Page:Advice to young ladies on their duties and conduct in life - Arthur - 1849.djvu/91

Rh I feel that there is as much difference between her character and mine, as between mine and Sarah J’s.”

“Should not such thoughts and such a consciousness make us very careful how we judge too severely the defects of others? Some persons are naturally deficient in true taste, and others have had their taste perverted by a bad education; some are naturally of an amiable temper, while others have much that is perverse to contend with. In all there is some good; let us magnify that rather than the evil we see.”

“I believe you are right,” was the reply to this. “We are all too apt to see that in our friends which calls for censure rather than praise.”

How much better is it thus to lead away the thoughts of a young friend, disposed to be critical and fault-finding, to the contemplation of excellences in others!

A great deal of unhappiness is created, and a great deal of harm done, by indulgence in the bad habit we are now condemning. Numerous instances might be given in illustration of this. We shall introduce but one, and this with the hope of making the fault appear in its truly odious light.

Ellen B was much given to the use of