ment. Unrestrained by domestic discipline, he would be exposed to become headstrong and capricious, a fit instrument of impiety and oppression when he became king. However this may be, he was of an age to understand the change wrought in the character of his father, and had often been warned by Manasseh to avoid idolatry. But if they who set a bad example become penitent themselves, they cannot be sure that others, whom their example has drawn into sin, will repent. Uninfluenced by his father's reform, Amon "did evil in the sight of the Lord, and sacrificed unto all the carved images which Manasseh had made, and served them." On the return of the penitent king from Babylon, these images had been thrown aside; but unhappily they had not been destroyed, and thus they became a temptation to his son. This shows how necessary was the command in the law to burn the graven images of the Canaanites, and the wisdom of Hezekiah in destroying the brazen serpent.

Amon imitated his father in transgression, but not in penitence. He "humbled not himself before the Lord, as Manasseh his father had humbled himself, but trespassed more and more." "It is not so much sin," says one, as impenitence in sin, that ruins men; not so much that they offend, as that they do not humble themselves for their offences; not the disease, but the neglect of the remedy."

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After Amon had reigned two years, "his servants conspired against him, and slew him in his own house." He had profaned the temple of God with idols; and now, as a righteous judgment, his palace was polluted with his own blood.

Nearly one-half of the kings of Israel, from the revolt of the ten tribes to their overthrow, were the victims of conspiracies. The idolatry introduced into that kingdom by Jeroboam and Ahab had corrupted the public morals and destroyed the foundations of government. Conspiracy, rebellion, and the murder of kings, were the natural results of casting off the fear of Jehovah.

Hitherto, idolatry had not so thoroughly corrupted the heart of the nation, that such crimes were familiar in the kingdom of Judah. The murder of Amon was evidence of the depravity which was sweeping over the land with deeper flood, from year to year, betokening the dissolution of good order, and national ruin.

LIFE OF JOSIAH.

CHAPTER XVII.

HIS CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH.

YOUTH is the appropriate season to begin a religious life. But beautiful as is early piety, many things oppose its growth. Not to mention the natural distaste of the human heart for holy duties and joys, there are many hinderances to prevent the young from entering the pleasant paths of wisdom.

If the youthful heart is tender, so is it often thoughtless, and unwilling to be saddened by concern for the future welfare of the soul. If the young are not too much occupied by the cares of busy life to find leisure for sober reflection, they are apt to be filled with what is equally engrossing and hostile to serious thoughts, the love of pleasure and amusement. If they are susceptible to good impressions, they are easily led astray by bad influences. Their hearts are so closely knit together, that one irreligious youth often finds it no difficult task to draw the whole circle of his companions into the same vortex of dissipation and ruin.

Religion involves the exercise of self-denial; but the young want instant gratification, and are slow to part with present ease or pleasure to secure a future good. Religion demands a cordial submission to the will of God; but the young are prone to dislike restraint, to think humility weakness, and submission to authority tameness of spirit unworthy those who boast of their freedom. Religion commands, "Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth;" but the young are apt to put far off the evil day, and to think it will be time enough to prepare for heaven when the frosts of age begin to chill the relish for earthly good.

How beautiful then is early piety flourishing in spite of all these hinderances! No wonder if angels, after executing their errands of mercy, sometimes linger on earth to view these tender plants of righteousness, which spring up and diffuse fragrance in the wilderness of giddy mirth.

Examples of early devotedness to the service of God are recorded now and then on the pages of inspiration; but none more satisfactory and striking than that of young Josiah. He was the son of Amon king of Judah, whom he succeeded on the throne at the age of eight years. "And he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord, and walked in the ways of David his father, and declined neither to the right hand nor to the left." As if, in the breaking up of the Hebrew common