DAILY SERVICE IN THE COTTAGE BY THE REV. J. C. NAPLETON, B.A. INCUMBENT OF HATFIELD, HEREFORDSHIRE. "LET NO MAN THINK OR MAINTAIN, THAT A MAN CAN SEARCH TOO LORD BACON. LONDON HATCHARD AND SON, PICCADILLY; 1848. PREFACE. No one who has been much amongst the poor will hesitate to admit, that family worship is comparitively a stranger in many households, and that the Sacred Volume is little better than a "sealed book" in most. And this is a state of things which it is far easier to lament, than to account for and redress. Certainly we might expect, that wherever the religion of the New Testament had found its way into the heart, there the home of the believer would at once become, like the house of Nymphas and §Philemon, of † Aquila and Priscilla, a church in itself; and that the head of that home would, like the saints of old time, be a priest unto God. We might expect to find the pious father on his knees at early morn, offering up like Job, his *Col. iv. 15. §Philem. 2. †Rom. xvi. 5. ‡Job i. 5. seasonable sacrifice of prayer and thanksgiving for each of his dear little ones, wrestling with God in supplications on his own and their behalf, and like another Jacob exclaiming, *"I will not let thee go, except thou pour out a blessing upon me and mine." Despite the jeers of the profane, the charge of affected singularity, or the many hindrances of the poor man's lot, we should expect to hear, from the lips of such an one, the noble determination of the good old Joshua,S "As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord." Nay, we should even think ourselves at liberty to say of him, what God himself declared of the father of the faithful, "I know him, that he will command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of the Lord." And when the labours of the day were over, and the ordinary duties done, it would be just what we anticipated concerning the diligent seeker after righteousness, if we were assured that his custom was to walk in the steps of the man after God's own heart-that then, like David,‡ he “returned to bless his household." And since we know how essential it is for those, who would do God's will, to ascertain and consider what that will is; and seeing moreover the additional weight which must be thrown into the scale of parental authority by the solemn and irreversible "Thus saith the Lord :"we should take it for granted that the reading of the Scriptures formed a daily part of the religious exercises of every religious *Gen. xxxii. 26, §Josh. xxiv. 15. †Gen, xviii. 19. 2 Sam. vi. 20. household. Nor would it be anything to surprise us if, in after life, when the minister of God fell in with some member of that well-trained family,—with one who was just entering for himself upon the business of the world, he should deem it his duty to accompany his farewell benediction with the words addressed by St. Paul to the youthful Timothy* "Continue thou in the things which thou hast learned, and hast been assured of, knowing of whom thou hast learned them; and that from a child thou hast known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation, through faith which is in Christ Jesus." But where it is not so; or rather, where it is all the other way, and we cannot recognize any of those marks of genuine devotion to God's service, which we have been supposing-where the parents, in effect, have been accustomed to say to their children, "We can expose you to the wiles of the devil, to the treachery of the world, and to the vain imagination of your own deceitful hearts; but we cannot spare the time to commit you to the care and grace of God; we fully expect you to honor and obey your father and mother; but we are too much taken up with our worldly occupations to instruct you in the duty which you owe to the Author and Giver of all good; we will labor diligently to provide for your temporal wants; but we would not have you perplex us or yourselves about laying up treasures in heaven;-your * 2 Tim. iii. 14, 15, compared with i,—3—6, |