( 15 )
ing us to check the disposition we are too apt to indulge, of prying into the secrets of heaven, and to conduct all our plans and enquiries, under a sense of our own ignorance, and in a full dependance on the over ruling providence and righteous government of God.
May we not also draw a lesson from the conduct of the old King on the occasion. It was not the wealth, the grandeur, the learning, or the arts of England which struck him as desirable, but the religion of England. He sent his son thither, not to make a fortune, not to procure an insight into trade, nor to form great connections, but to learn the Christian Religion. How many parents are there in this country, where it is so easy to attain the means of learning the Christian Religion, who take no pains to make their children acquainted with it.
But a still more instructive lesson, and one which appears more generally, may be drawn from the conduct of the Black Prince, whose story has just been told. He comes among us rude and ignorant with no just ideas of religion, and after having been accustomed for twenty three years to indulge all his passions without any restraint. No sooner, however, is Christianity placed before him, than he is struck with its truth and beauty, and embraces it with a child-like simplicity. As he views himself in the glass of scripture, he perceives its account of human nature to be true from his own experience. Humbled under a sense of his sins and imperfections, trembling under the apprehensions of the consequences of them, and sensible of his inability to help himself, he gladly lays hold of the hope set before him, he believes the promises of God to the
