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Page 54
When I speak to you of writing, and of your attaining to excellence in
this art, I have nothing in view but the improvement of your private
letters. It can seldom be desirable for a woman to challenge public
criticism by appearing before the world as an author. "My wife does not
write poetry, she lives it," was the reply of Richter, when his
highly-gifted Caroline was applied to for literary contributions to her
sister's publications. He described in these words the real nature of a
woman's duties. Any degree of avoidable publicity must lessen her peace
and happiness; and few circumstances can make it prudent for a woman to
give up retirement and retired duties, and subject herself to public
criticism, and probably public blame.
The writing, then, in which I have advised you to accomplish yourself,
is the epistolary style alone, at once a means of communicating pleasure
to your friends, and of conferring extensive and permanent benefits upon
them. How useful has the kind, judicious, well-timed letter of a
Christian friend often proved, even when the spoken word of the same
friend might, during circumstances of excitement, have only increased
imprudence or irritation!
Few printed books have effected more good than the private
correspondence of pious, well-educated, and strong-minded persons.
Indeed, the influence exercised by letters and conversation is so much
the peculiar and appropriate sphere of a woman's usefulness, that all
her studies should be pursued with an especial view to the attainment of
these accomplishments. The same qualities are to be desired in both. The
utmost simplicity--for nothing can be worse than speaking as if you were
repeating a sentence out of a book, except writing a friendly letter as
if you were writing out of a book,--a great abundance and readiness of
information for the purpose of supplying a variety of illustrations, an
intelligent perception of, and a cautious attention to, that which you
are called upon to answer, a conciseness of expression, that is
perfectly consistent with those minute details, which, gracefully
managed, as women only can, form the chief charm of their conversation
and writing,--with all these you should be careful to give free play to
the peculiarities of your own individual mind: this will always, even
where there is little or no talent, produce a pleasing degree of
originality.
Before every thing else, however, let unstudied ease, I could almost add
carelessness, be the marked characteristics of both your conversation
and your writing. Refined taste will indeed insensibly produce the
former, without any effort of your own, far better than the strictest
rules could do.
The praises of nonsense have been often written and often spoken; nor
can it ever be praised more than it deserves. However "within its magic
circle none dare walk"[84] but those who have naturally quick and
refined perceptions, assisted by careful cultivation. Narrow indeed is
the boundary which divides unfeminine flippancy from the graceful
nonsense which good authority and our own feelings pronounce to be
"exquisite."[85] The unsuccessful attempt at its imitation always
reminds me of Pilpay's fable of the Donkey and the Lapdog:--The poor
donkey, who had been going on very usefully in its own drudging way,
began to envy the lap-dog the caresses it received, and fancied that it
would receive the same if it jumped upon its master as the lap-dog did:
how awkwardly and unnaturally its attempts at playfulness were executed,
how unwelcome they proved, I need not tell you. Nothing is more
difficult than playfulness or even vivacity of manner--nothing is so
sure a test of good breeding and high cultivation of mind; either may
carry you safely through, but their union alone can render playfulness
and vivacity entirely fascinating.
After all that I have written, I must again repeat what I began
with,--that you are to try each different mode of study for yourself,
and that the advice of others will be of use to you only when you have
assimilated it with your own mind, testing it by your own practice, and
giving it the fair trial of _patient_ perseverance.
I ought perhaps, before I close this letter, to make some apology for
recommending, as a part of your course of study, either Rollin or Hume,
one because he is "_trop bon homme_,"[86] the other because he is not
"_bon_" in any sense of the word. My apology, or rather my reason, will,
however, be only a repetition of that which I have said before, viz.
that I should wish you to read history strictly, and merely, as a story,
and to form your _own_ philosophic and religious opinions previously,
and from other sources.
So many valuable and important histories, so many necessary books on
every subject, have been written by the professed infidel, as well as by
the practical forgetter of God, that you must prepare yourself for a
constant state of intellectual watchfulness, as to all the various
opinions suggested by the different authors you study. It is not their
opinions you want, but their facts. Most standard histories, even Hume
and Voltaire, tell truth as to all leading facts: after half-a-century
or so of filtration, truth becomes purified from contemporary passions
and prejudices, and can be easily got at without any importantly
injurious mixture.
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