That you may be prepared to bring moral and religious truths before their minds in the way I have described, your own mind must take a strong interest in this class of truths. You must habituate yourself to look at the moral and religious aspects and relations of all that you see and hear. When you are reading, notice such facts, and remember such narratives, as you can turn to good account, in this way. In the same way, treasure up in mind such occurrences as may come under your own personal observation, when travelling, or when mixing with society.
That the spirit and manner of these religious exercises, may be the more distinctly understood, I will give some examples.
Let us suppose then that the hour for closing school has come. The books are laid aside; the room is still; the boys expect the few words which the teacher is accustomed to address to them, and looking up to him, they listen to hear what he has to say.
"You may take your Bibles."
The boys, by a simultaneous movement, open their desks, and take from them their copies of the sacred volume.
"What is the first book of the New Testament?"
"Matthew:" they all answer, at once.
"The second?" "Mark." "The third?" "Luke."
"The next?" "John." "The next?" "The Acts."
"The next?"
Many answer, "Romans."
"The next?"
A few voices say, faintly and with hesitation, "First of Corinthians."
"I perceive your answers become fainter and fainter. Do you know what is the last book of the New Testament?"
The boys answer promptly, "Revelations."
"Do you know what books are between the Acts and the book of Revelation?"
Some say, "No sir;" some begin to enumerate such books as occur to them, and some perhaps begin to name them promptly, and in their regular order.
"I do not mean," interrupts the teacher, "the names of the books, but the kinds of books."
The boys hesitate.
"They are epistles or letters. Do you know who wrote the letters?"
"Paul," "Peter," answer many voices at once.
"Yes, there were several writers. Now the point which I wish to bring before you is this; do you know in what order, I mean on what principles, the books are arranged?"
"No sir;" is the universal reply.
"I will tell you. First come all Paul's epistles. If you turn over the leaves of the Testament, you will see that Paul's letters are all put together, after the book of the Acts; and what I wish you to notice is, that they are arranged in the order of their length. The longest comes first, and then the next; and so on to the shortest, which is the epistle to Philemon. This of course, comes last-No;-I am wrong in saying it is the last of Paul's Epistles, there is one more,-to the Hebrews; and this comes after all the others, for there has been a good deal of dispute whether it was really written by Paul. You will see that his name is not at the beginning of it, as it is in his other epistles: so it was put last."
"Then comes the epistle of James. Will you see whether it is longer than any that come after it?" The boys, after a minute's examination, answer, "Yes sir," "Yes sir."
"What comes next?"
"The epistles of Peter."
"Yes; and you will see that the longest of Peter's epistles is next in length to that of James': And indeed all his are arranged in the order of their length."
"Yes sir."
"What comes next?"
"John's."
"Yes, and they arranged in the order of their length. Do you now understand the principles of the arrangement of the epistles?"
"Yes sir."
"I should like to have any of you who are interested in it, try to express this principle in a few sentences, on paper, and lay it on my desk to-morrow, and I will read what you write. You will find it very difficult to express it. Now you may lay aside your books. It will be pleasanter for you if you do it silently."
Intelligent children will be interested even in so simple a point as this,-much more interested than a maturer mind, unacquainted with the peculiarities of children, would suppose. By bringing up, from time to time, some such literary inquiry as this, they will be led insensibly to regard the Bible as opening a field for interesting intellectual research, and will more easily be led to study it.
At another time, the teacher spends his five minutes in aiming to accomplish a very different object. I will suppose it to be one of those afternoons, when all has gone smoothly and pleasantly, in school. There has been nothing to excite strong interest or emotion; and there has been, (as every teacher knows there sometimes will be,) without any assignable cause which he can perceive, a calm, and quiet, and happy spirit, diffused over the minds and countenances of the little assembly. His evening communication should accord with this feeling, and he should make it the occasion to promote those pure and hallowed emotions in which every immortal mind must find its happiness, if it is to enjoy any, worth possessing.
When all is still, the teacher addresses his pupils as follows.
"I have nothing but a simple story to tell you to-night. It is true, and the fact interested me very much when I witnessed it, but I do not know that it will interest you now, merely to hear it repeated. It is this:
"Last vacation, I was travelling in a remote and thinly settled country, among the mountains, in another state; I was riding with a gentleman on an almost unfrequented road. Forests were all around us, and the houses were small and very few.
"At length, as we were passing a humble and solitary dwelling, the gentleman said to me, 'There is a young woman sick in this house; should you like to go in and see her?' 'Yes sir' said I, 'very much. She can have very few visiters I think, in this lonely place, and if you think she would like to see us, I should like to go.'
"We turned our horses towards the door, and as we were riding up, I asked what was the matter with the young woman.
"'Consumption,' the gentleman replied, 'and I suppose she will not live long.'
"At that moment we dismounted and entered the house. It was a very pleasant summer's afternoon, and the door was open. We entered and were received by an elderly lady, who seemed glad to see us. In one corner of the room was a bed, on which was lying the patient whom we had come to visit. She was pale and thin in her countenance, but there was a very calm and happy expression beaming in her eye. I went up to her bedside and asked her how she did.
"I talked with her some time, and found that she was a Christian. She did not seem to know whether she would get well again or not, and in fact, she did not seem to care much about it. She was evidently happy then, and believed she should continue so. She had been penitent for her sins, and sought and obtained forgiveness, and enjoyed, in her loneliness, not only the protection of God, but also his presence in her heart, diffusing peace and happiness there. When I came into the house, I said to myself, I pity, I am sure, a person who is confined by sickness in this lonely place, with nothing to interest or amuse her;' but when I came out, I said to myself, 'I do not pity her at all.'"