4.

Father and Mother:

How can children repay parents for

their watchings, anxieties, labors,
toils, trials, patience, and love? Think
of the utter helplessness of the long
years of infancy, of the entire
dependence of succeeding childhood,
of the necessities and wants of youth,
of the burning solicitude of parents,
and their deep and inexhaustible love;
think of the long years of unwearied
toil, of their deep and soul-felt
devotion to the interests of their
offspring, of the majesty and
matchless power of their unselfish
affections—and then say whether it is
possible for youth to repay too much
love and gratitude for all this bestowal
of parental anxiety.
Oh, what thankfulness should fill
every child's heart! What a glorious
return of love! Every day should they
give them some token of love. Every
hour should their own hearts glow
with gratitude and holy respect for
those who have given them being, and
loved them so fervently and long.
Nothing will so warm and quicken all
the affections of the parent's heart as
such respect. Who feels like trusting
an ungrateful child? Who can believe
that his affection for any object can
be firm and pure? The child who has
loved long and well his parents has
thoroughly electrified his affections,
has surcharged them with the sweet
spirit of an affectionate tenderness,
which will pervade his entire heart,
and will make him better and purer
forever. The affections of such a child
are to be trusted. As well may one
doubt an angel as such a one.

There is always a liability, where sons

and daughters have gone from the
home of their childhood, and have
formed homes of their own, gradually
to lose the old attachments and cease
to pay those attentions to parents
which were so easy and natural in the
olden time. New associations, new
thoughts, new cares, all come in,
filling the mind and heart, and, if
special pains be not taken, they thrust
out the old love. This ought never to
be. Children should remember that the
change is in them, and not with those
they left behind. They have every thing
that is new, much that is attractive in
the present and bright in the future;
but the parents' hearts cling to the
past, and have most in memory. When
children go away, they know not, and
never will know until they experience
it themselves, what it cost to give
them up, nor what a vacancy they left
behind.

The parents have not, if the children

have, any new loves to take the place
of the old. Do not, then, heartlessly
deprive them of what you still can give
of attention and love. If you live in the
same place, let your step be—if
possible, daily—a familiar one in the
old home. Even when many miles
away, make it your business to go to
your parents. In this matter do not
regard time or expense. They are well
spent; and some day when the word
reaches you, flashed over the wires,
that your father or mother is gone, you
will not regret then the many hours of
travel spent in going to them while
they were yet alive.

Keep up your intercourse with your

parents. Do not deem it sufficient to
write only when something important
is to be told. Do not believe that to
them "no news is good news." If it be
but a few lines, write them. Write, if it
be only to say, "I am well;" if it be only
to send the salutation which says they
are "dear," or the farewell which tells
them that you are "affectionate" still.
These little messages will be like
caskets of jewels, and the tear that
falls fondly over them will be
treasures for you. Let every child,
having any pretense to heart, or
manliness, or piety, and who is so
fortunate as to have a father or
mother living, consider it a sacred
duty to consult, at any reasonable
personal sacrifice, the known wishes
of such a parent until that parent is no
more; and, our word for it, the
recollections of the same through the
after pilgrimage of life will sweeten
every sorrow, will brighten every
gladness, will sparkle every tear-drop
with a joy ineffable.

There is no period of life when our

parents do not claim our attention,
love, and warmest affections. From
youth to manhood, from middle age to
riper years, if our honored parents
survive, it should be our constant
study how we can best promote their
welfare and happiness, and smooth
the pillow of their declining years.
Nothing better recommends an
individual than his attentions to his
parents. There are some children
whose highest ambition seems to be
the promotion of their parents'
interest. They watch over them with
unwearied care, supply all their wants,
and by their devotion and kindness
remove all care and sorrow from their
hearts. On the contrary, there are
others who seem never to bestow a
thought upon their parents, and to
care but little whether they are
comfortably situated or not. By their
conduct they increase their cares,
embitter their lives, and bring their
gray hairs with sorrow to the grave.
Selfishness has steeled their hearts to
the whispers of affection, and avarice
denies to their parents those favors
which would materially assist them in
the down-hill of life.

Others, too, by a course of profligacy

and vice, have drained to the very
dregs their parents' cup of happiness,
and made them anxious for death to
release them from their sufferings.
How bitter must be the doom of those
children who have thus embittered the
lives of their best earthly friends!

There can be no happier reflection

than that derived from the thought of
having contributed to the comfort and
happiness of our parents. When called
away from our presence, which
sooner or later must happen, the
thought will be sweet that our efforts
and our care smoothed their declining
years, so that they departed in
comfort and peace. If we were
otherwise, and we denied them what
their circumstances and necessities
required, and our hearts did not
become like the nether millstone, our
remorse must prove a thorn in our
flesh, piercing us sharply, and filling
our days with regret.

There is an enduring tenderness in the

love of a mother to her son that
transcends all other affections of the
heart. It is neither to be chilled by
selfishness, weakened by
worthlessness, nor stifled by
ingratitude. She will sacrifice every
comfort to his convenience; she will
surrender every pleasure to his
enjoyment; she will glory in his fame,
and exult in his prosperity. If
misfortune overtake him, he will be
the dearer to her from misfortune; and
if disgrace settles upon his name, she
will still love and cherish him in spite
of his disgrace. If all the world
besides cast him off, she will be all
the world to him.

A father may turn his back on his

child, brothers and sisters may
become inveterate enemies,
husbands may desert their wives,
wives their husbands; but a mother's
love endures through all. In good
repute, in bad repute, in the face of
the world's condemnation, a mother
still lives on and still hopes that her
child may turn from his evil ways and
repent; still she remembers his infant
smile that ever filled her bosom with
rapture, the merry laugh, the joyful
shout of his childhood, the opening
promise of his youth; and thinking of
these, she never can be brought to
think him all unworthy.

Young man, speak kindly to your

mother, and ever courteously and
tenderly of her. But a little while and
you shall see her no more forever. Her
eye is dim, her form bent, and her
shadow falls grave-ward. Others may
love you when she has passed away—
a kind-hearted sister, perhaps, or she
whom of all the world you chose for a
partner—she may love you warmly,
passionately; children may love you
fondly; but never again, never, while
time is yours, shall the love of woman
be to you as that of your old, trembling
mother has been. Alas! how little do
we appreciate a mother's tenderness
while living! How heedless are we in
youth of all her anxious tenderness!
But when she is dead and gone, when
the cares and coldness of the world
come withering to our hearts, when
we experience how hard it is to find
true sympathy, how few love us for
ourselves, how few will befriend us in
misfortune, then it is that we think of
the mother we have lost.

The loss of a parent is always felt.

Even though age and infirmities may
have incapacitated them from taking
an active part in the cares of the
family, still they are rallying points
around which affection and
obedience, and a thousand tender
endeavors to please, concentrate.
They are like the lonely star before us:
neither its heat nor light are any thing
to us in themselves, yet the shepherd
would feel his heart sad if he missed
it when he lifts his eye to the brow of
the mountains over which it rises
when the sun descends.

Over the grave of a friend, of a brother

or a sister we would plant the
primrose, emblematical of youth; but
over that of a mother we would let the
green grass shoot up unmolested; for
there is something in the simple
covering which nature spreads upon
the grave which well becomes the
abiding place of decaying age. Oh, a
mother's grave! It is indeed a sacred
spot. It may be retired from the noise
of business, and unnoticed by the
stranger; but to our heart how dear!

The love we should bear to a parent is

not to be measured by years, nor
annihilated by distance, nor forgotten
when they sleep in dust. Marks of age
may appear in our homes and on our
persons, but the memory of a beloved
parent is more enduring than that of
time itself. Who has stood by the
grave of a mother and not
remembered her pleasant smiles, kind
words, earnest prayer, and assurance
expressed in a dying hour? Many
years may have passed, memory may
be treacherous in other things, but will
reproduce with freshness the
impressions once made by a mother's
influence. Why may we not linger
where rests all that was earthly of a
beloved parent? It may have a
restraining influence upon the
wayward, prove a valuable incentive to
increased faithfulness, encourage
hope in the hour of depression, and
give fresh inspiration to Christian life.
The mother's love is indeed the golden
cord which binds youth to age; and he
is still but a child, however time may
have furrowed his cheek or silvered
his brow, who can yet recall with a
softened heart the fond devotion or
the gentle chidings of the best friend
that God ever gave us. Round the idea
of mother the mind of a man clings
with fond affection. It is the first deep
thought stamped upon our infant
heart, when yet soft and capable of
receiving the most profound
impressions; and the after feelings of
the world are more or less light in
comparison. Even in old age we look
back to that feeling as the sweetest
we have known through life.

Our passions and our willfulness may

lead us far from the object of our filial
love; we may come even to pain their
heart, to oppose their wishes, to
violate their commands. We may
become wild, headstrong, or angry at
their counsels or oppositions; but
when death has stilled their monitory
voices, and nothing but silent memory
remains to recapitulate their virtues
and deeds, affection, like a flower
broken to the ground by a past storm,
lifts up her head and smiles away our
tears. When the early period of our
loss forces memory to be silent, fancy
takes her place, and twines the image
of our dead parents with a garland of
graces, beauties, and virtues, which
we doubt not they possessed.