Page:Original stories from real life 1796.pdf/157

Rh that you cannot employ yourſelf about things of conſequence. How often muſt I tell you, that the Moſt High is educating us for eternity?

"The term virtue comes from a word ſignifying ſtrength. Fortitude of mind is, therefore, the baſis of every virtue, and virtue belongs to a being, that is weak in its nature, and ſtrong only in will and reſolution."

Children early feel bodily pain, to habituate them to bear the conflicts of the ſoul, when they become reaſonable creatures. This, I ſay, is the firſt trial, and I like to ſee that proper pride which ſtrives to conceal its ſufferings. Thoſe who, when young, weep if the leaſt trifle annoys them, will never, I fear, have ſufficient ſtrength of mind to encounter all the miſeries that can afflict the body, rather than act meanly to avoid them. Indeed, this ſeems to be the eſſential difference between a great and a little mind: the former knows how to endure—whilſt the latter ſuffers an immortal ſoul to be depreſſed, loſt in its abode; Rh