life of a confectioner, it now too much resembles that of an actress; the morning is all rehearsal, and the evening is all performance. And those who are trained in this regular routine, who are instructed in order to be exhibited, soon learn to feel a sort of impatience in those societies in which their kind of talents are not likely to be brought into play; the task of an auditor becomes dull to her who has been used to be a performer. Esteem and kindness become but cold substitutes to one who has been fed on plaudits, and pampered with acclamations: and the excessive commendation which the visitor is expected to pay for his entertainment, not only keeps alive the flame of vanity in the artist, by constant fuel, but is not seldom exacted at a price which a veracity at all strict would grudge. The misfortune is, when a whole circle are obliged to be competitors who shall flatter most, it is not easy to be at once very sincere and very civil. And, unfortunately, while the age is become so knowing, and so fastidious, that, if a young lady does not play like a public performer, no one thinks her worth attending to; yet, if she does so excel, some of the soberest of the admiring circle feel a strong alloy to their pleasure, on reflecting at what a vast expense of time this perfection must probably have been acquired.*

The study of the fine arts, indeed, is forced on young persons, with or without genius, (fashion, as was said before, having swallowed up that distinction,)

*That accurate judge of the human heart, Madame de Maintenon, was so well aware of the danger resulting from some kinds of excellence, that, after the young ladies of the Court of Louis Quatorze had distinguished themselves by the performance of some dramatic pieces of Racine, when her friends told her how admirably they had played their parts; "Yes," answered this wise woman, "" Iso admirably that they shall never play again."

to such excess, as to vex, fatigue, and disgust those who have no talents, and to determine them, as soon as they become free agents, to abandon all such tormenting acquirements. While, by this incessant compulsion, still more pernicious effects are often produced on those who actually possess genius; for the natural constant reference in the mind to that public performance for which they are sedulously cultivating this talent, excites the same passions of envy, vanity, and competition in the dilettanti performers, as might be supposed to stimulate professional candidates for fame and profit at public games and theatrical exhibitions. Is this emulation, is this spirit of rivalry, is this hunger after public praise, the temper which prudent parents would wish to excite and foster? Besides, in any event the issue is not favourable. If the young performers are timid, they disgrace themselves and distress their friends; if courageous, their boldness offends still more than their bad performance. Shall they then be studiously brought into situations in which failure discredits and success disgusts?

May I venture, without being accused of pedantry, to conclude this chapter with another reference to pagan examples? The Hebrews, Egyptians, and Greeks believed that they could more effectually teach their youth maxims of virtue, by calling in the aid of music and poetry; these maxims, therefore, they put into verses, and these verses were set to the most popular and simple tunes, which the children sang; thus was their love of goodness excited by the very instruments of their pleasure; and the senses, the taste, and the imagination, as it were, pressed into the service of religion and morals. Dare I appeal to Christian parents, if these arts are commonly used by them, as subsidiary to religion, and to a system of morals much more worthy of every ingenious aid and association, which might tend to

recommend them to the youthful mind? Dare I appeal to Christian parents, whether music, which fills up no trifling portion of their daughters' time, does not fill it without any moral end, or even without any specific object? Nay, whether some of the favourite songs of polished societies are not amatory, are not Anacreontic, more than quite become the modest lips of innocent youth and delicate beauty?

CHAPTER V.

On the religious employment of time.—On the manner in which holidays are passed.-Selfishness and inconsideration considered.-Dangers arising from the world.

THERE are many well-disposed parents, who, while they attend to these fashionable acquirements, do not neglect to infuse religious knowledge into the minds of their children; and having done this, are but too apt to conclude that they have done all, and have fully acquitted themselves of the important duties of education. For, having, as they think, sufficiently grounded their daughters in religion, they do not scruple to allow them to spend almost the whole of their time exactly like the daughters of worldly people. Now, though it be one great point gained, to have imbued their young minds with the best knowledge, the work is not therefore by any means accomplished. "What do ye more than others?" is a question which, in a more extended sense, religious parents must be prepared to answer.

Such parents should go on to teach children the religious use of time, the duty of consecrating to God every talent, every faculty, every possession, and of devoting their whole lives to his glory. People of piety should be more peculiarly on their guard

against a spirit of idleness, and a slovenly habitual wasting of time, because this practice, by not assuming a palpable shape of guilt, carries little alarm to the conscience. Even religious characters are in danger on this side; for, not allowing themselves to follow the world in its excesses and diversions, they have consequently more time upon their hands; and, instead of dedicating the time so rescued to its true purposes, they sometimes make, as it were, compensation to themselves for their abstinence from dangerous places of public resort, by an habitual frivolousness at home; by a superabundance of unprofitable small-talk, idle reading, and a quiet and dull frittering away of time. Their day perhaps has been more free from actual evil; but it will often be discovered to have been as unproductive as that of more worldly characters; and they will be found to have traded to as little purpose with their Master's talents. But a Christian must take care to keep his conscience peculiarly alive to the unapparent, though formidable perils of unprofitableness.

To these, and to all, the author would earnestly recommend to accustom their children to pass at once from serious business to active and animated recreation; they should carefully preserve them from those long and torpid intervals between both, that languid indolence and spiritless trifling, that merely getting rid of the day without stamping on it any characters of active goodness, or of intellectual profit, that inane drowsiness which wears out such large portions of life in both young and old. It has, indeed, passed into an aphorism, that activity is necessary to virtue, even among those who are not apprised that it is also indispensable to happiness. So far are many parents from being sensible of this truth, that vacations from school are not merely allowed, but appointed to pass away in wearisome sauntering, and indeterminate idleness. and this is

done by erring tenderness, by way of converting the holidays into pleasure! Nay, the idleness is specifically made over to the child's mind, as the strongest expression of the fondness of the parent. A dislike to learning is thus systematically excited by preposterously erecting indolence into a reward for application. And the promise of doing nothing is held out as the strongest temptation, as well as the best recompense, for having done well!

These, and such like errors of conduct, arise from the latent, but very operative principle of selfishness. This principle is obviously promoted by many habits and practices seemingly of little importance; and, indeed, selfishness is so commonly interwoven with vanity and inconsideration, that I have not always thought it necessary to mark the distinction. They are alternately cause and effect; and are produced and re-produced by reciprocal operation. They are a joint confederacy, who are mutually promoting each other's strength and interest; they are united by almost inseparable ties, and the indulgence of either is the gratification of all. Ill-judging tenderness is in fact only a concealed self-love, which cannot bear to be witness to the uneasiness which a present disappointment, or difficulty, or vexation, would cause to a darling child; but which yet does not scruple by improper gratification to store up for it future miseries, which the child will infallibly suffer, though it may be at a distant period, which the selfish mother does not disturb herself by anticipating, because she thinks she may be saved the pain of beholding.

Another principle, something different from this, though it may properly fall under the head of selfishness, seems to actuate some parents in their conduct towards their children: I mean, a certain slothfulness of mind, a love of ease, which imposes a voluntary blindness, and makes them not choose to