Page:The pastor in his closet.djvu/56

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42
WEDNESDAY.

of sin that have passed over my head, all this growth of sin in me, every day with its own burden of sin, and requiring its own act of repentance! And yet. Lord, I am to teach these little ones. Humble me while I am teaching them; help me to fill their souls with true godly knowledge, not with the letter, but with the spirit, with love of Thee and of Thy blessed Gospel. Preserve their innocency; keep them from the evil world, that they may be Thine, even from their youth up, and grow in grace unto their lives' end. Tf there be among them any fatherless and orphans, on them bestow especial pity, and enable me, in the things belonging unto their souls, to be unto them in the stead of a father.

The young also, who have grown out of childhood, preserve from the sins and offences to which youth inclines; guard them in that most difficult season when they rejoice in their strength, and the pleasures of the world dance before them, and their blood is warm, and life opens upon them, and length of life seems to be before them. In the hour of temptation, when they are enticed into youthful sins, do Thou succour them with gifts of the Holy Ghost: enable them to resist temptation; give them boldness, the resolute mind, the fear of sin, the tenderness of con-