decencies, both in furniture and in dress: Their rank in the world was eminent, but they never appeared the first, nor the highest in any i new-fangled forms of attire. By her wise example and instruction she had so formed their minds, as to be able to se garments more gaudy, and even more modish than their own, without envy or wishes. They could bear to find a trimming set on a little awry, or the plait of a garment ill disposed, without making the whole house and the day uneasy, and the sun and heavens smile upon them in vain. Phronissa taught them the happy art of managing a visit with some useful improvement of the hour, and without offence. If a word of scandal occured in company, it was soon diverted or suppressed. The children were charged to speak well of their neighbours as far ás truth would admit, and to be silent as to any thing further: but when the poor or the deformed were mentioned in discourse, the aged, the lame, or the blind, those objects were handled with the utmost tenderness: nothing could displease Phronissa more than to hear a jest thrown upon natural infirmities: she thought there was something. sacred in misery, and it was not to be touched with a rude hand. All reproach and satire of this kind was for ever banished where she came; and if ever raillery was indulged, vice and wilful folly were the constant subjects of it. Persons of distinguished characters she always distinguished in her respect, and trained up her family to pay the same civilities. Whensoever she named her own parents it was with high veneration and love, and thereby she naturally led her children to give due honour to all their superior relatives. Though it is the fashion of the age to laugh at the priesthood in all forms, and to teach every boy.to scoff at a minister, Phronissa paid double honours to them who laboured in the word and doctrine where their personal behaviour upheld the dignity of their office; for she was persuaded Saint Paul was a better director than the gay genilemen of the mode, 1 Tim. v. 17. Besides she wisely considered, that a contempt of their persons would necessarily bring with it a contempt of all their ministrations; and then she might carry her daughters to the church as much as she pleased, but preaching and praying, and all sacred things, would grow despicable and useless when they had first learned to make a jest of the preacher. But are these young ladies always confined at home? Are they never suffered to see the world? Yes, and sometimes without the guard of a mother too; though Phronissa is so well beloved by her children that they would very seldom choose to go without her. Their souls are inlaid betimes with the principles of virtue and prudence; these Сс are their coustant guard; nor do they ever wish to make a visit where their mother has reason to suspect their safety. They have freedom given them in all the common affairs of life to choose for themselves, but they take pleasure, for the most part, in referring the choice back again to their elders. Phronissa has managed the restraint of their younger years with so much reason and love, that they have seemed all their lives to know nothing but liberty; an admonition of their parents meets with a chearful compliance, and is never debated. A wish or desire has the same power over them now, as a command had in their infancy and childhood; for the command was ever dressed in the softest language of authority, and this made every act of obedience a delight, till it became an habitual pleasure. In short, they have been educated with such discretion, tenderness and piety, as have laid a foundation to make them happy and useful in the rising age their parents with pleasure view the growing prospect, and return daily thanks to Almighty God, whose blessings has attended their watchful cares, and has thus far answered their most fervent devotions. ADVERTISEMENT. Dr Watt's opinion alow! publishing these popers, appears in the following Advertisement prefixed to them by bimself. Τ HESE papers were written at several seasons and intervals of leisure, and on various occasions arising through the greatest part of my life. Many of them were designed to be published among the Reliquiæ Juveniles, but for some reason or other, not worth present notice, were laid by at that time. Whether I shall ever publish them' I know not, though far the greatest part of them have long stood carTected among my manuscripts; nor do I suppose many of them inferior to those Essays and remarks of this kind, which have before appeared in the world with some acceptance. If they are not published in my life-time, my werthy friends, who have the care of my papers, may leave out what they please. July 3. 1740. I. W. REMNANTS OF TIME, EMPLOYED IN PROSE AND VERSE, &c. I. JUSTICE AND GRACE. NEVER was there any hour since the creation of all things, nor ever will be till the last conflagration, wherein the hoty God, so remarkably displayed his justice and his grace, as that hour, that saw our Lord Jesus Christ hanging upon the cross, forsaken of his Father, and expiring. What a dreadful glory was given to vindictive justice, when the great and terrible God made the soul of his own Sọn, a painful sacrifice for sin? What an amazing instance of grace, that he should redeem such worthless sinners as we are from the vengeance, by exposing his beloved Son to it! When I view the severity or the compassion of that hour, my thoughts are lost in astonishment: it is not for me, it is not for Paul or Apollos, it is not for the tongue of men or angels to say which was greatest, the compassion or the severity. Humble adoration becomes us best, and a thankful acceptance of the pardon that was purchased at so dear a rate. Next to this I know not a more eminent display of terror and mercy, than the dying hour of a pious but desponding Christian, under the tumultuous and disquieting temptations of the devil. See within those curtains a person of faith and serious piety, but of a melancholy constitution, and expecting death. While his flesh is tortured with sharp agonies and terribly convulsed, a ghastly horror sits on his countenance, and he groans under extreme anguish. Behold the man, a favourite of heaven, a child of light, assaulted with the darts of hell, and his soul surrounded with thick darkness: all his sins stand in dreadful array before him, and threaten him with the execution of all the curses in the Bible. Though he loves God with all his heart, he is in the dark, he knows it not, nor can he believe that God has any love for him; and though he cannot utterly let go his hold of his Saviour and the gospel, yet in his own apprehension he is abandoned both of the Father and the Son. In every new pang that he feels, his own fears persuade him that the gates of hell are now openAng upon him: he hangs hovering over the burning pit, and at the |