contrast. But the true habit of
virtue is to stoop graciously, to lift inferiors towards itself, and
to look reverentially on the merits of superiors, lifting itself with
aspiring docility towards them.

Among the people of the present age, there is no need of teaching the
lessons of social scorn or envy; but there is need of teaching the
lessons of disinterested reverence and aspiration. It must therefore
be a profitable service to hold up for the contemplation and study of
women the examples of the noble sway, the delightful charm exerted by
such women as the grand Duchess Louise of Weimar, Madame Recamier,
Madame Swetchine, or the Duchess of Orleans. Each one of these
deserves the homage of being patterned after:

For she was of that better clay
That treads not oft this earthly stage:
Such charmed spirits lose their way,
But once or twice into an age.

They seemed to shed dignity, wisdom, virtue, repose, and bliss around
them wherever they moved, and to put all persons in their debt by the
boons unconsciously emitted from their being and their manners. We
cannot hold too constant or too worshipful communion with such
characters: it is equally a culture and an enjoyment. The secret of
their divine skill is not flattery, but deferential treatment. They
take for granted, that their friends have noble qualities and
admirable aims, and treat them accordingly, with a respectful
attention which heightens the self-respect of its recipients. Neglect
is insolent, and contempt is injurious. He who suffers them is hurt
and lowered. One blessed magic there is, as guileless as it is
supreme. This charm, this witchcraft, is a sincere and honoring
attention.

Woman can more keenly than man "taste the pure enjoyment that results
from the mere growth and exercise of good feelings." Who so well as
she knows how much more true pleasure there is in one peaceful moment
of modest goodness than in all the excitement that waits on the gaudy
game of ambition? She is never so happy, as when doing most and
asking least.

The Duchess de Duras wrote to a friend, "Madame de Montcalm has been
sick: she is eaten up by politics: they are her vulture." To man,
genius is an instrument, which he must use to achieve triumphs: to
woman, it is a load, which she must transmute into blessings. Thus
far in human history, it has been much easier for the most gifted of
our race to be unhappy than to be happy; because happiness is an
equilibrium of inn