The little child is an offering which gathers about itself more of rich joy and gratitude, recollection, present bliss, and anticipation, than any gift of God; it is itself an ordinance, a little rite, a sign and seal of covenants and love to which earth has no parallel.

The light of nature almost teaches us the propriety of infant dedication, in the use of the prevailing religious rite.

The only wise God manifested his goodness and wisdom, in establishing his covenant with the children of those who love him, as really as in creating a companion for Adam.
There were other sights, on this baptismal occasion, besides Henry Ferguson and his mother, and the young couple with their child.
A woman, in the habiliments of the deepest mourning, went up the aisle, leading with her finger a little boy between two and three years old, followed by a noble son of fifteen, and his sister of twelve.

Our pastor's rule, as to the limit of age within which children may be admitted to baptism, is this: So long as a parent, or guardian, or next friend, has the immediate tutelage of a child, so as to direct its instruction and government, and thus continues to exercise parental authority, he may properly offer the child for baptism; and therefore, as children differ as to degrees of maturity within the same ages, no express boundary of time can be prescribed to limit those baptisms which are by the faith of another.
The father of these three children had been lost at sea on a whaling voyage.

The seaman's chest had come home, and so the last star of hope as to his return had set.