VARIETY IN THE FAMILY. 175 



we found in young and old a reverential regard for what is 

 good, and just, and pure, our pity would be turned into envy. 

 We should feel that whilst conveniences, and luxuries, and 

 tasteful arrangements and surroundings, are not to be despised, 

 but rather to be rejoiced in, yet neither these things, nor any- 

 thing out-ward, in the way of architectural display — no variety 

 of shrubbery, no statues, or vases or fountains on the lawn, none 

 of these things, nor all of them grouped together can make a 

 New England home. Such a home must have something more 

 than external beauty to recommend it. It must be a household 

 home — not only must the eye be educated to appreciate what is 

 beautiful, tlie intellect must be quickened by thought and the 

 language improved by conversation and discussion. There 

 must be more than this even. That is not a true home which 

 is not a home of the heart. That cannot be accepted as a 

 model of a New England home, in which the affections are not 

 educated, in which love does not intertwine its living chain 

 between the parent and the child, securing obedience without 

 constraint, and holding each heart true to the great law of 

 kindness. Such a home as this will not have all its blessed 

 tilings to itself, but will be very apt to send out its good angels, 

 its angels of mercy to the poor, and its apostles, to teach the 

 world that the maxims and the spirit which can make one home 

 happy, are sufficient, if accepted and exercised, to make a world 

 happy — apostles of freedom, of reform, of progress, in every 

 good cause. Such are going forth year by year from the busy 

 hives, where the brain and the heart, the bone and the muscle 

 are being trained in a seminary more important and more 

 potent than any which the State endows. Our colleges and 

 our institutes, our theological and technical schools, may do 

 much to chisel and polish, but if the material which comes to 

 their hands, comes with no preliminary impress from the ameni- 

 ties and sanctities of home, that material can never be wrought 

 by any system of instruction, however well arranged, to the 

 good uses it might have subserved, whether for the individual 

 or for the State. 



An old-fashioned New England home, I am reminded here to 

 say, consisted often of many persons, and this element of num- 

 ber added much. It added variety. It exhibited different 

 modifications of that one supreme thing, which we call excel- 



