bible. He may withhold wealth, or health, or power; these are the mere passing pageantry of the hour,valuable, indeed, if rightly used during the brief pilgrimage; but piety is the permanent good, the gift which has the promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come. We are grieved when any young man, disregards the blessing, and breaks away from a home hallowed by a mother's godly teaching and example, and by the word of God, in forgetfulness, of the secret influences which have lured his early feet to the path of peace. There is nothing manly, nothing noble, in such foolish conceit. It is, rather, a violenced one to the heart, a wrong to himself, which, in riper years, and when the judgment is mature, he will despise, and call by its appropriate name—youthful folly and sin..

Let me, then, appeal to the sons of Christian mothers, as Paul appealed to Timothy. You have seen a mother's unfeigned faith and prayer, and, under her teaching, have known from a child the holy Scriptures. You know her love, her kindness, her earnest desire for your good; and can you, will you break away from the path to which God and the mother beckon you? What friends so kind, so true, as they? What light so sure as that of the blessed Bible, which they would make a lamp to your feet? Let the children of the world, all unblessed with pious teaching and prayer, wander, if they will, into darkness and sin... "But continue thou in the things which thou hast learned, and hast been assured of, knowing of whom thou hast learned them, and that from a child thou hast known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation, through faith which is in Christ, Jesus."

61

THE MAPLE SISTERS.

In a beautiful little book, entitled The Child's Keepsake, the poet says that in roaming through a swamp, he counted nine trees growing from one maple stump. They were all straight and fair, and stood together like so many affectionate sisters. The fierce wind, which makes its desolate track through the woodland, had spent its fury upon them in vain; for the

Desirous of ascertaining the secret of their strength, he went near for the purpose
of examination, when he found that a vine, having its root at the foot of the maples,
had so adroitly coiled its folds around them as to hold them securely in its embrace

"There cannot a lovelier spectacle be

Than households exhibit which always agree;
Where the members are all very fond of each other,
And children all honor their father and mother.

When brothers and sisters united are so,
They are strong in their concord to meet every foe;
Though young, they may buffet adversity's gale,
And survive when her terrible tempests assail.
As the albatross rides the south sea in a storm,
And exhibits through darkness her beautiful form,
Now mounting the billows, now sinking between,
So, moved by the tempests, those maples are seen.

As that bird cannot possibly sink in the flood,

As the gale leaves those trees standing just where they stood,
So nothing on earth can those children o'erwhelm,

Whose mutual loves, like the roots of the elm,

Reach forth from the bosoms of sons and of daughters,

And gather fresh strength from perennial waters;

Or encircle their hearts and their destinies shape,

As were those of the maples entwined by the grape."

EDITORIAL.

EXTRACT FROM MRS. G.'S SKETCH-BOOK.

"LADY! lady!"

NEW YORK, 18—.

The voice was sad and mournful, yet earnest and imploring. In the midst of a moving crowd, the clatter of numberless footsteps, the hum of voices, the rattling of carts and carriages, it fell upon my ear clear and distinct; and, as I hurried along in the deep twilight, without distinguishing the speaker, it seemed almost like the voice of a spirit.

It was on a short February afternoon, and I had been belated at Crowen's in the purchase of some books. When I left the shop, darkness had fallen upon the earth. The lamp-lighters were running from corner to corner, and ruddy gleams were partially illuminating the thick and murky atmosphere. The streets were filled with all descriptions of people, hurrying to their homes as the early night closed in. Broadway was crowded with omnibuses, but they were filled with business men from the lower part of the city. I had nearly a mile to walk to reach the house of my friend, but it was on a great, lighted thoroughfare, and I feared nothing. I rather enjoyed the varied thoughts and emotions which the mingling with such crowds of my fellow-beings is sure to awaken in my mind.

In the formality and etiquette of artificial life, only one aspect of society presents itself; our ideas and feelings are all drawn into one particular current, and that, sometimes, a very dull and uninteresting one, but, when the denizens of a great city meet and mingle, and you almost feel the warm beating of thousands of hearts, filled with every imaginable variety of hope, fear, joy and sorrow, how can your own heart fail to flow forth and mingle in sympathy with the great pulse-beat of humanity? How many startling gleams of intelligence are caught from an eye gliding quickly by us, how many thrilling emotions from momentary glimpses of intense expression! How the mind expatiates on the probable character concealed beneath some peculiar and striking physiognomy! How imagination is enticed to follow some expressive form, some speaking face, and build a little romance on its possible history.

So, when I issued from Crowen's, I fell into the current on the right-hand side of the trottoir, with a sensation of enjoyment and

expected pleasure, rather than the reverse. I did not fear detection. in my plebeian tastes, for I knew that my acquaintances generally would at this hour be at home in their shining, comfortable parlors; and I felt that I should be well compensated for my walk, if I saw nothing more to admire than the bright camelias in that pretty green-house near Twelfth-street, or the beautiful front of Grace Church, with its tall and slender spire piercing the sky. If the walk proved rather lonely and uninteresting, would it not be all the more charming to enter suddenly from the darkness into that world of light, comfort, cheerfulness and sympathy, which would be opened to me at the lightest ring of the bell by Kitty, that most pleasant of all door-openers, that most faithful of serving-maidens to the best and kindest of mistresses? And the face of that kind mistress, that kind friend, how would it beam and radiate with cordial smiles of heart-welcome, after this three hours' separation, and how bright the contrast between it and the darkness, the rush and confusion, without! There is dignity, sometimes even sublimity, in the cold, unaided strength which despises all dependence as weakness, and needs no support from others; but, to a tender, relying, sympathetic nature, what help and comfort there is in a cordial smile, an earnest word, a trustful look.

The sweepers at the crossings, and the little importunate sellers of cheap tape and matches, had mostly retired to their homes, if homes they had; and, as I came near Eleventh-street, I was startled to hear, as if spoken close to my ear, in a hurried yet plaintive voice, those two words, "Lady! lady!"

I glanced round, and had a vague impression of a slender female figure at my side, but the next step left her behind; and, as I passed along, I heard the same words, faintly and despairingly addressed to another ear. I had twenty times in the course of the day been importuned for charity. I had given, or had foreborne to give, and the mendicants had passed out of memory as out of sight. But there was something in this touching voice which reached. deeper. It seemed like the cry of a suffering soul addressed to the general ear of humanity, with small hope of being heard, yet in an agony of longing for human sympathy and help.

"And what if all should pass as heedlessly as I am passing?" said I to myself; "the poor soul would remain unheard, unaided. Who knows what misery might be relieved, what good accomplished,