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184 capable, could lead to the acceptance of such an obligation.

In this, therefore, as well as in all other cases, it is of the utmost importance that gratitude should be considered as a distinct feeling, in no way involving any other. It sometimes happens, however, and especially during the present rapid march of intellect, that the junior members of a family are far in advance of their parents in the cultivation of their intellectual powers, and this difference occasionally leads to a want of respect towards the heads of the family, which is alike distressing and disgraceful. On the other hand, there are young women—and happy would it be for our nation, if all the daughters of England were such—who, remembering that their parents, however humble and unenlightened, are their parents still; that by their self-denial, and their toil, and as the highest proof of their regard, they have received the education which makes them so much to differ, make it their constant study to offer to them tokens of respect and regard of such a nature as not to draw forth their intellectual deficiences, but to place them on the higher ground of moral excellence. How beautiful, how touching is the solicitude of such young persons, to guard the venerated brow from shame; and to sacrifice even something of the display of their own endowments, rather than outshine those, who, with all their deficiences, still were the oracles of their infant years; and who unquestionably did more during the season of childhood, towards the formation of their real character, than has since been done by the merely intellectual discipline of schools. Yes, we may owe our grammar, our geography, our music, and our painting, to what are called the instructors of our youth; but the seeds of moral character are sown by those who surround us in infancy; and how much soever we may despise the hand by which that seed is scattered, the bias of