means of affording. We have no right to make presents, and thus obtain the meed of gratitude and admiration for our generosity, with money which is immediately transmitted from our father's hand for that especial purpose, while our own resources remain undiminished, our own private store of treasures undivided, and our circumstances wholly unaffected.

I do not say that to each one of the immense variety of daily and familiar actions, which might be classed under this head, there attaches the highest degree of actual culpability. They are rather instances of encroachment, than of absolute injustice and wrong. But I do say that the habit of encroaching, just so far as decency will permit, and as occasion seems to warrant, upon all that is noble and generous, upright and kind, in human conduct, has a fatal tendency to corrupt the heart, while it produces at the same time a deadening effect upon the highest and holiest aspirations of the soul.

What answer can be made by such a soul to the secret questionings of its internal monitor? Or how shall we appeal to the gracious and merciful Creator of the universe, who has given us all this glorious world for our enjoyment, and all the elements of nature for our use; who has looked upon us in our degradation, and pitied our infirmities, and opened the gates of heaven, that his mercy might descend to us in a palpable and human form, and that we might receive the conditions of his offered pardon, be healed, and live?-how shall we appeal to him in our private prayers, or stand before him in the public sanctuary, with this confession on our lips that just so far as man could approve or condemn our actions, we have deemed it expedient to be just; but that to him, and to the Saviour of our souls, we have grudged the incense of a willing mind; and therefore we have enhanced our pleasures, and gratified our pride, and fed our selfishness, by all those trifling, yet forbidden means, which he has pronounced to be offensive in his sight?

Besides these considerations, there is one

of immeasurable importance, connected with our conduct in the sight of God. No human mind can set a bound, or prescribe a measure, to its voluntary deviations from the line of duty. We have been supposing a case in which these deviations are extremely minute, and yet so numerous as to form as it were a circle round the heart-a circle of evil. Imagine, then, this circle widening, and widening, year after year, through the seasons of youth and maturity, and the dreary winter of old age. What an awful and melancholy spectacle does the state of that heart present, enclosed as it were in a deleterious atmosphere, and growing perpetually colder and more callous by exclusion from the blessed light of heaven!

Oh! let us not begin to breathe this deadly atmosphere! And you who are yet inexperienced in the ways of human life, whose habits are not formed, whose paths not chosen, whose line of conduct not decided, what a blessing would it be to you, both in this world and in the world to come, were you to choose that better part, that would enable you to look with a single eye to what is most acceptable in the Divine sight, and most in accordance with the will of God; leaving the embellishments of person, the luxuries of taste, and the appropriation of worldly esteem, to be enjoyed or relinquished with a grateful and contented mind, just as your heavenly Father may permit; and bearing always about with you, as a talisman against the encroachments of evil, even in the most simple or most specious form, the remembrance that none of these things are worthy of a single wish, if they must necessarily be obtained by the violation of his laws, or accompanied by the tokens of his displeasure!

CHAPTER XIII.

HABITS AND CHARACTER-INTELLECTUAL AT

TAINMENTS-EMPLOYMENT OF TIME-MORAL COURAGE-RIGHT BALANCE OF MIND.

To those gentle readers who have been kind enough to accompany me through the

foregoing pages, and who feel inclined to exercise their forbearance towards me through a few more, I feel that some apology, or rather some explanation, is necessary for the manner in which I have so often been compelled to speak of the extraordinary ambition manifested by my country women, in the present day, to make themselves mistress of every possible variety of intellectual attainment that can be acquired at school; and I cannot help fearing that many of my remarks may appear to have been written with a view to depreciate the value of these treasures of mind, and, as far as my single influence may extend, to deter others from the pursuit of them.

So far from this, I would repeat, if possible, in words which could not be forgotten, my firm conviction that no human being can learn too much, so that their sphere of intelligence does not extend to what is evil. But, while the accumulation of a vast store of knowledge is one of the objects we have in view in the culture of the mind, we must not forget that it is by no means the only one. In rearing an infant, we not only supply its appetite with food, but also find it necessary to teach it the habit, and assist it in the power, of exercising its limbs; we guide its steps, and, as far as we are able, give it just notions of exercising its bodily functions with the best effect.

To feed the mind, then, is but a small part of our duty. If we leave it helpless and inert, without ability to exercise its various powers, and judgment to exercise them aright, the most important portion of that duty is neglected. Thus far, I believe, all who are employed in teaching the young will go along with me, for their experience must afford strong evidence in favor of this statement. There are some points, however, in which, it appears to me, they have allowed the fashion of the times to render their system of instruction extremely defective. But, for this, I am by no means prepared to say that they are in any degree to blame; because they have the taste of the times to consult; and they would obtain little credit for

making our young women what they ought to be, if that taste was not correct.

With regard to moral discipline, or that mode of instruction by which women would be fitted for their domestic and social duties, I have expressed my opinion in an earlier chapter of this work, and, with regard to intellectual culture, I hope to be pardoned if I now venture a few remarks.

It appears to me, in looking abroad upon society, and contemplating the immense variety of mental attainments which prevail among the young women of the present day, that they are in imminent danger of supposing, when they have acquired a vast amount of verbal knowledge, that the great work of education is done. They are, in short, in danger of mistaking the means for the end; and of resting satisfied that they are wiser than the generation before them.

In the acquirement of languages this is particularly the case. A young lady obtains the reputation of being clever, when she has made herself mistress of several languages; and with this she is generally satisfied; while she ought to remember that she has but gained possession, as it were, of the keys of vast storehouses of knowledge, for the use of which she is responsible to society.

Again, in the pursuit of science, there is a technicality that strikes the ear, and gives an idea of vast superiority in the way of attainments; and there are facts that may be impressed upon the memory, without the mind being in any way enlarged or enlightened by the reception of them. It is easy, for instance, to talk of botany, without the thoughts at any time extending themselves to the general economy of vegetation; and of astronomy, so as to tell the distances of different planets, without the soul being penetrated by one ray of illumination from the wisdom which designed, and which controls the starry heavens. It is easy to attend a few scientific lectures, and to return home talking of the names of gases, and of some of the most striking phenomena of electricity, the galvanic battery, and other popular exhibitions of the lecture-room; but it requires a totally

different process of mind to take a general survey of the laws of the universe, and to bow before the conviction that all must have been created by a hand divine.

From our observations of rural or romantic scenery, it is easy to babble about woods and waterfalls, about the ruggedness of mountains, and the grandeur of the raging sea; but it does not follow as a necessary consequence that we have formed any conception of the idea of abstract beauty, or of the reverential, but admiring awe, which true sublimity is calculated to inspire. It does not follow that we shall have learned to imbody in the elements of nature those subtler essences of spirit and of mind, which, to the poetical and imaginative, people every desert, and render vocal with melody the silence of night.

It may be said, that in this busy world there is little employment for the imagination-little scope for the exercise of poetical associations. I grant-for I am compelled to do so that poetry should be elbowed out of our working world to make room for machinery; but I see no reason why the same train of thought, and course of reasoning, should not be carried on. I grant that the materials are different; but why should we not still endeavor to raise an altar in our minds for a higher, holier worship than that of the mammon of this world? Why should we fix our attention solely upon the material part of the universe, satisfying ourselves with the names of substantial things, with their variety, classification, and physical properties? Why should we confine ourselves to counting the pillars in the temple of nature, computing its magnitude and measuring its height, without referring all our calculations, through the highest range of imagination, to the wonder-working power of the great Artificer?

It may be said that we dwell too much in cities, and lead too artificial a life, to be able to perceive the instrumentality of Divine Wisdom in all the events that pass beneath our observation. If this be the case, there is the more need that we should rouse our

selves by fresh efforts, to penetrate beyond the polished surface of the world in which we live, into the deeper mysteries that lie beyond-there is the more need that we should endeavor to perceive, in the practical affairs of busy life, those great principles by which the laws of nature are governed, and the system of the universe upheld.

If, for instance, we live in the heart of a thickly-peopled city, with the rush of its busy multitudes around us, and the labor of man's hand, and the efforts of his ingenuity, perpetually before our eyes, there is no reason why we should look only at the splendor of its manufactured articles, amuse our fancy with the outward aspect of its varied exhibitions of art, or regard with disgust the occupations of the mechanic, because he handles the raw material, and touches what is gross. Would it not be more consistent with the exercise of an enlightened mind, to contemplate the wonders of that power which the Creator has intrusted to the use of man, so that he lays hold, as it were, of the elements of nature, and makes them submit to his will? Night falls not with stillness and repose upon the city; but we walk as through a living blaze : and shall we pass on, like children, pleased with the glitter and the show, without reflecting that man has been able to convert the darkest substance from the bowels of the earth into the very source of all this light! Mountains and valleys, tracts of land and floods of water, intervene between us and our distant friends; but we fly to them with a rapidity which, a few years ago, would have been pronounced, even by philosophers, impossible. And shall we move like senseless matter, even through the very heart of the mountain, calculating only the speed at which we travel, without awaking to the momentous fact, that by the ingenuity of man, mere vapor, proverbial as it is for its weakness, emptiness, and nothingness in the creation, has been converted into the master-power by which the mighty operations of men are carried on? We take our daily walks through the bustling city, and gaze at the splendid exhibitions of taste, and learn the names of

those who are most skilled in music and painting, and all the sister arts; and we speak in the cant terms that are most in vogue, and think we display superiority of mind and intelligence to use them well; but should we not at the same time cultivate the habit of bearing in remembrance the unchanging principles of beauty, and of referring back to them whatever is offered to our admiration in the form of art?

We speak of the degrading cares and sordid views that occupy the working world; but how have we endeavored to pass beyond these, and to connect them with the world of thought? We hear of the vast amount of labor carried on, and the relative expenses incurred, and the different things that can be made and done within a given time: but why should we not sometimes make a transition of thought from the material, to the means of working it from the means, to the power -and from the power that is imparted, to the Creator who imparts. To-day the mechanic plies his busy tools. To-morrow his hand may have become rigid and motionless beneath the stroke of death. Thousands and tens of thousands pass away from the scene of their labors, but the labor still goes on; for the laws of nature change not, and the principles upon which the labor of man is carried into effect, remain the same.

We are too apt, because we mingle in populous and busy scenes, and feel the necessity of moving with the tide, to forget that what we see and hear, what is obvious to the senses and palpable to the touch, is not all that we live for, or even all that we live amongst. We should endeavor to find breathing-times even amidst the hurry and the rush of present things. We should sometimes pause among the multitude, and listen mentally, to the beating of the mighty pulse of a tumultuous city, and ask, whether the Creator and Sustainer of this living mass is not beholding the operation of the various powers he has set in motion, marking its defects, supplying its deficiencies, and sustaining the stupendous whole. We should then be enabled to perceive something of the

working of the inner plan, how one class of human beings depends upon another-how the principles of justice establish checks and counter-checks, so that no single power shall be predominant; how poverty and riches alternate, and how the vices of the bad are made to call forth the virtues of the good; and by renewing our conviction that God is indeed here, as well as present to the more peaceful and harmonious portions of his creation, we should renew our faith, and enjoy perpetual refreshment for our souls.

What we most want in education, then, is to invest material things with the attributes of mind; and we want this more and more, as commerce, and arts and manufactures increase in importance and extent. We want it more and more to give interest to our familiar and necessary occupations; and we want it especially, that we may assist in redeeming the character of English men from the mere animal, or rather, the mere mechanical state, into which, from the nature and urgency of their occupations, they are in danger of falling.

We want it also for ourselves; for a time seems to be approaching, when the middle class of society in England will have to be subdivided; and when the lower portion of this class will of necessity have to turn their attention to a different style of living, and to different modes of occupation, thought, and feeling. At present all this class are educated nearly upon the same plan. The happiness of society, and our moral necessities, will surely, before long, suggest the importance of females of this class being fitted for something very different from drawing-room exhibitions.

All that I have written in this volume, imperfect as it is, has been stimulated by a desire to increase the moral worth of my country women, and enhance the domestic happiness of my native land. In order that this should be done effectually, it seems to me indispensably necessary, that women, whose parents are possessed of slender means, or engaged in business, and who can with extreme difficulty accomplish even so much as what is called "making their way,"-that