This law of heredity asserts itself without reference to social or political condition, for you sometimes find the ignoble in high place and the honorable in obscure place. A descendant of Edward I. a toll gatherer. A descendant of Edward III. a door-keeper. A descendant of the Duke of Northumberland a trunk-maker. Some of the mightiest families of England are extinct, while some of those most honored in the peerage go back to an ancestry of hard knuckles and rough exterior. This law of heredity entirely independent of social or political condition.
Then you find avarice and jealousy and sensuality and fraud having full swing in some families. The violent temper of Frederick William is the inheritance of Frederick the Great. It is not a theory to be set forth by worldly philosophy only, but by divine authority. Do you not remember how the Bible speaks of "a chosen generation," of "the generation of the righteous," of "the generation of vipers," of an "untoward generation," of "a stubborn generation," of "the iniquity of the past visited upon the children unto the third and fourth generation?" So that the text comes to-day with the force of a projectile hurled from mightiest catapult: "Whose son art thou, thou young man?"
"Well," says some one, "that theory discharges me from all responsibility. Born of sanctified parents we are bound to be good and we cannot help ourselves. Born of unrighteous parentage we are bound to be evil and we cannot help ourselves."
TWO INACCURACIES.
As much as if you should say, "The centripetal force in nature has a tendency to bring everything to the centre, and therefore all things come to the centre. The centrifugal force in nature has a tendency to throw out everything to the periphery, and therefore everything will go out to the periphery." You know as well as I know that you can make the centripetal overcome the centrifugal, and you can make the centrifugal overcome the centripetal. As when there is a mighty tide of good in a family that may be overcome by determination to evil, as in the case of Aaron Burr, the libertine, who had for father President Burr, the consecrated; as in the case of Pierrepont Edwards, the scourge of New York society seventy years ago, who had a Christian ancestry; while on the other hand some of the best men and women of this day are those who have come of an ancestry of which it would not be courteous to speak in their presence.
YOUR DUTY.
The practical and useful object of this sermon is to show to you that if you have come of a Christian ancestry, then you are solemnly bound to preserve and develop the glorious inheritance; or if you have come of a depraved ancestry, then it is your duty to brace yourself against the evil tendency by all prayer and Christian determination, and you are to find out what are the family frailties, and in arming the castle put the strongest guard at the weakest gate. With these smooth stones from the brook I hope to strike you, not where David struck Goliath, in the head, but where Nathan struck David, in the heart. "Whose son art thou, thou young man?"
There is something in the periodical holidays to bring up
THE OLD FOLKS.
Sometime in the winter holiday, when we are accustomed to gather our families together, old times have come back again, and our thoughts have been set to the tune of "Auld Lang Syne." The old folks were so busy at such times in making us happy, and perhaps on less resource made their sons and daughters happier than you on larger resource are able to make your sons and daughters happy. The snow lay two feet above their graves, but they shook off the white blankets and mingled in the holiday festivities—the same wrinkles, the same stoop of shoulder under the weight of age, the same old style of dress or coat, the same smile, the same tones of voice. I hope you remember them before they went away. If not, I hope there are those who have recited to you what they were, and that there may be in your house some article of dress or furniture with which you associate their memories. I want to arouse the most sacred memories of your heart while I make the impassioned interrogatory in regard to your pedigree: "Whose son art thou, thou young man?"