Page:The works of Anna Laetitia Barbauld volume 1.djvu/33

 before they were hardly acquainted, and who then begin to court their notice; the choice of proper acquaintance of that sex, the art to converse with them with a happy mixture of easy politeness and graceful reserve, and to wear off by degrees something of the girlish bashfulness with out injuring virgin delicacy. These are the accomplishments which a young woman has to learn from fourteen or fifteen till she is married, or fit to be so; and surely these are not to be learned in a school. They must be learned partly at home, and partly by visits in genteel families: they cannot be taught where a number are together; they cannot be taught without the most intimate knowledge of a young lady's temper, connexions, and views in life ; nor without an authority and influence established upon all the former part of her life. For all these reasons, it is my full opinion that the best public education cannot at that period