great. She said, that the article
'_on baking bread_,' was the part that roused her to the undertaking;
and, indeed, if the facts and arguments, _there_ made use of, failed to
stir her up to action, she must have been stone dead to the power of
words.

328. After the age that we have now been supposing, boys and girls
become _men_ and _women_; and, there now only remains for the _father_
to act towards them with _impartiality_. If they be numerous, or,
indeed, if they be only two in number, to expect _perfect harmony_ to
reign amongst, or between, them, is to be unreasonable; because
experience shows us, that, even amongst the most sober, most virtuous,
and most sensible, harmony so complete is very rare. By nature they are
rivals for the affection and applause of the parents; in personal and
mental endowments they become rivals; and, when _pecuniary interests_
come to be well understood and to have their weight, here is a
rivalship, to prevent which from ending in hostility, require more
affection and greater disinterestedness than fall to the lot of one out
of one hundred families. So many instances have I witnessed of good and
amiable families living in harmony, till the hour arrived for dividing
property amongst them, and then, all at once, becoming hostile to each
other, that I have often thought that property, coming in such a way,
was a curse, and that the parties would have been far better off, had
the parent had merely a blessing to bequeath them from his or her lips,
instead of a will for them to dispute and wrangle over.

329. With regard to this matter, all that the father can do, is to be
_impartial_; but, impartiality does not mean positive _equality_ in the
distribution, but equality _in proportion_ to the different deserts of
the parties, their different wants, their different pecuniary
circumstances, and different prospects in life; and these vary so much,
in different families, that it is impossible to lay down any general
rule upon the subject. But there is one fatal error, against which every
father ought to guard his heart; and the kinder that heart is, the more
necessary such guardianship. I mean the fatal error of heaping upon one
child, to the prejudice of the rest; or, upon a part of them. This
partiality sometimes arises from mere caprice; sometimes from the
circumstance of the favourite being more favoured by nature than the
rest; sometimes from the nearer resemblance to himself, that the fat