Page:Ethel Churchill 2.pdf/155

Rh small triumph is too readily taken as earnest for a greater one. The vanity I speak of, is vanity of the highest and best kind; it belongs to the class of our most ethereal emotions; it asks "golden opinions from all ranks of men," because it is keenly susceptible, and has an even feminine craving for sympathy; it asks not so much praise as appreciation; it is generous and self-devoted: still it is vanity. There is also in mental exertion an absolute necessity for re-action: how often do the thoughts, long confined to one subject, crave, as it were, to spring out of themselves, or to run off in any opposite direction! To this may be ascribed the difference that often exists between the writings and the conversations of genius. In the first is embodied the moral truth of their being, worked out by strong belief and deep feeling; the other contains all that is sceptical and careless,—it is the glitter of the waters when not at rest. The thousand paradoxes that spring up, are thrown off both for amusement and for relief; and recklessly flung aside by the utterer, who