FEMALE EDUCATION BY SARAH K.'P. FALES. [Continued.] CHILDREN should never be permitted to appropriate a toy, fruit, or any indulgence, to their own exclusive use; and they should be influenced to share it with those who are least able to obtain similar gratifications, and from whom they can expect neither remuneration nor reward. A few such practical lessons of kindly feeling at an early age would be more effective, than all the homilies upon benevolence that ever fell upon the human ear. I will illustrate my opinion of the manner in which children may be instructed in the rare virtue of true charity, by an admirable incident which occurred within my own observation. God has denounced him who offers "a sacrifice that is lame, halt," or worthless to the donor. It was the custom of an instructress practically to teach her pupils to associate the feelings of privilege and pleasure with selfdenying kindness. She had a box in her school with a fissure just large enough to admit a piece of money. She represented to her charge the numerous class of beings who were destitute, not only of their abounding luxuries, but also of the comforts and necessaries, even, of life. She taught them that they were as responsible to God for the manner in which they disposed of what was exclusively their own, as their parents were with regard to their possessions, and as they would be to their companions for a borrowed dollar. She informed her pupils that the box was designed to be a repository for such money as was given to their own disposal, and which they would voluntarily lay aside until Thanksgiving, when it might purchase necessary garments for the destitute, to defend them from the inclemency of winter. The desired feeling is rarely difficult to be awakened in youth, although it soon becomes extinct by entire neglect. The box was not only replenished annually, but often overflowed. As the long looked for period approached, young brothers solicited the privilege to contribute; and young companions asked that their offerings might be accepted. A holiday was given on the week preceding the festival. Cast-off garments were brought-skilful friends assembled with the pupils, to instruct them to repair, or to alter, as might be necessary. The cash was appropriated to purchase shoes and stockings. On one day, each week after Thanksgiving, two or three pupils in succession were taken to destitute families, which their own search, or the information of others brought to their knowledge; and they had the pure and exquisite pleasure to "clothe the naked." Much care, however, was needed to exclude self-complacency from the charity. One of the pupils, on one occasion, was the daughter of persons, whose great wealth was the measure of their liberality; and whose prime object was the mental and moral elevation of their children. A heart-rending scene of wretchedness was witnessed. The offering was a very partial relief. The feeling girl returned home, and with tears entreated her mother for means to make the family comfortable. Her mother replied, that "she found numerous objects for all her charity, and that her daughter must provide for . these from her own resources.” To the inquiry what they were, the judicious parent answered-" that, if she were disposed to wear her pelisse another year, she might bestow the amount designed for a new one as she pleased." As a necessary consequence of such influence, the permission was joyfully received, and the destitute supplied. It seems almost useless to add, that this mother would not efface a lesson of great permanent value, by giving the garment so cheerfully relinquished. She said, that her self-denying daughter, instead of being mortified at her pelisse, when compared with the new one of her younger sister, seemed always to exult at the superior worth of her own purchase. The fortune to which she was heiress was a paltry possession, when weighed with this intrinsic generosity of soul. My heart-felt interest in the subject of parental instruction, and my deep conviction that there can be no adequate substitute for it, to the mind, character, or happiness of a child, I trust may be my excuse, if I have been thought to be too minute and tedious. Oh, mothers! mothers of immortal beings, whom you are practically guiding to eternal felicity, or unutterable and unending woe! the blight, or blessedness of whose existence may be traced to youoh, say, what care, what employment, and above all, what amusement, or follies, or what self-indulgence, shall supersede a duty which is imposed alike by God, by conscience, by reason, and by natural affection? Next to domestic influences, as means of education, I may rank schools. And what should a teacher be? Doubtless as nearly what you wish your child to be as you can obtain. Were you solicitous that your son might be an eminent lawyer, or physician, you would not place him in the office of a legal quack, or of an empiric. If you wished him to excel in a mechanical art, you would apprentice him to one whose skill in his business secured confidence in his instructions. And, if you sought nothing but high breeding and courtly elegance, he surely would need the example of a finished gentleman. The lowest requisites in a teacher should be, thorough knowledge of what he teaches, unblenching |