We should take care, then, that in the enjoyments of children, there is blended a reference to the principles of true taste; and, as in all things relating to the training of youth, we ought to act upon the plan of excluding what is objectionable, by filling up the space with what is good; so we ought to begin early to cultivate a just estimate of what is really worthy of admiration. How few persons think of this, who live in great cities, and take their children to see all the passing shows of the day, in preference to those objects of deep and lasting interest from which a true interest might be formed! How many, too, on taking their children for the first time to London, fly here and there in pursuit of sights which will be forgotten in a month, and never spare a quiet half hour for Westminster Abbey, or for any of those exhibitions of sculpture and painting, where they may both think and feel — where they may drink from the fountain of beauty, and be still.
I do not mean to say that children at a very early age would derive any benefit from such objects of attraction. It would be a waste of effort to attempt to introduce to their minds any conception of beauty, as an abstract idea. But there is a time when a sense of the beautiful, the harmonious, and the sublime, begins to dawn upon the soul; and the mother, if she has any poetry in her own nature, knows well how to discern the commencement of this new existence, for I can call it nothing less.
One of the symptoms of this change, is a habit of deep thought. I have thus far spoken of individual happiness chiefly in its character of cheerfulness and joy; but we all know that there is, beyond this, a happiness more profound, and that all deep happiness is still. Children vary much in their capability for this feeling. Some begin at a very early age to creep quietly to the mother's side, and to lead her out into converse upon deep and interesting themes; and it is then, above all other times, that the mother ought to bear upon her heart a sense of that higher, deeper, more absorbing happiness, which is derived from the contemplation of a Supreme Being, in connexion with his love for all the families of earth, his care of the helpless, and his merciful designs for the redemption and the eternal salvation of all
