Pg. 312

¶ 1 Leave a comment on paragraph 1 0 24 THE SPOILED CHILD. [312

¶ 2 Leave a comment on paragraph 2 0 in his deliriums: at intervals he recovered his senses, and for a season was somewhat composed in his mind, but expressed deep compunctions and sorrow for his evil ways and doings. When he felt himself dying, he became awfully alarmed: he seemed actually frantic: the very bed shook under him; as if with supernatural strength, he tried to raise himself up; and shrieked out for some moments, “O Lord Jesus, have mercy on met God of my father, have mercy on me ! O Christ, have mercy on me!—O curses, curses on the head of General — who seduced me from the ways of my father’s God into his infidel ways!—Curses on my vicious companions, who taught me to break the Sabbath, and to dishonor and disobey my father and mother! And led me into taverns, instead of the church of my fathers! O mercy, mercy, Lord, on me, a poor miserable outcast!”—Thus he continued wailing, sometimes crying for mercy, and frequently uttering fearful imprecations. In a few hours, during which there was nothing but horror and distraction in the family, his strength, though the strength of a giant, became utterly exhausted; and his spirit, with an agonizing struggle, took its everlasting flight!

¶ 3 Leave a comment on paragraph 3 0 This, as reported to me, was the end of the SPOILED CHILD.—In these solemn facts we set up a beacon, to give an awful warning to Parents, of the fatal rock on which they also may strike. “Avoid it; pass not by it; turn from it, and pass away!” “O let us hear and fear, and do no presumptuous sin!” Let us labor for the conversion of our dear children, like those who feel that they are laboring to “pluck brands from the devouring fire!” We pronounce not on the final destiny of poor John C——; but who of us, I beseech you, would wish our children to follow his course of life, or to die his appalling death?

¶ 4 Leave a comment on paragraph 4 0 END.