20 MB. king's address. 



miglit receive the Society's certificate, accompanied by some 

 useful treatise on rural economy or domestic duties, such as 

 Fessenden's Complete Farmer, for the males, and Mrs. Child's 

 Frugal Housewife, for the females, so that the very means of 

 rewarding, should be an encouragement and guide to greater 

 excellence. 



But if as members of this society you can do but little to 

 remedy the evil abroad, as members of a jDore limited society 

 you can do much to remedy it at home. Fathers and mothers, 

 you stand at the fountain ; with the lightest trace of your finger 

 on the yielding soil you can give a direction to the infant 

 stream. You can send it gliding down through verdant fields 

 and flowery lawns, imparting new fertility and beauty, and anon 

 contribudng its strength to propel the complicated machinery of 

 industry : or you can send it dashing, foaming over precipices, 

 to join with other impetuous, headlong streams, carrying devas- 

 tation in their course : or you can suffer it to roll its sluggish way 

 into some stagnant pool, affording a refuge for loathsome reptiles, 

 and poisoning the atmosphere x^ith irs pestilential vapors. In 

 infancy, and at home, the deepest and most lasting impressions 

 are made ; your children may hsve able and faithful instructers, 

 but there are many lessons of practical wisdom which are not 

 taught in the schools. The mind of your child is constantly 

 busy — he will be learning a lesson of you when you least think 

 of it. To your child your remark is wisdom ; your observation, 

 experience ; your opinion, sound doctrine ; and your word, a law ; 

 your child is learning a lesson from every look and action — but 

 most of all, your example is educating your child. It is a book 

 constantly open before him, and which he is constantly study- 

 ing. Be careful, anxious father, fond mother, that you insert no 

 page which hereafter you may wish to tear, no line you may 

 wish to blot — be careful that you admit into that much read 

 volume no sentiment which you are unwilling your child should 

 transcribe on the fair tablet within his own innocent bosom. 



Fear not that I am about at this late hour to inflict on you a 

 lecture on general education. Schools, academies and colleges 

 have been founded for the education of the mind and the heart ; 



