ards
the rich, but I cannot help feeling at such times how much
characters require the discipline of difficult circumstances.
To say nothing of the need the soul has of a peace and courage
that cannot be disturbed, even as to the intellect, how can
one be sure of not sitting down in the midst of indulgence to
pamper tastes alone, and how easy to cheat one's self with the
fancy that a little easy reading or writing is quite work.
I am safer; I do not sleep on roses. I smile to myself, when
with these friends, at their care of me. I let them do as they
will, for I know it will not last long enough to spoil me.'

* * * * *

'I take great pleasure in talking with Aunt Mary.[B] Her
strong and simple nature checks not, falters not. Her
experience is entirely unlike mine, as, indeed, is that of
most others whom I know. No rapture, no subtle process, no
slow fermentation in the unknown depths, but a rill struck out
from the rock, clear and cool in all its course, the still,
small voice. She says the guide of her life has shown itself
rather as a restraining, than an impelling principle. I like
her life, too, as far as I see it; it is dignified and true.'

* * * * *

'_Cambridge, July_, 1842.--A letter at Providence would have
been like manna in the wilderness. I came into the very midst
of the fuss,[C] and, tedious as it was at the time, I am glad
to have seen it. I shall in future be able to believe real,
what I have read with a dim disbelief of such times and
tendencies. There is, indeed, little good, little cheer, in
what I have seen: a city full of grown-up people as wild, as
mischief-seeking, as full of prejudice, careless slander,
and exaggeration, as a herd of boys in the play-ground of the
worst boarding-school. Women whom I have seen, as the
domestic cat, gentle, graceful, cajoling, suddenly showing
the disposition, if not the force, of the tigress. I thought I
appreciated the monstrous growths of rumor before, but I
never did. The Latin poet, though used to a court, has faintly
described what I saw and heard often, in going the length of
a street. It is astonishing what force, purity and wisdom it
requires for a human being to keep clear of falsehoods. These
absurdities, of course, are linked with good qua