Has the Almighty bestowed upon you fuch marks of importance, and is it posfible for us not to be ftruck with them? Whilft earth and heaven, whilft mortal and immortal powers, are beholding you with earnest expectation, and awful suspenfe, can we remain unconcerned fpectators? Senfibility, benevolence, religion, forbid !

Have not all the best minds, and most virtuous nations, ever taken a deep intereft in the sentiments, tempers, and manners, of Young Men? Have not the judgement and learning, the experience and policy of ages, united in training them to knowledge, virtue, and glory? Where is the subject, that has employed more able or more eloquent pens, than their education? And, if we speak of Scripture, what shall we fay of the attention paid them by many of the infpired writers, particularly by the man renowned above all others for his wifdom, of which he

has in a manner exhausted the treasures that Young Men might share them? He, indeed, appears to have been peculiarly affected with a fenfe of their confe

quence, and also to have poffeffed a profound infight into their characters, the leading lines of which his inftructions, warnings, and encouragements, have almost constantly in view.

It has been long obferved, that befide the difference of form and appearance fufficiently visible for the most part, the several periods of life, from the commencement of reafon, may commonly be difcriminated from one another by a certain cast of thought and difpofition proper to each. Among the rest, we naturally expect to find in Young Men a lively fancy, a ready understanding, a retentive memory, a refolute spirit, a warm temper and tender affections, a quick sense of honour and difgrace, an irresistible love of action and enterprise, an ambition to be admired and

praised, especially for their probity, their manhood, their generofity, their friendfhip, their good-nature and other virtues of that order, with a deteftation and difdain of the oppofite vices. In them too we naturally expect to discover a strong propenfity to amusement, company, and imitation; a high relish of existence, fanguine hopes of happinefs, exalted ideas of the world; candour and truth, extending even to an honeft bluntness and an eafy credulity; a keen appetite for pleasure ; a restless attachment to the other Sex, with an ardent defire of their approbation; an impatience of controul, a thirst for liberty, an eagerness of information; a paffion for what is wonderful, curious, or new.

But human nature is infinitely varied. In numbers of youth many of these qualities are either not found at all, or in a very feeble degree; and in none are they univerfally found alike ftrong. Even where they do exift with confiderable force,

VOL. I.

C

it is divided amongst them in very different proportions; and the character of mind and heart, difcoverable in different Young Men as fuch, appears under a great diverfity of fhapes and combinations, producing a correfpondent diverfity in their tendencies and manners, and requiring nearly an equal diftinction in the particular modes of treating them.

Mean while it is pleafing to observe in general, that many of the qualities juft named furnish very valuable feeds of intellectual, moral, and religious improvement; as, on the other hand, the friends of fociety cannot but be alarmed at the danger arifing to its highest concerns from the rest: a danger infinitely increased by the endless and formidable fnares that befet you on every fide, from bad companions, bad books, bad fafhions, falfe ridicule, or continual flattery; often from the blandifhments of worthlefs, but artful women; often from the worst examples in

the nearest relations; often from rank and affluence; and, alas! how often from an education deplorably neglected, or grofsly mistaken! Where indeed is the wonder, if all these, meeting with the warmth and vivacity, the confidence and inexperience, the want of fufpicion and therefore the want of guard-shall I add, the unthinking rafhness and the ungrounded conceit too common to youth, should render your fituation exceedingly critical and hazardous?

Your Situation will recur to our remembrance so frequently, that I shall only touch upon it now, as it is affected by the character and circumftances of the times. From the fnares juft fpecified, we must not flatter ourfelves, that youth could be wholly fecure in any period confiftent with an advanced ftate of fociety. But who does not fee, that, in an age fo deeply and fo widely corrupted as the prefent, those temptations are ftrengthened and