The Puritans were noted for the care in which they brought up their children -- they never fell into the fault of sparing the rod, and their children were catechized every Sunday.  They were prayed for and wept over, and the Puritan household was a very Heaven upon earth.  But oh, if some of us see our children running into sin, and growing up to be thoughtless, careless, and giddy -- what can we say -- who shall we blame?  Are there none here, like Eli, who have only said to their children, when they have done wrong, "My sons, why do you do this?" but have let them go unchastised?  Remember the character of Hophni and Phinehas, and the message of Samuel concerning them -- "Thus says the Lord, I will do a thing at which both the ears of everyone that hears shall tingle:  I will judge the house of Eli because his sons made themselves vile, and he restrained them not."

    Let us take heed, lest God bring the like on us!  Oh, Sirs, it is no small charge to be a parent, and to neglect that charge brings no small guilt upon us!  When I see so many children of Christians turn out worse than others.  When I find some of the sons of ministers among the ringleaders in sin -- what can I do but pray that I may sooner die than have such a curse fall upon myself?  If any of us have neglected home duties, let us beware lest we have the blood of our children laid at our door!

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    O God, we are all guilty here!  "Deliver us from the guilt of bloodshed, O God, The God of our salvation."  Further have we not been guilty of the blood of souls by exposing them to danger?  When a father puts his boy apprentice, if he only cares about his worldly gain and not about his soul's interest, I cannot acquit him, nor will God acquit him.  Parents have sometimes put their girls to school and their boys to trade where if they had obtained any good it would have been a miracle, and where if they met with mischief it was only what they might expect.

    Now it is according to law that if I expose my child to the cold and it perishes through my negligence I am punished.  Surely it must be so with sin.  So with servants, our neighbors, and work people -- if we expect them to do for us what we would not do for ourselves we are guilty of their sins.  Some here may possibly be carrying on unnecessary trades which require working men to toil all Sunday (works of necessity, of course, I speak not of), but there are systems of trading which for no justifiable reason involve the keeping away of the men employed from a place of worship; now when these men are lost, I ask at whose door will their blood lie? Who had the profits of their labour? Who fattened on their gains? Who sucked the very blood of their souls to coin it into wealth for himself? If there be such a one, let him cease from the sin, and pray, “Deliver me from blood-guiltiness. O God, thou God of my salvation.”