FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94  
95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   >>   >|  
. The flower growing by the way-side, the picture or the poem, the works of God's own hand, or the works of the genius which he has breathed into his creature Man, may all alike bear you messages of love, of warning, of assistance. Listen attentively, and you will hear--clearer still and clearer--every day and hour. It is not by chance you take up that book, or gaze upon that picture; you have found, because you are on the watch for it, in the first, a suggestion that exactly suits your present need, in the latter an excitement and an inspiration which makes some difficult action you may be immediately called on to perform comparatively easy and comparatively welcome. There is a deep and universal meaning in the vulgar[63] proverb, "Strike while the iron is hot." If it be left to cool without your purpose being effected, the iron becomes harder than ever, the chains of nature and of habit are more firmly riveted. There are some other features of self-control to which I wish, though more cursorily, to direct your attention. They have all some remote bearing on your moral nature, and may exercise much influence over your prospects in life. Like many other persons of a refined and sensitive organization, you suffer from the very uncommon disease of shyness. At the very time, perhaps, when you desire most to please, to interest, to amuse, your over-anxiety defeats its own object. The self-possession of the indifferent generally carries off the palm from the earnest and the anxious. This is ridiculous; this is degrading. What you wish to do you ought to be able to do, and you will be able, if you habitually exercise control over the physical feelings of your nature. I am quite of the opinion of those who hold that shyness is a bodily as well as a mental disease, much influenced by our state of health, as well as by the constitutional state of the circulation; but I only put forward this opinion respecting its origin as additional evidence that it too may be brought under the authority of self-control. If the grace of God, giving efficacy and help to our own exertions, can enable us to resist the influence of indigestion and other kinds of ill-health upon the temper and the spirits, will not the same means be found effectual to subdue a shyness which almost sinks us to the level of the brute creation by depriving us of the advantages of a rational will? Even this latter distinguishing feature of humanity is prostrat
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94  
95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
shyness
 

nature

 

control

 
opinion
 
health
 
comparatively
 

influence

 

disease

 

exercise

 

picture


clearer
 
anxious
 

creation

 

depriving

 

carries

 

earnest

 

ridiculous

 

habitually

 

growing

 

degrading


generally
 

possession

 

desire

 
feature
 

prostrat

 
humanity
 
interest
 

rational

 

advantages

 

object


physical

 

distinguishing

 
anxiety
 
defeats
 

indifferent

 
origin
 

additional

 

evidence

 

respecting

 

forward


brought

 

exertions

 
enable
 

resist

 
efficacy
 
authority
 

giving

 

circulation

 
effectual
 

bodily