A GENTLEMAN traveling abroad had a letter of introduction to another gentleman. He was of accomplished mind and manners, but an infidel. The gentleman to whom he had brought letters of introduction, and his lady, were active Christian philanthropists. They invited the stranger to make their house his home, and treated him with every possible attention. Upon the evening of his arrival, just before the usual hour for retiring, the gentleman, knowing the peculiarity of his friend's sentiments, observed to him that the hour had arrived in which they usually attended family prayers; that he would be happy to have him remain and unite with them, or, if he preferred he could retire. The visitor intimated that it would give him pleasure to remain. A chapter of the Bible was read, and the family all knelt in prayer, the stranger with the rest. In a few days he left this hospitable dwelling, and embarked on board a ship for a foreign land. In the course of three or four years, however, the providence of God again led him to the same dwelling. But, oh! how changed! He came the happy Christian, the humble man of piety and prayer. In the course of the evening's conversation, he remarked, that when, on the first evening of his visit, he knelt with them in family prayer, it was the first time in many years that he had bowed the knee to his Maker. This act brought to his mind such a crowd of recollections, and so vividly reminded him of a parent's prayers which he had heard at home, that he was entirely bewildered. His emotion was so great that he did not hear one syllable of the prayer which was uttered, from the commencement to the close. But God made this the instrument of leading him from the dreary wilds of infidelity to the peace and joy of piety. Now these good people, with whom the accomplished infidel tarried, might have prayed very earnestly in their chamber for his conversion, and he might, and probably would have gone away unarrested: it was the family prayer that overpowered him with recollections which eventually brought him to the cross. Recollections of what? Of the prayers of his parents. Even the domestic worship of his new friends would have been powerless, had not his youth been accustomed to a solemn service at home. What encouragement is this to parents.—Wesleyan Methodist Magazine.