...age, they can receive, and that includes every thing — repentance, love, duty, dependence, faith. Nay, the operative truth necessary to a new life may...truth effectual as the preaching of the gospel itself. Never is it too early for good to be communicated. Infancy and childhood are the ages most pliant to...

...communication could take place. ln a truly godly parent, Bushnell argued, the gospel "beams out ... as a living epistle, before it escapes from the lips, or is taught in words." Thus, in effect, years before a child could understand a Bible story or respond to a Sunday school...

...prayer book, but through the silent, psychic language of parental, especially maternal, affection. "[F]or the Christian scheme, the gospel, is really...it escapes from the lips, or is taught in words," Bushnell wrote. The most "plastic age" for Christian nurture came before the infant learned to speak,...