Page:The Daughters of England.djvu/77

66 I am perfectly aware that there are intricate questions, brought before our senate, which it may require a masculine order of intellect folly to understand. But there are others which may, and ought to engage the attention of every female mind, such as the extinction of slavery, the abolition of war in general, cruelty to animals, the punishment of death, temperance, and many more, on which, neither to know, nor to feel, is almost equally disgraceful.

I must again observe, it is by no means necessary that we should talk much on these subjects, even if we do understand them; but to listen attentively, and with real interest when they are discussed by able and liberal-minded men, is an easy and agreeable method of enlarging our stock of valuable knowledge; and, by doing this when we are young, we shall go on with the tide of public events, so as to render ourselves intelligent companions in old age; and when the bloom of youth is gone, and even animal spirits decline, we shall have our conversation left, for the entertainment and the benefit of our friends.

For my own part, I know of no interest more absorbing, than that with which we listen to a venerable narrator of by-gone facts—facts which have transpired under the actual observation of the speaker, in which he took a part, or which stirred the lives, and influenced the conduct, of those by whom he was surrounded. When such a person has been a lover of sterling truth, and a close observer of things as they really were in early youth, his conversation is such as sages, listen to, and historians make the theme of their imperishable pages. Yet, such a companion every woman is capable of becoming; and since old age is not rich in its attractions, is it not well worthy the attention of youth, to endeavour to lay up, as a provision for the future, such sterling materials for rational and lasting interest?