It is under these impressions that I now address you. Your grandparents are drawing near to the end of their course. They must soon leave you in a depraved and ensnaring world. What they do for your benefit, they must do quickly. As one placed in these tender and endearing relations to you, and in these solemn circumstances, allow me to pour out the fulness of a heart most earnestly engaged for your welfare, and desiring more ardently than I am able to express, to see you walking in truth and happiness, and embalming by your conduct, as well as by your affection, the memory of that blessed Parent, who, if she is ever permitted from her high and holy abode, to look down on those whom she has left behind, will rejoice to see you making choice of that path which leads to the same blessedness. There are two considerations, beloved grandchildren, which, I think, you will all agree, entitle me to expect from you a respectful and affectionate attention to what I have to offer in these letters. The _first_ is, that I have lived a long and somewhat eventful life; and, of course, my range of _experience_ has not been small. In my three-score and tenth year, I have had an opportunity of following many young people from the cradle to the grave. I have seen the training, the subsequent course, and the end of thousands. Need I say, that the lessons derived from such experience are not unworthy of your regard? O, if you could start in your career with that practical knowledge of the vanity, the snares, and the sufferings of the world, which has come to me through the medium of many a melancholy sight, and many a painful conflict, how great would be the advantage! But this cannot be. Happy were it for you, if you were willing to profit as you might from the experience of others. But neither can this be expected, in ordinary cases, to be realized. I cannot, however, admit the thought, that you will be willing to reject this teaching altogether.