op of weeds; the
roots die for want of expression. A compress on a limb will stop its
growing; the surgeon knows this, and puts a tight bandage around a
tumor; but what if we put a tight bandage about the heart and lungs, as
some young ladies of my acquaintance do,--or bandage the feet, as they
do in China? And what if we bandage a nobler inner faculty, and wrap
_love_ in grave-clothes?

But again there are others, and their number is legion,--perhaps you and
I, reader, may know something of it in ourselves,--who have an
instinctive habit of repression in regard to all that is noblest and
highest, within them, which they do not feel in their lower and more
unworthy nature.

It comes far easier to scold our friend in an angry moment than to say
how much we love, honor, and esteem him in a kindly mood. Wrath and
bitterness speak themselves and go with their own force; love is
shamefaced, looks shyly out of the window, lingers long at the
door-latch.

How much freer utterance among many good Christians have anger,
contempt, and censoriousness, than tenderness and love! _I hate_ is said
loud and with all our force. _I love_ is said with a hesitating voice
and blushing cheek.

In an angry mood we do an injury to a loving heart with good, strong,
free emphasis; but we stammer and hang back when our diviner nature
tells us to confess and ask pardon. Even when our heart is broken with
repentance, we haggle and linger long before we can

"Throw away the worser part of it."

How many live a stingy and niggardly life in regard to their richest
inward treasures! They live with those they love dearly, whom a few more
words and deeds expressive of this love would make so much happier,
richer, and better; and they cannot, will not, turn the key and give it
out. People who in their very souls really do love, esteem, reverence,
almost worship each other, live a barren, chilly life side by side,
busy, anxious, preoccupied, letting their love go by as a matter of
course, a last year's growth, with no present buds and blossoms.

Are there not sons and daughters who have parents living with them as
angels unawares,--husbands and wives, brothers and sisters, in whom the
material for a beautiful life lies locked away in unfruitful
silence,--who give time to everything but the cultivation and expression
of mutual love?

The time is coming, they think in some far future when they shall find
leisure to enjoy each other, to stop an