Page:The Daughters of England.djvu/119

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108
THE DAUGHTERS OF ENGLAND.

to the angelic host, has been bestowed in order that therewith they may glorify the gracious Giver.

Now, this very weariness, which at the same time is the most prevalent disease, and the direct calamity, we find amongst young women; since it not only makes them useless and miserable, but drives them perpetually into excitement as a momentary relief—this weariness arises out of various causes with which young people are not sufficiently made acquainted, and one of the most powerful of which is, a neglect of the habit of observation.

"I have seen nobody, and heard nothing to-day," is the vapid remark of one to whom the glorious heavens, and the fruitful earth, might as well be so much paint and patchwork. "What an uninteresting person!" exclaims another, who has never looked a second time at some fine expressive countenance, where deep feeling tells its own impassioned story. "I wish some one would come and invite us out to tea," says a third, whose household library is stored with books, and whose parents have within themselves a fund of intelligence, which they would be but too happy to communicate, could they find an attentive listener in their child. "But my life is so monotonous," pleads a fourth, "and my range of vision so limited, that I have nothing to observe." With those who live exclusively in towns, I confess this argument might have some weight; and for this reason, I suppose it is, that town-bred young women are often more ignorant than those who spend a portion of their early life in the country—not certainly because there is really less to be observed in towns, but because the mind, in the midst of a multitude of moving images, is comparatively unimpressed by any. I confess, too, there is something in the noise and tumult of a crowded city, which stupifies the mind, and blunts its perception of individual things, until the whole shifting pageant assumes