THE
Cf f*
DAUGHTER AT SCHOOL.
BY
Rev. JOHN TODD, D. D.
NORTHAMPTON : BRIDGMAN AND CHILDS
1865.
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1853, by
Hopkins, Bridgman, and Company,
in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts
PREFACE.
In sending this little volume out into the world, the Author has no explanation to make, no apology to offer, no wish to ex- press, except that he fervently hopes it may be useful to those for whom it was written. It will drop in the path of some to whom life is new, whose experience is next to nothing, and who will be willing to receive a few hints, even if they are not so full, so pertinent, or so valuable as a professed teacher could give. Till such a teacher does speak, may I not hope that my whispers will be useful?
How I came to write on a subject so for*
IV . PREFACE.
eign to my own laborious profession, and to attempt to do that for which I have so many disqualifications, need not now be ex- plained.
May I hope that the daughter, who, away from her home, just entering upon the un- tried scenes of school, shall open this lit- tle volume, will find something to guide, to encourage, to stimulate and ennoble her, so that she shall return to her home in after days, like the king's daughter, " all glorious within " ; and that the anxious mother, on putting it into the carefully-packed trunk, will feel that her child has not gone wholly unattended by any friend.
Pittsfield, September 1, 1853.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
EDUCATION THE FIEST THING. INTRODUCTORY.
PAGE
A New Attempt. Indefatigable Student. Embryo of Im mortality. Learning to see. How the Little Child learns. Labor makes beautiful. A Great Work. Will subdued. The World of Fancy. Where is the Attention ? The Wild Colt. Napoleon's Memory. Somewhere and Somebody Investigate and reason. Garden of Life. For Eternity. Better than Wealth. The Polished Jewel. ... 1
CHAPTER II.
THE SCHOOL-GIRL AWAY FROM HOME.
Home Education. The Opening Flower. Parents unfit Teachers. Private Instruction. All need a Standard. In- fluence of Nunneries. Teaching a Profession. It is a Trial. On a larger Scale. A Pleasant Plan. Clothes and Shoes. Longing to turn back. Weather changed. Count- ing the Weeks. A Critical Point. Character developing. a*
VI t CONTENTS.
Best of every Thing. Back-bone Work. An Angel's Wing drooping 18
CHAPTER III.
THE SCHOOL-GIRL AT STUDY.
£ he Great Trial. Trunks full. Nothing forgotten. A Va- cant Stare. Two Thirds lost. Memory wanting. Xeno- phon's Retreat. All need Judgment. Learn to discrimi- nate. Best Taste in Town. Select the Best. Knowledge running away. Loose Change. Where to look. Society of a Lapdog. Not a Short Job. Iron-hearted Bell. Habit of Toil 36
CHAPTER IV.
HOW TO STUDY.
Witch Stories. The Question proposed. Study dry Work. Look it out again. Bishop Jewel's Memory. Conquer, step by step. A High Standard. A Finished Young Lady. Capacity wanted. Chain the Attention. Author of this Mischief. Dr. Gregory. Ship obeying the Helm. Algebra forgotten. Waters filtered. Cambridge and Oxford. Taste cultivated. Duty become Pleasure 52
CHAPTER V.
SOCIAL DUTD3S OF THE SCHOOL-GIRL.
Power of Oratory. Constant Impression. Almost a Nun. Poor Relations forgotten. Small Coin of Life. Professor
CONTENTS. VU
Francke's Advice. Crows' Nests. A Beautiful Compari- son. The always Miserable. Mirth and Cheerfulness. What you will desire to recall. Severest Punishment. Out of our own Shadow. School-girls not Matrons. One Burden lightened. Desperate Intimacies. Carry Sunshine with you. Not afraid of Responsibility. . . . 70
CHAPTER VI.
TRIALS AND TEMPTATIONS.
New Trials. Better Scholars than you. Friends will be dis- appointed. Wonderful Blacksmith. No Excuse for you. Rock Slates and Sea-egg Pencils. Not too late. So much done. Parents' Mistake. A Good-for-nothing Machine. Too great a Difference. The Best Response. Letters like Chimneys. Starving Pupil. Genteel Prisons. Why not spend Money ? School not for the Rich alone. Daniel Webster's Congratulation. East Winds must come. Cow- ard won the Day. 86
CHAPTEE VII.
READING.
The Tedious Day. How to read. Now is the Time to begin. Nothing to build with. One Dish at a Time. Great Men raised up in Times of Commotion. One hundred and twenty-four Volumes. A Book read in Six Months. Books of Pewter and of Bank-notes. Starving on Jellies. Chang-
. ing Horses at Paris. Convent in Portugal. Chain of Mem- ory. Three Hours a Week. Let Nothing interfere. Po-
Vlll CONTENTS.
etry its own Reward. None, safest. Giant cracking Nuts. Phosphorus and Honey 104
CHAPTER VIII.
USE OF THE PEN.
How to preserve Thought. Fresh as ever. Not a Little Undertaking. Composition dreaded. Watered by Tears. Theory mistaken. No Time for Newspapers. Factories near the Waterfall. Whitefield's Pathos. Passion-flower. Women must do the Letter-writing. Chain kept bright. How Letters are treated in Turkey. Graceful Handwrit- ing. First Specimen. Learn to bear the Yoke of Disci- pline. Graces of Time run into Glories of Eternity. Econ- omist of Time. Thousand Years before Noah. Arrow ruined. Life hurried. 121
CHAPTER IX.
FORMATION OF HABITS.
Indian Fashions. Dr. Chalmers's Handwriting. John Fos- ter's Regret. Habit of Seeing. Audubon's Bet. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu a Physician. Not ashamed to ask a Question. Secret of Despatch. Chinese Student. Al- ways waiting. Reproof warded off. Just slipping on her Things. Lord Brougham's Rules. Mr. Condar's Speech. A Sure Recipe. Strive to please. Never-failing Beau- ty. Haydn's Gladness. Feast df Joy. Fair Weather will come. Passion disgusting in Woman. Rejoicing in God 140
CONTENTS. IX
CHAPTER X.
HEALTH AT SCHOOL.
Conveniences of our Day. All under Law. Abuses among Good Men. Dr. Payson's Letter. Good Advice. The Two Extremes. John Howard's Testimony. His Experi- ence in full. Too much Care. The Conscientious Self- destroyer. Recovery, — a Curious Case. Hints not Eules. Sleep, how much needed. Sir William Jones. A Curious Will. Importance of Habits. Mother's Cupboard. The Young Lady's Self-control. Exercise indispensable. Dr. Franklin's Experience. Mind corresponds with the Body. Cheerfulness essential to Health 162
CHAPTER XI.
THE BIBLE.
No Excuse for us. Bible worn on the Neck. Eusebius's Testimony. Bible committed to Memory. Primitive Cus- tom. Cool Water from the Spring. " Let us begin again." The Embarrassed Merchant. The Bible Hawker. Fifty Centimes. Garden of the Lord. Commit it accurately. Eight Thousand Verses a Year. Do not omit a Day. Bi- ble in the Trunk. Ice broken. Not a Bad Idea. Sixteen Bible Clerks. Chinaman's Experience. Bible in Yuca- tan. Concordance a Help. Let your Faith be strong. A Lamp to the Feet. Suited to every Thing. . . .181
X CONTENTS.
CHAPTER XII.
THE TRUE -POSITION OF WOMAN.
The JLolian Harp. Golden Links in the Chain of Life. Rough Diamond polished. Her True Position. They make us. New Stars. Man cannot do it. Her Perfect Love. Gray's Filial Love. Home-loving Queen. Where Aris- tocracy begins. Light of the Household. To save rather than earn. Real Friendship. A Great Mistake. The Noble Woman. Another Woman's Heart. The Pleasant Surprise. Soft Star of Love. Honor to Old Age. Pecu- liar Protection. Rights of Women. Five Sisters. A Lit- tle " Laming." Mrs. Kennicott. Woman appreciated. . 202
CHAPTER XIII.
THE DAUGHTER AT HOME.
Pleasant Anticipations. " The Last." Joy awaiting you. Responsibility before you. Minute by Minute. Poor Housekeeping. Knowledge useless. No Regular Time for Study. A Part of your Discipline. " Twitting upon Facts." Help your Mother. Household Duties. Apolo- gize for Nothing. Sit still but an Hour. Afternoon Oc- cupations. Franklin's Courtesy. Form a Library. Busy and Quiet. Mazes of Fractions. Never-failing Cheerful- ness. Service to your Father. Home Field first. Woman's Way opened. Joy in the Evening. Chariot-Wheels drag- ging. Melody of Heaven. A Rod or a Crown. Uses of Sorrow. Ready to work. Life's Harvest. . . . A28
THE
DAUGHTER AT SCHOOL
CHAPTER i.
EDUCATION THE FIEST THING. INTEODUCTOEY.
A New Attempt. Indefatigable Student. Embryo of Immor- tality. Learning to see. How the Little Child learns. La- bor makes beautiful. A Great Work. Will subdued. The World of Fancy. Where is the Attention ? The Wild Colt. Napoleon's Memory. Somewhere and Somebody. Investi- gate and reason. Garden of Life. For Eternity. Better than Wealth. The Polished Jewel.
I am about to try to do what, as far as I know, no one has ever yet attempted ; — I am now to undertake the preparation of a book for the sole benefit of the school-girl. I am intending, as far as possible, to have two char- acters. I mean, I wish to throw myself into her situation, to feel her trials and wants, and at the same time, so to remain myself that I may drop hints and bestow advice that may be useful to her.
A few years since, and you were all little 1
4 INDEFATIGABLE STUDENT.
children. Your education began when you first opened the eye and noticed the light, when you first bent the ear and distinguished sounds, when you first put forth the hand and brought it in contact with something else. The first two years of life, though the impres- sions and the feelings and emotions excited are all now forgotten, were, perhaps, the most important of any two years that you have lived. You were then an indefatigable stu- dent, — learning size and distances, forms and colors, sound and tones, the different taste of food and drinks, the geography of your home, the tones of the human voice and the variations of the human countenance. Then you first learned the difference between the smile and the frown, the bitter and the sweet, the cold and the hot, the distant and the near, the hard and the soft, the great and the small, the sweet tone and the harsh, the feeling of pleasure and of pain. Then the emotions of joy or of grief were easily aroused and quickly passed away ; — then hope and fear followed each other in quick succession. Then you began to compare, to judge, to discriminate, and to remember. Then you first learned
EMBRYO OF IMMORTALITY. 3
"that a pictoe would recall an object before seen, and even that it might be recalled by the mysterious power of the memory. Then the powers of the mind, feeble indeed, began to unfold themselves, and the germ of an immor- tal nature began to be developed. No hand, no voice, no care, and no love, but that of one being, were fitted to begin the education of such a being. Need I say whose ? No voice thrilled upon the little heart, no hand felt so soft to the silken head, no look beamed so bright, no love watched with such vigilance and such sleepless care, as that of the Mother ! To her care and watch and love was com- mitted the first training of that mind whose thoughts were to be deathless, and the first forming of that character which was to grow for ever. The nursing of a planet, a moon, or a sun, which will shine a few ages of time and then go out, would be of less conse- quence than the training of such a mind. If the mother cannot do battle with the elements without, and if she cannot mingle with the strifes and struggles of business and take her place and crowd her way with the eager mul-
4 LEARNING TO SEE.
titncle who cany on the concerns of the world, she has a higher and a holier duty to perform. She has committed to her the embryo of im- mortality, and the little feet which she first teaches to walk are receiving a direction from her Avhich will never change.
Now what is the object which we have in educating a daughter ? It is very plain that we wish to teach her to use her eyes. We point her to the window. We turn her face to the candle. We show her bright colors. Then we teach her to use the ear. We call her in different tones of voice. We make musical sounds. We cheer her with notes of cheerfulness, and we quiet her with the soft tones of music. Next we educate her to use her hands. We put things into them. We close the hand and teach her to hold fast. We teach her to move the hand, to shake the rrf+le, and to expect that the next shake will make the same noise. Then we teach her to use the feet, to poise her weight on them, and then on one foot while she carefully takes up and moves the other : to balance herself and to move where she will. Then we instruct
HOW THE LITTLE CHILD LEARNS. O
her in the art of making sounds, uttering words, and forming sentences. Then we teach her to make known her wants, to ex- press her emotions, to utter her notes of joy or of sorrow, to understand human language and to receive and communicate human thoughts.
All this process of education takes place before the child is two years old. And a very great work it is to do it; but God has in- sured its being done in three ways : first, it gives the child such pleasure to learn and to do these things that she strives continually to improve herself ; secondly, we love to see the little one in its artless attempt to imitate, so that it is a pleasure to instruct and aid it ; and thirdly, that inexpressible love of which ] have already spoken, which makes the mother forget herself and her fatigues, in the pleasure of instructing and drawing out the soul of her child.
Now the process of education has be- gun. And God has so ordered, in his wis- dom, that all that is valuable shall cost in proportion to its value. If we want a beauti-
D LABOR MAKES BEAUTIFUL.
ful tree for shade, or to produce us fruit, we must plant the seed, defend the germ, train the shrub, watch over the little thing till it grows into strength and beauty. We may have beautiful stones to sparkle and flash be- fore the eye, but they must first be dug from the earth, then polished with immense care, and finally set with skill. Even then they are hideous, unless they adorn the person of the virtuous. "We may take a pound of steel which is worth a few cents, and bestow labor and skill upon it, till it is made into springs for ladies' watches, and that one pound of steel is then worth forty thousand dollars ! We may throw out the stones of a quarry, and they are almost worthless ; but labor and skill lay them up into the walls of a palace, and ages hence they are admired and in use ; and in the hands of the wonder-working artist, the rough block of marble becomes the beautiful statue. We take the hardest and the most gnarled trees that grow, and they become, un- der labor and skill, the beautiful ship that passes like a bird from continent to continent. The most beautiful rose that now adorns the
A GREAT WORK.
window or the garden was once the single wild-rose, possessing hardly any thing like beauty or fragrance. Cultivation has done all the rest ; and many of our most nutritious vegetables were, in their wild state, both un- savory and poisonous.
It is not surprising, then, that, in the ar- rangements of God's providence, it is a great, as well as an important work, to educate one human being, — to train its body and its spirit so that it will eventually be and do all for which it is created. It is a great work, for ten thousand right impressions are to be made and fastened on the soul ; ten thousand wrong impressions are to be counteracted and ef- faced. As years roll onward and the child grows, the work of education becomes more and more difficult. There must be the work of many years ere the child is in any measure fitted to take care of itself, and to be intrusted with its own interests. Slowly and carefully must the foundations of character be laid, and while many would think that the great anxi- ety of the parent would now be, How shall I feed and clothe and shelter my little daugh-
8 WILL SUBDUED.
ter ? there is a much heavier question weigh- ing upon him, and that is, What manner of child shall this be ?
It is very plain that one of the first things is to teach the child self-discipline, and to yield up his will and his wisdom to that of another. This is called obedience. It should be prompt, unreserved, and cheerful. The happiness of the child depends on this. And the child that has not been taught to obey at once, with alacrity, and with cheerfulness, lit- tle knows what it is to be happy. That con- test between the will of the child and the will of the parent, which is often so mortifying to the parent, is utterly incompatible with hap- piness. The same remark is true of your instructor who is in the place of the parent. Whenever your will comes in contact with his, and you yield only outward obedience and outward submission, you are very unhappy. The will, like a wild animal, must submit or conquer very quicldy. A state of contest is a state of wretchedness.
One of the first things, then, in education, is to learn cheerfully to submit your will to
THE WORLD OF FANCY. 9
that of another. And God has appointed your parents to this high trust. They may dele- gate their authority to others for a time, as they do in relation to the teacher of their child. But a great trust is theirs. An edu- cated mind, then, has learned to submit to law, to order, and to such regulations at home, in the school, or in the state, as are for the best good of the community.
But now we come to the mind, — how is that to be trained ? The little child lives in an ideal world. The boy has horses and cat- tle, menageries and armies, ships and rail-cars, all made of his little pile of blocks. And the little girl has her dolls, her visitors, her parties, and her housekeeping all in her little play- house. They make visits and long journeys, receive and entertain an abundance of com- pany, and all without going out of the room. Fancy is uncurbed and unchecked. But now we begin to take that curious thing called the • mind, to train it. The first thing is to teach it to give attention. At first this is a very difficult task. The little creature looks at the letters or on the page of the book, draws the
10 WHERE IS THE ATTENTION?
breath, sighs, and by the answer to the ques- tion shows that the mind and the thoughts are not there. So it is even when she be- comes a school-girl. She finds that it is hard to keep the mind on the book or the lesson. It will wander, — it will go home, it will visit the play-house, or it will dream of something else. Again and again she begins to read over the lesson. " Oh ! " says she, " what hard lessons ! Did any body ever have such hard lessons ? " The difficulty is not in the lesson, but in her not commanding her atten- tion. Let a story, quite as long as the lesson, be told her, and she will give it the closest at- tention. And she can repeat it at once. But her lesson, she says, she has read over fifty times, and cannot get it. The reason is, that she has not learned to command her attention, and to make the mind obey her. This is what the teacher wants to accomplish; and there is no way to do this but by continual effort, lesson after lesson, trial after trial. • The mind is like a wild colt at first ; and this study is like the halter put on the colt. He pulls and chafes and worries at first ; but
THE WILD COLT. 11
every time he is haltered, he chafes less and less, till finally you may lead him where you will, and do with him as you please. You must never wait to be in a mood for study, any more than you would wait for a horse to be in a mood to go. To be educated, implies that you can take the mind and put it down to hard thinking, and hold the mind there as long as you please. This is what we mean by being able to command your attention.
The next step is to cultivate the memory, — so that you can remember faces, voices, con- versations, events, facts that have taken place, and be able to recall them at any moment you wish. Some have what we call a strong memory. They seem to take hold of any thing and hold it as if the memory had steel hooks. Others can hardly retain any thing. The sieve lets every thing run through it. Perhaps no faculty can be more improved by training than the memory. A Roman once had his memory so cultivated, that he could attend an auction all day, and at night tell every article that was sold, the order in which it was sold, the person who purchased it,
12 napoleon's memory.
and the price which he paid. Few have a memory like that. But if Alexander could call every one of his soldiers by name, if Napoleon could remember where every part of his vast armies was, and the prices of every thing through his empire, so that he knew at a glance when he was* charged too much, we cannot doubt but the memory can be vastly improved by cultivation. My own im- presskm is, that much more attention ought to be paid to the improvement of the memory than is paid, both at home and in our schools. This is not the place to tell hoiv to do this. I will here only remark, that to cultivate the memory it is absolutely necessary to be per- fectly accurate. You are not to remember that such a place is about so far off, or such an event took place about such a time, or that such a thing was once done somewhere and by somebody ; but you are to be perfectly accurate, as to the event, the time, the place, the actor. All other training is very bad for the memory. And this faculty comes under the work of education.
Then, after you have learned how to attend^
INVESTIGATE AND REASON. 13
and to remember, that is, recall accurately what you know, you are next to be taught how to reason, how to think. The reason makes comparisons between one thing and another. You go to select a book, or a new dress, and you have to ask and answer many questions. Is this the precise book that I am seeking? Is it the right edition ? Is the price such that my purse can pay for it ? Is this the right time to buy it ? Ought I to do without it ? Is the quality, the color, the style, of this dress such as is suitable to my age and position? Is it within my means ? Do I need it now, and will my parents approve of it ? This is reasoning. And the judgment is what de- cides the answers. But these are small oper- ations of the mind, and we wish to educate the mind and the understanding so that you can grapple with more difficult questions ; and so we place before the mind, not the colors of a dress, but the numbers in the Arithmetic, the problems in Algebra, and the demonstra- tions in Euclid. You are not educated till you have learned to reason in regard to any and all subjects, and have an understanding
14 GARDEN OF LIFE.
that will quickly and properly decide every question. You must be able to investigate, and this requires memory and judgment, and you must be constantly coming to decisions of the judgment. Otherwise you could never distinguish between such characters as Wash- ington and Benedict Arnold. But we wish your mind to be, not only a thing that can think and investigate, but that can also en- joy. For this purpose we must cultivate your taste, so that instantly you see, or rather feel, what is in good taste and what is bad. So that in the wide garden of life you may be able to distinguish between flowers and weeds, and to cultivate only such flowers as are fragrant and beautiful. She who can discover what is beautiful in history, in eloquence, in poetry, in music or in painting, has received a rare gift from edu- cation. For this purpose, among others, you are instructed in composition, in rhetoric, in the reading of poetry, and the criticism of writers who are immortal.
In a school or college the amount of knowl- edge which is stored away in the mind is not
FOR ETERNITY. 15
much, nor of any great value. It is not the design to see how much knowledge you can lay up, but to see how perfectly we can make your mind an instrument able to instruct and guide itself. We barely begin the work of education while you are at school. Educa- tion is to continue, we believe, for ever.
Then there are other things to be attended to, such as your manners, habits, conversa- tion, which we shall speak upon hereafter. But in speaking of what we wish to accom- plish by your education, we must not forget to say, or to impress it upon you, that we educate the soul for eternity; that we feel that we are far out of the way, and have too narrow views, when we think of you as crea- tures of earth. We wish*your manners to be polished, your conversation pure and instruc- tive, your countenance lighted up with intel- ligence, and your mind bright and awake ; but we desire more. We want the heart trained to commune with God, and the soul to rise up into his light, and to plume her wings for the flight of eternal ages. A right education embraces that humility which a conscious sin-
16 BETTER THAN WEALTH.
ner ought to feel, that self-denial which the Christian spirit ever carries with it, that cheer- fulness which Christian hope creates and cher- ishes, and that adoration and love of God which the opening prospects of eternity in- spire. The great questions with the parent and the teacher who feels rightly will be, not, Will this daughter be beautiful, be admired, be prosperous in this world, be long-lived in time ? but, Will she be so educated as to make the most of all her powers and faculties both here and hereafter? Will she understand that the mind is as much loftier than the body, that knowledge is as much better than wealth, as the heavens are superior to earth ?
The only beings on earth worthy of being educated are our sons and our daughters. A horse may be educated in a few weeks. So can a dog or an ox. But it requires years of incessant care and anxiety and labor, to unfold and improve the faculties of one child. But when the work is done, when that child is truly and properly educated, you have a jewel polished which will outlive and out- shine the sun. We are training up an angel
THF POLISHED JEWEL. 17
for eternity. And if the parent or the child thinks that a few months' schooling, or a superficial manner of instruction, or the put- ting on the outside polish of a few ornamental studies, is to educate that mind, they are to be pitied for their ignorance. The foundations of an education that is worthy of the name must be laid very slowly, very carefully, and very thoroughly. You may make fashion- seekers and fashion-finders without this, but you cannot make an educated, cultivated woman, fitted to adorn her home, to elevate society, stamp her character on others, leave the world better than she found it, and one whom Jesus Christ will own as his mother or his sister. To educate or to be educated, even for one daughter, is a work that requires all that is good and wise and great to assist in accomplishing what is so mighty in re- sults.
CHAPTER II.
THE SCHOOL-GIRL AWAY FROM HOME.
Home Education. The Opening Flower. Parents unfit Teach- ers. Private Instruction. All need a Standard. Influence of Nunneries. Teaching a Profession. It is a Trial. On a larger Scale. A Pleasant Plan. Clothes and Shoes. Long- ing to turn hack. "Weather changed. Counting the Weeks. A Critical Point. Character developing. Best of every Thing. Back-bone Work. An Angel's Wing drooping.
The child is committed by its Maker to its parents for training. In ordinary cases, this is a sacred and a delightful trust. For the first few years of its life, no parent thinks of putting his child out from under the influences and the care of home. And, were there not most weighty reasons, surely the child would never be sent away from home till he went out to a home of his own, and the daughter whose mind and heart just begin to expand
HOME EDUCATION. 19
would not be put into the hands of strangers to form her character, were there not some very special inducements. The argument for a home education is a very strong one. At home, we are told, there must be order and government, but it is all done through the af- fections. The sternness of law is not felt. The affections are so warm, that it is not felt to be obedience to obey. But in the large school it is all one unbending system of rules and regulations, cold and stern, without any play of the affections. At home, each child can be instructed according to its tempera- ment and capacity, without coming under the regimen adopted for a great number. Plans of study, of recreation, and the like, are there adapted to the habits and the temperament of each, without overlooking any peculiarity, physical or mental. At home, there is no ri- valry which urges on to efforts beyond the strength, or which creates envy and jealousy in the heart, or which ends in disappointment. There the mental powers can be developed slowly and carefully, and the bud can have time to open under the genial sun and gentle
20 PARENTS UNFIT TEACHERS.
dews. There is no forcing like the hot-bed. And there, too, at home, under the eye of love, the purity of the child can be insured, and she is shut away from contamination, and from evil associates. There, in the shades of the sweet home, may she spend her early days, and, screened from the cold world and its vices, she can be educated, and thus be pre- pared, at the right time, to take her place in the world, an ornament to her sex and to her station. This is the substance of the argu- ment for a strictly home education. And I think it has strength ; and yet very few at- tempt to do the thing ; and for this there must be some urgent reasons. What are they? Or rather, why is the young girl sent away among strangers, when so much is at stake, and perhaps so much is imperilled? I re- ply—
Because but few parents are competent to educate their children themselves. Amid the cares and toils necessary to provide for a fam- ily, the parents soon forget the particulars of their own education. And, moreover, every thing is on the advance. No parent expects
PRIVATE INSTRUCTION. 21
to send the child out into the world with only the education with which the mother began. The child lives in a day when she wears richer dresses, has better books, better food, more travelling, more intercourse with society, than her mother had. Who is to in- struct her at home ? The mother is incompe- tent, and the father probably is likewise ; or if not, he is too much occupied in business to do it. She must have private teachers, then, at home. But here are two difficulties. The first is, that few are able to pay the needful compensation for the best private teachers. It would cost many hundreds of dollars to obtain good teachers for a single family : but there is a greater difficulty, and that is, they could not be had. It is only by having large schools that teachers are trained up and qualified ; and it is only because they here have a field so wide, that the first-rate minds can be in- duced to become teachers. Reduce all to home education, and you would have but few good and competent teachers. Large schools are, at any rate, necessary to raise them for their work. Parents and teachers would both
22 ALL NEED A STANDARD.
soon have narrow views as to the principles of«education, and, I should fear, would be too indulgent and too indolent in applying them. The home education, it is said, would make them amiable children ; and so it would, but the difficulty is, they would be children as long as they lived. Some, under this sys- tem, and probably the greater part, would be satisfied with a low standard, and have very little energy of mind ; while the few who did study, having no standard, and n6 way of measuring themselves with others, would have an overweening idea of themselves. Every one wants a standard, and all need to be measured by others. And it is noticed, that those who have a strictly private education are apt to over-estimate themselves, if, in any measure, successful as students. In a large seminary, the young lady soon knows what mental application means, and what is a right standard of scholarship. She soon knows her own proportions. The blind partiality of friends does no good now. She now has a standard of study, of application, and of at- tainment, which is entirely new. She now sees
INFLUENCE OF NUNNERIES. 23
new methods of imparting instruction. She sees what so-called improvements are worth preserving, and how the mind of the teacher and of the scholar works under a strong pres- sure. Then, as to coming in contact with temptation, sooner or later, every one must do that. It may be putgofT a few years by home seclusion ; but if so, when it does come, it comes with great power. It is said that the young ladies who are secluded and educated in the nunneries of Europe, are the least prepared to resist temptations when they come out. The mind and the heart must come in contact with what is evil, sooner or later. If the heart be fortified with early religious principle, you may as well meet it in the days of school, as ever. We need stimulus and pressure, to call out mental labor, — the hardest labor in the world, — and we cannot get this at home. And it is found to be a law almost universal, that for perfection there must be, in all the departments of life, a division of labor. The head of a family does not attempt to shoe his own horse, make his own coat, or grind his own wheat. He well knows that the
24 TEACHING A PROFESSION.
blacksmith and the tailor and the miller can do these things quicker and cheaper than he can. He knows, too, that by doing one thing, carrying on one kind of business himself, he can support his family better than if he at- tempted to do every thing. Now teaching becomes a profession o;i this principle ; be- cause it is found that those who make it their business can accomplish more, and do it vastly better, than others ; and by collecting a large number of young minds together, you can induce the best educated and the best qualified minds to become teachers. Each parent pays his share of the expense, and he thus puts his child into the hands and under the care of those who can do for that child what he cannot. The teacher can do but that one thing. The merchant and the law- yer and the farmer say to him, You can in- struct my child far better than I can, and better than I can, afford to hire teachers un- der my own roof. Do you take her, and I will pay my share of supporting the estab- lishment and of carrying on the school. Hence our schools grow out of our necessi-
IT IS A TRIAL.
25
ties, and they are large, because a few parents are not able to procure all the advantages on a small scale.
This, then, is the reason why the mother and the father send their beloved daughter away to school, — because they can afford to give her so good advantages in no other way. It is often very painful to send away the child, and to commit her to people, whom, perhaps, they have never seen. It is trying to send her out exposed to temptations and dangers ; but what can they do ? In no other way can the child have her mind disciplined, have a correct standard of scholarship, and learn the make of other minds. In no other way can she be thrown upon her own respon- sibility, learn self-denial, self-control, and self- discipline.
The teaching which is within the reach of every pupil in a good school, would often cost thousands of dollars at home. And besides, in a large seminary, there is not only a di- vision of labor, but another division scarcely less important. One mind is best adapted to teach mathematics ; another, the languages ;
26 ON A LARGER SCALE.
and another still, music or drawing ; and a9 each is supposed to take the post for which he is best qualified and adapted, so the advan- tages to the pupils are greatly enhanced by this arrangement. Thus it is plain, that what- ever disadvantages a seminary has, or how- ever much we might prefer a home education, the? arguments in favor of going away to school greatly preponderate. Add to this, that at the seminary you meet with minds from all parts of the country, form acquaint- ances that last through life, and see human nature developed in ways seen nowhere else.
I have made these remarks that you may understand why you go away to school, and why those who love you most, thus place interests so dear out of their own hands. I have hoped too, that, if I could make you see the object for which you are sent away to school, you would the more readily see what duties your new position devolves upon you. But let us now see how many — I do not say all, for I hope the picture will not suit all — but how many a school-girl looks upon this subject. When the first mention of her going
A PLEASANT PLAN. 27
away to school is made, she feels excited, and fluttered, and thinks how beautiful it will be — to have a new trunk and her clothes so nicely packed, and the new dresses all so com- plete; and how beautiful it will be to see the school and the new faces, and see how they are dressed, and how they behave; and how beautiful it will be to take the journey, and to write long letters home, and tell of all the new things which she sees and hears ; and how beautiful it will be to have nothing to do but to study, and think, and be educated, and excel in music and Latin, drawing and dress- ing, and then to come home all educated and finished off, ready for whatever may come next, — and who can tell what that may be ! During the preparations, the discussions about clothes and shoes, umbrellas and overshoes, inquiries about who is going and how every thing appears there, she is in fine spirits. All goes well. By and by, however, after the new trunk is nearly packed, and a thousand hints and admonitions have been dropped by the anxious mother, after the very day of leaving is appointed, she begins to have other
28 LONGING TO TURN BACK.
feelings come over her. She never went away from home before, except on short visits among her relatives. And now the fact that she is to leave her home, her mother, her brothers and sisters, and go away among strangers, comes to be a reality. She begins to feel that it is not all brightness. There are shadows falling upon her spirits. What if they should be sick at home? "What if death should take away any one from that loved circle before she returns ? What if she herself should be sick, away among strangers ? But the time arrives, and though she has slept but little, and can eat no breakfast, the hour of parting has come, and with a hurried, tearful good-by she leaves her home. All the way her thoughts return back, saddened and chilled, and she wishes she had never consented to go to school. She wishes it were possible to turn back again, and give it all up. This is going to school away from home.
And now she arrives at the school. But how different every thing looks from what she expected ! Nothing is so pleasant as she had anticipated. The teachers look so different!
WEATHER CHANGED. 29
And the scholars, — was there ever such a homely set gathered together ! How cold and strange they all look, — all strangers, and all very strange strangers ! And now every thing looks blue. Nothing seems like home. The very w^eather is changed, and the sun does not shine here. The food and cooking are so unlike home ! The sound of the bell seems harsh, and the very birds sing as if they were reciting. The school-room is a dull, dry place, and the very clock ticks as . if it was tired. She sheds many tears alone, and writes home in tones that wTould not disgrace a martyr. O, if she could only now describe her feelings and her sufferings, how would she " become a thing of dark imaginings, on whom the freshness of the heart has ceased to fall like dew, whose passions are consuming them- selves to dust, and to whom the relief of tears seems to be grudged " ! She already begins to count the weeks when the term will be through and she can leave this horrid place ! When this week is out, and twenty-one more, she will be through ! It now becomes the great question how she can contrive to
30 GENTLE HINTS.
exist till that time. Ah ! if she could annihi- late time and space, how quickly would she be at home again ! Now, if I could catch the attention of this almost martyred young lady, I should like to whisper a few things in her ear. I would say to her, My young friend, your grandmother went through all this, and lived to a good old age; and your mother lived through all this, and I hope she will live as long ; and you will live through it all, and if nothing else kills you, you will be a young lady at the age that Methuselah died. I do not blame you for all your sufferings ; but now, dry up your tears and let us see what you have to do.
" Thou hast been reared too tenderly, Beloved too well and long, Watched by too many a gentle eye ; Now look on life, — be strong ! "
There need be no denial that the first en- counter with the new world in which you find yourself placed is attended with trials. But now, after you understand what is the object of being educated, and the reasons why you
A CRITICAL POINT. 31
must go from home for the sake of this educa- tion, do not spend your time and waste your dear sensibilities in mourning that a school is' not home, that new companions are not old friends, that change is not sameness, or that you cannot encounter the trials of life and yet have no trials. Do not stop now to count your fingers, nor to see how sombre you can make every thing seem. Now is the time to show character, if you have any ; to show courage, if you have any ; to show that you have mind and thought, if indeed you have them. Now you have arrived at a critical point in your character. You can now shake off old habits and form new ones. You can now set out with new courage and new hopes. The shock through which you have just passed, like elec- tricity, may give all your powers of mind a new energy. The object now is, not to count the weeks to vacation, nor to see how little you can do in a single day or week, but to see how much you can really accomplish between this and vacation, — how few recita- tions you can miss, how many perfect recita- tions you can make, how much you can exer-
32 CHARACTER DEVELOPING.
cise and task the mind, and how much you can do to form, strengthen, and draw out your character. Do not lisp now, but speak. Do not mince now, but walk. Do not muddle over your books, but study. Do not feel that you are to be swallowed up and to be a part of a great school, but that you have an indi- vidual mind to cultivate, and an individual character to form. The character you now develop will be that which you will carry with you through life. The confidence which you are to have in yourself, all the way through life, will depend on what you are and what you do now. The estimation in which you are to be held by your schoolmates, all the way through life, will depend on what they now see you accomplish. If now you array yourself against any of the regulations of the school, because you do not think them to be wise ; if you set yourself to see how very little you can bring about ; if you try to feel that the teachers have one interest and you an- other ; if you try to see how many faults you can find in the arrangements of the school; and if, on this your first seeing a school, you
BEST OF EVERY THING. 33
feel competent and called upon to pronounce this and that wrong, and are determined to see how long a face you can wear, and how you can most torment yourself and others, you will indeed lose your time, and wonder how you fell in with so poor a school ! But if you feel determined to make the best of every thing, to take every thing by the smooth handle, to see the bright side of every tear, and to catch as many warm sunbeams as you can, your school-days will be happy, and be associated with nothing but what is cheer- ful and pleasurable. It is the time for you now to be right earnest, for the days and the weeks will now come round very rapidly. Remember that every lesson you slight, every imperfect recitation you make, is not an in- jury upon the teacher which will last, though it may annoy him ; but the injury inflicted upon yourself will be permanent. In every contest with indolence in which you are de- feated, in every struggle with difficulties in which you are worsted, in every effort made in which you do not succeed, you lose ground. You are accustoming yourself to be con- 3
34 an angel's wing drooping.
quered. Let it be your ambition now, first to secure your own esteem, by diligence and ap- plication, and the actual overcoming of dif- ficulties, and then the esteem of your teachers, by the evidence that you are determined to do all that you can, and of your companions, by their seeing you making evident progress. Away with pining after home! now is not the time for that; it is the time of action. Away with sentimentalism ! you need a back- bone now. Away with discontentment ! you now have the best opportunity which money, care, anxiety, and experience can afford you, for improvement. It will be your misfortune if you have too little mind to be educated, your folly if you fail through negligence, and your guilt if you fail through wilful perverse ness.
" Wake ! ere the earth-born charm unnerve thee quite, And be thy thoughts to work divine addressed ; Do something, do it soon, with all thy might ; An angel's wing would droop if long at rest, And God himself inactive were no longer blest. Some high or humble enterprise of good Contemplate till it shall possess thy mind,
STRENGTH TO COMPLETE. 35
Become thy study, pastime, rest, and food,
And kindle in thy heart a flame refined ;
Pray Heaven for firmness thy whole soul to bind
To this thy purpose, to begin, pursue,
With thoughts all fixed and feelings purely kind,
Strength to complete, and with delight review,
And grace to give the praise where all is ever due."
CHAPTER III.
THE SCHOOL-GIKL AT STUDY.
The Great Trial. Trunks full. Nothing forgotten. A Va- cant Stare. Two Thirds lost. Memory wanting. Xeno- phon's Eetreat. All need Judgment. Learn to discrimi- nate. Best Taste in Town. Select the Best. Knowledge running away. Loose Change. Where to look. Society of a Lapdog. Not a Short Job. L*on-hearted Bell. Habit of Toil.
Every one who goes to school knows that, for some reason or other, the object is to study. But many seem to know nothing as to why they must study, or how to do it. I am sorry to say, too, that many parents seem as ignorant as their daughters. They know that other people send their daughter to school, and that before she arrives at that most impor- tant age of eighteen, or when she is " brought out," it is necessary to be able to say that she
TRUNKS FULL. 37
was educated at this or that celebrated insti- tution. They fail in their plans and in their conversation to impress upon her the real ob- ject of her going from home to be educated. They talk much about what she needs as to dress, in order to appear well, and they talk over the privations she will endure, and the trials she must meet, but the great trial, that of study, they hardly mention.
Suppose now we were in some nook, our- selves unseen, where we could hear the con- versation at the breakfast-table, between a judicious, sensible father and his daughter, who is about leaving home for school.
"Well, daughter," says he, in a cheerful tone, " I suppose you have every thing ready to start, — trunks, bandboxes, umbrellas, and overshoes."
" Yes, father, I believe so. My trunks are all full, and I thought I never could crowd in my new de laine, the two new silk dresses, the cream-colored merino, the purple alpaca, and my twelve aprons. But by great efforts moth- er and I pressed them in, though I am afraid they will be terribly rumpled. Then I have the three bandboxes besides."
V
38 NOTHING FORGOTTEN.
" Indeed ! I should think you were fitting out for the tour of Europe. But these are not what comes within my province. But there is one thing I am very desirous to have you carry, and which, if you are not very careful, will be left behind."
" Why, I am sure I have forgotten nothing. We have put up every thing we could think of, even to the boxes of hair-pins."
" No doubt ; no doubt. But have you any- where packed away a correct idea of the object for which you go, and how you are to accomplish that object ? You go in order to study ; but do you know why you study and how to study ? "
" No, father, and I wish you would tell me."
" Well, then, forget the crowded trunks and the hair-pins for the present, and I will try to tell you. Now you must be patient and at- tentive, for I shall be what you call ' awfully dull.'
" The objects of study, then, are these : —
"1. To give you power to -command the at- tention. Till we have made many and long- continued efforts, this is no easy matter. You
A VACANT STARE. 39
sometimes undertake to read a book, and while your eye runs over the pages or the lines of the page, the mind and the thoughts are off upon something else ; and when you reach the bottom of the page, you know noth- ing of what you have been reading. When you are in conversation with another person, it often happens that you lose whole sen- tences, and have to assent to what he has said, though you know not what it is. Have you never found it so, my daughter ? "
The young lady looked up with a vacant stare, and nodded her head in assent, though the fact was that she had scarcely heard a word of what her father had said ; for the mo- ment the words " command the attention "w were uttered, her thoughts had been wander- ing off to a small party which she had at- tended, and where she was sure she had the power to command the attention of a certain young gentleman, who wore young whiskers and a yellow vest. Thus she was uncon- sciously illustrating the need of which her father was speaking.
"2. A second object of study is to give you
40 TWO THIRDS LOST.
the power to hold the mind down to a subject or to a point, as long as is necessary. In do- ing a long sum in arithmetic, in demonstrat- ing a difficult problem in Euclid, or in evolv- ing a complicated question in algebra, you must hold the mind down to the point, and hold it there till you understand it and can explain it to others. When you write a let- ter, or a composition, you want the power to hold the mind or the thought till you know what to say and how to say it. How many people lose almost the whole of a lecture, or a sermon, or a public speech, because they can- not hold their minds fast till it is through! Perhaps two thirds of every sermon, and of every lecture and every valuable public effort of mind, are lost for the want of this power. It is the want of it that makes it so difficult for the school-girl to master her lesson. And it is to be acquired only by severe and contin- ued application of the mind.
" 3. The third object of study is to strength- en the memory.
" You know that some men are rich in con- versation, welcomed everywhere, and their
MEMORY WANTING. 41
society eagerly sought, because they have at their command history, books, beautiful thoughts and great thoughts, all held fast by the memory, and all ready to be used at any time ; while other men, who have read quite as much, are dry and barren of thought, and almost dull ; they cannot recall any thing, they are sure of no fact, they are afraid to be ques- tioned about any date. Such a mind is a sliding plane, down which every thing hurries, and with no power to draw it up."
" But, father, I have a good memory now. I can tell over every story I read, and can al- most repeat the whole of that delightful new novel in the last Saturday's Post."
" Very likely. But suppose I should ask you to trace the route which Xenophon in his famous retreat followed, or to give me the date of the Magna Charta of England, or pe- riod of Cromwell's government, or the date of the Reformation in Europe, what says your memory then ? "
" Ah, you surely do not expect me to re- member every thing."
" No, I should be sorry to have you remem-
42
ALL NEED JUDGMENT.
ber every thing*; but ' surely,' as you say, you ought to remember many ; and you ought to remember facts, and not fiction ; the history of human deeds, human efforts, and human sufferings, and not imaginary deeds and the sufferings of imaginary heroes and heroines. At school, you are made to store up dry facts, history, definitions, and a thousand things, for the very purpose of strengthening the memory.
" 4. The fourth object of study is to strength- en the judgment.
" In all the departments of life, we need a balanced judgment. For the want of it, households are made wretched, homes are made unpleasant, property is squandered, character is never obtained, and life is almost lost. No lady can make a custard or a cooky, a jelly or a garment, spread a table or a cradle, without it, nor can a man well provide for his family, accomplish much in business, or gain in property or influence. It is an every- day commodity, and no day can be a happy one without its abundant exercise. The laun- dress needs it to make your clothes white and
WHAT IS VALUABLE. 43
neat. The milliner and the tailor need it to fit our garments. The cook needs it to pre- pare our food. The teacher needs it in order to instruct, the sailor to guide his ship, the merchant to invest his money in goods, the physician to prepare his medicines. The law- yer needs it to make out his case, and the min- ister to prepare his sermons. If we wished to cultivate your judgment in cooking, in house- keeping, in sewing or needle-work, at this time, we should retain you at home and give you the opportunity to learn the theory and the practice. If it were our object to cultivate your judgment as to any thing external, we should not send you to school. But we want to cultivate your judgment as to thought and mind, as to what is valuable and what is worthless in that vast repository which the human mind has left to us. We want to cul- tivate your judgment so that you can know what is argument and what is sophistry; what is proved and what is asserted ; what is true and what is only plausible ; what is evi- dence and what is not to be admitted. We want you to judge correctly as to what peo-
44 BEST TASTE IN TOWN.
pie can do and what they cannot ; what they will be likely to do, and what they will not. It is to give you the power to discriminate between wisdom and folly, light and twilight, real jewels and those that are false, things valuable to the mind and the memory, and things useless.
" 5. The fifth object of study is to cultivate the taste.
" People naturally differ much as to the possession of this power or faculty. One in- dividual has a certain taste which makes her lady-like in her dress and address, while another is so deficient that she can in no possible circumstances deserve the title of lady."
" But, father, I have this quality already. Every body says I 've the best taste in town. They all come to me to advise about their dresses, and all say my taste is so good ! "
" Very probably. I should myself be will- ing to trust your taste to select a few yards of ribbon, or a dress for a child, and very likely a pocket-handkerchief for your father. But suppose you were called upon to select a
SELECT THE BEST. 45
library. for a village or for a Sabbath school, or a wardrobe to be sent to a friend in Asia, would you feel that your taste is sufficiently cultivated? Or suppose a company should invite you to select and read a portion from Milton or Cowper or Shakspeare, are you pre- pared? Suppose fifty or sixty manuscripts written in a seminary, for a prize, were put into your hands to select the two best, are you qualified to do it ? Or suppose, left des- titute, you were compelled to instruct others for your support, could you select the books to be studied, and especially, if your pupils were advanced, the books to be read by them? You see that to have a good taste in judging of a good dinner, or a charming tea, or a rich dress, is a very different thing from a taste cultivated so as to be able to judge what is a beautiful thought, and what is disagree- able ; what is a strong and elegant figure of speech, and what is weak and inappropriate ; what is chaste and beautiful language, and what is bombastic and out of place. These are the things which are learned, little by lit- tle, at a good school, by the guidance of the
46 KNOWLEDGE RUNNING AWAY.
teachers, and by coming in contact with others. It is not to be created by rules and text-books, but by constant examples of what is in good taste and what is not.
" 6. The sixth object of study is to store the mind with knowledge, or to teach it where to find what it wants.
" In the course of the time necessary to dis- cipline the mind so as to call it educated, you will have a vast amount of knowledge poured into the mind. Some of it will stay, but the greater part will run directly through and be lost. Still, the waters leave a tinge in the channel, and the banks through which they passed are richer than before. But at the completion of the course of study, you have new and enlarged and corrected views. You stand on a higher point of ground, and can see farther in every direction. You have also saved a great many things that are valu- able. They are in the mind, not like drift-wood upon the shore, strewed anywhere ; but they are stored away in the mind, in their appropri- ate places, labelled, numbered, and ready for use whenever wanted. This, to be sure, is
LOOSE CHANGE. 47
not the greatest object of an education. Et is only incidental; but it has great value. But Where your own stored resources slop and fail, you need not slop. The knowledge which you have in fche mind is fche loose change, to be used as called for on smaU occasions; but fche bank upon which yon are to draw is inex- haustible. You know where to go for ma- terials of thought, of composition, or of in- formation. You know what histories of the past are best; you know how to make a good
index of a volume yield you a grej.it amount Of information in a short time. „ You know how to make your author do the most pos- sible for you in a short time. You know how to shake the tree in order to obtain the ripest fruit. You know from which bottle to obtain the most exquisite odors from the condensed extracts within. If you want to know a fact in the lite of l>uoiiapartc, you know how and where to find it with- out reading the volume through. If you
are expecting lo meet a descendant of a. great man, you know where to find a. brief ac- count of that man, so that you can eon-
48 WHERE TO LOOK.
verse concerning him to advantage, with pleasure to him, and with profit to yourself. And here I cannot help saying, that, if every one who expects to go into company on a particular evening would go to books and obtain one valuable thought, and use it, giv- ing the name of the author if he saw fit, the individuals would, every one, be more re- spected, and the company be saved the mor- tification of saying all the small, light, and foolish things possible. In a world contain- ing the thoughts and the beautiful creations of all the past, the man or the woman who cannot carry to the common gathering at least one valuable thought ought not to be toler- ated. Not long since, I overheard a gentle- man roundly asserting (he had read it in a penny newspaper that afternoon) to a lady, that Lord Bacon was not a great man, — only second or third rate. And the lady said, ' Indeed,' and looked pleased, and vacant, and had no more to say in the defence of that immortal mind, than if he had said that West- phalia hams and bacon are pretty much the same thing. An educated young lady who
NOT A SHORT JOB.
49
will cry, ' Indeed ! ' when puppies thus dig on the graves of giants, and say, ' There 's nothing worth scratching for here,' ought to have no society more intellectual than a lap-dog with a blue ribbon about his neck.
" 7. One more object to be mentioned is to create habits of patient toil.
" If a man has a field of grass to mow, or a wheel to build, or if a lady has an article to sew, or a nice cake to make,' each one can see, at every step, there is progress made. Each feels that it is but a short job, and then it will be done. But in study, the results of a day's labor are seen to be so small, if seen at all, that there is nothing to cheer. You cannot show what you have accomplished. You can see that the hill looks higher and steeper, and that you have climbed hard all the day, but you cannot see any progress. You can see that to-morrow will be like to-day; and that it is toil, toil, from day to day, and from week to week, without much, if any, apparent advance. It is un- mitigated labor. You do not have the lux- ury of the sweat of the brow, as in bodily 4
50 • IRON-HEARTED BELL.
toil. How much patience is needed to get one lesson in Latin, or to make a single good recitation in algebra ! Now you must multi- ply this toil as many times over as you have lessons. In the course of a week, and a year, how much is the patience exercised ! And this toil, this perseverance, this endurance of what is hard and what we naturally dislike, is the very discipline which we must meet all the way through life. Toil, patient toil, is our lot, and there is no place where the young can learn it so well as at school. At home, the young lady will now and then make an effort, — she will take some extra steps or stitches, and perhaps for a few hours or days will really toil. But these seasons are excep- tions. She visits, she has company, she sews when she pleases, reads when she feels like it, and thinks when she cannot help it. There is no system of patient toil. There is no rigid, unyielding bell, that has no bowels of com- passion, and nothing human about it but a tongue, calling for punctuality, for study, and for attainment. But at school, lesson follows lesson. You may yawn or you may weep,
HABIT OF TOIL. 51
but there is no escape. There comes the hour, and your class will be there, and you must be on hand and ready, or you lose your standing. Every day impresses the habit of toil upon you, till eventually, strange as it may seem, it becomes easy, and finally pleas- ant. It is not merely that you can study, can apply the mind, and can conquer your les- sons, but you have the habit of doing so. Hence it is, that the girl who has been the longest at school, and has done most to ac- quire this habit, finds it much easier to study than those who lack this habit."
" O father, you don't mean to keep me at school till I have got such a habit of study that I shall love the toil, do you ? "
" That will depend on circumstances. I am now showing you what you study for, — the object of studying at all. And I believe I have given you enough for once."
" Yes, indeed, but after all, you have not told me how to study. That 's what I want to know."
" That we must discuss at our next break- fast."
CHAPTER IV.
HOW TO STUDY.
Witch Stories. The Question proposed. Study dry "Work. Look it out again. Bishop Jewel's Memory. Conquer, step by step. A High Standard. A Finished Young Lady. Capacity wanted. Chain the Attention. Author of this Mischief. Dr. Gregory. Ship obeying the Helm. Alge- bra forgotten. Waters filtered. Cambridge and Oxford. Taste cultivated. Duty become Pleasure.
In our nursery books, we read of seven- leagued boots, with which a man can take twenty miles at a step ; and we have heard of halters by which witches turned their hus- bands into horses, and in a single night could drive them over continents ; and strange tales are told at twilight, of rooks as large as a church, whose flight darkened the air, and in whose claws a man might be carried over oceans; and children have trembled at the
THE QUESTION PROPOSED. 53
thought of cannon into which a weary travel- ler might creep for lodgings, and at daylight find that he had been shot into a foreign country, where were strange faces and an un- known language : but we have never yet read of a machine which could make the ignorant mind cultivated and refined, without toil and hard labor. There are no seven-leagued boots that enable us to go through all the limits of science, and gather all the rich fruits there found, in a single day. There is no halter that can subdue the wandering attention, and discipline the imagination, in a few hours. There is no one who can have a cultivated and well-disciplined mind without personal labor and great effort. You may acquire ease of manners, and a superficial character, very easily ; but you cannot think, or have a mind capable of judging and deciding rightly, with- out hard study. But how shall I study ? How learn ? How do the thing required ? I shall spend this chapter in the attempt to tell you.
1. Make up your mind that study is hard work.
Many things make it hard. Any thing to
54 STUDY DRY WORK.
which we are unaccustomed is difficult. It is tiresome to sit down and remain in the same position, to confine the attention, to control the wandering thoughts, to take hold of a thing that is new and which you do not understand, to grapple with difficulties con- stantly arising. It is not like walking, when you can see just how fast you move, and see that every step sets you onward ; it is not like your sewing, when you can see that every stitch makes one less ; it is not like any labor of the body. It is dry work, and some- times it is cry-iuork. You would not need teachers to urge and assist you, parents to en- courage you, classes to incite you, school- mates to watch you and compete with you, and the bell to admonish you every half-hour, if it were not hard work. Expect then that every lesson will require hard application ; that there are no pillows of down for the mind in study, but at every step it must be girded up, goaded to effort, and pushed on to toil.
2. Go over your lesson again and again.
If you have a translation to recite, a prop-
LOOK IT OUT AGAIN. 55
osition to demonstrate, an explanation to give, go over it as many times as possible. Sometimes you have a new word to translate from the Latin, German, or French. You look it out in the Dictionary, and yet, in a few minutes, it has passed from your memory. "What shall you do ? Simply look it out again and again, and as often as is necessary. A distinguished professor of languages in one of our colleges has been heard to say, that he has looked out a single word in his lexicon over fifty times ! When we teach a child his letters, he can hardly confine his at- tention for a moment, and we depend on rep- etition to fix the word permanently in his mind. I cannot speak too highly of review- ing the same lesson over and over again. Were I to instruct, I might err in reviewing too much, if that is possible. At any rate, I should repeat the same lesson very often. But in learning your lesson you will be in no danger of going over it too many times. Once will not make you master of it, nor will twice. When you hear a young lady say that she can get her lesson by reading it over
56 bishop jewel's memory.
once or twice, you may {eel sure she has not got it, or if she has, it will not stay long with her. *What comes quickly goes quickly. And do not feel discouraged, if, af first, and for years, the mind moves slowly. If you will faithfully go over the lesson, again and again, you will find that your memory will grow ac- curate and reliable. " Bishop Jewel had natu- rally a very strong memory, which he so im- proved by art, that he could exactly repeat whatever he wrote after once reading. Bish- op Hooper once, to try him, wrote about forty Welsh and Irish words. Mr. Jewel, going a little while aside, and recollecting them in his memory, and reading them twice or thrice over, said them by heart, backward and for- ward, exactly in the same order they were set down. And he taught his tutor, Mr. Park- hurst, the same art."
3. Resolve to understand every lesson as far as you go.
Some have the idea that, if they do not quite see through this lesson, they shall the next, and that will do quite as well. Be sure that every unconquered difficulty will, by and
CONQUER, STEP BY STEP. 57
by, become an enemy behind you, and will be exceedingly annoying. In mastering one hard lesson to-day, you conquer half a "dozen for the future. You teach the mind to be careful and patient, and you acquire the prin- ciples which are to be applied hereafter. The lesson may be a dry one, or a difficult one. No matter. Determine that you will conquer it, and understand all that can be known about it. A distinguished scholar says he owes his success to the faithful observance of his rule, always to believe that whatever could be done by any person, could, if he would take sufficient pains, be done by him. It is probably no harder for you to sit down and thoroughly understand a lesson, than it was once for the mind that made your text- book, or than for the teacher who disciplined his mind by study so as to be qualified to in- struct you. None find "any other way to be- come scholars but to understand each and every lesson as they go along. To say that I have my task so that I can recite pretty well, or so that my teacher will not find fault, is not enough. If you find, after using all your
58
A FINISHED YOUNG LADY.
own efforts, that there is any thing you can- not understand, then ask for aid from those who can render it, but do not leave it till the obstacle is removed. Every such negligence will be a great trouble to you hereafter.
4. Do not undertake too many studies.
If there is any one thing which prevents our daughters from receiving a thorough edu- cation, it is the feeling, among parents and daughters, that one must be educated, fin- ished, accomplished and polished and com- plete, and all must be done by the time she is about eighteen years old. In order to do this, the school must be a kind of mental hot-bed. She must understand all the English branches, of course, and the parents will be very much gratified if they can say she studied Latin and German and Italian and French, of course. Yea, she spoke it with a native teacher. And then she must be familiar with algebra; geometry must be at her tongue's end; she must be at home in history and criticism ; she must take music-lessons, and sing divinely ; she must draw in crayon, and paint in water and oil colors : she must
CAPACITY WANTED. 59
learn to read and write blank verse, — to say nothing about dancing and love ; — all this before she is eighteen. This to be sure is something ; but in our boyhood we heard of an old lady in Connecticut, who washed and baked and brewed, made soap and a cheese, and read the Bible through, all in one day! We wonder if some of these young ladies who are such intellectual prodigies may not be re- lated to her. By the time our boys are fitted and qualified to go to college, and begin then- education, our daughters must have theirs all completed ; and they must not only stop at the/given time and place, but they must have gone over all that is thought necessary to a minute, thorough, full, .accomplished, fashion- able, essential and non-essential education. The lady who inquired of the teacher what more her daughter wanted, and was told, " Nothing, Madam, but a capacity," and who replied, " Well, get her one, for her father is rich and able to pay for it," was right, if we only knew where the article is to be had. In college, we never attempt to carry on more than three studies at once : but our young
60 CHAIN THE ATTENTION.
ladies will take more than twice that number, and make — nothing of them ! Were we to advise, we would never have the mind tasked with more than three at once. By taking too many, you distract the mind, and by turning from one subject to another too often, weary and exhaust it. " John Williams, an English prelate, used to allot one month to a certain province of learning, esteeming variety almost as refreshing as cessation from labor, at the end of which he would take up some other matter, and so on till he came round to his former courses. This method he observed especially in his theological studies, and he found his account in it." In amusements we want change often. But in study, if we get the mind turned in a particular direction for a time, we want to keep it there till it has ob- tained strength.
5. When engaged in study, give all your attention to it.
This is a very hard thing to do. You sit down determined to learn that lesson well. Before you are aware of it, your thoughts are somewhere else. A figure in the dress of a
AUTHOR OF THIS MISCHIEF. 61
schoolmate, the color of a bright ribbon on her neck, a stray lock of hair, the rustling of a paper, the striking of a clock, the scratch- ing of a pen, any noise, any movement, may divert your attention and turn off your thoughts. You bring them back to the lesson and begin again. Before long they are off again, — you are at home, you are conversing with your friends, you are in company, you are among belles and beaux, small talk and all talk. Now again you try to bring the mind back to the hard, dry lesson. And how reluctantly does it come ! The lesson grows harder every moment, and you sigh, " What a tedious lesson ! Did any poor creature ever have to study so hard before ? were there ever such strict teachers ? " And so you feel ready to quarrel with your lesson, and with your teachers, with the school, and with any body and every body but the very author of all this mischief, yourself! When you sit down to that lesson, determine that you will give the mind so wholly to it, that you will hear nothing, see nothing, care for nothing, till you have conquered the task. Let the paper
62 DR. GREGORY.
rustle, the clock strike, curly locks go astray, but do not let them disturb you. But, above all, do not permit your thoughts to wander to things at a distance, — building castles in the air, or thinking how delightful it would be to be here or to be there, how pleasant to do this or do that. One thing at a time. Down, down with your mind and courage to that lesson. Give all your soul to it for the present. Chain the attention, the thoughts, all to it, and you will soon feel that, by the wrestling, you have acquired strength. Dr. Gregory says : " With a few exceptions (so few, indeed, that they need scarcely to be taken into a practical estimate), any person may learn any thing' upon which he sets his heart. To insure success, he has simply so to discipline his mind as to check its vagran- cies, to cure it of its constant proneness to be doing two or more things at a time, and to compel it to direct its combined energies, simultaneously, to a single object, and thus to do one thing at once. This I consider as one of the most difficult, but one of the most use- ful, lessons a young person can learn." One
ONLY FOR HALF AN HOUR. 63
reason why the memory of the blind is so tenacious is probably that, not being diverted by objects surrounding them, they can con- centrate their attention firmly and fixedly. Nor need this become wearisome, for you will rest often. The school exercises will be so arranged that every hour, or perhaps every half-hour, you will be released. Professional men have every week to sit down with the pen in hand, and bend the mind, and task all their powers, and write three hours at a time, without rising from the chair, or laying down the pen. I would willingly engage thus to sit and labor three hours daily, for seven days in the week, if that would accomplish all I feel bound to do ; and surely a young lady can give her mind and her attention to her lesson for half an hour, when she knows that at the end of that time she will be released.
6. Study any thing that is assigned to you cheerfully.
How often do you hear scholars say, and they think it oftener than they express their dissatisfaction, " This study will be of no possible use to me ; in after life I shall never
64
SHIP OBEYING THE HELM.
use it, and why must I study it now ? " Whenever this discontent arises, you forget the objects of study as illustrated in the last chapter. Very likely you may never be called to use the particular study ; but you do not study for the sake of the knowledge you lay up in your memory for future use, but more especially for the purpose of dis- ciplining the mind, — teaching it how to think, to discriminate, to acquire, to call up and to use its own powers. You are teach- ing the ship to obey the helm hereafter. You are gaining power over your own attention and thoughts. You are learning to control your powers and faculties at your will. If the study of mathematics, languages, or ma- gic, will do that, then study these. The ner- vous child might be set to hold a gold watch with care, not because he will be called upon, in after life, to hold gold watches for any length of time, but because it aids him to control himself, and it teaches him to be care- ful. We make the colt draw the bush around the field, not because it will be his future em- ployment to draw bushes, but because we
ALGEBRA FORGOTTEN. 65
wish to teach him to draw, and not to be frightened at what is to come after him. You may, or you may not, wish to instruct other minds hereafter ; but whether you do or not. every lesson which you now thoroughly un- derstand will be of use all the way through life. We care not whether you ever see an algebra again after you have mastered it. The benefits of studying it do not depend on the question whether you ever again see those problems which now cost you so many hours of patient labor. The solutions may not re- main, but the benefit of having conquered these difficulties will not pass away.
The waters that have been thoroughly filtered remain pure, though the filter is no longer used. So that, whatever study is thought best for you to pursue, take hold of it cheerfully, and let no foolish notion that it will not be useful in life prevent your doing that study full justice.
7. Select those studies which are best to strengthen the mind.
Young ladies who are brought up in good society will have abundant opportunities to 5
66 CAMBRIDGE AND OXFORD.
improve their taste and to cultivate and re- fine their manners. But if they neglect to strengthen the faculties of the mind at school, they can never do it. To do this, they can use mental arithmetic. Scarcely any exercise can be more valuable than the practice which enables you to carry accurately long processes of addition or multiplication "in the head." And we must confess that we take great de- light in hearing a young lady recite well in algebra, and in Euclid, and if they could and would go on to the higher mathematics, we should be still more pleased. For there is no study, which, on the whole, is so good to strengthen the mind as mathematics. In studying Latin or Greek, you acquire a dis- criminating power over language, and learn what is the force, position, and strength of words. In mental philosophy you learn how the mind works ; but to teach it to work, and how to work hard, give us mathematics. Though it may be that Cambridge and Ox- ford, so long rivals, and so eagerly contending for preeminence, one devoting the strength in mathematics and the other ranking the dead
TASTE CULTIVATED. 67
languages as of the first importance, have at last decided rightly^ when each tries to unite both branches of study.
As to what are called accomplishments, — they doubtless have their use and their place. But whether they compensate for the im- mense amount of time spent on them is an- other question. For example, I have often thought that, if half the time spent in learning to draw and to paint were spent, under a competent teacher, in learning how to judge of paintings and drawings, how to discrimi- nate and enjoy what is really beautiful, it would be far more advantageous to most young ladies. To be a poor artist is not very desirable ; but to be a good judge of the works of art, is a very high and pleasurable accom- plishment ; and I am sometimes led to wish that the same expense, which is frequently laid out in teaching the young ladies of a seminary to draw and paint, could be laid out in procuring beautiful pictures, with a real art- ist to come in for a few days each term and lecture upon them, and teach how to judge and how to enjoy good paintings, drawings,
68 . DUTY BECOME PLEASURE.
and engravings. I am not sure that the ex- periment would not command the approba- tion of the wisest and best. How many learn to appreciate beautiful poetry who never try to write a line of verse !
You will see from what I have said, that study is a thing which no one can do for you. Authors may prepare good text-books, carpen- ters may make pleasant desks and beautiful rooms for study, and teachers may be ready to aid and encourage you, and, after all, no- body can study for you. It is the toil of the brain, and it must be done by yourself alone. It will always be hard, but easier the more and longer that you study. God has so made us, that the duty which is at first unpleasant will become easier and lighter, till at last it is a positive pleasure. The first rounds of the ladder are the most difficult to mount. The first part of the estate is the most difficult to obtain. The first few days of a journey are the most wearisome. By every effort you make, by every difficulty you overcome, by every successful bending of the mind and at- tention to your lesson, you are acquiring
THE MIND OBEDIENT TO THE WILL. 69
power and laying up strength for future years. You cannot become a scholar, nor can you discipline your mind, in a day ; but every day you can take a step forward, and if faithful to yourself, you can learn, while at school, how to make your mind an obedient and a willing servant to the will, how to quarry out beautiful and polished stones from the deep earth, and how to create, for the soul, a palace of truth, of light, and of joy.
CHAPTER V.
SOCIAL DUTIES OF THE SCHOOL-GIRL.
Power of Oratory. Constant Impression. Almost a Nun. Poor Eelations forgotten. Small Coin of Life. Professor Prancke's Advice. Crows' Nests. A Beautiful Compari- son. The always Miserable. Mirth and Cheerfulness. What you will desire to recall. Severest Punishment. Out of our own Shadow. School-girls not Matrons. One Burden lightened. Desperate Intimacies. Carry Sun- shine with you. Not afraid of Responsibility.
The tongue was given us as a means of pleasure, of mental and moral improvement. The human voice is the most powerful instru- ment to move the soul, so far as we know, that ever came from the hand of God. And the mightiest power which this instrument can exert is in speech. The utterance of mu- sic can thrill to a very high degree ; but there are only a very few who are greatly moved
POWER OF ORATORY. 71
by it. It requires a peculiar organization of the human body to feel the full power of mu- sic. But every body is carried away by the orator. He can move and sway the heart, and thus the feelings, the mind, the actions, and the whole man, as no songster can ever do. There is no voice that will startle or move you like the voice of human agony. In our daily social intercourse, we use the voice as the great instrument by which to com- municate our thoughts and feelings. This includes the words uttered, the tones and ca- dences of the voice, and the countenance of the speaker. It is the shortest and surest method by which one mind can reach and communicate with another. And conversa- tion, which usually includes all our social intercourse with one another, is always and at all times for good or for evil. You make a constant impression of some kind or other on all with whom you come in contact.
One of the difficulties of the school-girl, in regard to this subject, is, that she feels no responsibility in regard to her social inter- course with her companions. To be sure,
72 ALMOST A NUN.
she would not insult an instructor, and she would not be rude and unlady-like before visitors, and she would not be untidy in her personal appearance in the school-room, but in private, when with none but her mates, may she not throw off responsibility and say and do what she pleases ? I reply, Yes, if she pleases to say and to do only what is proper and becoming. Some young ladies, on going to school and meeting new-comers, are fond of entertaining their new friends with doleful accounts of their personal sufferings, — what unheard of sacrifices they are making to at- tend school ; what very fine houses and furni- ture, horses and dresses, they are leaving be- hind; what genteel society they have moved in ; and how awful it is thus to be shut away and secluded in the crowded room of the school! She seems to repine most of all, if she could only express herself, that she finds a new standard of measurement in her new position, that houses and furniture, horses, dresses, and even admirers, are nothing here ; but is she a scholar? Has she mind and diligence, industry and a desire to improve?
POOR RELATIONS FORGOTTEN. 73
Some want to talk only about themselves, and what pertains to themselves. And per- haps selfishness, the most unpardonable self- ishness in the world, is manifested in our daily social intercourse. We want to spend the time in talking about ourselves or our great and rich friends, but say very little about our poor relations, though every body has poor relations, however high they may carry their heads. It is a great talent to be able to be agreeable in conversation. The great secret of it is to be willing to forget yourself, and try to please others. " To hear patiently and to answer precisely," says Rochefoucault, " are the great perfections of conversation. One reason why we meet so few persons who are reasonable and agreeable in conversation is, that there is scarcely any one who does not think more of what he has to say than of answering what is said to him." When you hear another talk, do not try to think what you are to say when he stops. Fix your mind and keep your mind on what he is saying, and your reply will come of itself, if you have any reply. The great secret of
74 SMALL COIN OF LIFE.
making others happy in our intercourse with them is to forget ourselves entirely, and let all our interests, for the time, be swallowed up in theirs. " Our happiness depends less upon the art of pleasing than upon a uniform dis- position to please. The difference is that which exists between ceremony and sin- cerity." It is not merely for the sake of pass- ing your time, or of being entertained, that you have intercourse one with another. But you wish to make it an influence in sweet- ening the disposition, cultivating your kind feelings, and drawing out your benevolence. It is the small coin of life, no one piece of which is of very great value, but with it we make vastly more purchases than with our bank-notes and heavy gold. It is in the power of most school-girls to learn more about conversation at school, as well as about books, than anywhere else. Here you are equals : and every one has the power of di- recting the conversation in the right way for improvement. " Cultivate," says Professor Francke, " a talent for directing the conver- sation in a proper channel. Never change
crows' nests. 75
the conversation from a profitable subject. Much is to be learned, both in discipline of the mind and in the collection of facts, by- much conversation on the same topic. Never interrupt a person who is speaking, and be silent if you yourself are interrupted." %
Some young misses think that the charac- ter of a hoyden, a kind of thoughtless romp, is a beautiful disguise under which they can conceal themselves, and make folly and rude- ness pass for wisdom and propriety. But they forget that we cannot respect the calf, though we may be amused at his gambols. We cannot love where we cannot respect. We have had the misfortune to know a very few ladies who wore pantaloons on occasions, and who could climb trees for crows' nests before breakfast, and leap fences and shoot with a double-barrelled gun; but we never found it in us to respect them. You always draw yourself up when you see such a young lady, not knowing what may come next. You can imagine how horses would run side by side, but when you see the heifer taking her stand to run, you do not know what the crea-
76 A BEAUTIFUL COMPARISON.
ture may do. Let no one feel that she can challenge admiration by putting off her sex and laying aside the delicacy of the true lady, even though she might come out in the skin and the voice of the lion.
Trifles make up life ; and " true politeness is fyenevolence in trifles." You cannot ex- pect every day to do some great thing to confer happiness around you; but every day you can do little acts of courtesy. You can forbear to utter an unkind remark, a cutting sarcasm, an unpleasant truth, and a mortify- ing remark ; and you can by tone and voice and words every day make one or more happy. If you cannot remove mountains from the paths of your companions, you can show kindness and gentleness. " A gentle spirit is like ripe fruit, which bends so low that it is at the mercy of every one who chooses to pluck it, while the harder fruit keeps out of reach. No one living in society can be independent." It is small, frequent wounds which are so hard to bear. The horse may now and then step on your foot and cause you great pain ; but we suffer far more
THE ALWAYS MISERABLE. 77
from the impudent horse-fly, whose foot only tickles as he walks over your nose.
One great thing to be attended to is an unflinching, unalterable cheerfulness. Some people have no sunny side to their houses. They eat, drink, sleep, and summer only on the north, cold, damp, mouldy side of the house. They seem to feel that, if they are not martyrs to religion, they must be to circum- stances. They do not know how it is, but they have more trials, more misfortunes, than any body else. All the colors of the rainbow are gathered into blue, and the clear sunshine would be pleasant, were it not that it is always followed by bad weather. The moon would look bright, but she, too, is surrounded by a ring, which foretells a long storm. The spring would be pleasant, but it gets here so late. The summer would do better, but it is always so hot. The autumn is sad, because the leaves decay and fall; and who does not know that winter is all horrors ! If there be a great, a certain curse, from which you should strive and pray to be delivered, it is a mur- muring disposition.
78 MIRTH AND CHEERFULNESS.
Some, however, mistake mirth for cheerful- ness. They feel that it is enough, if now and then they throw off gloom, and break through their heart-rending trials, and become sweet and mirthful. This, perhaps, is a little better than nothing. But it is not what you want. Let the beautiful pen of Addison instruct you. " I have always," says he, " preferred cheerfulness to mirth. The latter I consider as an act, the former as a habit of the mind. Mirth is short and transient ; cheerfulness fixed and permanent. Those are often raised to the greatest transports of mirth who are subject to the greatest depressions of melan- choly : on the contrary, cheerfulness, though it does not give the mind such an exquisite gladness, prevents us from falling into any depths of sorrow. Mirth is like a flash of lightning, that breaks through the gloom of clouds, and glitters for a moment ; cheerfulness keeps up a kind of daylight in the mind, and fills it with a steady and perpetual serenity."
One good method of reformation in wrong habits, and in little things, when you are away at school, is to review your life and see
WHAT YOU WILL DESIRE TO RECALL. 79
how you have treated your parents. If I mis- take not, you will see some sad pictures, when memory comes to hold up her canvas, and show you the past. Those little acts of disobedience, unkindness, which you hardly thought of at the time, should now come up before you and instruct you, not merely how you will behave towards them in future, but
*
how you will now treat your companions. What we do and feel to-day will come up in the review hereafter. Charles Lamb, in writ- ing to his friend, thus speaks of these memo- ries in his own case. " O my friend, I think sometimes, could I recall the days that are past, which among them should I choose. Not those ' merrier days,' not the ' pleasant days of hope,' not those ' wanderings with a fair- haired maid,' which I have so often and so feelingly regretted, but the days, Coleridge, of a mother's fondness for her school-boy. What would I give to call her back to earth for one day, on my knees to ask her pardon for all those little asperities of temper, which, from time to time, have given her gentle spirit pain ! And the day, my friend, I trust will
80 SEVEREST PUNISHMENT.
come ; there will be time enough for kind offices of love, if heaven's eternal years shall be ours. Hereafter, her meek spirit shall not reproach me. O my friend, cultivate the filial feelings ! and let no man think himself released from the kind charities of relation- ship. These shall give him peace at the last ; these are the best foundation for every species of benevolence." The young lady should ever bear in mind, that the short answer, the impatient look, the unkind tone of voice, and the irritating reply, are not injuries inflicted on her companions merely. They recoil and do her a greater injury than they do others; and it is thus that a "little injury done to another is a great injury done to ourselves. The severest punishment of an injury is the consciousness of having done it ; and no man suffers more than he who is turned over to the pain of repentance." The heart, in its outgoings and ingatherings, is the seat of our enjoyment. You want to draw from the hearts around you, as from wells of pure, clear, fresh, and unfailing pleasure. So do others wish to draw from you ; and the max-
OUT OF OUR OWN SHADOW. 81
im is as old as Seneca, that, " if you wish to gain affection, you must bestow it." And she who does not make it a matter of prin- ciple and of calculation to do at least one act of love every day, is not out of her own dark shadow. Make it a matter of conscience, at all events, and at any cost, not to speak evil of any one. It would be better still not to hear evil spoken. It always takes two to make, a slander, one to speak and one to hear ; and it is sometimes difficult to decide which is the more guilty. Do not keep ac- count of the good things you have said or done for others, and watch for their return. " Say all the good you can of all," says a quaint writer, " but if you would have evil spoken of any, turn that office over to the Devil." You will hereafter remember and think of one another, just as you now ap- pear to one another. No time or circum- stances can alter the impressions which you now make ; and if you wish hereafter to be remembered by your associates with respect and kindness and love, you must show a kind, friendly, and unselfish heart. 6
82 SCHOOL-GIRLS NOT MATRONS.
You will not suppose I am trying to make the life of the school-girl a formal, stiff, always- guarded condition. Far from it. I expect you will be school-girls, and not prim matrons. I expect you will do childish acts and say child- ish things ; but what I want is, that these lit- tle things which you do and say shall be done and said with a view to make others happy : it is, that you make it a point in all that you do, whether it be to aid in a lesson, comfort in a sick-room, or only to pick up a pin, to do it all for the purpose of mak- ing others happy. We are the most appro- priately dressed when others give our dress no thought ; we are the most happy when we do not think of our own happiness, and most likely to be beloved, when we have no thought for ourselves. Treat your associ- ates, not as young ladies who have met you here to compare notes, to see who has the most property, the finest homes, the gayest wardrobe, the brightest eye, or the fairest face, but as friends who have been thrown together on the sunniest spot in life, to see how you can aid and bless one another in providing
DESPERATE INTIMACIES. ^3
food and discipline of heart and of the intel- lect for all future life. She who can banish one shade of anxiety or of sadness from the face of a companion, has done a good deed, and she who has lightened one burden, or poured a single flash of light into the sorrow- ing heart, will not lose her reward.
It is a mistake to suppose it is best to see how few friends you can make, and how inti- mate you can become with them. It is the way with school-girls, often, to clan together, to select two or three unspeakably dear and intimate associates, — sworn friends whom they will correspond with at least twice a week, all the rest of their lives ; and they feel that this is the best way. But I would recom- mend you to try, not how intimate your friends may be, but how many you can make your friends. Endeavor to live in bright sunshine, not always mourning and trying to feel how unfortunate you have been in your room, in your room-mate, in your teacher, in your stud- ies, in your associates, but how many things you have to make you happy. In your corre- spondence home, do not try to see how doleful
84 CARRY SUNSHINE WITH YOU.
a story you can make out, — what sufferings you have to undergo, what sacrifices you are making, and how you are counting the weeks and the days, the hours and the minutes, when the prison-doors will be opened, and the poor sufferer may again set her face towards that paradise, — home, — which was any thing but a paradise while she was in it : do not try to see how much romantic suffering you can endure in six months, and strive to make your- self believe that you really are almost sacri- ficed on the altar of learning ; but try to make the beams of the morning, the sweet breath of early . flowers, the warm light of the sun, and the beautiful world that surrounds you, all cheer you on in your duties ; and let your face carry sunshine into every room that you enter, into every recitation that you make, and into every thing you do. Remember that there are few places in this world where happiness may not be found. But like the gold-dust, it must be first sifted out of the sand, or the rock must be broken, pounded, and perhaps smelted, ere you obtain it. And when found, it is not in great lumps,
NOT AFRAID OF RESPONSIBILITY. 85
but in grains. So our happiness is made up of grains, which we must pick up par- ticle by particle. In the same way we must impart it. In no situation will you ever have it in your power to add so fast to your capital as while at school. And your social intercourse and habits affect your own happi- ness, and the well-being of those around you now, and will help to shape your and their happiness, for all the future of your life. Feel that you have not come here to shun responsi- bility, but to assume it ; not come merely to receive good, but also to bestow it ; not only to receive smiles, but to scatter them; not alone to be improved, but to aid in improving others. It is not the place to have or to be dolls; but the place and the time to make moral and intellectual greatness the standard, and thus humble the pride; to subdue the temper, and bow the will, and govern the heart, and thus make you tolerable to your- self, and lovely in the eyes of others.
CHAPTER VI.
TKIALS AND TEMPTATIONS.
New Trials. Better Scholars than you. Friends will be dis- appointed. "Wonderful Blacksmith. No Excuse for you. Rock Slates and Sea-egg Pencils. Not too late. So much done. Parents' Mistake. A Good-for-nothing Machine. Too great a Difference. The Best Response. Letters like Chimneys. Starving Pupil. Genteel Prisons. Why not spend Money? School not for the Rich alone. Daniel Webster's Congratulation. East Winds must come. Cow- ard won the Day.
Every situation has its inconveniences, which we call trials ; and, of course, every new situation must have new trials. Some- times these seem heavy because they are new, though in reality they may not be as severe as those we have left behind. At home, perhaps, you had every indulgence ; you were petted and caressed, and every
NEW TRIALS. 87
thing as far as possible was made to bend to your pleasure. But when you reach your place in the school, there is no partiality, no petting your whims, no caressing your wishes. You have to take your place among a multi- tude of your equals, and your place seems a cold one. Their interests are to be looked after as well as yours, and they must receive, each, as much attention as you do. This is a new trial. It is one that you did not think of, and it meets you many times every day. It is very hard to come to the conclusion that we are of no more consequence than others, and are to receive no more attention.
You have the trial, too, of finding by pain- ful experience that there are others who go before you. They have manners more agree- able, dispositions more mild and winning, memories more retentive, minds that are quicker to seize and understand a subject, thoughts that are brighter, and an imagina- tion that flashes more than yours ; you meet with those who have had better early advan- tages, who were better instructed in child- hood, and who, consequently, can better com-
88 FRIENDS WILL BE DISAPPOINTED.
mand the mind than you can. You thought, before leaving home, that study, away from home, would be easy; that you could stand among the first in the school ; but you find, as a matter of fact, that many are far above you. This is a severe trial. You feel, perhaps, mortified, to find that you had over-estimated yourself, and that your friends had made the same mistake. You feel, perhaps, that you can never be what your friends expect ; and that the great thing which you have learned by coming to school is, that you know but a very little. Now out of these circumstances arise certain temptations into which you are in danger of falling.
1. The temptation to indolence.
This temptation is so universal, so power- ful, that it seems to be a part of our very nature. It meets us at all times and places ; before we rise in the morning, it comes and whispers to us ; when we plan to do any thing, indolence bids us put it off till to-mor- row, or to do it by halves, or to do something- else first, or to try some easier way. When you find that a lesson comes hard, she tells
WONDERFUL BLACKSMITH. 89
you that your advantages have heretofore been so poor, that you are not^o be expected to get it as well as others. You forget that there are no circumstances so unfavorable, but that we can learn, and learn a great deal. " In one of our Southern States is a colored man, who has recently been purchased of his master to be sent as a missionary to Africa. He is a Presbyterian, and has the confidence of all who know him. This slave is a black- smith. He first learned the letters of the alphabet by inducing his master's children to make the letters, one at a time, on the door of his shop. He next learned to put them to- gether, and to make words, and was soon able to read. He then commenced the study of arithmetic, then of English grammar and geography. He is now able to read the Greek Testament with ease, and has obtained some knowledge of Latin, and even commenced Hebrew, which he was compelled to give up for want of suitable books. He is now read- ing theology, in which he makes good prog- ress. He is as remarkable for piety and humility as for diligence. He studies every
90
NO EXCUSE FOR YOU.
night till eleven or twelve o'clock, and intel- ligent lawyers, in conversing with him, feel that he is their equal. He is between thirty and thirty-five years of age."
Now what excuse have you for indolence, when you see that, under the worst circum- stances, diligence will raise the mind. There are no strata so thick under which the mind can be buried, that diligence cannot burst them and cause the mind to work up through. If any ever have an apology for indolence, it is those who are crushed by poverty, dark- ened by ignorance, and depressed by their cir- cumstances. But the individual who has every possible advantage, as you have, should blush to be overcome by idleness. If the neglected and the lowly can bend or break, and rise up over all difficulties, surely you can do so too. Mr. Pritchard, a missionary from one of the South Sea Islands, in speak- ing to a London audience, stated that the na- tive boys belonging to one of the South Sea Islands, having no slates, and no writing- books, supply the lack by going to the moun- tains and breaking off a piece of the rock, one
ROCK SLATES AND SEA-EGG PENCILS. 91
side of which they smooth by rubbing it upon a coral reef. They then dive into the sea, and, breaking off one of the spires of the sea- egg, use it as a pencil. The speaker held in his hand one of these substitutes for slates while giving the account.
And when we remember that Samuel Lee, Professor of Hebrew in the University of Cambridge, England, was seventeen years of age before he conceived the idea of learning a foreign language ; that out of his small earn- ings as carpenter he purchased at a book- stall a volume, which, when read, he ex- changed for another, and so by degrees he advanced in knowledge; that without any living assistant, and burdened with cares, he still pressed on in his course ; that he had to pass directly from hard labor to study ; that during the six years previous to his twenty- eighth year, he omitted none of the hours usually appropriated to manual labor ; and that at the age of thirty-one he was master of seventeen different languages, which he was actually teaching, — we shall be slow to allow that indolence ought to be allowed in a
92 NOT TOO LATE.
t
school of young ladies. But unless you are very determined, this enemy will follow you with velvet step into the school-room, and into the recitation-room, and into your private room. Bolts and bars will not keep him out ; he can scale walls, leap over boundaries and proprieties, and even creep through key-holes. Do not allow him to come and mourn with you, that you had so poor advantages in early life, that it 's in vain to try now. It is never too late to do rightly and properly, and with our might. Do not let him whisper in your ear, that you can stay in the school but a short time, and therefore you cannot accom- plish much. Up and to your work. " The hawks of Norway, where a winter's day is hardly an hour of clear light, are the swiftest on the wing of any fowl under the firmament, — nature teaching them to bestir themselves, to lengthen the shortness of the time by the speed of their flight." So you must make the more speed and the more effort if your time of going to school is short. Up and to the work.
2. The temptation to be superficial.
Many young ladies have the ambition to
parents' mistake. 93
feel and to say, that they have studied so many books ; and their ambitious fathers and mothers are anxious to be able to say that their daughters accomplished so much and so much during the short time they were at school. The parents are more to blame than the daughters, and the teachers who allow them to multiply and carry on half a dozen studies at once are more to blame than either. The whole process becomes like the cram- ming process of preparing turkeys for market. Very many have no idea that going over a study and through a book is not the same thing as understanding it. "Why cannot par- ents see that it is better to understand and master one study, than to get a smattering of a dozen ? If the object of study were to see how much ground you could pass over, of how many things you could learn a little, — to see how much you could crowd into the memory and charge it to receive and hold it all, — then this superficial way would be the right way ; but if the object be to see how you can discipline all the faculties of the mind in due proportion, it is the last thing
94
A GOOD-FOR-NOTHING MACHINE.
that should be done. I would urge you to do whatever you do as well as possible ; to have no more studies On hand than you can mas* ter, and at all events not to be superficial.
Shenstone says, " Mi*. Reynolds has brought my lady Luxborough a machine that goes into a coat-pocket, yet answers the end of a jack for boots, a pair of snuffers, a cribbage- board, a reading-desk, a ruler, an eighteen- inch rule, three pairs of nut-crackers, a lemon- squeezer, two candlesticks, a piquet-board, and the Lord knows what besides ! Can you form any idea of it? But, indeed, while it pretends to these exploits, it performs nothing' well?
3. You will feel tempted to be envious and jealous of others.
We have implanted in us a strong desire to be and to do what others are not and can- not. When we sit down alone, we can, in reverie, make ourselves to be heroes and hero- ines, powerful to accomplish, and great, lofty, and noble in character. But these dreams are over when we meet a class at recitation, v the whole school for study. We see that
TOO GREAT A DIFFERENCE. 95
this one and that one excels us. She is a better scholar. Her lessons are better learned and better recited ; and we feel, — not that injustice is really done us, — but we are jeal- ous lest her standing should be placed too high and ours too low. We think there ought not to be so wide a difference between us. And thus, ere we are aware, we feel jealous of our friend, or we envy her the attainments to which we can lay no claim. It is then very easy to accuse the teacher of being partial, and to feel that unfortunately we are not duly appreciated. The proba- bility is that very few human beings live who have not, at times, more or less of this feeling. The temptation is strong. It is hard to come home and allow that we have not studied faithfully, or that we have not the mind and the intellect which others have. Then this feeling breaks out in evil speak- ing, in disparaging remarks upon those who excel us. And perhaps we hear of some- thing said about us by some fellow-student not quite so flattering as we could wish, and then we must see if we cannot say some-
96 THE BEST RESPONSE.
thing a little keener, smarter, and more severe in return. It is hard to recollect at all times " that silence is the softest response of all con- tradictions that arise from impertinence and envy." We need humility to bear being in contact and in contrast with those who ought to be our equals, but whom we know to be our superiors. However much you may be tempted, and few temptations are stronger, to speak evil of your companions, be very careful that you do not. You inflict wounds that are hard to cure; and you may feel assured, that with what measure ye mete, it shall be meted out to you again.
4. You will be tempted to exaggeration.
Some people never see any thing which has not a thousand wonders thrown around it; the lesson to be recited is the hardest ever seen ; the study itself is truly horrible, and every thing is superlatively good or superlatively bad. Especially is this the case- when you write to your friends. What sorrows and groans do the mail-bags some- times carry! The letters written home are not unfrequently like our chimneys, the con-
.
STARVING PUPIL. 97
ductors of smoke and soot enough to put out any common pair of eyes. It is so much more romantic, and makes us appear so much more like martyrs, to be able to tell of our suf- ferings and trials, and be able to set them out to good advantage ! A small mishap is a real God-send to some people, and they are sure to make the most of their afflictions. Sometimes these sorrows ' meet them in the shape of " horrid " teachers, or " shocking rooms," or "awful" food, or "dismal" weath- er, or most unamiable companions. In a boys' school lately, where I knew the boys had food enough, and of the best quality, though plain, the teacher showed me a letter which one of the boys had just written home to his father, and in which was this sentence : " I am glad you sent me the box of eatables, for I have not had a meal fit to eat since I have been here." " Shall you let him send that letter just as it is ? " I inquired. " Certainly," said the principal, laughing, "certainly; if the father, who has been here and seen my school, don't know better, he is so great a fool that I care 7
98
GENTEEL PRISON.
not what he thinks." You can injure a school, you can give incurable wounds to teachers and fellow-pupils, by giving way to the foolish notion, that a letter must be spiced with strong language, playful satire, burning indignation, or beautiful exaggera- tion. Remember that what is put on paper must remain ; and the impressions which you send abroad are handed round and passed on from one to another almost indefinitely.
School is a place of discipline, and there- fore is, and must be, in some respects, a hard place. But you would think, judging from the conduct of many scholars, that it was the most terrible place in the world. I have heard young ladies, who, however, were far from being good scholars or good improvers of tHeir opportunities, speak of the school which they had left as a very horrid place. You would think by their account of it that it was a kind of genteel prison, where the keepers are without mercy, and the prisoners without help. The teachers are a set of peo- ple who band together and make it their whole business to see how much they can
WHY NOT SPEND MONEY? 99
oppress, what burdens they can lay on, what new plans of torture they can invent, while the scholars are the most meek and forbear- ing and lovely beings in the world, never doing an action that is mean or Wrong or unlady-like.
5. The temptation to extravagance in spend- ing money.
A young lady goes abroad to school, and we will suppose her father is reputed to be rich. He allows her to have pocket-money in abun- dance ; and now why should she not spend it freely and liberally ? What if she does spend a hundred or even two hundred dollars need- lessly, of what consequence is it ? I reply, that it is not always the case that those are rich who are reputed to be. As a general thing, almost every man's property is overrated, and nine probabilities to one, your father is not as rich as you think him to be. He wants to gratify his child, and he feels that he must not appear to be close with his family; but depend upon it, there are very few people who who are not occasionally a little pinched for money. Then, again, every dollar you spend
100 SCHOOL NOT FOR THE RICH ALONE.
must more or less take your thoughts off from your studies. You must think before- hand what you intend to purchase ; you must go and get it, and you must use it after ob- tained; all of which must occupy thought and attention. But this is not all. The ma- jority of those who are with you in school are not able to spend money thus : at any rate, a school, to be a good and useful instrument of benefiting the human race, ought to be so constituted that those who are not rich can be educated at it. Now no one ought to do what will make others feel uneasy because they cannot do the same, or what would make the standard of expense in a school so high as to make it burdensome to the rest. School is the place for study and for mental discipline, and not the place for display, for costly dressing or ornaments. Fashion ought to be shut out here, so that if, with her pat- terns and measures, and collars and boxes, she knocks at your door, she may hear a stern voice bidding her begone. No young man is respected any more at college for his dress; and a free use of pocket-money there is al-
daniel Webster's congratulation. 101
most certain ruin ; and I presume that display and expenditures, to any great amount, are incompatible with scholarship in a ladies' school. Worth grows in rough places. Pov- erty is no hindrance to intellectual or moral worth. " I congratulate you," said Daniel Webster to a lame student at Yale College, " I congratulate you on being lame ! " And that lame student came out the first scholar in his class. Somebody beautifully remarks, that Spain, which has the best land in the world, has the poorest farmers ; and Scotland, which has the poorest land in the world, sends out the best gardeners. If you happen to be among the favored whose inheritance is your character and not property, do not be ashamed of your poverty nor be disheartened by it. It will most likely make your char- acter. We need to feel the iron hand of ne- cessity pressing hard upon us before we really accomplish much. Some of the most val- ued things ever written were wrung out by poverty.
Set it down as settled, that there can be no situation without temptations and trials
102 EAST WINDS MUST COME.
which we must meet. We cannot shun them, we cannot go round them, we must meet and look them in the face. There must be north winds and east winds, cloudy days and cold storms in our way, as well as clear sun- shine and soft breezes. They are all in the providence of God ; and when you go to school, expect to meet them ; and when they come, do not waste your strength in wonder- ing over them, nor yet in mourning over them. Meet them gently as you please, but firm as a rock. Courage will rise as you approach the trial, if you will advance steadily. Two young officers were sent, under Wellington's own eye, to make a charge upon a body of French cavalry in Spain. As they rode to- gether, one grew pale, trembled, and his feet shook in the stirrups. His companion, a fine, bold fellow, observed it, and reproached him.
" You are afraid," said he.
" That is very true," said the other, " I am afraid, and if you were half as much afraid as I am, you would turn your horse's head and ride back to the caipp."
COWARD WON THE DAY. 103
As they had not advanced far, the other, indignant, returned to Wellington to tell the story, and to ask for a worthier companion. " Clap spurs to your horse," was Wellington's reply, "or the business will be done by your cowardly companion before you get there." He was right. The business was done ; the coward swept down upon the enemy like a whirlwind, and scattered them like chaff!
CHAPTER VII.
BEADING.
The Tedious Day. How to read. Now is the Time to begin. Nothing to build with. One Dish at a Time. Great Men raised up in Times of Commotion. One hundred and twenty- four Volumes. A Book read in Six Months. Books of Pewter and of Bank-notes. Starving on Jellies. Changing Horses at Paris. Convent in Portugal. Chain of Memory. Three Hours a Week. Let nothing interfere. Poetry its own Eeward. None, safest. Giant cracking Nuts. Phos- phorus and Honey.
Dr. Franklin thinks that he must be a very wretched man who is shut up of a rainy day and knows not how to read. It seems to me that he must be more wretched who is thus shut up and does know how to read, but who has nothing to read. The world contains a vast amount of the mind and the thought that have lived before us ; not all, to be sure,
HOW TO READ. 105
nor is it all digested, sifted, reduced, and well arranged ; but so much so, that the books now in the world are a vast repository, to which we may go and take what we wish. The mine is very rich and the ore extracted very precious ; but you want to know how to dig it, how to separate and refine it. There probably is not a subject upon which the hu- man mind has ever thought, which has not left the record of these thoughts on the print- ed page. As all think more or less, and as multitudes have not judgment or taste suf- ficient to know whether their thoughts are worth printing or not, there must be of course a huge mass printed, and thrown into the common stock, to be used or thrown aside as mankind may choose. As we have a great multitude of duties to perform, arid a very limited period in which to do them, we want to know how to make the most of our time and opportunities. We want to know how we can read to the best advantage, obtain the most of instruction, thought, or amuse- ment in a given time. This is what I wish you to be able to do.
106 NOW IS THE TIME TO BEGIN.
There are but two kinds of books in the world, — such as are designed to instruct, and such as are intended to amuse ; and when a book blends amusement with instruction, it is not for the sake of the amusement, but for the sake of instruction, — just as you mix sugar with your medicine, not for the sake of the sugar, but to make the medicine go down. It is our privilege, within certain bounds, to make books subserve both of these ends. There is no way in which one can be so easily and quickly instructed or amused as by the reading of books. Still we need to know how to read to advantage, what to read, and in what proportions we may read for improvement and what for entertain- ment.
Let me say, too, here, that if you ever ac- quire habits of reading, and if you ever have in the mind stores laid up which you have drawn from books, it must be done in the morning of life. I never knew a man ac- quire a love for reading who did not com- mence it early ; and I never knew a full man, who had great resources from which he could
NOTHING TO BUILD WITH. 107
draw with facility, who did not lay up faith- fully in early life. There is no subject 01 which you may not obtain information from books, — there is none on which you are lim ited as to amount. He, therefore, who does not know how to read to advantage is a great loser; and he who may know how, but will not read, is not merely a dunce, but very wicked. Bishop Home remarks, " You should be careful to provide yourself with all neces- sary knowledge, lest, by and by, when you should be building, you should have your ma- terials to look for and bring together ; besides that, the habit of studying and thinking, if it be not got in the first part of life, rarely comes afterwards."
My first caution is, Do not try to read too many books. Some seem to have the notion that if they only read, — read something, and a great deal, — they are on the high way to improvement. You might just as well say, that if you only eat a great deal, keep at it, no matter what you eat, flesh or fish, pies or pork, tomatoes or tom-tits, potatoes or pud- dings, sausages or sorrel, green apples or green
108 ONE DISH AT A TIME.
turtle, eels or elfins, — only eat and you will be robust, fair, and in perfect health. Does not the merest child know that we are nour- ished most and best by the plain dish, and one dish at a time ; that it is not the amount that we eat, but the amount that is digested and incorporated into the system, that gives us health and vigor ? The mind that reads a good book slowly is much more likely to be enlightened and fed than if it read ten books in the same time. " A good book," says John Milton, " is the precious life-blood of a mas- ter-spirit embalmed and treasured up ,on pur- pose to a life beyond life." The most re- markable men that have lived are usually those who have lived at some marked epoch in the world, and who, in Providence, were then called out to make and to leave their mark upon the world. Hence it is that his- tory and biography are so instructive ; for history is only the record of great movements and changes and events ; and biography is the story of the agents who acted in these epochs of the world. You must have revo- lutions to bring out Washingtons or Buona-
GREAT MEN RAISED UP. 109
partes ; and these strong minds wake up the nations, and call out character and cause
events which never cease to affect the world.
•
Or, as Milton beautifully says, " When God shakes a kingdom with strong and healthful commotions to a general reforming, it is not untrue that many sectaries and false teachers are then busiest in seducing ; but yet more true it is, that God then raises up to his own work men of rare abilities and more than common industry, not only to look back and revise what hath been taught heretofore, but to gain further and to go on some new en- lightened steps in the discovery of truth." It is therefore to be understood, that you can scarcely read a good history or biography without finding a mine rich with instruction. Now do not try to read too many of these. It is better to understand and remember the history of one period, or the life of one re- markable man, than to go over the history of many ages, or ramble through the whole biographical history. Hence
My second caution is, not to read fast.
I once had the misfortune, in my boyhood,
110 HUNDRED AND TWENTY-FOUR VOLUMES.
■
to fall upon a set of books called " The World," in one hundred and twenty-four volumes, and, feeling that my time was lim- ited, I read them all in six months ! I might as well have poured gold-dust through a coarse sieve, thinking that by pouring it by the bushel my sieve must certainly retain much. Had I read but two volumes during that time, I am sure I could to-day have told you something of their contents, but now all I can remember is, that they were English books in a pretty shape, with many pictures, and very interesting. And now, if I have not given you a great amount of information about my one hundred and twenty-four vol- umes, you may feel assured I have given you all I possess. A book should be read no faster than you can understand it, digest it, and remember it. The most accurate and best- informed reader that I have ever met with was never less than six months in reading an octavo volume. He usually read walking his room. His method, as well as I remember, was as follows : to read the title-page, and see how much and what he knew about the
A BOOK READ IN SIX MONTHS. Ill
author. He then read the preface, to see what the author had to say by way of claim to attention. He then read the whole table of contents over very carefully, to see what the author professed to accomplish. He then closed the book, to see if he could give a connected account of the contents of that volume. He next made the contents of the first chapter his own, by reading the chapter through, and then closing the book to see if he could, from memory, give the contents of that chapter. So he went through the whole volume, reading every chapter twice, and re- viewing, analyzing, and understanding every thing. At the end of six months, the vol- ume was his own, and two such volumes in the year made him rich in the learning of men. Let me say here, that no book is worth reading which is not worth reading twice. For in reading for improvement we have two objects in view : we want information, knowl- edge of facts ; we also want to strengthen the power of comprehension and vigorous thought. A small spot well cultivated makes a rich and beautiful garden; and the same
112 SILVER BOOKS AND GOLDEN BOOKS.
time and labor spent upon it produces more of value and of beauty than if spread over hundreds of acres of hungry land. Do not waste time and energy in trying to read, and master, and retain a poor book. John New- ton says : " I have many books that I cannot sit down to read ; they are indeed good and sound, but, like half-pence, there goes a great quantity to little amount. There are silver books and a few golden books, but I have one book worth more than all, called the Bible ; and that is a book of bank-notes."
But some feel that they cannot read a book that is not amusing, — "interesting," as they call it. They read solely for amusement, — and they have their reward. They obtain the amusement, and nothing else. What is called a dry book, however important may be its subject, or however rich its thought, they can- not endure. Just as well might the stomach be sustained by jellies, custards, whips, or confectionery. Understand that it is easy to school the mind so that a dry book shall be- come interesting. Henry Kirke White, writ- ing to his brother, says, " The plan * which
CHANGING HORSES AT PARIS. 113
1 pursued in order to subdue my disinclina- tion to dry books was this : to begin attentive- ly to peruse it, and to continue thus one hour every day : the book insensibly, by this means, becomes pleasing to you ; and even when reading Blackstone's Commentaries, which are very dry, I lay down the book with regret." There is nothing which is unpleasant long, if we put right into it with a hearty, cheer- ful good-will : no book is dry that adds to our knowledge, or that strengthens our mind. But how often do people go through a book as one of our countrymen is said to have changed horses at Paris, and then asked what the name of that town was !
3. My third hint is, that you use the pen whenever you read.
I am aware that I am now touching a dif- ficult point. The pen is in danger of being used too much or too little. Some have large commonplace books into which they copy almost all they read, and thus trust nothing to memory. The consequence is, that the memory is injured and nearly destroyed by the process. It is better to make the memory 8
114 CONVENT IN PORTUGAL.
grapple your acquirements and hold them, than to commit its charge to paper, and feel no further responsibility. Some things, however, must be preserved in the commonplace book, such as chronological events, dates, names, and the like. Sometimes, too, you take up a book for a few moments, which is not your own. You may never see it again. You find a sentence, or a fact, or an anecdote, or a beau- tiful figure, which you wish to retain. In all such cases, you should copy it. For example, I take up Byron's Letters to his Mother. I do" not own the book, nor shall I ever own it. But I find the following two sentences, and I copy them, feeling sure that some time or other I shall want them. Visiting a convent in Portu- gal, he says, " The monks, who possess large revenues, are courteous enough, and under- stand Latin, so that we had a long conversa- tion. They have a large library, and asked me, if the English had any books in their country ! " Your commonplace books should be of two kinds ; — one a kind of Index Rerum, in which you may note down the book and the page which treat on a particular subject. This
CHAIN OF MEMORY. 115
should be arranged alphabetically by subjects. The other should be a book of extracts from such books as you cannot own, or which are rare and curious. These should be noted down under the proper heads in the index. It is impossible to read to the highest advan- tage without using the pen much. Sir Wil- liam Jones well says, " Writing is the chain of memory." Dr. Franklin, writing to a young lady, says, " I would advise you to read with a pen in your hand, and enter in a little book short hints of what you find that is curious, or that may be useful : for this will be the best method of imprinting such par- ticulars in your memory, where they will be ready, either for practice on some future oc- casion, if they are matters of utility, or at least to adorn and improve your conversation, if they are rather points of curiosity."
4. My fourth hint is, that you have a stated time for reading every day.
I am not now determining how much time you can spare for reading from other duties. I will suppose that, by close economy as to sleeping, dressing, and the like, you can com-
116 THREE HOURS A WEEK.
mand but three hours during the week. I say it is far better to divide those hours, and read half an hour daily, than to read three hours at once. You will read more carefully ; you will give the mind more exclusively to your book. You will long to have the season return for reading, and you will have something to think upon during the day. One reason, as it seems to me, why so many lose all the benefit of reading, is, that they not only read miscellaneously any thing they happen to fall upon, but they read any time when it hap pens to be convenient. If you have never made the trial, you will be astonished to find how the mind rejoices to have the stated hour arrive when she can return to the book. The Earl of Chatham, when trying to form the character of his nephew, writes thus : " If you do not set apart your hours of reading, and never suffer yourself or any one else to break in upon them, your days will slip through your hands, unprofitably and frivo- lously, unpraised by all you wish to please, and really unenjoyable to yourself." To this testimony, I will add, that I have never
LET NOTHING INTERFERE. 117
known any one who grew in knowledge and mental- strength by reading, who had not the stated time when he went to his book, and with which nothing was suffered to interfere. You do not read much unless you read at stated times, and what you do read is not read to the best advantage. Always have a book on hand, — a real, substantial book by you, which you are reading, — such a book as you would not feel ashamed to have a great man or a great scholar see lying upon your table.
As to the question, what you shall read, I have not time to go into it fully. Poetry, good, beautiful poetry, every lady ought to read. Poetry is the daughter of the skies. Inspiration, in her loftiest strains, comes to us in poetry. You cannot write it nor make it ; but the mind through which it passes seems to be beautified, like the channels through which the clear, cold waters of the mountains run. It is a teacher whose voice was tuned in the skies, sweet as that of the silver trum- pet, and whose robes reflect the purity and the odors of heaven. Not that you are to read
118 POETRY ITS OWN REWARD.
poetry all the time, any more than you are to be surrounded by the colors of the rainbow all the time. Says the gifted Coleridge, " Poetry has been to me its own exceeding great reward. It has soothed my afflictions, it has multiplied and refined my enjoyments, it has endeared solitude, and it has given me the habit of wishing to discover the good and the beautiful in all that meets and surrounds me." You will find that poetry is not only thought, and thought condensed and refined, but it is fruit which grew in a warmer cli- mate and under fairer skies than those to which we have been accustomed.
And what shall I say of novels and roman- ces ? Where shall they come in, and how large a place shall they occupy ? I reply, as the phy- sician did to his patient who importuned him to know if a little brandy would hurt him much, " No ; a little won't hurt you much, but none at all won't hurt you any." There has been so much said, and so well said, in regard to this kind of reading, that I need only utter my testimony, clear, decided, strong, and earnest, that you touch not, taste not, handle
GIANT CRACKING NUTS. 119
not. Many a young lady has stood out in the soft moonlight, under cool dews, bright heavens and fairy visions around her, and felt confident that it was all in safety, while from the cool and beautiful evening she was silently inhaling an unseen, unfelt something, which ended in consumption and her early death. There are parts of the human body too deli- cate for the sweet air of evening; and there are chords in the human soul, and fibres of the human heart, that are destroyed by the subtle poison drawn from novels and romances. Even the best of them leave the soul dissatis- fied with her lot, cold towards her duties, dis- tasteful towards realities, and sorrowing that she could not be somebody else, or in some- body's condition besides her own. Wilber- force, speaking of the Waverley Novels, says in his Diary, " I am always sorry that they should have so little moral or religious object. They remind me of a giant spending his strength in cracking nuts. I would rather go to render up my account at the last day carry- ing up with me The Shepherd of Salisbury Plain, than bearing the load of all these vol-
120 PHOSPHORUS AND HONEY.
umes, lull as they are of genius." If those books are the most profitable which make the reader think the most, if the world is abun- dant in books that are good, if the taste and the heart are all vitiated by works of fiction, if the young can never lose the influence of the knowledge obtained, and of the habit of read- ing then formed, then an enemy could hardly do you a worse injury than to pile up your table with novels, or encourage you to read them. We have known multitudes made foolish, nervous, sickly in sentimentalism, mor- bidly silly, by such reading ; but have yet to find the first instance of any one's being bene- fited by it. You cannot be nourished by eat- ing phosphorus, or even honey ; the one will burn you up bodily, and the other will give you the apoplexy.
CHAPTER VIII.
USE OF THE PEN.
" Three things beax mighty sway with men, — The Sword, the Sceptre, and the Pen ; And he who can the least of these command, In the first ranks of fame is sure to stand."
How to preserve Thought. Eresh as ever. Not a Little Undertaking. Composition dreaded. Watered by Tears. Theory mistaken. No Time for Newspapers. Factories near the Waterfall. Whitefield's Pathos. Passion-flower. Women must do the Letter-writing. Chain kept bright. How Letters are treated in Turkey. Graceful Handwriting. Eh-st Specimen. Learn to bear the Yoke of Discipline. Graces of Time run into Glories of Eternity. Economist of Time. Thousand Years before Noah. Arrow ruined. Life hurried.
By commanding the pen, we do not mean merely the mechanical art of holding and guiding the quill, so as to have the lines graceful, open, and easy, but we mean the
122 HOW TO PRESERVE THOUGHT.
higher quality of composition. The objects of writing are : —
1. To record your thoughts, observations, and discoveries for the use of others, so that you can make thought permanent, and be able to transmit it from one place to another, and also preserve it for future generations. So anxious have men been, in all ages, to do this, that they have used stone, slate, brass, bones, wax, parchment, paper, every thing, any thing, on which to write. The greater part of what is done and said and thought by the generations of men goes unrecorded : and of that which is written, but little is read, or perhaps worth reading. But the power is to fix thought on paper, and then to send it off to some friend, is a talent of inestimable value.
2. A second object of the pen is to record your thoughts, your observations, or your read- ing- for future use.
You have read to-day an article of great value, — the thoughts were new, fresh, beauti- ful and important ; you cannot retain them in the memory ; but with the pen you can make
FRESH AS EVER.
123
them your own for all the future. You listen to a conversation to-day which interested you much ; you will forget it shortly ; but if your pen notes it down on paper, you have it years hence, as fresh and as beautiful as the day you heard it. Thought does not lose its fra- grance by keeping, and the time may come when a single thought may be of unspeakable value to you.
3. A third object in using the pen is to dis- cipline your own mind.
Were I to set out to make a perfect scholar of myself or of some other one, I would make the pen the great instrument. " Reading," says my Lord Bacon, " maketh a full man conversation a ready man, and writing an ac- curate man." A child may mistake in the spelling of a word, many times, when ad- dressed to the ear ; but let him learn to spell with the pen, and he will seldom mistake the same word more than once. You take the pen, ana you cannot make the letters, the words, or put down your thoughts, at random.
But if any one thinks that the art of writ- ing clearly, simply, and elegantly is to be
124 COMPOSITION DREADED.
acquired without much pains-taking, he has forgotten how he obtained his art, or else he never had it, and never will have it. It is of the highest importance, that every one who professes to have an educated mind should be able to express his thoughts on paper. And the power must be acquired in early life, or it never will be obtained. Some make it a hard and most disagreeable duty, while oth- ers find it a pleasure. It can hardly be com- menced too early. It can hardly be followed too closely or too carefully. It is the daugh- ter of practice. You may read good authors, may see good society, may be able to express yourself appropriately, and even elegantly, and yet not be able to write well. How many young ladies at school sit down and sigh, and dread the day of composition! How they dread to read what they have written ! Why do they ? Because they are aware that they have nothing written worth hearing. And how do they go to work to write a composition? First, they are a great while — days, if not weeks — in selecting a subject on which to write ; rejecting one and another,
WATERED BY TEARS. 125
taking a new one and laying it aside for something else, till the very day arrives when they are to write, and then they must, in a sort of despair, select something. Or if the teacher has compassion on them, and selects a subject for them, — what awful subjects! what hard subjects ! what unheard-of sub- jects! what old, worn-out subjects! or, what new, out-of-the-way subjects he selects ! And a curious picture it would make, a young lady sitting down alone to write her composi- tion,— the broad, blank sheet spread before her, the pen nicely dipped in ink, the title written down ; and now she pauses, bites the tip of her pen, dips it in the ink again, and waits for something to come. One single sentence, especially if it were a long one, would be a great relief. Now she lays down the pen, rests her chin upon her hand, and tries to think hard, and force the mind into something ! A few tears often water the flow- ers of her composition, and sometimes they are so abundantly watered that they too ought to be abundant. Now where is the difficulty ? What makes it so hard for her to write, and
126 THEORY MISTAKEN.
the composition often so tame and poor when written? The reason is, she had nothing to write. When she called upon the mind for thought, there were no thoughts at command. But she has done the best she could, as she thinks. True, if there were no better way, she has. But she mistakes the very theory of good writing. Instead of this course, let the subject be selected, fixed upon for at least a week — ten days would be better — before you begin to write. During this time, turn it over in your mind continually y see what be- longs to it, and what does not. See how much you can think about the subject. See how you would go to work to explain it to a child six years old. See how many questions you could ask about it, and how many of these you could answer yourself. Are there any simple ways of illustrating it, by com- parison, or by figures, and the like ? It is not for want of time, but because we waste it, that we do not accomplish more, and more to our minds. The grand secret of Walter Scott's ability to accomplish so much, was the carrying out his own grand maxim,
NO TIME FOR NEWSPAPERS. 127
" never to be doing- nothing." Every moment was turned to account, and thus " he had leisure for every thing, except, indeed, the newspapers, which consume so many precious hours now-a-days, with most men, and which, during my acquaintance with him," says Lockhart, " he certainly read less than any other person I ever knew, that had any habit of reading at all." It is this maxim of " never to be doing nothing " that will fill up the mind, so that, when you come to draw from it by composition, it will have something to give out. There is something in the cask from which you are wishing to draw. Some think over what they are to write while walk- ing ; some do it on the pillow, in the night- watches ; some have a slip of paper near*' them, and put down a thought as it occurs ; but however you may collect your thoughts, you cannot write well unless you premedi- tate on your subject. You may sit down and bite your pen, and wait for thoughts to come, but they will not come, and for the plain rea- son, there are none to come. But no mind can turn over and think over a subject for
128 FACTORIES NEAR THE WATERFALL.
several days, without finding something to say, and the fuller the mind is, the easier to write.
In selecting a subject on which to try your pen, take one that is common and simple. Some have an idea that it is easier and every way better to select out-of-the-way subjects, and import all their thoughts from a long dis- tance ; but this is too expensive. If we rear a house, we take the stone and the timber which are nearest and easiest to come at. "We build our factories near the waterfall, and carry the water as short a distance as we can. Do not try to see what new, uncommon words or thoughts you can obtain. Sim- plicity is one of the first requisites in any thing that is perfect, or approaching perfec- tion. " The strongest, purest, and least-ob- served of all lights is day-light, and his talk was commonplace, just as the sunshine is, which gilds the most indifferent objects, and adds brilliancy to the brightest." The first thing, of course, is to get thought which you can put on paper. The next is to express that thought in clear, simple language, and,
whitefield's pathos. 129
if you can, elegantly. Common things be- come beautiful when expressed with elegance. Dean Swift once wrote a composition upon a broomstick, and found no lack of materials or interest, and we all know how charmingly Cowper has sung the sofa. A clergyman of our country states that he once told an affect- ing occurrence to Mr. Whitefield, relating it, however, with but the ordinary feeling and beauty of a passing conversation ; when after- wards, on hearing Mr. Whitefield preach, up came his own story, narrated by the preacher in the pulpit with such native pathos and power, that the clergyman himself, who had furnished Whitefield with the dry bones of illustration, found himself weeping like a child. I have known a man, noted for the beauty of his productions, write a single page over from thirty to seventy times, even after the thoughts were fully in his mind. There is no way of writing elegantly but by this painstaking. Examples and illustrations of your subject and thoughts are always wel- come. " General propositions," says one, " are obscure, misty, and uncertain, compared 9
130 PASSION-FLOWER.
with plain, full, home examples ; precepts only apply to our reason, which in most men is but weak; examples are pictures, and strike the senses, nay, raise the passions and call in those (the strongest and most general of all motives) to the aid of reformation." A sin- gle figure is sometimes a jewel, whose bril- liancy will be remembered while all the rest is forgotten. "When Pope says that " compli- ment is, at the best, but the smoke of friend- ship," who can forget the figure ? And who can pass by the beautiful eulogium of Jeremy Taylor, expressed in a single metaphor: " Thus she lived, poor, patient, and resigned. Her heart was a passion-flower, bearing within it the crown of thorns and the cross of Christ." It is not necessary to suppose that you will all become authors, — this is not the standard, — but all will write for the ear and the eye of others, and it is desirable to do this with as much clearness, simplicity, and beauty as possible.
There is one species of writing which seems to belong appropriately to the lady. I mean letter- writing. In ease and beauty I think
WOMEN MUST DO THE LETTER-WRITING. 131
some ladies have produced letters of sur- passing brilliancy. The letters of Madame de Sevigne will be immortal, and every gen- eration will read them with admiration. The same is true of the letters of Hannah More, while the labored letters of Walpole and Burns, though striking and often beautiful, show that the elegance of the female mind is wanting! It is too much like a gentleman trying to put on the dress and the address of a lady. The correspondence which aims to instruct, to cheer the fireside, to encourage the wanderer, and to sustain age, is now mostly in the hands of females. Men are, or think they are, too much hurried to write letters, — except the short, dry letter of business, which, like a dry, hard cough, is laid aside as soon as possible. Daughters are those upon whom parents depend for long, full, and hopeful letters ; and in every situation of life, she who can write a good letter confers many blessings upon others. " Friendship is the great chain of human society, and intercourse of letters is one of the chiefest links of that chain." And she who lays herself out to
132 CHAIN KEPT BRIGHT.
keep the links of that chain bright, does a noble deed. It is more than an accomplish- ment for a lady to write a beautiful letter, though an accomplishment of the highest kind; it is a positive duty. In order to be able to do this easily and readily, you must write frequently, — not stiff, formal letters, — but as much like social, cheerful conversation as you can. There is a sunlight in which .we may look at every thing, and in which every thing looks beautiful. A letter, then, to be a good one, must be cheerful, and come to your friend like a warm sunbeam. It should be the echo of a cheerful heart, in- stead of one of those gloomy visitants who sometimes come to us, a trouble while with us, and leaving cold shadows after they are gone. Little troubles which vex you need not be put into your letter to trouble others. Sorrows which will pass away to-morrow need not become fixtures by being embalmed in your correspondence. Some feel that their letters are to be full of gossip, — retailing all the petty scandal they can hear or think out of themselves. These letters ought to be
GRACEFUL HANDWRITING. 133
treated as they treat letters in Turkey, cut through and through with a knife, lest they should be full of the plague. You should remember that, though your letter is ad- dressed to the eye of a particular friend, yet it is to live long ; for that friend will preserve it, and whose eye shall fall upon it after he and< you are among the dead ?
" Dead letters, thus with living notions fraught, Prove to the soul the telescope of thought; To mortal life a deathless witness give, And bid all deeds and titles last and live. In scanty life eternity we taste, View the first ages, and inform the last. Arts, history, laws, we purchase with a look, And keep, like fate, all nature in a book."
I hope the impression will not be left upon your mind that I deem a fair hand of no con- sequence. It is to the composition of a lady what dress is to her person, — what a fair body is to the soul, — what the chasing is to the jewel. A lady is more known and better judged of by her handwriting than a man is : we are allowed to wear our hair as we please, on the head or on the face, but a lady may not do so ; and we may write an abominable
134 FIRST SPECIMEN.
hand, and yet pass among respectable people. With some, it is even a mark of genius ; but who ever thought a lady a genius because she wrote in hieroglyphics, or in English in a way that nobody could read ?
" Ye sprightly fauywhose gentle minds incline To mend our manners and our hearts refine, With admiration in your works are read The various textures of the twining thread Then let the fingers, whose unrivalled skill Exalts the needle, grace the noble quill. An artless scrawl the blushing scribbler shames ; All should be fair that beauteous woman frames , True ease in writing comes from art, not chance, As those move easiest who have learned to dance."
I have desired to give you a specimen or two of beautiful letter-writing. They must be short. The first is from a bishop to a young clergyman : —
" I am much pleased to hear you have been for some time stationary at Oxford; a place where a man may prepare himself to go forth as a burning and shining light into a world where charity is waxed cold, and where truth is wellnigh obscured. Whenever it pleases God to appoint you to the government of a
THE YOKE OF DISCIPLINE. 135
parish, you will find work enough to employ you; and therefore before that time comes you should be careful to provide yourself with all necessary knowledge, lest by and by, when you should be building, you should have your materials to look for and bring together; besides, the habit of studying and thinking, if not got in the first part of life, rarely comes afterwards. A man is misera- bly drawn into the eddy of worldly dissipa- tion, and knows not how to get out of it again , till, in the end, for want of spiritual exercises, the faculties of the soul are be- numbed, and he sinks into indolence, till the night cometh when no man can work. Hap- py, therefore, is the man, who betimes ac- quires a relish for holy solitude, and accus- toms himself to bear the yoke of Christ's discipline in his youth; who can sit alone and keep silence, and seek wisdom diligently where she may be found, in the Scriptures of faith and in the writings of the saints. From these flowers of Paradise he extracts the honey of knowledge and divine love, and therewith fills every cell of his understanding
136 COWPER TO JOHN NEWTON.
and affections. The winter of affliction, dis- ease, and old age will not surprise such a one in an unprepared state. He will not be con- founded in the perilous time, and in the days of dearth he will have enough to strengthen, comfort, and support him and his brethren. Precious beyond rubies are the hours of youth and health ! Let none of them pass unprofitably away, for surely they make to themselves wings, and are as a bird cutting swiftly the air, and the trace of her can no more be found. If well spent, they fly to heaven with news that rejoices angels, and meet us again as witnesses for us at the tri- bunal of our Lord. When the graces of time run into the glories of eternity, how trifling will the labor then seem that has procured us, through grace, the everlasting rest, for which the Apostles toiled night and day, and the martyrs loved not their lives unto death."
Cowper to John Newton.
" My dear Friend, — I have neither long visits to pay nor to receive, nor ladies to spend hours in telling me that which might be
ECONOMIST OF TIME. 137
told in five minutes, yet often find myself obliged to be an economist of time, and to make the most of a short opportunity. Let our station be retired as it may, there is no want of playthings and avocations, nor much need to seek them, in this world of ours. Business, or what presents itself to us under that imposing character, will find us out, even in the stillest retreat, and plead its impor- tance, however trivial in reality, as a just de- mand upon our attention. It is wonderful how, by means of such real or seeming neces- sities, my time is stolen away. I have just time to observe that time is short, and by the time I have made the observation, time is gone. I have wondered in former days at the patience of the antediluvian world ; that they could endure a life almost millenary, with so little variety as seems to have fallen to their share. It is probable that they had much fewer employments than we. Their affairs lay in a aarrower compass; their libraries were indif- ferently furnished, philosophical researches were carried on with much less industry and acuteness of penetration, and fiddles, perhaps,
138 THOUSAND YEARS BEFORE NOAH.
were not even invented. How, then, could seven or eight hundred years of life be sup- portable? I have asked this question for- merly, and been at a loss to resolve it, but I think I can answer it now. I will suppose myself born a thousand years before Noah was born or thought of. I rise with the sun ; I worship ; I prepare my breakfast ; I swal- low a bucket of goat's milk and a dozen good, sizable cakes. I fasten a new string to my bow, and my youngest boy, a lad of about thirty years of age, having played with my arrows till he has stripped off all the feathers, I find myself obliged to repair them. The morning is thus spent in preparing for the chase, and it is become necessary that I should dine. I dig up my roots, I wash them ; I boil them ; I find them not done enough, I boil them again ; my wife is angry ; we dispute, we settle the point ; but in the mean time the fire goes out, and must be kindled again. All this is very amusing. I hunt, I bring home the prey ; with the skin of it I mend an old coat or I make a new one. By this time the day is far spent; I feel my-
1
LIFE HURRIED. 139
self fatigued, and retire to rest. Thus, what with tilling the ground, and eating the fruit of it, hunting, walking and running, and mending old clothes, and sleeping and rising again, I can suppose an inhabitant of the primeval world so much occupied as to sigh over the shortness of life, and to find at the end of many centuries that they had all slipped through his fingers, and were passed away like a shadow. What wonder, then, that I, who live in a day of so much greater re- finement, when there is so much more to be wanted, and wished, and to be enjoyed, should feel myself now and then pinched in point of opportunity, and at some loss for leisure to fill up four sides of a sheet like this ? Thus, however, it is, and if the ancient gentlemen to whom I have referred, and their complaints of the disproportion of time to the occasions they had for it, will not serve me as an excuse, I must even plead guilty, and confess that I am often in haste when I have no good rea- son for being so."
CHAPTER IX.
FOKMATION OF HABITS.
Indian Fashions. Dr. Chalmers's Handwriting.' John Fos- ter's Regret. Habit of Seeing. Audubon's Bet. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu a Physician. Not ashamed to ask a Question. Secret of Despatch. Chinese Student. Al- ways waiting. Reproof warded off. Just slipping on her Things. Lord Brougham's Rules. Mr. Condar's Speech. A Sure Recipe. Strive to please. Never-failing Beauty. Haydn's Gladness. Feast of Joy. Fair "Weather will come. Passion disgusting in Woman. Rejoicing in God.
The different tribes of Indians in this coun- try have various notions as to what consti- tutes human beauty. But whatever their ideas may be, they are all careful to begin to train the child according to this standard early. If the pappoose belong to the ^Flat- heads, he has a board securely oound to his head, that his skull may be flattened by the
dr. Chalmers's handwriting. 141
continual pressure. If he is a child of one of the Nez Perces, his nose is early cut and trimmed into the fashionable shape. All, while infants, are fastened to a board, that they may be erect. I have seen an Indian over a hundred years of age, who was still straight as an arrow in consequence of be- ing thus trained. Thus we can impress habits upon the body, the mind, and the whole character. These habits are of great value if good, but if wrong, they are sore mis- fortunes. Dr. Chalmers wrote a very illegible hand. "When writing to his mother, he says, " Let me know if you can read my present letter ; for if you can, it will give me satisfac- tion to know that I can make myself legible. I have made a particular effort, and I hope I have succeeded in it." Three years after, his old habit is strong as ever ; for in a letter from his mother to one of her other children, she writes, " I had a letter last night from Thom- as. It is a vast labor the reading his letters. I sometimes take a week to make them out." . It is hardly necessary to bring forward such an example to prove that habits are formed
142 john Foster's regret.
in early life, and grow upon us, and cling to us firmer and firmer, the longer we live. Whether we desire them or not, we shall have them. Dr. Paley says truly, " We act from habit nine times, where we do once from deliberation." Let the habits of the aged be what they may, we do not expect or at- tempt any change. But it is very important for the young to know what habits to form, and how this may be done. Any action re- peated at stated periods becomes a habit. Thus the habit of the intemperate begins by his having stated hours or places where he drinks. And if any one desires to know whether his future life will be happy or wretched, let him now decide what habits to abandon, what ones to strengthen. " How much I regret," says John Foster, " to see so generally abandoned to the weeds of vanity that fertile and vigorous space of life, in which might be planted the oaks and the fruit- trees of enlightened principle and virtuous • habit, which, growing up, would yiel4 to old age an enjoyment, a glory, and a shade." Life-long habits you are now forming, and
HABIT OF SEEING. 143
I am wishing to point out to you some of those which are essential to your happiness and usefulness, through your whole life.
1. Cultivate a habit of close observation.
Some people see things in general, and some do not see them at all. A few have the power to use the eye for the purpose for which it was given. It is not seeing a landscape as a whole, but noticing the minute parts of it, that makes it beautiful. It is not seeing the grove as a whole, that makes the vision so pleasant, but it is the study of the different trees, their various shapes, heights, the shades of their leaves, and their attitudes. Keep the eyes open, and the ears awake. " Every new class of knowledge and every new subject of interest becomes, to an observer, a new sense to notice innumerable facts and ideas, and consequently receive endless pleasurable and instructive hints, to which he had been else as insensible as a man asleep." There must be originally, in the mind of a good observer, the faculty j, but it is greatly improved and en- larged by cultivation. " The capabilities of any sphere of observation," says a strong
144 audubon's bet.
thinker, " are in proportion to the force and number of the observer's faculties, studies, in- terests. In one given extent of space, or in one walk, one person will be struck by five objects, another by ten, another by a hundred, and some by none at all." Notice the minutest object, pick up even the smallest morsel of knowledge, retain the smallest fact, save the rustiest nail ever lying in the dust. Have patience, you will find the value of all at last. When Audu- bon was on a visit to the Natural Bridge in Virginia for the first time, he travelled a short distance with a farmer, who offered to bet that Audubon could not tell when he came to the Bridge. But Audubon stopped directly on the bridge, saying, " We are on it now." The astonished farmer inquired how he knew he was on the right spot. He explained by saying that he saw a little pee-wit, and know- ing that these little birds build their nests under bridges, he knew that the bridge could not be far off. There is scarcely a spot in creation, or a thing created, or an art among men, however humble, from which something may not be learned, or in which some beauty
LADY MONTAGU A PHYSICIAN. 145
may not be discovered. " Lady Mary Wort- ley Montagu, on observing among the vil- Jagers of Turkey the practice of inoculating for the small-pox, became convinced of its utility and efficacy, and applied it to her own son, at that time about three years old. By great exertions, Lady Mary afterwards estab- lished the practice of inoculation in England, thus conferring a lasting benefit on her native country and on mankind." I have never yet met the man in any station from whom I could not learn something. The great Mr. Locke was asked how he had contrived to ac- cumulate a mine of knowledge so rich, and yet so extensive and so deep ? He replied that he attributed what little he knew to not having been ashamed to ask for information ; and to the rule he had laid down, of convers- ing with all descriptions of men, on those topics chiefly that formed their own peculiar professions or pursuits.
Let me drop a hint on your habits of ob- serving character ; do not study to find what is uncouth or ludicrous or ridiculous in those whom you meet. Every one has more or less 10
146 SECRET OF DESPATCH.
about him which partakes of weakness, and it may be of folly, which always seems ridic- ulous in others. But do not allow yourself the bad habit of noticing these little shades, dwelling on them, and perhaps detecting them for the amusement of others. In every one you can see something good. Seize upon that. Be like the bee which can find honey in almost every weed, even to the deadly nightshade, and not like the spider, which sucks poison from the fairest flowers that creation affords. Every step in life will pre- sent you a thousand new things, minute, to be sure, but these all become a study, and if you cultivate the habit of close observation, you will be enriched, not by finding a great treasure at once, but by the accumulation of sands of pure gold.
2. The habit of untiring industry is invalu- able.
Those accomplish the most in life who can turn every moment of time to advantage. Some can work a short time and apparently despatch a great deal, but at the end of life have done but little. The power of despatch
CHINESE STUDENT. 147
is a misfortune, if it be not accompanied by- untiring industry. The hare could run fast for a while, but he must soon lie down to sleep, and while he rested, the tortoise passed him and run the race. To make each mo- ment do a little for us is the great secret of doing much.
There is a story of a Chinese student who felt discouraged because when he shook the tree of knowledge only a single apple would " drop at a time, and sometimes he had to shake a long time before any fell ; but he was encouraged one day to new efforts, which re- sulted in his reaching eminence, by seeing an old woman rubbing a crowbar on a stone to make her a needle ! President Dwight says, " Among all those who within my knowledge have appeared to become sincerely penitent and reformed, I recollect only a single lazy man ; and this man became industrious from the moment of his apparent, and, I doubt not, real conversion." No one can rely upon tal- ents, friends, opportunities, or attainments for success. The question ever recurring is, not what are your talents and ability, but, what
148 ALWAYS WAITING.
can you, what do you, accomplish. The blows you strike may not be heavy, but let them be long continued. You must begin early in the morning and keep doing as long as the day lasts. Any thing but spasmodic efforts, now working a whole night, and then wast- ing whole days. He who becomes rich in money, learning, or attainments does so, not by rapid increase, but by' that industry which continually adds small gains. Any man, with the habits of industry fixed upon him, will accomplish tenfold more than the most gifted without these habits.
3. Punctuality. There are very few who have strength of character sufficient at all times to do now what we hope may be done to-morrow. Thus we put off acting at the right time, not because it will be easier done hereafter, but because we do not wish now to make the effort. We make appointments and do not keep them punctually, and think little of it ; but we have no conception of the annoyance we cause our friends. We abuse their patience, consume their time, and lead them to distrust our promises in future.
REPROOF WARDED OFF. 149
Melancthon says, when he had an appoint- ment, he expected not only the hour, but the minute, to be fixed, that the time might not run out in idleness or suspense. " The punc- tuality of Dr. Chalmers's father was so well known, that his aunt, appearing one morn- ing too late at breakfast, and well knowing what awaited her if she exposed herself de- fenceless to the storm, thus managed to divert it. ' O Mr. Chalmers ! ' she exclaimed, as she entered the room, ' I had such a strange dream last night ! I dreamt you were dead/ ' Indeed ! ' said Mr. Chalmers, quite arrested by an announcement which bore so direct- ly upon his own future history. ' And I dreamt,' she continued, ' that the funeral day was named, and the funeral hour was fixed, and the funeral cards were written; and the day came, and the folks came, and the hour came, but what do you think happened? Why the clock had scarce done chapping [striking] twelve, which had been the hour named in the cards, when a loud knocking was heard within the coffin, and a voice, gey peremptory, and ill- pleased like, came out of it, saying, ' Twelve 's
150 JUST SLIPPING ON HER THINGS.
chappit, and ye 're no liftin'.' Mr. Chalmers was himself too great a humorist not to relish a joke so quickly and cleverly contrived, and in the hearty laugh which followed, the inge- nious culprit felt that she had accomplished more than an escape." Let only those follow her example who can equal her wit.
We do not pretend to know the secrets of the lady's toilette, but we do know that some- how or other, when waiting for a lady to ac- company us at an appointed hour, we have often to wait a long time while she "just slips on her things, and will be ready in a moment." Whether it is our impatience for the return of her bright face, or whether it is because we know not the mysteries of just slipping on her things, — whatever it is, we do know that the wear and tear of patience is terrible, and we often wish she had said frank- ly, " Sir, I have to hunt up my clothes, dress my hair, dust my bonnet, lace my boots, se- lect a collar, cologne my handkerchief, and I cannot possibly be ready under a full half- hour." So when the bell rings for breakfast, dinner, tea, or recitation, some one is always
LORD BROUGHAM'S RULES. 151
a little too late, — always a little tardy, — a lit- tle late in rising, dressing, at meals, at church, — everywhere some one is behindhand. The rest wait, and run, and call, and try to aid her, and when at last she appears, you wish that, in addition to all that she has put on, she had adorned herself with one more garment of beauty, — the habit of being punctual.
4. Next to this comes the habit of doing' every thing well.
Some men make what they call rules of action ; but they always embrace industry, punctuality, and thoroughness. Jefferson had ten of these rules ; Lord Brougham has three. His Lordship's are the following : — 1. To be a whole man to one thing at a time. 2. Never lose any opportunity of doing any thing that can be done. 3. Never entreat others to do what you ought to do yourself. Many people are always in a hurry, and resemble the squirrel in the revolving cage, who labors hard, and thinks he is travelling at a prodi- gious rate, while in fact he is standing on the same spot. Hurry is the mark of a weak mind, and those who have the habit mistake
152 mr. condar's sprech.
it for despatch. But they differ, as the sword which rattles and clashes only in the scab- bard is different from the Damascus blade that quietly does execution. Whatever you undertake to do, if it be nothing more than paring your nails, do it thoroughly, neatly, as well as you can. He who always does his best, even in small things, will hardly fail of attaining great excellence. At a soiree of the Sheffield Mechanics' Institute, Josiah Condar made the following remarks, Montgomery, the poet, being present. " I can look back to the time when, as a young man, I was guilty of the perhaps pardonable crime of writing verses, and I looked upon my valued friend, Mr. Montgomery, as my patron and master in poetry. I may be allowed to mention, that at that time I received from him a piece of advice, which I have found of great use in poetry and injother matters, and I will repeat it, if you will forgive me, for the benefit of all. He said to me, when reading some of my juvenile poetry, and making his invalua- ble marks on the margin, ' Always do your best, and every time you will do better.' It
ALWAYS THE BEST. 153
has been of great use to me, for if I have produced any thing acceptable in poetry, it is owing to this advice." The young lady who will not allow her needle to take a single stitch which is not the best it can take, her pen to write a letter or a composition which is not the best she can write, — who will not allow her- self to read a page aloud, nor to recite a les- son, nor to touch the piano, without doing her best, — will by and by accomplish, not only a great deal, but will astonish all around her by the degree of perfection she has attained. " A place for every thing, and every thing in its place," is essential to character. Many a young man has lost a valuable opportunity, and not a few young ladies have lost situa- tions, kindnesses, and friends, because, though they sometimes excelled, it was not their habit always to do well. You must do your best in little things, on humble occasions, and in all circumstances, if you are to approach anywhere near the standard of perfection.
5. Cultivate the habit of making others hap- py daily.
Some confer very little happiness on others,
154 GREAT OPPORTUNITIES FEW.
because they really lack a generous, kind disposition ; but more fail because they know not what constitutes the happiness of life. They wait for great occasions, for opportu- nities to do good on a large scale, whereas few have these great opportunities, and most lack the power of using them when they do meet them. We can probably never be the means of saving a country or an army, or ol snatching a friend from the waters in which he is drowning, or from the dwelling in which he is burning. Dr. Johnson says truly, " He who waits to do a great deal of good at once, will never do any." We sigh for opportuni- ties to do some great and noble action, and perhaps dream in our reveries how we would do this or that, which would be so romantic and so noble, and thus life slides away while we are losing ten thousand opportunities of making others happy. I find in the course of my reading a recipe for making every day happy ; and if it were to be followed and copied, as you copy and follow the recipes in the cook-books, it would do a great deal for your enjoyment. It reads thus : — " When
A SURE RECIPE. 155
you rise in the morning, form a resolution to make the day a happy one to a fellow-crea- ture. It is easily done : a left-off garment to the man who needs it, a kind word to the sorrowful, an encouraging expression to the striving, trifles in themselves as light as air, will do it at least for the twenty-four hours ; and if you are young, depend upon it, it will tell when you are old. And if you are old, rest assured it will send you gently and hap- pily down the stream of human time to eter- nity. By the most simple arithmetical sum, look at the result. You send one person, only one, happily through the day ; that is three hundred and sixty-five in the course of the year, and supposing you live forty years after you commence this course of medicine, you have made one hundred and forty-six thousand beings happy, at all events for a time ; and this is supposing no relation or friend partakes of the feeling and extends the good. Now is not this simple? Is it not too easily accomplished for you to say, I would if I could ? Thus we may give a rose where we cannot gather a magnificent bou-
156 STRIVE TO PLEASE.
quel We may bestow the kind word, and the cheerful look, and the pleasant smile, where we cannot take off great burdens of sorrow, or add great things to the possession of our friends. " To think kindly of each other is well, to speak kindly of each other is better, but to act kindly one towards another is best of all."
6. Make it a part of your duty to please.
Those who think they can always please, will often disgust by their vanity; those who never try, never will ; while those who attempt it as a part of life's duty, will often succeed. This disposition is a perennial flower which is beau- tiful and fragrant in summer and winter. It never fades. Let the young lady who desires *to be beloved — and who does not? — remem- ber that " permanent beauty is not that which consists in symmetry of form, dignity of mien, gracefulness of motion, loveliness of color, reg- ularity of features, goodliness of complexion, or cheerfulness of countenance ; because age and disease, to which all are liable, and from which none are exempt, will, sooner or later, destroy all these. That alone is permanent
haydn's gladness. 157
beauty which arises from the purity of the mind and the sanctity of the heart, the agree- ableness of the manners and the chasteness of the conversation. If the outward form be handsome, it appears to greater advantage ; and if it be not so, it is as easily discerned, and as justly appreciated. That, therefore, which in the sight of God is of price, ought to be so in the judgment of men."
7. The habit of being and feeling cheerful is of unspeakable value.
We are not by nature equally amiable and cheerful ; but nature is given to us to improve upon. By culture, the wild rose of the hills becomes the charm of the green-house. The pure white lily is nurtured by the muddy bot- tom of the lake. It is easy to be pleased when every thing is as we desire it, but what we want to acquire and retain is the cheerful disposition. " It is more valuable than gold, it captivates more than beauty, and to the close of life retains all . its freshness and its power." When Haydn was inquired of how it happened that his church music was always so cheerful, he made this beautiful reply:
158 FEAST OF JOY.
" I cannot make it otherwise. I write it ac cording to the thoughts I feel ; when I think upon God, my heart is so full of joy that the notes dance and leap, as it were, from my pen ; and since God has given me a cheerful heart, it will be pardoned me that I serve him with a cheerful spirit." There are few spots on earth that are not sometimes warm with sunshine, few winds that do not purify the air, no storms that are not followed by a calm, and no situations in which there are not mer- cies mingled with our afflictions. Feltham says, " I know we read of Christ's weeping, not of his laughter, yet we see he graceth a feast with'his first miracle, and that a feast of joy." The man who has grown up through the kindness of others, as we all have, and who will not, in his turn, try to aid and bless others, is like a tree, to use the figure of Pope, which will not bear fruit itself, nor suffer young plants to flourish beneath its shade. If there are waves, remember that they will soon sleep ; if there are winters, that summers are sure to follow ; if there are clouds, that we can look through them often, and that the sun
FAIR WEATHER WILL COME. 159
is always shining beyond them. In the midst of troublous times, James Howel sent this beautiful consolation to his friends. " You know better than I, that all events, good or bad, come from the all-disposing high Deity of heaven ; if good, he produceth them, if bad, he permits them. He is the pilot that sits at the stern and steers the great vessel of the world ; and we must not presume to direct him in his course, for he understands the use of the compass better than we. He com- mands also the winds and the weather, and after a storm he never fails to send us a calm, and to recompense ill times with better, if we can live to see them." It is a great misfortune, especially to a young lady, to have a temper sour, morose, or melancholy. It is particularly necessary that women " ac- quire command of temper, because much of the effects of their powers of reasoning and of their wit depends upon the gentleness and good-humor with which they conduct them- selves. A woman who should attempt to thunder with her tongue, would not find her eloquence increase her domestic happiness.
160 PASSION DISGUSTING IN WOMAN.
We do not wish that women should im- plicitly yield their better judgment to their friends ; but let them support the cause of reason with all the grace of female gentle- ness. A man in a furious passion is terrible to his enemies, a woman in a passion is dis- gusting to her friends ; she loses all the re- spect due to her sex, and she has not masculine strength and courage to enforce any other kind of respect. The happiness and influence of women, in every relation, so much depends on their temper, that it ought to be most care- fully cultivated. We should not suffer girls to imagine that they balance ill-humor by some good quality or accomplishment; be- cause, in fact, there are none which can sup- ply the want of temper in the female sex." And there are some who, though cheerful in their daily life, yet are unhappy in their re- ligion. To such I would recommend the advice of the Earl of Strafford to his son, just before his death : " And in all your du- ties and devotions towards God, rather per- form them joyfully than pensively, for God loves a cheerful giver." Let your heart re-
REJOICING IN GOD. 161
joice in all the pleasant things with which he hath surrounded you. Enjoy all the friends with whom he hath blessed you, but when you come into his presence praise him for all these delights, and while you mourn your un- worthiness, dishonor him not Ly your faith- lessness and your complainings of his provi- dence.
ii
CHAPTER X.
HEALTH AT SCHOOL.
Conveniences of our Day. All under Law. Abuses among Good Men. Dr. Payson's Letter. Good Advice. The Two Extremes. John Howard's Testimony. His Experi- ence in full. Too much Care. The Conscientious Self- destroyer. Recovery, — a Curious Case. Hints not Rules. Sleep, how much needed. Sir William Jones. A Curious Will. Importance of Habits. Mother's Cupboard. The Young Lady's Self-control. Exercise indispensable. Dr. Franklin's Experience. Mind corresponds with the Body. Cheerfulness essential to Health.
So much is written and said on the subject of health at this day, — so many lectures are given, so many prescriptions are made, and so much complaint is made for the want of it, — that we should be inexcusable not to say something about it. We have so many con- veniences, stoves, furnaces, furs, and shawls,
ALL UNDER LAW.
163
so many luxuries in food, so many thin, pa- per-soled shoes at this day, that good health has become almost like a ghost, — a thing much talked about, but seldom seen. Almost every affliction of the body, as well as of the mind, arises from the fact that we refuse to obey law. God has given the ten command- ments for the welfare of human society, and no one can be universally violated without destroying society, and no one can be partial- ly violated without injuring society just in proportion as it is violated. So he has given laws for the body, — not spoken, indeed, on Sinai, but written on the body, — laws which cannot be violated without injuring the health. These laws often clash with our wishes and habits, but they are inexorable. We must obey them or suffer. I would that all, while they are young, would improve every advan- tage which they have for learning these laws of physiology, — understand them thoroughly, — and then they would be none too careful in their observance. While we are young, feel buoyant and elastic, we hardly know when we violate the laws of our system, or if we
164 ABUSES AMONG GOOD MEN.
do know, we feel that it is of little conse- quence. Do not be deceived. Depend upon it, for every violation of these laws, you have some day to render an account; and to pay a penalty, probably, by suffering. Is it not strange that many, who feel that they are in- excusable for wasting their property, or their minds, are yet wholly indifferent to the health, or rather, that they should think they may violate all the laws of their being, and yet be healthy? Even the best of men, clergymen, think it wrong to spend time for the special and sole purpose of exercise ; forgetting that God designed that men should earn their bread by the sweat of the brow, and therefore he has made it a law, that we must work, exercise, or be invalids, or go to an early grave. Says the . late Dr. Payson, writing to a young clergyman : " I am very sorry to learn that your health is not better, but rather worse. Should it not have improved before you receive this, I beg you will attend to it without delay : attend to it as your first and chief duty, for such be assured it is. ' A merciful man is merciful to his beast,' and
dr. payson's letter. 165
you must be merciful to your beast; or, as Mr. M. would say, to your animal. Remem- ber that it is your Master's property, and he will no more thank you for driving it to death, than an earthly master would thank a servant for riding a valuable horse to death, under pretence of zeal for his interest. The truth is, I am afraid Satan has jumped on to the saddle, and when he is there in the guise of an angel of light, he whips and spurs at a most unmerciful rate, as every joint in my poor broken-winded animal can testify from woful experience. He has temptations for the con- science, as Mr. Newton well observes ; and when other temptations fail, he makes great use of them. Many a poor creature has he ridden to death by using his conscience as a spur, and you must not be ignorant, nor act as il you were ignorant, of his devices. Re- member Mr. Brainerd's remark, that diversions rightly managed increased rather than dimin- ished his spirituality. I now feel that I am never serving our Master more acceptably, than when, for his sake, I am using means to preserve my health and lengthen my life ; and
166 THE TWO EXTREMES.
you must feel in a similar manner if you mean to do him service in the world. He knows what you would do for him if you could. Do not think less favorably of him than you would of a judicious father. Do not think that such a father would require labor when he enjoins rest or relaxation. Ride then, or go a fishing, or employ yourself in any way which will exercise the body gently, without wearying the mind. Above all, make trial of the shower-bath."
There are, I am well aware, two extremes. The one, when you take no care of your health; when you go out with shoes that seem as if made to defy consumptions, colds, or coughs, — so thin that they seem good for nothing but to keep the wet in, and the foot cold ; when you set the elements at defiance by the smallest quantity of clothing ; when you eat any thing and every thing without regard to quantity or quality ; when you are irregular in all your hours and habits of sleep and rest ; and when you never feel that you are responsible for the welfare of your body. The other extreme is when you give your
john Howard's testimony. 167
thoughts too much to health, and feel that fresh air is deadly poison ; that cold water brings consumption, or chills ; that exercise cannot be taken in any proportion to the wants of the system. These extremes are to be avoided. In a climate so fickle as ours, so cold and so hot, where the greatest changes may take place in a few hours, it will not do to be too confident. But this very alterna- tion — now bracing you up with the severe cold of winter, and now pouring upon you the brightest of all suns in summer — requires care, attention, and much careful exercise. I am satisfied, that if, when young, you will pay proper attention to this subject, you may hope, not only for a long life, but a life of vigor, of energy, and of high enjoyment. I cannot forbear quoting in this place £he ex- perience of John Howard, as related in his own simple, but beautiful language. " A more puny whipster than myself in the days of my youth was never seen. I could not walk out an evening without wrapping up. If I got wet in the feet, a cold succeeded. I could not put on my shirt without its being
168 john Howard's testimony.
aired. I was politely enfeebled enough to have delicate nerves, and was occasionally troubled with a very genteel hectic. To be serious, I am convinced that whatever emas- culates the body debilitates the mind, and renders both unfit for those exertions which are of such use to us, as social beings. I therefore entered upon a reform of my consti- tution, and have succeeded in such a degree, that I have neither had a cough, cold, vapors, nor any more alarming disorder, since I sur- mounted the seasoning. Prior to this, I used to be a miserable dependent on wind and weather; a little too much of either would postpone, and frequently prevent, not only my amusements, but my duties. And every one knows, that a pleasure or a duty deferred is often destroyed. If, pressed by my affections, or by the necessity of affairs, I did venture forth, in despite of the elements, the conse- quences were equally absurd and incommodi- ous, not seldom afflictive. I muffled up, even to my nostrils. A crack in the glass of my chaise was sufficient to distress me ; a sudden slope of the wheels to the right or left set me
TOO MUCH CARE. 169
a trembling ; a jolt seemed like a dislocation ; and the sight of a bank or precipice, near which my horse or carriage was to pass, would disorder me so much, that I would order .the driver to stop, that I might get out, and walk by the difficult places. Mulled wine, spirituous cordials, and great fires were to comfort me, and keep out the cold, as it is called, at every' stage; and if I felt the least damp in my feet, or other parts of my body, dry stockings, linen, &c. were to be instantly put on, the perils of the day were to be baffled by something taken hot, going to bed; and before I pursued my journey the next day, a dram was to be swallowed down to fortify the stomach. In a word, I lived, moved, and had my being so much by rule, that the slightest deviation was a disease.
" Every man must, in these cases, be his own physician. He must prescribe for and practise on himself. I did this by a very sim- ple, but, as you will think, a very severe regi- men ; namely, by denying myself almost every thing in which I had long indulged. But as it is always much harder to get rid of a bad
170 THE CONSCIENTIOUS SELF-DESTROYER.
habit than to contract it, I entered on my re- form gradually, that is to say, I began to diminish my usual indulgences by degrees. I found that a heavy meal, or a hearty one as it is termed, and a cheerful glass, that is to say, one more than does you good, made me incapable, or at best disinclined to any useful exertion for some hours after dinner ; and if the diluting powers of tea assisted the work of a disturbed digestion so far as to restore my faculties, a luxurious supper came so close upon it, that I was fit for nothing but dissipation, till I went to a luxurious bed; where I finished the enervating practices, by sleeping eight, ten, and sometimes a dozen hours on a stretch. You will not wonder that I arose the next morning with the solids re- laxed, the nerves unstrung, the juices thick- ened, and the constitution weakened. To remedy all this, I ate a little less at every meal, and reduced my drink in proportion.
" It is really wonderful to consider how, im- perceptibly, a single morsel of animal food and a teaspoonful of liquor deducted from the usual quantity daily, will restore the mental
RECOVERY, A CURIOUS ONE. 171
functions without any injury to the corporal, nay, with increased vigor to both. I brought myself, in the first instance, from dining upon many dishes, to dining on a few ; and then to being satisfied with one.
" My next business was to eat sparingly of the adopted dish. My ease, vivacity, and spirits augmented. My clothing, &c. under- went a similar reform ; the effect of all which is and has been for many years, that I am neither affected by seeing my carriage dragged up a high mountain or driven down a valley. If an accident happen, I am prepared for it, I mean, so far as it respects unnecessary ter- rors, and I am proof against all changes in the atmosphere, wet clothes, wet feet, night air, damp houses, transitions from heat to cold, and the long train of hypochondriac affec- tions. Believe me, we are too apt to invert the remedies which we ought to prescribe to ourselves. For instance, we are for ever giv ing hot things when we should give cold."
There are no specific rules to be given as to health. We can give only hints.
1. Remember, that, while young, you as
172
SLEEP,
HOW MUCH NEEDED.
much decide the question what your health shall be in after life, as you do what your mind shall be. The habits now formed, the train now laid, either for health or feeble- ness, will show itself hereafter. Form no habits of eating, drinking, sleeping, or dress- ing which are not for life, — none which you would not be willing to own as your habits as long as you live. It costs much less to form a right habit now, than it will to correct a bad habit and form a new one in after years. Therefore eat as you mean to eat, sleep, exercise, and do just as you hope to do all the way through life.
2. Early rising is essential to health.
Some lay down the principle, that no one needs more than six hours of sleep. I do not believe that. They might as well say that we need only so many ounces of food. We differ in constitution. The food or the sleep which would be ample for one man is very inadequate for another. One needs no more than six, or even five hours, while another needs seven or eight, for his rest. As all do not wear out the system equally fast, or as all
SIR WILLIAM JONES. 173
do not recover equally fast, we can have no specific rule. Each must judge for himself; but all agree, that early rising is essential to health. You will find men of eighty years of age, some who have been very temperate in food and drink ; others that have eaten and drank when and what they pleased ; some who have lived in doors and some without ; but they all agree in this, that early rising was a habit with them all. Sir William Jones says to a friend, " I am well, rising constantly be- tween three and four, and usually walking two or three miles before sunrise." In order to rise early, therefore, it is essential that you retire early ; and as soon as the duties of the day are over, you cannot be too quickly on your pillow. The first sleep of the night is much more refreshing than that of the latter part of the night. To many, one of the hard- est duties connected with the discipline of school is that of early rising. But who ever accomplished much, or satisfied his own con- science, without being in this habit ? In the will of the late James Sergeant, of the Bor- ough of Leicester, is the following clause
174 A CURIOUS WILL.
relative to early rising : — " As my nephews are fond of indulging in bed in a morning, and as I wish them to improve the time while they are young, I direct that they shall prove, to the satisfaction of my executors, that they have got out of bed in the morning, and either employed themselves in business or taken ex- ercise in the open air from five o'clock till eight every morning, from the 5th of April to the 10th of October, being three hours each day; and from seven o'clock till nine in the morning, from the 10th of October to the 5th of April, being two hours every morning, for two years. This to be done for some two years during the first seven years to the satis- faction of my executors, who may excuse them in case of illness, but the task must be made up when they are well ; and if they do not do this, they shall not receive any share of my property."
To rise early till it becomes a habit and a pleasure, requires a strong will and prompt action. You can easily acquire the habit of awaking at any given hour, provided you act promptly, and rise the moment the time has
mother's cupboard. 175
come. There must be no dreading it, no dal- lying, no postponing. " If you once turn over on your side after the hour at which you ought to rise, it is all over with you." There is no time when the mind is so fresh, so elas- tic, so vigorous and young, as early in the morning. And there is nothing which goes to promote the health of the body like it. The Spaniards are famous for their proverbs. One of them reads on this wise. " He that sleeps too long in the morning, let him bor- row the pillow of a debtor."
3. Be simple in food and drinks.
All who have been away from home to school are aware, that, of all places in the world, this is the most hungry. And the cases are not few, when the scholar, and the parent too, imputes this appetite to being stinted in food designedly on the part of the school. I need not go into the philosophy of the thing. A young lady at her father's table feels, of course, free to eat all she can, and more than is for her good. In addition to this, her mother's cupboard was always open to her, and many a bit does she eat between
176 THE YOUNG LADY's SELF-CONTROL.
meals. She does not wait to feel hungry at home, she only waits long enough to think of food, when she eats. When, therefore, she goes from home, she is cut off from the between-meal system, and at the table she feels less at liberty to indulge. The conse- quence is, that she feels hungry, and that feeling is so new and so strange, that she is alarmed, and begins to look round and see who is so cruel as to allow her to feel the sensation of hunger. To be sure she is al- most a martyr now. But does not her health improve ? Yes ; but she feels hungry ! Does not the bloom gather on her cheek, and she look like the picture of health ? Yes ; but she feels hungry ! She acts and wants to act from appetite, and not from principle. To prove this is so, let the young lady have a large box arrive from home, and let her have it in her room ; let it be filled with chicken- pie, roast turkey, mince-pies, loaf-cake, pound- cake, and, above all, the black, most sticky fruit-cake, — and how long will it be before the said young lady has a dreadful head- ache, and is very sick, and must lay aside her
EXERCISE INDISPENSABLE. 177
books, and have the doctor, and swaljow jalap and ipecac, castor-oil and senna, and all the good things in which he deals ? Not one in fifty, I am safe in saying, could receive and use such a box from home without being sick. And yet they feel that they can hardly eat too much or too rich food, and that a plain, simple diet is not for their good, but the good of those who provide for them.
4. To enjoy healthy you must take some regular exercise.
We may quarrel with the law, may forget it, nay, plead that we cannot be under it; but yet God has so fixed it that we cannot long remain well without exercise. The best exercise is in the clear, pure, out-of-door at- mosphere. You ought not to be near a fire when you exercise. It is the air, the pure air that surrounds us, and in which we are bathed, that does us so much good as we go out. What is called going out and taking the air, is really taking a medicine. Says Dr. Franklin : " In considering the different kinds of exercise, I have thought that the
quantum of each is to be judged of, not by 12
178 dr. franklin's experience.
time or by distance, but by the degree of warmth it produces in the body ; thus, when I observe that if I am cold when I get into a carriage in the morning, I may ride all day without being warmed by it ; that if on horse- back my feet are cold, I may ride some hours before they become warm ; but if I am ever so cold on foot, I cannot walk an hour briskly without glowing from head to foot by the quickened circulation : I have been ready to say (using round numbers without regard to exactness, but merely to make a great differ- ence), that there is more exercise in one mile's riding on horseback, than in five in a carriage, and more in one mile's walking on foot, than in five on horseback ; to which I may add, that there is more in one mile up and down stairs than in five on a level floor, and this last may be had when one is pinched for time, and as containing a greater quantity of exercise in a ' handful of minutes.' "
Some most unfortunate young ladies have imbibed the notion, that exercise will spoil that excessive delicacy and that softness which, as they think, is so lady-like, and so
MIND CORRESPONDS WITH THE BODY. 179
becoming to them. Let them know that we can well spare the lily when the rose comes to take its place. I know not how it is, but among men we expect to find few brains, few thoughts, and very little character, in a case that is not robust, strong, and vigorous. " Strong men are usually good-humored and active men, and often display the same elas- ticity of mind as of body. These superiori- ties, indeed, are often misused. But even for these things God shall call us to judgment."
5. To enjoy good health, you must cultivate cheerfulness.
A sour, gloomy mind fills the body with negative electricity, so that it repels whoever and whatever comes near it. I am aware that some are born under an evil star, and seldom see the sun when it shines. We can- not all be and fee] equally cheerful. But we can cultivate cheerfulness. We can look on the sunny side of our dwelling, and not al- ways on the shady side. We can believe that the present evils are transitory, and will soon go past. We may believe that those who surround us are not enemies, but friends ;
180 CHEERFULNESS ESSENTIAL TO HEALTH.
that those who are our teachers or compan- ions are all friends; that our circumstances are not bad, but good ; and that if we have trials now, they are for a day only, and are for our good. We may believe that a kind Providence watches over us for good, and that all that pertains to our well-being, in this world and the next, is in the hands of Infinite Wisdom and Goodness.
CHAPTER XI.
THE BIBLE.
No Excuse for us. Bible worn on the Neck. Eusebius's Tes- timony. Bible committed to Memory. Primitive Custom. Cool Water from the Spring. " Let us begin again." The Embarrassed Merchant. The Bible Hawker. Fifty Cen- times. Garden of the Lord. Commit it accurately. Eight Thousand Verses a Year. Do not omit a Day. Bible in the Trunk. Ice broken. Not a Bad Idea. Sixteen Bible Clerks. Chinaman's Experience. Bible in Yucatan. Con- cordance a Help. Let your Faith be strong. A Lamp to the Feet. Suited to every Thing.
My young friends may not realize how pre- cious the word of God has been to all gen- erations who have had the opportunity to read it. We probably feel that now, when every child has a Bible, perhaps beautifully printed and bound, we have no excuse for neglecting to read the Scriptures. Is she aware how
182 BIBLE WORN ON THE NECK.
much more it depends on the state of the heart than upon the conveniences we enjoy ? Is she aware, that in the generations past, before the beautiful page of the Bible was printed, this book was read with a faithful- ness never since excelled ? I cannot forbear transcribing the testimony to their earnest love for this best of all books, and I think you will say it is none too long.
" At a time when the copies of the sacred volume were all in manuscript, and very scarce, being so dear as to be beyond the reach of many to purchase, and when multi- tudes of those who had been converted to Christianity were unacquainted with the first elements of reading, the great majority of them were conversant with the phraseology and the matter of the word of life, to a de- gree that might well put modern Christians to shame. Those of the men who could read never went abroad without carrying a Bible in their pockets, while the women wore it hanging about their necks, and by frequent- ly refreshing their memories by private pe- rusal, and drawing little groups of anxious
EUSEBIUS'S TESTIMONY. 183
listeners around them, they acquired so famil- iar an acquaintance with the " lively oracles," that there were few who could not repeat those passages that contained any thing re- markable respecting the doctrines of their faith, or the precepts of their duty. Nay, there were many who had made the rare and enviable attainment of being able to say the entire Scriptures by heart. One person is mentioned among the martyrs of Palestine, so well instructed in the sacred writings, that, when occasion offered, he could, from memory, repeat passages in any part of the Scripture, as exactly as if he had unfolded the book and read them ; a second, being un- acquainted with letters, used to invite friends and Christian strangers to his house to read to him, by which means he acquired an ex- tensive knowledge of the sacred oracles ; and another may be mentioned of whom the de- scription is so extraordinary, that we shall give it in the words of the historian, Eusebi- us, who knew him : ' Whenever he willed, he brought forth, as from a repository of sci- ence, and rehearsed, either the law of Moses,
184
BIBLE COMMITTED TO MEMORY.
or the prophets, or the historical, evangelical, and apostolical parts of Scripture. Indeed, I was struck with admiration when I first be- held him standing amidst a considerable mul- titude, and reciting certain portions of holy writ. As long as I could only hear his voice, I supposed that he was reading ; but when I came close up to him, I discovered that, em- ploying only the eyes of his mind, he uttered the divine oracles like some prophet.' Every day it was the practice for each individual to commit a portion of Scripture to memory, and for the members of a family to repeat it to each other in the evening. So much was this custom regarded as part of the ordinary business of the day, that they had a set time appointed for conning the daily lesson, — an horn* which, though every individual fixed it as suited his private convenience, was held so precious and sacred, that no secular duties, however urgent, were allowed to infringe up- on it ; and while some, who had their time at their own disposal, laid their memories under larger contributions, and never relaxed their efforts till they had completed the daily task
PRIMITIVE CUSTOM.
185
they had imposed upon themselves, others were obliged to content themselves with such shorter passages as they could learn during the intervals of labor, and amidst the distrac- tions of other cares. By all classes, however, it was considered so great an advantage, so desirable an attainment, to have the memory richly stored with the records of salvation, that, while in the lapse of time many ancient practices became obsolete, and others more suited to the taste of succeeding ages were adopted into the Church, this excellent custom still maintained its place among the venerable observances inherited from primitive times ; and the pious Christians of the first centuries would have regarded it as a sin of omission, for which they had occasion expressly to sup- plicate pardon in their evening devotions, if they were conscious of having allowed a day to pass without having added some new pearls from the Scriptures to the sacred treas- ures their memory had previously amassed."
Every one knows that the food which he has had from childhood is that which suits his health and taste; he may occasionally
.186 COOL WATER FROM THE SPRING.
vary his diet, but he soon feels that he is the loser. So he who daily reads the Scriptures will soon find, not only that they are neces- sary to him, but delightful to the spirit. There is no other reading which will not pall upon the taste, when you come to read it again and again. But the Bible, like the air of morning and like the cool water from the spring, is always fresh and pleasant. It is important to read the Scriptures daily, and I cannot too earnestly urge you to let nothing come in to prevent it. Read your Bible alone ; not here and there a chapter, but in a continuous course. Three chapters read daily, as they average, will carry you through the Bible every year ; and four daily will add the Psalms and the New Testament a second time. By accident, I lately discovered that a friend of mine, and he not a very old man, had read his Bible in course thirty-eight times through in the last eleven years. What bet- ter way could he have taken for increase in mental strength, in knowledge of God, and for growth of character ? Fifteen minutes of reading daily will carry you through the Bi-
" LET US BEGIN AGAIN." 187
ble once every year of your life. Whether the reader of the Bible be learned or illiterate, the result is the same, — he loves the book the more, the longer he reads it. During the time that Dr. Kennicott was employed in col- lating the Hebrew Scriptures (a work which occupied the last thirty years of his life), it was Mrs. Kennicott's constant office, in their daily airings, to read to him the different por- tions to which his immediate attention was called. When preparing for their ride, the day after this great work was completed, upon her asking him what book she should now take, " O," exclaimed he, " let us begin the Bible ! "
It is not merely that the Bible lights up the path of the soul beyond this life, but it now sheds a light that is like a lamp to our feet. It soothes the troubled spirit, hushes every passion of the soul, and lifts the clouds of fear and of sorrow from the heart. It is like bathing the soul in the waters of life. A dy- ing merchant leaves the following beautiful testimony of his own experience : — " Last year I became considerably embarrassed in
188 THE EMBARRASSED MERCHANT.
business. On Saturday evening I would come home, not knowing how I should meet the obligations of the following week, and with my mind so distracted, that it seemed as if the Sabbath would be worse than lost. I was then teaching a Bible-class. With sad- ness I would sit down to prepare the lesson for the next day; but as I advanced, truth took possession of my mind, faith took the place of distrust, and hope of fear. I was led almost insensibly to leave my affairs with my covenant God. And invariably I found these Sabbaths precious and delightful. And, more- over, in returning to business on Monday, a way was always provided to meet my re- sponsibilities."
We who have always had a fulness of bread, have little conception how sweet it tastes to those who have it not ; and I some- times fear that we who have had the precious word of life in our hands all our days, are unable to appreciate the greatness of the blessing. Let us look .into one of the little cottages of the poor in France, and see how a part of the Bible can turn it into a palace, by
THE BIBLE HAWKER. 189
making the soul a temple of the great God. A hawker presented himself at the door of a hut, situated on the skirts of a wood. A poor old woman opened the door to him. No sooner had he offered her a Testament, than she seized his hand with an air of gratitude, and said, —
" I thank you, I already possess this book, and have a debt to pay you."
" I have never seen you before," replied the hawker.
" I will tell you how it happened," said the woman. " Six years ago, a hawker passed this way ; he offered me this book, but I had not sufficient money to pay for it ; fifty cen- times (fivepence) was a great sum for me, and still I had a great longing to possess the book. Your friend, who observed this, said to me, ' Take it. I leave it with you ; if you have no money to pay for it, you will pay it to the first hawker who passes after me.' I accepted his offer. At first I thought' the book sufficiently expensive ; but when I be- gan to read it, I considered it cheap : I then began to put a few half-pence aside, but as I
190 GARDEN OF THE LORD.
advanced, I found in it so many beautiful things, that I added now and then a few more half-pence. I have known many unhappy hours, I have been sometimes without bread, but not for all the world would I have touched this money."
As she said this, the poor woman produced the fruit of six years' economy. It amounted to five francs, which she consigned with joy to the hawker, telling him that she did not consider that she could ever pay for the book its real value ; that to her it was worth more than a thousand francs, but that she gave all that she had.
When I urge the daily reading of the Bi- ble, I do not mean reading it as you read other books, — passing along, and letting what will impress the memory and the heart. It is a book spiritually discerned, and you need to pause often and contemplate the fields you are passing over. A few hasty glarfces are not sufficient ; you should stop before every tree, and examine every flower, and admire every ! shrub, for you are in the garden of the Lord, and every tree and plant
COMMIT IT ACCURATELY. 191
and flower was planted by the hand of your Heavenly Father. " I would recommend you," says one, " to pause at any verse of Scripture you choose, and shake, as it were, every bough of it, that, if possible, some fruit, at least, may drop down to you. Should this mode appear somewhat difficult to you at first, and no thought suggest itself immediately to your mind capable of affording matter for a short ejaculation, yet persevere, and try another and another bough. If your soul really hun- gers, the Spirit of the Lord will not send you away empty ; you shall at length find in one, and that perhaps a short, verse of Scripture, such an abundance of delicious fruit, that you will gladly seat yourself under the shade, and abide there as under a tree laden with fruit."
I cannot but urge you to commit as much of the Bible to memory as you possibly can. Be sure to commit it accurately, in the very words of the Bible. You will find in after life, in the da^ of sickness, when on journeys, when in the thronged city, when the eyes fail, when old age overtakes you, or when you
192 EIGHT THOUSAND VERSES A YEAR.
hear the Bible questioned, or its truths de- nied, or allusions or quotations made in the pulpit, — you will find that every verse which you committed to memory will be invaluable. At first it will seem a task, but begin by committing one or two verses each day, and the memory will shortly become so strong as to retain whatever you call upon it to retain. Many complain of a bad memory when they have been too indolent to task it, and have abused and slandered it, instead of trusting to its strength. Do not blame your hooks till you have hung something upon them. In a Sunday school in Southwark, one boy repeat- ed to his teacher a total of above six thousand verses of Scripture in one year. Another boy in the same school committed to memory and repeated to his teacher a total of over eight thousand verses, in one year, which formed an aggregate of one hundred and fifty verses every week. These were remarkable cases, perhaps ; but I have been surprised, in my own experience, to see how readily the memory retains the Bible, when the habit is cultivated. It seems as if its simple language
DO NOT OMIT A DAY. 193
and beautiful imagery were peculiarly adapt- ed to the memory, provided you are careful to commit it accurately. I cannot too ear- nestly insist that you give your whole, undi- vided attention to the word of God while your eyes are fixed upon it. Do not let the thoughts wander, do not allow any thing else to intrude upon you. When Patrick Henry was near the close of his life, he laid his hand on the Bible, and addressed a friend who was with him, " Here is a book worth more than all others printed, yet it is my misfortune never to have read it with proper attention until lately."
Let me urge upon you as a matter of the ut- most importance, that you daily, in all circum- stances and conditions, read a portion of your Bible, — in the hotel, the steamboat, on the visit to friends, or wherever you are. Perhaps the latter place is where you will be most in danger of neglecting it. ' You are on a visit at your acquaintance's or friend's house ; the hour of retiring arrives ; you have been accus- tomed at that hour to open the word of God. You are now engaged in conversation ; in the 13
194 BIBLE IN THE TRUNK.
review of the day and in plans for the mor- row : before you are aware, you will find you are tempted to lay your head on the pil- low, and neglect the reading. I would most fervently urge you not to do it. Most likely, the very friend on whose account you put aside your best Friend is doing the very same thing on your account.
" When I was a young man," says a clergy- man, " I was a clerk in Boston. Two of my room-mates at my boarding-house were also clerks, about my own age, which was eighteen. The first Sunday morning, during the three or four long hours that elapsed from getting up to bell-ringing for church, I felt a secret desire to get a Bible, which my mother had given me, out of my trunk, and read it ; for I had been so brought up by my parents as to regard it as a duty at home to read a chapter or two every Sunday. I was now very anxious to get my Bible and read, but I was afraid to do so before my room-mates, who were reading some miscellaneous books. At length, my conscience got the mastery, and I rose up, and went to my trunk. I had half raised
ICE BROKEN. 195
it, when the thought occurred to me that it might look like over-sanctity, and Pharisaical, so I shut my trunk, and returned to the win- dow. For twenty minutes I was miserably ill at ease. I felt I was doing wrong. I started a second time for my trunk, and I had my hand upon the little Bible, when the fear of being laughed at conquered the better emotion, and I again dropped the top of the trunk. As I turned away from it, one of my room-mates, who observed my ir- resolute movements, said laughingly, ' What 's the matter ? You seem as restless as a weath- ercock ! '
" I replied by laughing in my turn ; and then, conceiving the truth to be the best, frankly told them both what was the matter.
" To my surprise and delight, they both spoke up and averred that they both had Bibles in their trunks, and both had been se- cretly wishing to read in them, but were afraid to take them out lest I should laugh at them.
" ' Then,' said I, ' let us agree to read them every Sunday, and we shall have the laugh all on one side.'
196
NOT A BAD IDEA.
" To this there was a hearty response, and the next moment the three Bibles were out; and I assure you we felt happier all that day for reading in them that morning.
" The following Sunday, about ten o'clock, while we were each reading our chapters, two of our fellow-boarders from another room came in. "When they saw how we were engaged they stared, and then exclaimed, * Bless us ! what is all this ? A conventicle ? '
" In reply, I, smiling, related to them exactly how the matter stood ; my struggle to get my Bible from my trunk, and how we three, hav- ing found we had all been afraid of each other without cause, had now agreed to read every Sunday. * Not a bad idea,' answered one of them. i You have more courage than I have. I have a Bible, too, but have not looked into it since I have been in Boston ! But I '11 read it after this since you 've broken the ice.' The other then asked one of us to read aloud, and both sat quietly and listened till the bell rang for church. That evening, we three in the same room agreed to have a chapter read every night by one or the other
SIXTEEN BIBLE CLERKS. 197
of us at nine o'clock, and we religiously ad- hered to our purpose. A few evenings after this resolution, four or five of the boarders (for there were sixteen clerks boarding in the house) happened to be in our room talk- ing, when the nine-o'clock bell rang. One of my room-mates, looking at me, opened the Bible. The others looked inquiringly. I then explained our custom. ' We '11 all stay and listen,' they said, almost unani- mously.
" The result was, that, without an exception, every one of the sixteen clerks spent his Sab- bath morning in reading in the Bible ; and the moral effect upon our household was of the highest character. I relate this incident," concluded the clergyman, "to show what in- fluence one person, even a youth, may exert for evil or good. No man should ever be afraid to do his duty. A hundred hearts may throb to act right, that only await a leader. I forget to add, that we were all called Bible clerks ! All these youths are now useful and Christian men, and more than one is laboring in the ministry."
198 chinaman's experience.
The fact that the Bible can be understood and enjoyed only by a heart under the influ- ence of the Spirit who gave it, is a great fact, to be remembered. You cannot relish read- ing it if the mind is given up to lightness, frivolity, and worldly pleasures. A Chinaman who had learned to read the Bible, being in- quired of how he liked the book, returned it, saying, " I like the book better than the book like me." As fast, therefore, as you can bring your mind and heart into conformity with the spirit of this blessed book, the higher will be your enjoyments and the greater your profit in its study. We sometimes read of the effects of a single copy of the word of God, and see what wonderful power it has in particular cases, thus showing us what power it would always have were there not some particular thing to prevent it. Take, for example, the following, and try to answer the question why every Bible does not have as great an influence, and especially why not as great upon your soul. A Roman Catho- lic priest lived in Yucatan, about the end of the last century, and near to the British settle-
BIBLE IN YUCATAN. 199
ment, who was in the habit of preaching from a Spanish Bible, which somehow had fallen into his possession. He was forbidden to do so, but persevered, and was cast into prison, where he was left to die. His old house- keeper got his Bible, and read from it to the villagers and young people who assembled around her on the feast days of the Church. She not only instructed them, but was often sent for by the dying. The Bible was left- to a young woman who was the pupil of this housekeeper, and who, with others, when ad- vanced in life, came seeking books from Mr. Henderson in Balize. Discovering an in- structed mind and unusual regard for the Scriptures, inquiry was made, and the pre- ceding facts came into explanation. Here was a Bible passing through three genera- tions and blessing each ; and yet for fifty years the good it had done was unknown be- yond its immediate hearers !
Should every copy of the word of God perform such a mission, how rapidly would the face of the world be altered! Should your copy have a like power over your soul,
200 CONCORDANCE A HELP.
how soon would it assimilate your will and heart and soul to the character of God !
It would be very convenient for you to have a small Concordance with your Bible, — since no Scripture is of private interpretation, and must be explained one Scripture by an- other. Sometimes a Bible Dictionary is a great help. But of all aids to the under- standing of the Scriptures, the references and the Concordance are the best.
Allow me to urge one thing more with all the fervency of my soul. I mean, take the Bible as God's word, — inspired, unerring, the standard of appeal, and the end of all in- quiry. What you there find revealed, receive as God's truth. It may be you cannot ex- plain it, or understand it fully, but you can believe it. If there be any one point at which I would have you set a special guard, it is the point of receiving the Bible as all inspired. Only on this ground can you rest in your faith, so that no quibbling, no bold- ness, no strong hand, can shake it; only on this can you rest your hopes, so that no mind shall shake them, no darkness obscure them.
A LAMP TO THE FEET. 201
If your Bible be not God's inspired word, it is the mightiest imposition ever laid upon the world. But if it be, receive it, read it, believe it, and take all the comfort in its teachings, hopes, promises, and invitations which your young heart, already conscious of sin, so much needs. If you are young, full of life, health, and hope, it will teach you the true and the real value of these things, and show you how you may enjoy them most and use them so as to make the most of them ; if you come to the place where your hopes are clouded, and your prospects are cut off, it opens to you a hiding-place where the storm cannot come, and where you will feel that you have near you a heart to sympathize with every sorrow. It is a lamp to the feet till the day dawn and the day-star arise in your heart. Let no day pass without your learning something more than you knew out of this book of wisdom; without drawing fresh water out of this ever-gushing fountain ; without your obtaining light that is new, faith that is stronger, hopes that are fresher, and zeal that is purer.
202
SUITED TO EVERY THING.
Read the Scriptures for history, — the old- est and truest ever written ; for morality, — the purest ever presented for practice ; for information, — with which, once obtained, no one can ever be an ignorant man ; for con- firmation, — that Faith may stand on the Rock of Ages; for sanctification, — that you may become fitted for heaven ; for consola- tion, — when sorrow and disappointment over- take you ; and, lastly, for companionship, — because she who loves her Bible need never be lonely, never cheerless, never discouraged. The pure light of heaven surrounds her, and everlasting strength is embracing her.
CHAPTER XII.
THE TRUE POSITION OF WOMAN.
The JEolian Harp. Golden Links in the Chain of Life. Kough Diamond polished. Her True Position. They make us. New Stars. Man cannot do it. Her Perfect Love. Gray's Filial Love. Home-loving Queen. Where Aristoc- racy begins. Light of the Household. To save rather than earn. Keal Friendship. A Great Mistake. The Noble Woman. Another Woman's Heart. The Pleasant Surprise. Soft Star of Love. Honor to Old Age. Pecu- liar Protection. Eights of Women. Five Sisters. A Lit- tle " Laming." Mrs. Kennicott. Woman appreciated.
Whatever be the end for which we train up character, it has been made plain, I trust, that it needs much faithful training. We sometimes hear of a character that breaks out upon the world without much discipline, that is great and symmetrical : so the iEolian harp may now and then throw out notes of sur-
204 GOLDEN LINKS IN THE CHAIN OF LIFE.
passing tone, and that vibrate strongly upon the heart; but is that instrument, after all, to be compared to the well-tuned piano, on which both science and skill have exhausted their efforts ?
It is sometimes said that our daughters are better educated than our sons, — especially, if the sons do not obtain a classical educa- tion; that almost universally, a girl of the same standing, and in the same family, is better educated than her brothers, and that when she marries, she is often thought to be stooping, and to be uniting herself to a man whose education is inferior to her own. Now, two things are to be considered ; first, that a part of her apparent education is mere tinsel, and will wear off shortly, while he has no tinsel. We all can think of ladies, who, in their school days, could draw, paint, play, or sing, and these gave them prominence then ; but amid the cares and anxieties and constant demands of life, they have had no time or taste to keep bright these golden links of the chain of life. Show us the married lady who does not prefer her beautiful children to any drawing of the
ROUGH DIAMOND POLISHED. 205
human head, and the flowers of her nursery to any bouquet that can be painted in water- colors. And how seldom does a married lady of forty or of fifty excel on the piano ? On the contrary, that young man who seemed so awkward, and so unrefined, begins his educa- tion now. He is at the head of a family, has to plan to support it, has to see all sorts of people, and his whole life is a continued edu- cation ; so that by the time that he is forty or fifty years old, you find him manly, intelligent, shrewd, and in the possession of real char- acter. You wonder how it is that he is so much more than he promised, on setting out in life, to become. His education, of neces- sity, continues, while the woman's in a great measure stops. At starting in life, we often wonder at her superiority. At forty-five, we wonder at his, — often, certainly. The reason is plain. He must improve by contact with the world. The rough diamond is rolled against others till it must receive a polish, while she is so absorbed in the cares of her family, that her education, as such, seems to stop.
206 HER TRUE POSITION.
If these views are correct, then the inference is unavoidable, that the daughter at starting in life ought to be better educated than her brother or husband. She ought to have more capital laid up, for she will be called upon to use it more constantly, without having so good an opportunity to increase it as he has. I cannot sympathize with the cry that is often raised, that our daughters are better educated than our sons. I doubt whether it be true, unless you call polish education, and then it is true. But the wear and tear of life is un- equal upon the two sexes, and we need have no great fear that she will get too much the start of her more slowly developed brother.
And this leads me to the true position of woman. On this point it would be very easy to say some very smart things, to ridicule some very ancient notions, to admire some very modern theories, to laugh at pretension, and to scold outrageously at what is called old prejudices.
I do not assert that woman, even in Chris- tian society, of which only I am speaking, has found her true position. I do not say that
THEY MAKE US. 207
her voice has not hitherto been too much con- fined within doors, — that she may not do far more than she ever has done by teaching and authorship. I believe she will ; and I yield to no one in my estimate of her power in the world, or in the belief that, under the light of the Bible, her influence in the world is not less than that of the other sex. But from her very constitution and nature, from her peculiar sensibilities and tenderness, it seems to me that the great mission of woman is to take the world — the whole world — in its very infancy, when most pliable and most suscep- tible, and lay the foundations of human char- acter. Human character, in all its interests and relations and destinies, is committed to woman, and she can make it, shape it, mould it, and stamp it just as she pleases. There is no other period of life when character is formed so decidedly and so permanently as during childhood. I maintain that we are just what the ladies have made us to be. If they want us to be wiser, more discreet, more ami- able, more lofty, or more humble, why do they not make us so ? There is no earthly being
208 NEW STARS.
whom the boy or the man reverences so much as his mother, and why does not she make him right ? And I care not to look the man in the face who is not afraid of his wife when he is doing wrong !
The professions of men are many ; we are lawyers, physicians, clergymen, mechanics, manufacturers, politicians : the profession of woman is that of being the educator of the human race, the former of human character. By the very arrangements of his providence, God has made it so, and to refuse to believe it, or to throw off this responsibility, is as unwise as it is wicked.
If, now, any one should say that this is a small profession, or a low duty, I reply, that it is more lofty and more responsible than if it were assigned you to lay the foundations of so many suns to shine in the heavens for a few ages ; it is taking what is immortal at its very setting out, and deciding what path it shall tread, what character it shall bear, and what destiny it shall obtain. You are decid- ing, during the first few years of its training, whether the new star shall travel and shine
- MAN CANNOT DO IT. 209
through the bright heavens, mingling its light with that of glorious constellations, or whether it shall be quenched shortly, and be lost in darkness and forgetfulness.
God seems to say, " I cannot commit in- terests so precious, so vast, to man, who must be out on the rough ocean of life, struggling to support his children, where he must do battle with the elements, with the troubled sea, with avarice and dishonesty, and his time and thoughts must be so occupied that he cannot be in the place at all times, to form and mould and start the human family in their eternal race of being." Man is too hur- ried, too much absorbed, too rough, too im- patient, too unsusceptible, and too tyrannical for this office ; and so Infinite Goodness and Wisdom pillows the head of infancy on woman's breast, where it can hear the beating of a heart so full of patient tenderness, and of gentleness, purity, and love, that infancy and childhood instinctively go to her as the best friend, the wisest teacher, and the most faith- ful guardian. " It is the part of woman, like her own beautiful planet, to cheer the dawn 14
210 HER PERFECT LOVE.
and darkness, — to be both the morning and the evening star of life. The light of her eye is the first to rise and the last to set upon manhood's day of trial and suffering." I do not believe that in this wide world the angel in the sun can see a sight so beautiful as that of a family of children nestling round their mother, as she kindly bends her ears to their little sorrows and joys, fears and hopes. The storm without may rock their dwelling, the great forest may groan and crash, the mighty ocean may madden and foam, — they care not, fear not, for their mother is with them ! If sickness comes upon them, they take any thing from her hand confidently, knowing that she will do all in perfect love. The father may be kind and indulgent, — they can fear and reverence him ; but to their mother they tell their temptations, their weaknesses.
" My father blessed me fervently, Yet did not much complain ; But sorely will my mother sigh Till I come back again."
The tears which fall over the grave of a fa- ther are sincere and agonizing, but they do
GRiY's filial love. 211
not scald like the burning drops shed over the ashes of a mother. Gray, the poet, who was a model of filial love, " seldom mentioned his mother without a sigh. After his death her gowns and wearing-apparel were found in a trunk in his apartments just as she had left them ; it seemed as if he could never take the resolution to open it, in order to distribute them to his female relations, to whom, by his will, he bequeathed them. To one of his cor- respondents, he says : —
" ' Your letter informed me that your mother was recovered, otherwise I had then wrote to you only to beg you would take care of her, and to inform you that I had discovered a thing very little known, which is, that in one's whole life one can never have more than a single mother. You may think it obvious, and what you call a trite observation. You are a green gosling ! I was at the same age (very near) as wise as you, and yet I never • discovered this (with full evidence and con- viction I mean) till it was too late. It is thirteen years ago, and seems but as yester- day, and every day I live it sinks deeper into my heart.' "
212 HOME-LOVING QUEEN.
Unhesitatingly I put it to the world at the present moment, when the British nation looms up so great, so rich, so strong, and so mighty, if she, the glorious queen so ad- mired and honored beyond any queen that ever sat on the throne, — if she, the home- loving Victoria, is not admired most of all, and beyond all, as a true and faithful mother? There is no jewel in her crown that shines so bright as that domestic love. She is on a high throne, and around her stand a galaxy of warriors and statesmen, and the drum- beat of her armies hails the sun the world round; but, above it all, she rises up the ad- miration of her generation, because she oc- cupies a position for woman higher than that of a queen, — that of an untiring, loving mother! To watch over the education and the training of the immortal minds that God has committed to her in the dearest relation- ship, is the highest responsibility and honor of woman. You see, therefore, why I desire the education of woman in the highest, largest sense.
I would have her so educated that she can
:
WHERE ARISTOCRACY BEGINS. 213
comprehend the Divine Wisdom in the ar- rangements of this world and in the distribu- tion of our lots ; so educated that she can see afar and judge what effects will follow such and such causes, — that she can rightly judge as to what and when and how she shall teach, and discipline and guide the hu- man family, as they are committed to her. No narrow views are wanted here, no darkened understanding. The world has been, and is, and will be, just what woman makes it. So- ciety is what she makes it. We men have nothing to do with aristocracy or the distinc- tions in society. We talk and walk and shake hands with men of all classes and con- ditions. It is the drawing-room that decides all the distinctions of society ; there the circle is drawn, and there, if anywhere, aristocracy begins. Every woman determines for herself with whom she will or will not associate, and what shall or shall not be respectable. Woman decides what we shall eat and drink, what our furniture and associates shall be, what our homes and society shall be, what our children shall become in this world
214 LIGHT OF THE HOUSEHOLD.
and the next. If she has deep sorrows, she has fresh joys. If she must go down almost to the grave during the pilgrimage, she brings up priceless jewels in which her heart may rejoice to all eternity ! Do not then feel that woman does not need an education of the highest kind and degree possible, — that any care or expense in her training is lost. Can- not all bear witness to the truth of this beau- tiful testimony ? — "I believe no one, who has not tried, can estimate the amount of influ- ence which one loving, unselfish spirit can exercise in a household. If a cold and gloomy temper can shed its baneful influence round, making all who come within its shadow cold and gloomy, so much more, blessed be God, shall the spirit of Christian love diffuse and spread itself over the hearts around, till it has moulded them, in some degree, to its own image, and taught them to seek for them- selves that renewing spirit whose fruit is seen to be love and joy and peace." Woman is to hold the wires that are to make the world advance or move backwards. She is to stand at the head-waters and send out the
TO SAVE RATHER THAN EARN. 215
streams that are to make glad the cities of our God.
Should fashion or folly, or a desire to make experiments, ever thrust woman out of the beautiful sphere in which God hath placed her, the other sex will not suffer so much as she herself will. It does not seem to me to be the design of God, as the general lot of woman, that she should wrestle with the out- of-door occupations, grapple with business, or that her province is so much to earn as to save. No father or husband can be prospered or respected or happy, unless her department of home is well cared for. It is a far greater blessing to have her save five hundred dollars in rightly managing the domestic concerns, than to earn twice that sum by neglecting them. And as to the comfort, and the joys of the human heart, nothing but her mild, constant, and sweet influence in the family circle can ever bestow them.
" Woman is the heart, of the family, If man 's the head,"
and the head is of no value without the heart to influence it. Every man feels that, when
216 REAL FRIENDSHIP.
he selects a wife, he wants a pure, warm, and noble heart. No other gifts will compensate for the want of this. " A coquette is a rose from which every lover picks a leaf ; the thorns are reserved for her future husband."
Some females seem to feel that in their sphere they cannot be and shall not be suffi- ciently honored. But to whom do we go with the deepest sorrows of the heart, and where do we find the truest, purest, and most unself- ish friendship ? When upon the dreary path of the life of the distressed, there breaks in the sparkle of stars, from whom do they come ? " I remember, some years ago," says Mr. Jay, " to have buried a corpse. In the extremity of the audience that surrounded me, I dis- covered a female wrinkled with age, and bending with weakness. One hand held a motherless grandchild, the other wiped her tears with the corner of her woollen apron. I pressed towards her when the service was closed, and said, ' Have you lost a friend ? ' She heaved a melancholy sigh. ' The Lord bless her memory ! ' I soon found that the deceased had allowed her for several years
A GREAT MISTAKE. 217
sixpence per week. O, is it possible the ap- propriation of a sum so inconsiderable may cause a widow's heart to sing for joy, and save the child of the needy ! "
It is a great mistake to suppose that it is the great speech in the Senate, or the influ- ence of high offices, or the glare of a great public character, that makes this world happy. All that wealth ever cast into the treasury of the Lord will never have so much influence upon the moral welfare of our race, as will the two mites cast in by the poor widow. You admire a great character and the daring achievement ; but it is such deeds as the fol- lowing that sink down into the human heart and make us better. It is like a light burst- ing out when we are surrounded with dark- ness, and know not where to turn.
Some time in the year 1839, there arrived in the city of Schenectady an interesting young girl, about eighteen years of age. She was an utter stranger, but soon obtained employ- ment for a few weeks as an assistant nurse. After this temporary employment ceased, she fortunately presented herself to a merchant-
218 THE NOBLE WOMAN.
tailor of character, who kindly gave her em- ployment and instruction, and after a short time she was received into his family. Soon she became expert with her needle, which not only gave her support, but enabled her to dress genteelly, having such a fund of good sense as to avoid all extra finery, yet always appearing neat and in good taste.
In 1842, she accidentally secured a home with a married lady with two children, a son and a daughter aged eight and ten years, whose husband and father had deserted and left them to such provision as none but a wife's and mother's resources could procure. Whilst in this deserted family, the heart-broken wife sickened and died. The mother, when dying, gave a heart-rending farewell to her two chil- dren. And this noble stranger-girl, weeping by the death-bed, assured the dying mother that she would be a mother to her children. This assurance calmed the last death-agony of a fond mother who died. The young stranger- girl took the two children, hired a room, dili- gently plied her needle, paid the rent, contin- ued her neat and modest appearance, fed and
ANOTHER WOMAN'S HEART. 219
dressed the boy and girl handsomely and ap- propriately, sent them to a well-selected school taught by a lady, who, much to her praise, declined remuneration. Another woman's heart !
Now, reader, you ask, Who is this young female ? The writer will not tell you, but, to gratify the feeling excited by this narrative, I will tell you a little of her history. Her parents, in good circumstances, reside in the Upper Province of Canada. She was wooed by a worthy young man, whose affections were fully reciprocated, as ardently and as purely as woman loves. But the father, an Englishman, opposed the connection with all the determination of an Englishman. She was sent into " the States," to a farmer uncle, to avoid further intercourse between the lov- ers. At this uncle's, contrary to her habits, she was duly appointed milkmaid. At this the young girl revolted, and left, determined to depend upon her own resources. She ar- rived at Schenectady, where she has lived till now, — living above charity, solely upon her own energetic labor, with the additional
220 THE PLEASANT SURPRISE.
charge of two interesting orphans. This spring she wrote to her mother, apprising her of her intention of visiting her home, — the home of her childhood and childhood's mirth, and the home, too, of her maiden trials and sorrows. To her astonishment, surprise, and gratification, the first response to that letter was the presence of her father, who upon the receipt of it left for Schenectady, that he might the more safely conduct his long absent daughter to her early home and her fond mother. But mark ! with a predetermined purpose and high-souled magnanimity, she says, " Father, I will go ; but these " (pre- senting the orphans) " are my children ; they go where I go." The father, not to be out- done, replied, " Yes^ C, come home, my daughter, and take with you your adopted children ; there is a welcome and a double welcome, and room for you and yours."
They left for Canada, flooded with tears, — tears for parting from the stranger's friends ; tears for a happy uniting of parent and child ; tears for a parent's free, frank permission to come to a better home, offered to a wander-
HONOR TO OLD AGE. 221
ing daughter, with two adopted children ! O, what a lesson !
God has made woman's heart ; and the thing which that heart longs for, beyond all things, is not greatness, nor splendor, but to be beloved. And God has given to her those fine sensibilities, that quick perception of what is lovely, and ten thousand opportuni- ties to cause the lips around her to bless her. Opportunities which the other sex would overlook are every day opened to her, by which to make a good deed shine like the soft star of love. " Two years ago," says a lady, in the Ohio State Journal, " I made a jour- ney to New England, accompanied by my husband; also my father-in-law, an old man of fourscore years. I have often seen that good old man offer his seat to some hale wo- man of half or less than half his age, and seen her accept it as if it were a right, without even a passing notice of his gray hairs, or the right of years, that entitled him to her kind- ness and attention. Once, and only once, a lady of queenly grace and beauty sprang from her seat as we entered, and, with a voice
222 PECULIAR PROTECTION.
that was musical in every tone, said, ' Father, take this arm-chair ! ' How my heart sprung to her goodness ! Such has been our idea of a lady, — which is synonymous with a true woman."
It is also to be borne in mind, that woman can do what men cannot, can go where they cannot, surrounded by that protection which is always thrown around the sex, and which shields them from opposition. When Han- nah More was riding twenty miles to estab- lish schools for poor children, among a popu- lation so degraded that in one village they found but one Bible, and that was used to prop up a flower-pot, and in a school of one hundred and eight there were not any boys or girls, of any size, whom she asked, who could tell her who made them. John Newton writes thus : " If a prudent minister should attempt such an extensive inroad into the kingdom of darkness, he might expect such opposi- tion as few could withstand. But your sex and your character afford you a peculiar pro- tection. They who would try to trample one of us into the dust, would be ashamed openly
RIGHTS OF WOMEN. 223
to oppose you. I say openly; I believe you do not expect they will thank you, much less
assist you Fear not, my dear ladies,
all the praying souls upon earth, all the saints in glory, all the angels of the Lord, and the Lord of angels himself, are with you."
When we hear so much said about the rights of women, as if the stern sex were combined against them to keep them depressed and shut away from all that is ennobling, it seems strange that such a mind as I have referred to above did not make the discovery, and with her powerful pen break down those mighty barriers which men have thrown around the feebler sex. I cannot allow myself to pass by a short quotation from her own words: — " I have been much pestered to read ' The Rights of Women,' but am invincibly resolved not to do it. Of all jargon, I hate metaphysical jargon; besides, there is something fantastic and absurd in the very title. How many ways there are of being ridiculous ! I am sure I have as much liberty as I can make a good use of, now I am an old maid ; and when I was a young one, 1 had, I dare say,
224 FIVE SISTERS.
more than was good for me. If I .were still young, perhaps I should not make this con- fession ; but so many women are fond of gov- ernment, I suppose, because they are not fit for it.".
And while I am so near Hannah More, I cannot but advert to the beautiful fact, that women have more rights, and their sphere is larger, than is commonly supposed. How those five sisters lived together in unity and love, using their individual and combined tal- ents to support themselves and to do good, eac]^ and all in their spheres, like five sister stars, sending out their individual and com- bined light, till one after the other they sank beneath the horizon, each and all still leav- ing a soft, but strong, light behind them! Hear Patty's account of her childlike inter- view with the great Dr. Johnson : — " With all the same ease, familiarity, and confidence we should have done had only our dear Dr. Stonehouse been present, we entered upon the history of our birth, parentage, and educa- tion ; showing how we were born with more desires than guineas, and how, as years in-
A LITTLE ;c LARNING." 225
creased our appetites, the cupboard at home became too small to gratify them ; and how, with a bottle of water, a bed, and a blanket, we set out to seek our fortunes ; and how we found a great house, with nothing in it, and how it was like to remain so, till, looking into our knowledge-boxes, we happened to find a little laming, a good thing when land is gone, or rather has never come ; so at last, by giving a little of this laming to those who had less, we got a good store of gold in return ; but how, alas ! we wanted the wit to keep it. ' I love you both! ' cried the inamorato, ' I love you all five ! I never was in Bristol : I will come on purpose. What ! five women live happily to- gether ! I will come and see you. I have spent a happy evening. I am glad I came. God for ever bless you! You live lives to shame duchesses ! ' He took his leave with so much warmth and tenderness, we were quite affected at his manner."
You will recollect the name of Mrs. Kenni-
cott, already mentioned. She will ever be an
example to those who are ready " to make all
duty sweet." She devoted her life to assist-
15
226 MRS. KENNICOTT.
ing her husband in collating the Hebrew Scriptures. It was said of her, that she " prob- ably lengthened her husband's life by her at- tentions, and certainly gladdened it by her prudence, her understanding, and her gentle- ness. And it is her peculiar praise, that she took the pains to acquire Hebrew for the sole purpose of qualifying herself for correcting the printing of her husband's great work. From this knowledge she could derive neither pleas- ure nor fame. Her only desire in this labor was to be useful to her husband. And is not her " record on high " as really as the labors of Dr. Kennicott, so well appreciated by the learned ? " The meek and quiet spirit," who with a feeble hand lightens the burden of a weary father, a toil-worn mother, or encour- ages a sister, shall not fail of her reward.
If, now, there are those who hold woman in low estimation, they are exceptions to the great body of the intelligent and the best men of our age. There have been times in the history of the world, when woman was more toasted, in the manner of chivalry, when knights and warriors were eager to break each
WOMAN APPRECIATED. 227
other's heads and cut one another's throats to show their admiration, yet I doubt whether there was ever a time when she was held in truer estimation, or more appropriately re- garded, than at the present time. You may be assured that all the rights which she can ever need or exercise for her own good will be hers, if they are not already hers. There will be no need of fear lest you are denied all that is needed to make your sex the ornament of our homes, the ministers of mercy for our race, and the benefactors and educators, cheerfully acknowledged as such by all whose regard you would esteem of any value. The great Redeemer placed the sex in their true position when he treated woman as his best friend, and held up her example for the imita- tion of all future time.
CHAPTER XIII.
«
THE DAUGHTER AT HOME.
Pleasant Anticipations. " The Last." Joy awaiting you. Responsibility before you. Minute by Minute. Poor Housekeeping. Knowledge useless. No Regular Time for Study. A Part of your Discipline. " Twitting upon Facts." Help your Mother. Household Duties. Apologize for Nothing. Sit still but an Hour. Afternoon Occupations. Franklin's Courtesy. Form a Library. Busy and quiet. Mazes of Fractions. Never-failing Cheerfulness. Service to your Father. Home Field first. Woman's Way opened. Joy in the Evening. Chariot- Wheels dragging. Melody of Heaven. A Rod or a Crown. Uses of Sorrow. Ready to work. Life's Harvest.
However happy our daughters may be at school, we desire them to feel that the hap- piest place is at home; and if ever we are disposed to envy a young lady, it is when, having faithfully improved her school days, she anticipates her return to her family. She
"the last." 229
feels that she will then be, not free from du- ties, but at liberty to do them in her own time and way. One of the trials of school life must unavoidably be its monotony, and from this she will soon be relieved. Soon she will be beyond the call of the imperious bell. To be sure, there is the sadness we al- ways feel when we come to the last of any stage of life. Wherever you turn, you see written the solemn words, "the last." The last recitation will bring some regrets, the last meal in the accustomed seat will be very still, the last time you kneel at the school altar you will rise in tears, and no sorrow you meet in life will be more real than the last parting with teachers, schoolmates, and even the study hall. You rejoice in the thought that you will come back for a visit, and you do not wonder that the student clings so strongly to Alma Mater. Yet were it not for these tear-drops, so bright a rainbow could not hang over you. If you have not wasted the hours that Memory now makes so pleas- ant, if you go home with all the discipline of mind your parents have desired, if you be-
230 JOY AWAITING YOU.
lieve that the reasonable expectations of your friends are not to be disappointed, you may leave with a light heart ; for your past is cheer- ful, and your future will never be more hope- ful. I cannot describe, but can you not look into your home, and see the joy that is await- ing your arrival ? Has not your father deferred many little schemes of pleasure for the fam- ily that you may enjoy them ? Has not your mother, almost as impatient as you, counted the days before she may expect you to be her daily comfort? Her child is now to be a trusted friend and helper. Your brother has planned for you a famous fishing-excursion, and your sisters have arranged your cham- ber, and all that thoughtful love can devise to make that room pleasant will be done. Even, in your honor, the little one of the flock is saving his playthings to show to you. The flowers now blossoming in the garden will beautify the parlor, and ere they wither you will be there. No wonder you are glad. No wonder you long for the time to come.
You probably go, determined to prove your gratitude to your parents for all the expense
RESPONSIBILITY BEFORE YOU. 231
and anxiety they have bestowed upon yon, yet, unless you are very watchful, you will unintentionally waste the next few years, — years whose influence will be felt by you to all eternity. Of all the responsibilities which lie before you in life, you have' scarcely thought, and soon, whether ready or not, you must meet them.
If now — for I have opportunity for but a very few hints — I can help you to realize the importance of improving your time wise- ly, and enjoying the opportunities which will slip by you so quickly, — if I can suggest any duties you may be likely to forget or neglect, — I shall rejoice more than you. Jeremy Taylor's beautiful illustration of the value of time may not be out of the way here, for never can it be more valuable to you than now : — "It is very remarkable that God, who giveth plenteously to all creatures, that scattereth the firmament with stars, as a man sows corn in his fields, in a multitude bigger than the capacities of human order ; he hath made so much variety of creatures, and gives us great choice of meats and drinks, although
232 MINUTE BY MINUTE.
any one of both kinds would have served our needs ; and so in all instances of nature, — yet in the distribution of our time, God seems to be straight-handed, and gives it to us, not as nature gives us rivers enough to drown us, but drop by drop, minute after minute ; so that we can never have two minutes together, but he takes away one when he gives us an- other. This should teach us to value our time, since God so values itv and by his so small dis- tribution of it tells us it is the most precious thing we have." The reason why your time is now especially a great treasure is, that now is the time for you to learn many things es- sential to your welfare in life. This is the time for your professional studies.
In the last chapter I endeavored to define woman's true position, and can you conscien- tiously say that you are fitted for it? Are there not many home duties of which you hardly know the existence, and which you must of necessity neglect while away from home ? Housewifery, that ancient but most honorable occupation, which Mother Eve first taught her daughters, is, I presume, almost an
POOR HOUSEKEEPING.
233
unknown science to you. You may not be to blame if you cannot now make biscuit like your mother ; but if at the end of six months you still boast of your ignorance, you may be sure you will fall in the estima- tion of sensible people. Your indigestible bread, muddy coffee, and burnt chickens, may make many a joke now, but it is wit of which you will soon weary. By your careful industry and consequent success, make your failures matters of tradition in the family.
In consequence of your long absence, you have never been able to acquire domestic habits, — habits which are to increase your happiness through life. This you now desire to do. It will seem a new and difficult branch of your education, and many trials will arise, none the less real, because small. These un- looked for annoyances may fret you, as the hunter is more troubled by the mosquitoes and gnats than by all his other hardships. Perhaps if you think of some of these now, you will be more resolute and cheerful in meeting them.
(1.) You will soon feel that all the knowl-
234 KNOWLEDGE USELESS.
edge acquired during these years of hard study- is useless. Chemistry does not teach you the secret of good bread-making ; geometry will not fit a dress ; nor can you, by the aid of mental philosophy, attain the art of making people do as you think best. All this may be true, yet if you have gained the full ad- vantage of these studies, you have acquired self-control and the power of fastening the mind to any subject.
(2.) You will feel that all your hard-earned treasure is slipping away from you. The algebra, now so familiar, will soon seem to glide from your memory, and the binomial theorem will be even harder to retain than to acquire. You can, however, by a little care, at- any time recall this knowledge, and though you thought it forgotten, it will be wonder- fully familiar, as the old painters had the power of bringing back to ancient pictures the freshness of beauty.
(3.) You will be disappointed in your plans for regular study and self-improvement. You have become accustomed and attached to the systematic division of time, and if you desire
NO REGULAR TIME FOR STUDY. 235
to continue your education, you will doubtless endeavor to have a regular system for intel- lectual labor. But you will soon be discour- aged by frequent interruptions. Your mother will have the first claim upon you, and indeed every member in the family will expect to call upon you for little favors constantly. You will find that you cannot command the same hour, or indeed any hour, for close study. And if your household duties are removed by the power of wealth, still your friends and family will claim most of your time. Very few can, and still fewer will, adhere to any system of study at home.
If you wish to improve in any particular branch, music or any of the languages, you had better, if possible, take lessons regularly from a teacher ; for the necessity of being prepared to meet your instructor will always be a satisfactory reason for devoting a part of your time to study. Many of our most accomplished ladies have improved in this way exceedingly after leaving school. If you study alone, you must consider it as a part of your discipline to snatch a little time here
236 " TWITTING UPON FACTS."
and there, and perhaps in this, more than in any other way, you may learn the secret of making every moment do the most for you. But remember that your education may be going on, though the dust may be daily gath- ering on your favorite authors. Be careful that nothing interferes with your regular read- ing. Secure an hour every day ; and this you can have before breakfast, if you will only be resolute in fighting your most easily over- coming enemy, — Indolence.
(4.) You will find daily, unexpected vexa- tions. Perhaps nowhere is the temper tried so severely as in one's own family. At school and in travelling, the presence of others is always a considerable restraint, and very few strangers will deal in the honest and often unpleasant truths which " candid " friends deal out so unsparingly. Away from home, your faults are not so well known, your weak- nesses are not commented upon in your pres- ence ; your motives are not weighed and found wanting, when you have not yet yourself analyzed them. The common habit of " twit- ting upon facts," as far as I know, never re-
HELP YOUR MOTHER. 237
suits in good, and often creates lasting family unhappiness. You had gained a standing at school, and commanded a degree of respect; it will be a little hard to be treated as a child by children.
But 1 cannot think you will spend much time in considering your possible trials com- pared with your certain duties. These can- not be definitely enumerated, for they will varv with the circumstances of each individ- ual. A few will fall to almost all. Does not your own heart suggest to you the first, near- est duty in the family circle, — your obliga- tion to be a comfort to your mother, — to try to repay her, in some measure, for her un- ceasing watchfulness and love ? Has she not changed somewhat since your first remem- brance of her ? Has not her face deeper wrinkles, more gray hairs ; is her form as erect as ever? If Time has done this, he shows that her burdens should grow easier; she has borne them long. If anxiety has worn upon her, though the cause may be removed, the scar of the arrow will still re- main. Do all you can to help her. The
238 HOUSEHOLD DUTIES.
time may soon come when you shall have done all you ever may for her ; then, when love and duty are alike powerless, you will not regret one labor of love, one deed or Word of sympathy, one act of devotion to her. Take this upon the word of one who, in looking back upon his life, finds one of his brightest memories the love and care he was permitted to bestow upon his mother, though, alas! she was unconscious of this love. I am sure you will try to relieve your mother's cares as far as possible. If you be- long to the class who are not ashamed to recognize the Divine law which commands us to labor with our own hands, — if you feel that, while our Master says, " My Father worketh hitherto and I work," it is presumptuous not to labor with your own hands, as well as your minds and souls, — you will not wonder that I allude briefly to your minor household duties. Every morning consider the duties of the day, and let one be to assist your mother in all that she does towards breakfast. How much you shall do, your circumstances will determine ; but whatever your mother is
APOLOGIZE FOR NOTHING. 239
accustomed to do as her share, will not be too much for you. At any rate, to see that every thing is in order, that nothing is forgotten, is a charge that you cannot hire ; and if, after the morning meal, you wash the china and silver, you will gain much credit if you do it creditably.
Let me caution you not to be ashamed of any manual labor you may think best to per- form. To wash glasses is as ladylike as to listen at an evening concert to their musical ringing. It is as honorable to prepare a din- ner as to preside at one ; and the power of making pies is surely as desirable as that of eating them. Every morning you will find much to be done in your own chamber. Here you cannot be too particular. Your rule should be, that it shall be in such order, that at any time your intimate friends may enter it, and you will need to apologize for nothing. And let it be your pride that you do it all yourself.
All the aid you can give throughout the morning, (and now I am speaking of the New England fashion of dining in the middle of
240 SIT STILL ONLY AN HOUR.
the day,) you will not withhold. You * will be quick to anticipate any regular " chores," as our grandmothers used to call them, which will be each a sensible relief to your mother. You will be ready to help in the sewing ; and you will not shrink from the planning, the " cutting-out," the altering, which every house- wife says is the most tedious part of needle- work. Watch carefully to detect any latent taste or talent you may have for dress-making and millinery. You will find it more availa- ble than the most delicate flower-painting or wax-work.
Do not spend all your strength on any one labor. Change frequently, and especially, in sewing, be sure never to sit more than an hour. Jump up then for a few moments, ar- range flowers for the vases, practise a song, dust a parlor, — any thing to change your position, to relax your muscles and straighten your spine. This is very important. For when you are tired with one duty, you will find that you are quite fresh for another. Here let me advise you, in health you should never indulge in a day-time nap. If you find by
AFTERNOON OCCUPATIONS. 241
persisting in early rising you are not rested, that your strength is gone before the day goes, retire earlier and earlier, till you find you have sufficient sleep. At any rate, do not rob the night to do your daylight duties. The duty after ten o'clock in the evening is to sleep, and very seldom ought any thing to infringe upon this. You will find that, if you faithfully perform the morning employments, your afternoons will be free. In the country, and everywhere except in our largest cities, this is the time for visiting and shopping. Your first duty after dinner will be to dress, either to see your friends or to go out; and then you will be ready to " follow your ain gate." Should any emergency arise in the family cares, and should you be obliged to receive company after dinner in your morning dress, which, if you are a true lady, will be whole and neat, however cheap and plain, you will not detain your friends till you can hastily and carelessly " don your best array " ; neither will you weary them with explana- tions. They come to see you, not your silk dress and silk apron. On this point I think 16
242 franklin's courtesy.
King Charles's rule is excellent, " Never to make an apology or excuse till one is ac- cused."
" Making calls " I regard one of the duties a young lady owes to society. Let them be frequent, short, and friendly. Especially be ready to call promptly upon strangers. You have realized how pleasant it is when away from home to receive courtesies ; be not for- getful to be as kind. In a letter to Rev. George Whitefield, Franklin says : " For my own part, when I am employed in serving others, I do not look upon myself as conferring fa- vors, but as paying debts. In my travels, and since my settlement, I have received much kindness from men to whom I shall never have any opportunity of making the least direct return, and numberless mercies from God, who is infinitely above being bene- fited by our services. Those kindnesses from men I can therefore only return on their fel- low-men, and I can only show my gratitude for these mercies from God by a readiness to help his other children and my brethren."
In doing this kindness you will never fail
FORM A LIBRARY. 243
of your reward. If my observation is correct, by devoting two afternoons in the week to this branch of courtesy, you need never neg- lect your friends. Your evenings will be your time of greatest quiet and enjoyment. It is a pleasant time to receive your friends, to cheer the family by music, to amuse and improve by reading aloud. To read distinctly to your friends and easily to yourself, requires great practice ; but it is an accomplishment for which your friends will be grateful. You will soon find that you peculiarly enjoy a book that is your own. You will read it more carefully and remember it better. This will lead you to form a library which shall be yours, and by devoting a fixed, though it may be a small sum, for this purpose every week, you will be surprised at your literary possessions.
Every morning you should plan for the day. You will think of something almost every day which you will desire to do aside from the common course. Whether it be in the way of duty or pleasure, endeavor to accom- plish it without interfering with your ordi-
244 BUSY AND QUIET.
nary duties. Decide in what order you will take your employments, and then carry out your plans as far as possible. " But however great your method may be, do not make an idol of it, and compel every body to bow to it." That is, do not persist in doing things in your own time and way, though the time and way be good, if you incommode or trouble others. Arrange your plans so that, however faithfully you may improve your talents, you may be like the noble lady upon whose monument was the epitaph, " Always busy and always quiet." Do not be so hur- ried, that your body and mind are always wearied, your temper irritable, and your spirit vexed. If you do not enjoy yourself now, you probably never will.
Do not think I am planning too much for you, because I remind you that, if you are one of the oldest of a large family, your duties and your pleasures with the younger children will be many. You can assume the entire charge of the wardrobe of one child. This plan I have known tried to very great advantage. If you will engage to keep one
MAZES OF FRACTIONS. 245
sister's or brother's clothing in as good order as your own, you will take one responsibility from your mother. And teach your protege to come to you, when an essential button is wanting in a hurry, when gloves are to be re- paired at a moment's notice, when the shoe- string is broken. If it is not necessary or best that you have the charge of instructing your brothers and sisters, you will be ready to help them all you can in the way of explanation and encouragement. Have patience with your sister who is in the mazes of decimal fractions ; it is not long since you were in the same dif- ficulties. Help your brother out of the mys- teries of the famous forty-seventh of Euclid : have you forgotten , how lately you were floundering in the same depths? Though you do not remember it, you shed many tears over the third page of Colburn, the very one over which your little sister is so disconsolate, trying to subtract seven from fifteen. If, in your first attempts to mount the height of science, you ever found encouragement from others, return it now ; if you did not, remem- ber how you desired it. You will be watched
246 NEVER-FAILING CHEERFULNESS.
carefully. Will you not also so watch that your example shall be a blessing to the fam- ily ? Your temper will be tried, let it not be wanting ; your industry will be taxed, do not be discouraged ; your cheerfulness will be de- manded, pray that it may not fail. In all the contingencies which must arise in a large family, be ready to meet them. When acci- dents happen, have patience with the careless one. Do not punish or reprove according to consequences, but motives. How should we fare should God visit us for the results of our errors ? When duties press, and new ones rise while old ones were crowding hard, be cool. When strangers come in the midst of some jar in the domestic machinery, do not let them feel that their coming is inopportune. Be hospitable, not merely when you have a fatted calf and the house is in order, but when the dinner of herbs is all you can offer. Be cheerful when every thing is discouraging, be patient when every body else is fretful, be hopeful when the night is the darkest. Re- member that " the chief secret of comfort lies in not suffering trifles to vex one, and in pru-
SERVICE TO YOUR FATHER. 247
dently cultivating an undergrowth of small pleasures, since very few, alas! are let on long leases."
Mrs. Elizabeth Montagu, whose name will long be honored, says : " I endeavor to drink deep of philosophy, and be wise when I can- not be merry, easy when I cannot be glad, content with what cannot be mended, and patient when there is no redress." You will soon find the sphere of your duties enlarging around you. You may be of great service to your father. Show him that your years spent upon mathematics have not been wasted ; that they enable you to add columns of figures accurately ; that you can balance his books. Can you not save him many hours of tedious labor by copying legibly and neatly? You will never repay him in money for the expense he has lavished upon you, nor does he desire it ; but at least let him see how well you have improved these advantages, how anxious you are to prove your grateful love to him. Yes, the circle of your duties will enlarge. You will soon see duties out of your own family. The sick are to be comforted by visits of sym-
248 HOME FIELD FIRST.
pathy, children are to be 'led into the Sabbath- school, the sewing-circle needs your aid. Do as much as you can, but do not let these duties lead you to forget those which belong particularly to home. To collect contribu- tions for the cause of missions, is a work which will be accepted of the great Master, but not if, in doing this, you leave a sick sister who pines for your comforting presence, nor if you add to the labors of an almost broken- down mother. The " nearest duty " must first be done. If you are conscientious in this matter, you can easily decide how many du- ties you can undertake. But promise to do nothing that you cannot perform promptly and regularly. However anxious you may
be to do good as a tract distributor, you will
r fail if your zeal flags as you see the difficul- ties of your work, and you go irregularly through the monthly routine you began with so much enthusiasm.
Work with all your heart and soul, but do not be anxious for the future. Do each day's duty, and leave to-morrow's chances with God. Providence can and will assign to you the
woman's way opened. 249
best lot. There is truth as well as wit in the quaint saying, " Man cares for himself, woman is helped to her destiny." And to many this seems hard, but it takes a vast responsibility from you, it makes your path easier. You will never know the struggles of the young man who desires to have an education, though it makes his daily bread scanty, — when he chooses between a business which will soon make him independent, perhaps wealthy and influential, and a profession which is almost starvation at first, and which must ever seek a higher reward than any earth can give, — when he looks out into life and every niche seems filled, every post occupied, and he must push and struggle in the crowd or be crushed and trampled under foot. But Providence kindly opens woman's way before her. When one sphere is fully occupied by her, he gives* her a larger one, and if she will but follow the leadings of his hand, she shall be led by green ^pastures and still waters. Do not fret, or even dream, concerning the future ! If He would give you the power, would you dare to decide your earthly destiny ? None but weak
250 JOY IN THE EVENING.
young ladies will speculate much concerning their settlement in life, or regard it as a mat- ter at all under their own control. To those who live only for admiration, who spend their time in " making nets instead of cages," whose object in life is to be married and live "in style," I have nothing to say. They must have parted company with me and my book long ago!
The longer you live, the truer you will find the observation of Thomas a Kempis, " The more thou knowest and the better thou un- derstandest, the more grievously shalt thou be judged, unless thy life be more holy." Re- member also his caution, " Be not therefore lifted up, but rather let the knowledge given thee make thee afraid." His comfort is, " Thou shalt always have joy in the evening, if thou hast spent the day well."
Soon my chapter must close, and so far T have spoken of your responsibility in your family. How can I measure your duty to yourself and your God ? If you owe a life- long gratitude to your parents, what should you not render to your heavenly Friend ?
CHARIOT-WHEELS DRAGGING.
251
Tf the remark of John Foster, that " Power to its last particle is duty, " is fearful, it is be- cause it is true. Every thought, feeling, ac- tion, should be to His glory. Alas ! how are we failing ! Without His forgiveness we shall fail still more in duty, and at last fail of our heavenly inheritance ! What joy will it be that your soul is refined, enlarged, and enno- bled by all that earthly skill and love can do, if in eternity you find not your Saviour your friend. Worse than lost will be all your labor without his love and acceptance. And day by day you will need new strength. If you depend not on a strength infinitely beyond your own, you will soon despair. If you daily, hourly, seek not God's blessing, you will soon realize the truth of Philip Henry's experience at the close of a day of hard study : " I for- got, when I began, explicitly and expressly to crave help from God, and the chariot-wheels drove accordingly." You can obtain the pow- er for endurance of every day's burden. Need I remind you that " Prayer is a key which un- locks the blessings of the day, and locks up the dangers of the night " ? I trust you have
252 MELODY OF HEAVEN.
and appreciate the blessing of a family altar. In the beautiful words of the celebrated Dr. Hunter : " Secret prayer, like the melody of a sweet-toned voice stealing upon the ear, gen- tly wafts the soul to heaven ; social worship as a full chorus of harmonized sounds pierces the sky, and raises a great multitude of kin- dred spirits to the bright regions of everlast- ing love, and places them together before the throne of God."
Though your lot is pleasant, and your fu- ture yet brighter, I should not feel that I was your friend did I not tell you that trials will come, and point you to the only way to meet them. I do not mean that trials can be re- moved, but they can be softened by resigna- tion to your Father's will. " Religion will do great things; it will always make the bitter waters of Marah wholesome and palatable. But we must not think it will usually turn water to wine, because it once did so." I would not have you believe that, because you love God first, you will not suffer when he sends afflictions. Indeed, I agree with a dis- tinguished writer who says : " I never could
A ROD OR A CROWN.
253
observe that nature suffered less because grace triumphed the more. And hence arises, as I take it, the glory of the Christian suf- ferer : he feels affliction more intensely than a bad man, or grace would not have its perfect work ; as it would not be difficult to subdue that which it is not difficult to endure." Faith can make the darkest providences bright, and, as an old writer says, "is exceedingly charitable and thinketh no evil of God ; nay, whether God come to his children with a rod or a crown, if he come himself with it, it is well." Many afflictions would be unen- durable without the Comforter. In the dark nisht of sorrow we still feel sure that " He who sends the storm steers the vessel." When the heart is crushed, it is hard to see the good for which the trial is designed ; but, as Locke beautifully remarks, "Beyond all this we may find another reason why God hath scattered up and down several degrees of pleasure and pain, in all things that environ and affect us, and blended them together in almost all that our thoughts and senses have to do with, that we, finding imperfection, dis-
254 USES OF SORROW.
satisfaction, and want of complete happiness in all the enjoyments which the creatures can afford us, might be led to seek it in the enjoy- ment of Him with whom there is fulness of joy, and at whose right hand are pleasures for evermore." This experience of the great reasoner is confirmed by an extract from one of our most beautiful poets, — perhaps so beautiful because chastened by the sorrow he describes : — " He who best knows our nature (for He made us what we are) by such afflic- tions recalls us from our wandering thoughts and idle merriment ; from the insolence of youth and prosperity, to serious reflection, to our duty, and to himself: nor need we hasten to get rid of these impressions : time, by the appointment of the same power, will cure the smart, and in some hearts blot out all the traces of sorrow ; but such as preserve them the longest (for it is partly left in our own power) do perhaps best acquiesce in the will of the Chastiser."
If my weak hand could keep back sorrow from every young heart, I should do it ; but my kindness would be injudicious, my judg-
READY TO WORK. 255
ment erring. I rejoice that your happiness is in the keeping of One whose wisdom cannot mistake, whose power will never falter, whose love can never fail. Do not dread the future. The troubles we anticipate rarely come. Many a parent who dreads leaving a delicate child in a lonely world of sin lives to do the last acts of love for that child. Though you may " prepare for storms, pray for fair weather." The fair weather will be fairer for the storms. And now in the sunny time, when, having learned your own powers, having found the instruments to work, and the greatness of the labor, you look out into the harvest-field of the world, — when, in the fulness of your yet fresh strength, yet relying on Him who sends forth the laborers, you long to go forth and gather in a few sheaves for the Lord of the harvest, — sing the pleasant song a gentle heart hath sung before you : —
" When morning wakes the earth from sleep, With soft and kindling ray, We rise, Life's harvest-field to reap, 'T is ripening day by day.
256 life's harvest.
" To reap, sometimes with joyful heart, Anon with tearful eye 5 We see the Spoiler hath a part, We reap with smile and sigh.
" Full oft the tares obstruct our way, Full oft we feel the thorn ; Our hearts grow faint, — we weep, we pray, Then Hope is newly born.
" Hope that at last we all shall come, Though rough the way and long Back to our Father's house, our home, And bring our sheaves with song."
THE END.
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