IS IT WELL WITH THEE? I ADDRESS this serious, and I hope to make it profitable question, to those who sustain the interesting relation of wives and mothers. There are reasons of the most peculiar character, why this question should be pressed with earnestness and perseverance. No one can be ignorant of the amazing influence exerted by the female sex over all the relations of society; and no one can rationally doubt that this influence should be exerted for the purpose for which God in his providence seems to have designed it. You are a wife and a mother, and I have B no doubt that you have often heard the remark- —a remark not to be questioned as to the fact on which it is built-that your sex is more inclined to religion than the other; and, if you take the evidence of observation as satisfactory testimony on the subject, it may appear that the remark is true. For it scarcely requires the trouble even of observation to know, that of those who, at least, make any profession of religion, the vast majority is with the sex to which J a have the high privilege to belong. I am perfectly aware that, for this fact, a variety of reasons have been given; some highly honourable, some as highly discreditable to your sex. My own sentiments (otherwise I should not think it either a duty or a privilege to address you) coincide with those who trace the distinction to the profoundest wisdom and most expanded benevolence of God. I have no doubt you have often heard, and as often been pained at the expression, that this remarkable fact has been accounted for upon an original difference between the two sexes on the score of mental force. This is one of those sneers which is characteristic of infidelity; which, not satisfied with rejecting the evidence of christianity itself, brands with imbecility of mind those who make it the richest ornament of their character, and their hope for eternity. Ask the wretcheu sceptic, who prides himself upon that intellectual elevation which causes him, as he makes his boast, to rise above the restraints of religion, and to despise and reject its authority; ask him why there is so marked a difference between your sex and his, on the subject of religion, and he will tell you with a sneer that it arises from an original inferiority of intellect; or, if personal respect to the inquiry should induce him to |