keep on doing so, more and more, till you grow up to be men and women. Is there not great danger that you will become very passionate, and have a very bad temper; and that some time or other, you may get in such a rage as to kill somebody?

For the murderer himself will tell you, that when he was a little child, he never thought he should be a murderer. And yet, you see, he has become so because he did not repent of his sinful anger, when he was young, and pray to God, to enable him to get rid of it. Children who get into a passion, and strike and hurt others, and keep on doing so, are certainly in great danger of becoming murderers, as the people of Nineveh were.

You may not, my dear children, be liars, as the people of Nineveh were. But have you never told any falsehoods? have you never deceived any body, and said what was not the exact truth? Remember, if you keep on doing so, you will grow more and more careless about telling the truth; and will be in great danger of telling falsehoods; and of doing this more and more, and at last, of becoming liars, as the people of Nineveh were.

You have never robbed any body. But have you never taken any thing that was not your own and kept it? Have you never kept any thing

that you have found, without trying, or even wishing, to find the owner, and return it to him. People do not become great thieves and robbers, at once. They take little things, at first, which they think are not worth much, and which others will not miss, or even want to use again. And they keep on taking things till they become more and more wicked, and, at last, get to be great thieves, and robbers, as the people of Nineven were.

Besides, people would not steal anything if they did not first covet it, or wish to have for their own what belongs to another. And this is the reason, why God, in the tenth commandment, says, Thou shalt not covet anything that is thy neighbor's ;-thou shalt not wish to take from another what belongs to him, and deprive him of it, and have it for thy own.

My dear children, have you never broken this tenth commandment? If so, and if you continue to covet things which belong to others, although you may not have yet begun, to steal anything, is there not great danger of your doing this, and of your becoming thieves, and perhaps robbers, as the people of Nineveh were?

You do not make any idols to worship. Many of you have never seen an idol. But, although you do not worship idols, instead of the true God,

do you not love many things more than you loye God? If so, it is very much the same thing as if you loved and worshipped idols, instead of loving and worshipping the true God.

For why do people make and worship idols? It is because they do not feel willing to love, and obey, and worship God. They dislike to do this. There is something in the true God which they do not like. They like their idols better. They know, that the true God commands them to be like Himself, and to quit all kinds of wickedness, and to be good, and to do good. They know, too, that the idol does not command this, and that, while they love, and serve, and worship the idol, or false god, they can keep on in all their wickedness. So they choose to do it.

Now, if you love anything more than you love God, you have your idols, too, my dear children. They may not be idols of wood, or stone, such as the people of Nineveh had; but they are things which you love so much, that they keep you from loving and obeying God as you ought. And you do indeed break the first commandment, as truly as the people of Nineveh did.

The first commandment is, thou shalt have no other gods before me; and Jesus Christ has told us, that this means the same thing as to say, thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with all thy heart,

and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind.

Do you thus love God, my dear children; or do you love other things a great deal more than you love God? If you do not love God the most, I fear, if you had lived in Nineveh, you would have worshipped their idols, and been idolaters as they were.

Think of these things. Look into your minds and hearts. See if you have right thoughts, and feelings, such as God commands you to have. See if you love Him more than anything else; see if you say and do what He commands.

If you have not done this; if you have had wrong and wicked thoughts and feelings; if you have said and done, very often, what you ought not to say and do;-then God has been very much displeased with you. And He is still displeased with you; and will continue to be so, if you do not feel sorry for all your wickedness, and trust in Christ to save you.

Do not think because you are not now as wicked as the people of Nineveh were, that you are but a little wicked, and that God will not punish you. He will punish all the wicked persons who do not repent of their wickedness and forsake it.

Fear, too, my dear children, that if you keep on in your wickedness, you may, at last, become

as wicked as the people of Nineveh were. That will be dreadful, indeed! For such wickedness, if it is not repented of, and forsaken, will meet with a very terrible punishment, after death, in the future world.

CHAPTER III.

Jonah tries to flee to Tarshish. A dreadful storm. The sailors cry to their false gods. They throw their goods overboard, to save the ship. Men will part with anything to save their lives. How much more ought we to be willing to part with anything to save our souls.

THE wickedness of Nineveh was so great, that God commanded Jonah to go and cry against it; —to go, and cry aloud, in the streets of the city, so that all the people could hear him, and tell them of their great wickedness, and of the dreadful punishment which their sins deserved.

Jonah was afraid to do this. He thought it would be a difficult and dangerous journey, to go alone, a great way from his own country, among strangers. And, when he should get to Nineveh, and begin to preach to the people, he feared, that they would be very angry with him, and, perhaps,