Some years since, the pastor of a country congregation in a neighboring State was riding through his parish in company with a ministerial friend. As they passed a certain house, the pastor said to his friend, "Here is a riddle which I wish you would solve for me. In yonder house lives one of my elders, a man of sterling piety and great consistency of character, who prays in his closet, in his family, and in public. He has seven or eight children, several of whom are grown up, and yet not one is hopefully converted, or even at all serious. Just beyond him, on the adjoining farm, lives a man of the same age, who married the elder's sister. This man, if a Christian at all, is one of those who will 'be saved so as by fire;' he is very loose and careless in his talk, is in bad repute for honesty, and, although not guilty of any offense which church authorities can take hold of, does many things which grieve the people of God, and are a stumbling-block to others. Yet, of his eleven or twelve children, seven are valued and useful Christians, and there is every reason to anticipate that the rest, as they grow up, will follow in the same course. Now, solve me this difficulty, that the careless professor should be so blessed in his family, while the godly man mourns an entire absence of converting grace, especially as both households are as nearly equal as may be in their social position, their educational facilities, and their means of grace?"

"Let me know all the facts," said the pastor's friend, "before I give my opinion. Have you ever considered the character of the mothers, respectively?"

At once the pastor clasped his hands and said, "I have it; the secret is out. It is strange I never thought of it before. The elder's wife, although, as I trust, a good woman, is far from being an active Christian. She never seems to take any pleasure in religious conversation, but whenever it is introduced, either is silent or speedily diverts it to some worldly subject. She is one of those persons with whom you might live in the same house for weeks and months, and yet never discover that she was a disciple of Christ. The other lady, on the contrary, is as eminent for godliness as her husband is for inconsistency. Her heart is in the cause; she prays with and for her children, and whatever example they have in their father, in her they have a fine model of active, fervent, humble piety, seated in the heart and flowing out into the life."

The friends prosecuted the inquiry no further; they felt that the riddle was solved, and they rode on in silence, each meditating on the wide extent, the far-spreading results of that marvellous agency—a mother's influence.

Original.