Transfer from Cird Dup 25 INSCRIBED WITH FRATERNAL AFFECTION BY THEIR SINOERE FRIEND AND WELL-WISHER, DANIEL WISE PREFACE. THE importance of female culture cannot be too highly estimated, especially in this country, where our institutions depend on the virtue of the people. A self-governed nation must be both intelligent and religious; for if a principle of moral restraint dwells not in the breast of a man, he cannot live peacefully in society, without the terror of some external, constraining force. Society must sink into a state of anarchy, from which a relentless despotism will be evolved, unless it feels the moral force of the sentiment of duty. And on what agency are we to depend for the creation and cultivation of this mighty conservative idea of DUTY, in the teeming millions of our future population? Are our pulpits and our educational appliances sufficient to accomplish this great work? Nay! That they are indispensable and potent instrumentalities, that they cannot be too highly appreciated or earnestly supported, is freely admitted; but there is ▲ POWER BEHIND THE SCHOOL-ROOM AND THE CHURCH, which is capable of neutralizing the efforts of both. Maternal influence, acting on the infant mind in its first stage of impressibility, stamps an almost ineffaceable image of good or evil upon it, long before it can be made to feel the power of the teacher or the minister. Hence the necessity of multiplied, earnest endeavors to promote the growth of the loftiest and holiest traits of mind and heart, in the young women who are destined to be the mothers of a succeeding generation, and, consequently, to exert that fearful influence, which, more than all others, will determine its character. This book is an humble but earnest effort to stimulate and direct the growth of female mind, and thereby to fit it for the fulfilment of its high earthly mission, and for felicity in the world of spirits. If God will be pleased to make it a dew-drop of love, beauty, and fertility in the spirits of some of the daughters of our land, the highest ambition of the author will be satisfied. ELM STREET PARSONAGE, D. W. CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. THE MISTAKE OF A LIFETIME. THE death-bed of a royal lady - A spectacle of sadness-The mistake of her lifetime — A fear expressed - An appeal to the reader's views of life Her mistake-The alchemist - His home described-His theory and labors - His fate-Contempt for his folly-A similar folly described-Voices of revelation and experience - Poetical extract — A vital question proposed - A poet's answer-The answer of inspiration-Relation of the visible world to the mind- - Quotation from Schiller-Bees and flowers - The laboratory of bliss — A poet on the Alps - Beautiful description of an Alpine storm - Power of the mind over nature-The mind independent of social evils- The sick maiden Her poverty, sufferings and bliss-The masquerade – Miserable minds in places of pleasure - The mind its own heaven or hell-Unpalatable truth-The despised herb-The lock of hairDanger of scorning truth - A happy escape,. - CHAPTER II. THE FOUNTAIN OF LIFE UNSEALED. 13 - Pic The Alpine fir-tree- Happiness must be brought into the heart — ture of a soul trusting to its own resources- Lessons from the lips of Jesus-The fountain of living bliss- Goddess of Grecian mythology A famine described A national enigma-Its solution - The evils of life-How to view them calmly - Picture by a German artist - Loneliness of woman's lot renders religion necessary - Opinion of the Duchess of Newcastle -The rich joy of a religious mind - The subterranean homes of the polar regions-Religion renders woman |