The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Good Resolution, by Anonymous

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Title: The Good Resolution

Author: Anonymous

Release Date: February 8, 2004 [EBook #10994]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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THE

GOOD RESOLUTION.

[Illustration]

REVISED BY D.P. KIDDER

FOR THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL UNION OF THE METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH, 200
MULBERRY-STREET.

1831.

THE GOOD RESOLUTION.

"Why am I so unhappy to-day?" said Isabella Gardner, as she opened her
eyes on the morning of her fourteenth birth-day. "Is it because the sun
is not bright enough, or the flowers are not sweet enough?" she added,
as she looked on the glorious sunshine that lay upon the rose-bushes
surrounding her window.

Isabella arose, and dressed herself, and tried to drive away her
uncomfortable feelings, by thinking of the pleasures of the afternoon,
when some of her young friends were to assemble to keep her birth-day.
But she could not do it; and, sad and restless, she walked in her
father's garden, and seated herself on a little bench beneath a shady
tree. Everything around was pleasant; the flowers seemed to send up
their gratitude to Heaven in sweetness, and the little birds in songs of
joy. All spoke peace and love, and Isabella could find nothing there
like discontent or sorrow. The cause of her present troubled feelings
was to be found within.

Isabella Gardner was in the habit of indulging in a fretful and peevish
temper. She was often "hasty in her spirit to be angry;" forgetting that
the wise Solomon says, "Anger resteth in the bosom of fools;" and that a
greater than Solomon had commanded her to forgive, as she would be
forgiven.

Her disrespect and ill-humor toward her parents had caused her many
unhappy days and sleepless nights; and often had the day closed on
faults unrepented of, and sins unforgiven. It was but the afternoon
before that she had spoken in a high angry tone to her eldest sister,
Mary, and parted in displeasure from her brother Edward, because he
would not leave his studies to go into the garden with