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Page 14
But, alas! it is too late; in feeble health, in advanced years, in
depressed spirits, their powers of "working together with God" are
altogether broken. They may be finally saved indeed, but in this life
they can never experience the peace that religion bestows on its
faithful self-controlling followers. They can never bestow happiness,
but always discomfort on those whom they best love; they can never
glorify God by bringing forth the fruits of "a meek and quiet spirit."
This is sad, very sad, but it is not the less true. Strange also it is,
in some respects, that when sin is deeply mourned over and anxiously
prayed against, its power cannot be more effectually weakened. This is,
however, an invariable feature throughout all the dispensations of God,
and you would do well to examine carefully into it, that you may add
experience to your faith in the Scripture assertion, "What a man soweth,
that shall he also reap."[34] May you be given grace to sow such present
seed as may bring forth a harvest of peace to yourself, and peace to
your friends!
I must not forget to make some observations with respect to those
physical influences which affect the temper and spirits. It is true that
these are, at some times, and for a short period, altogether
irresistible. This is, however, only in the case of those whose
character was not originally of sufficient force and strength to require
much habitual self-control, as long as they possessed good health and
spirits. When this original good health is altered in any way that
alters their natural temper, (all diseases, however, have not this
effect,) not having had any previous practice in resisting the new and
unaccustomed evil, they yield to it as hopelessly as they would do to
the pain attending the gout and the rheumatism. If, however, such
persons as those above described are sincere in their desire to glorify
God, and to avoid disturbing the peace of those around them, they will
soon learn to make use of all the means within their reach to remove the
moral disease, as assiduously and as vigorously as they would labour to
remove the physical one. Their newly-acquired self-control will be blest
to them in more ways than one, for the grace of God is always given in
proportion to the need of those who are willing to work themselves, and
who have not incurred the evil they now struggle against, by wilful and
deliberate sin. I have spoken of only a few cases of ill-temper being
irresistible, and even these few only to be considered so at first,
before proper means of cure and prevention are used. Under other
circumstances, though the ill-temper mourned over may be strongly
influenced by physical causes, the sin must still remain the same as if
the causes were strictly moral ones. For instance, if you know that by
sitting up at night an hour or two later than usual, or by not taking
regular exercise, or by eating of indigestible food, you will put it out
of your power to avoid being ill-tempered and disagreeable on the
following day, the failure is surely a moral one. That the immediate
causes of your ill-humour may be physical ones, does not at all affect
the matter, seeing that such causes are, in this case, completely under
your own control. From this it follows that it must be a duty to watch
carefully the effects produced on your temper by every habit of your
life. If you do not abandon such of these as produce undesirable
effects, you deserve to experience the consequences in the gradual
diminution of the respect and affection of those who surround you.
Should the habits producing irritation of temper be such as you cannot
abandon without loss or detriment to yourself or others, the object in
view will be equally attained by exercising a more vigilant self-control
while you are exposed to a dangerous influence. For instance, you have
often heard it remarked, and have perhaps observed in your own case,
that poetry and works of fiction excite and irritate the temper. You may
know some people who exhibit this influence so strongly that no one will
venture to make them a request or even to apply to them about necessary
business, while they are engaged in the perusal of any thing
interesting. I know more than one excellent person, who, in consequence
of observing the effect produced on their temper, by novels, &c., have
given up this style of reading altogether. So far as the sacrifice was
made from a conscientious motive, they doubtless have their reward. From
the consequences, however, I should be rather inclined to think that
they were in many cases not only mistaken in the nature of the
precautions they adopted, but also in their motives for adopting them.
Such persons too frequently seem to have no more control over their
temper when exposed to other and entirely inevitable temptations, than
they had before the cultivation of their imagination was given up. They
do not, in short, seem to exercise, under circumstances that cannot be
escaped, that vigilant self-control which would be the only safe test
of the conscientiousness of their intellectual sacrifice.
For you, I should consider any sacrifice of the foregoing kind
especially inexpedient. Your deep thoughtfulness of mind, and your
habitual delicacy of health, make it impossible for you to give up light
literature with any degree of safety; even were it right that you should
abandon that species of mental cultivation which is effected by this
most important branch of study. People who never read difficult books,
and who are not of reflective habits of mind, can little understand the
necessity that at times exists for entire repose to the higher powers of
the mind--a repose which can be by no means so effectually procured as
by an interesting work of fiction. A drive in a pretty country, a
friendly visit, an hour's work in the garden, any of these may indeed
effect the same purpose, and on some occasions in a safer way than a
novel or a poem. The former, however, are means which are not always
within one's reach, which are impossible at seasons when entire rest to
the mind is most required,--viz. during days and weeks of confinement to
a sick and infected room. At such periods, it is true that the more idle
the mind can be kept the better; even the most trifling story may excite
a dangerous exertion of its nervous action; at times, however, when it
is sufficiently strong and disengaged to feel a craving for active
employment, it is of great importance that the employment should be such
as would involve no exercise of the higher intellectual faculties. I
have known serious evils result to both mind and body from an imprudent
engagement in intellectual pursuits during temporary, and as it may
often appear trifling, illness. Whenever the body is weak, the mind also
should be allowed to rest, if the invalid be a person of thought and
reflection; otherwise Butler's Analogy itself would not do her any harm.
It is _only_ "Lorsqu'il y a vie, il y a danger." This is a long
digression, but one necessary to my subject; for I feel the importance
of impressing on your mind that it can never be your duty to give up
that which is otherwise expedient for you, on the grounds of its being a
cause of excitement. You must only, under such circumstances, exercise a
double vigilance over your temper. Thus you must try to avoid speaking
in an irritated tone when you are interrupted; you must be always ready
to help another, if it be otherwise expedient, however deep may be the
interest of the book in which you are engaged; and, finally, if you are
obliged to refuse your assistance, you should make a point of expressing
your refusal with gentleness and courtesy.
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