CHAPTER II.HUMAN NATURE.
Ignorant selfishness.
He was one of that class of people who, of a freezing day, will plant themselves directly between you and the fire, and then stand and argue to prove that selfishness is the root of all moral evil. Simeon said he always had thought so; and his neighbors sometimes supposed that nobody could enjoy better experimental advantages for understanding the subject. He was one of those men who suppose themselves submissive to the divine will, to the uttermost extent demanded by the extreme theology of that day, simply because they have no nerves to feel, no imagination to conceive, what endless happiness or suffering is, and who deal therefore with the great question of the salvation or damnation of myriads as a problem of theological algebra, to be worked out by their inevitable x, y, z.
Sensitiveness to blame.
A generous, upright nature is always more sensitive to blame than another,—sensitive in proportion to the amount of its reverence for good.
Depression after exaltation.
It is a hard condition of our existence that every exaltation must have its depression. God will not let us have heaven here below, but only such glimpses and faint showings as parents sometimes give to children, when they show them beforehand the jewelry and pictures and stores of rare and curious treasures which they hold for the possession of their riper years. So it very often happens that the man who has gone to bed an angel, feeling as if all sin were forever vanquished, and he himself immutably grounded in love, may wake the next morning with a sick-headache, and, if he be not careful, may scold about his breakfast like a miserable sinner.
French nature.
True Frenchwoman as she was, always in one rainbow shimmer of fancy and feeling, like one of those cloud-spotted April days, which give you flowers and rain, sun and shadow, and snatches of bird-singing, all at once.
Simple honestyvs.worldliness.
He is one of those great, honest fellows, without the smallest notion of the world we live in, who think, in dealing with men, that you must go to work and prove the right or the wrong of a matter; just as if anybody cared for that! Supposing he is right,—which appears very probable to me,—what is he going to do about it? No moral argument, since the world began, ever prevailed over twenty-five per cent. profit.
Dutyvs.expediency.
“Madam,” said the doctor, “I’d sooner my system should be sunk in the sea than that it should be a millstone round my neck to keep me from my duty. Let God take care of my theology; I must do my duty.”
Joy of living.
There are some people so evidently broadly and heartily of this world that their coming into a room always materializes the conversation. We wish to be understood that we mean no disparaging reflection on such persons; they are as necessary to make up a world as cabbages to make up a garden; the great, healthy principles of cheerfulness and animal life seem to exist in them in the gross; they are wedges and ingots of solid, contented vitality.
A boy’s growth.
“Oh, you go ’long, Massa Marvin; ye’ll live to count dat ar’ boy for de staff o’ yer old age yit, now I tell ye; got de makin’ o’ ten or’nary men in him; kittles dat’s full allers will bile over; good yeast will blow at de cork,—lucky ef it don’t bust de bottle. Tell ye, der’s angels hes der hooks in sich, an’ when de Lord wants him, dey’ll haul him in safe an’ sound.”
Will-power.
“Law me! what’s de use? I’se set out to b’liebe de Catechize, an’ I’se gwine to b’liebe it, so!”
The world’s injustice.
“But, Marie, how unjust is the world! how unjust both in praise and blame.”
Selfish love.
These dear, good souls who wear their life out for you, have they not a right to scold you, and dictate to you, and tie up your liberty, and make your life a burden to you? If they have not, who has? If you complain, you break their worthy old hearts. They insist on the privilege of seeking your happiness by thwarting you in everything you want to do, and putting their will instead of yours in every step of your life.
Expressive silence.
Aunt Lois, as I have often said before, was a good Christian, and held it her duty to govern her tongue. True, she said many sharp and bitter things; but nobody but herself and her God knew how many more she would have said had she not reined herself up in conscientious silence. But never was there a woman whose silence could express more contempt and displeasure than hers. You could feel it in the air about you, though she never said a word. You could feel it in the rustle of her dress, in the tap of her heels over the floor, in the occasional flash of her sharp black eye. She was like a thunder-cloud, whose quiet is portentous, and from which you every moment expect a flash or an explosion.
Power of a tone.
That kind of tone which sounds so much like a blow that one dodges one’s head involuntarily.
Making the best of it.
“There’s no use in such talk, Lois: what’s done’s done; and if the Lord let it be done, we may. We can’t always make people do as we would. There’s no use in being dragged through the world like a dog under a cart, hanging back and yelping. What we must do, we may as well do willingly,—as well walk as be dragged.”
Influence of heredity and association.
It is strange that no human being grows up who does not so intertwist in his growth the whole idea and spirit of his day, that rightly to dissect out his history would require one to cut to pieces and analyze society, law, religion, the metaphysics, and the morals of his time; and, as all things run back to those of past days, the problem is still further complicated. The humblest human being is the sum total of a column of figures which go back through centuries before he was born.
Personal magnetism.
Supposing a man is made like an organ, with two or three banks of keys, and ever so many stops, so that he can play all sorts of tunes on himself; is it being a hypocrite with each person to play precisely the tune, and draw out exactly the stop, which he knows will make himself agreeable and further his purpose?
Physical good humor.
That charming gift of physical good humor, which is often praised as a virtue in children and in grown people, but which is a mere condition of the animal nature.
Effect of sinning.
“Ye know sinnin’ will always make a man leave prayin’.”
Scepticism.
“You look at the folks that’s allers tellin’ you what they don’t believe,—they don’t believe this, an’ they don’t believe that,—an’ what sort o’ folks is they? Why, like yer Aunt Lois, sort o’ stringy an’ dry. There ain’t no ’sorption got out o’ not believin’ nothin’.”
Life.
“That ’are’s jest the way folks go all their lives, boys. It’s all fuss, fuss, and stew, stew, till ye get somewhere; an’ then it’s fuss, fuss, an’ stew, stew, to get back again; jump here an’ scratch your eyes out, an’ jump there an’ scratch ’em in again,—that ’are’s life.”
Life as a play.
There are those people who possess a peculiar faculty of mingling in the affairs of this life as spectators as well as actors.It does not, of course, suppose any coldness of nature or want of human interest or sympathy,—nay, it often exists more completely with people of the tenderest human feeling. It rather seems to be a kind of distinct faculty working harmoniously with all the others; but he who possesses it needs never to be at a loss for interest or amusement; he is always a spectator at a tragedy or a comedy, and sees in real life a humor and a pathos beyond anything he can find shadowed in books.
A childlike nature.
Mrs. Pennel had one of those natures, gentle, trustful, and hopeful, because not very deep; she was one of the little children of the world, whose faith rests on childlike ignorance, and who know not the deeper needs of deeper natures; such see only the sunshine, and forget the storm.
Unintended hurts.
All that there was developed of him, at present, was a fund of energy, self-esteem, hope, courage, and daring, the love of action, life, and adventure; his life was in the outward and present, not in the inward and reflective; he was a true ten-year-old boy, in its healthiest and most animal perfection. What she was, the small pearl with the golden hair, with her frail and high-strung organization, her sensitive nerves, her half-spiritual fibres, her ponderings, and marvels, and dreams, her power of love and yearning for self-devotion, our readermay, perhaps, have seen. But if ever two children, or two grown people, thus organized, are thrown into intimate relations, it follows, from the very laws of their being, that one must hurt the other, simply by being itself; one must always hunger for what the other has not to give.
Real love.
“I always thought that my wife must be one of the sort of women who pray.”
“And why?” said Mara, in surprise.
“Because I need to be loved a great deal, and it is only that kind who pray who know how to lovereally.”
Difficulty of self-knowledge.
It is astonishing how much we think about ourselves, yet to how little purpose; how very clever people will talk and wonder about themselves and each other, not knowing how to use either themselves or each other,—not having as much practical philosophy in the matter of their own character and that of their friends as they have in respect to the screws of their gas-fixtures or the management of their water-pipes.
Reserve not understood.
There are in every family circle individuals whom a certain sensitiveness of nature inclines to quietness and reserve; and there are very well-meaning families where no such quietness and reserve is possible. Nobodycan be let alone, nobody may have a secret, nobody can move in any direction, without a host of inquiries and comments: “Who is your letter from? Let’s see.”—“My letter is from So-and-so.”—“He writing to you! I didn’t know that. What’s he writing about?”—“Where did you go yesterday? What did you buy? What did you give for it? What are you going to do with it?”—“Seems to me that’s an odd way to do. I shouldn’t do so.”—“Look here, Mary; Sarah’s going to have a dress of silk tissue this spring. Now I think they’re too dear, don’t you?”
I recollect seeing in some author a description of a true gentleman, in which, among other things, he was characterized as the man that asks the fewest questions. This trait of refined society might be adopted into home-life in a far greater degree than it is, and make it far more agreeable.
If there is perfect unreserve and mutual confidence, let it show itself in free communications coming unsolicited. It may fairly be presumed that, if there is anything our intimate friends wish us to know, they will tell us of it, and that when we are in close and confidential terms with persons, and there are topics on which they do not speak to us, it is because for some reason they prefer to keep silence concerning them; and the delicacy that respects a friend’s silence is one of the charms of life.
Shyness of love.
It comes far easier to scold our friend in an angry moment than to say how much we love, honor, and esteem him in a kindly mood. Wrath and bitterness speak themselves and go with their own force; love is shame-faced, looks shyly out of the window, lingers long at the door-latch.
Throwing away happiness.
For the contentions that loosen the very foundations of love, that crumble away all its fine traceries and carved work, about what miserable, worthless things do they commonly begin! A dinner underdone, too much oil consumed, a newspaper torn, a waste of coal or soap, a dish broken!—and for this miserable sort of trash, very good, very generous, very religious people will sometimes waste and throw away by double-handfuls the very thing for which houses are built and all the paraphernalia of a home established,—their happiness. Better cold coffee, smoky tea, burnt meat, better any inconvenience, any loss, than a loss oflove; and nothing so surely turns away love as constant fault-finding.
Morbid feelings.
There isfretfulness, a mizzling, drizzling rain of discomforting remark; there isgrumbling, a northeast snowstorm that never clears; there isscolding, the thunder-storm with lightning and hail. All these are worse than useless; they are positivesins, by whomsoever indulged,—sins as great and real as many thatare shuddered at in polite society. All these are for the most part but the venting on our fellow-beings of morbid feelings resulting from dyspepsia, over-taxed nerves, or general ill-health.
Love of a bargain.
Milton says that the love of fame is the last infirmity of noble minds. I think he had not rightly considered the subject. I believe that last infirmity is the love of getting things cheap! Understand me, now. I don’t mean the love of getting cheap things, by which one understands showy, trashy, ill-made, spurious articles, bearing certain apparent resemblances to better things. All really sensible people are quite superior to that sort of cheapness. But those fortunate accidents which put within the power of a man things really good and valuable for half or a third of their value, what mortal virtue and resolution can withstand?
Warning for mothers.
Mothers who throw away the key of their children’s hearts in childhood sometimes have a sad retribution. As the children never were considered when they were little and helpless, so they do not consider when they are strong and powerful.
Careful observation.
I think the best things on all subjects in this world of ours are said, not by the practical workers, but by the careful observers.
Looking through blue glasses.
Friend Theophilus was born on the shady side of Nature, and endowed by his patron saint with every grace and gift which can make a human creature worthy and available, except the gift of seeing the bright side of things. His bead-roll of Christian virtues includes all the graces of the spirit except hope; and so, if one wants to know exactly the flaw, the defect, the doubtful side, and to take into account all the untoward possibilities of any person, place, or thing, he had best apply to friend Theophilus. He can tell you just where and how the best-laid scheme is likely to fail, just the screw that will fall loose in the smoothest working machinery, just the flaw in the most perfect character, just the defect in the best written book, just the variety of thorn that must accompany each particular species of rose.
Châteaux en Espagne.
Rudolph is another of thehabituésof our chimney corner, representing the order of young knighthood in America, and his dreams and fancies, if impracticable, are always of a kind to make every one think him a good fellow. He who has no romantic dreams at twenty-one will be a horribly dry peascod at fifty; therefore it is that I gaze reverently at all Rudolph’schâteauxin Spain, which want nothing to complete them except solid earth to stand on.
Care inevitable to human nature.
The fact is that care and labor are as much correlated to human existence as shadow is to light; there is no such thing as excluding them from any mortal lot. You may make a canary-bird or a gold-fish live in absolute contentment without a care or labor, but a human being you cannot. Human beings are restless and active in their very nature, and will do something, and that something will prove a care, a labor, and a fatigue, arrange it how you will. As long as there is anything to be desired and not yet attained, so long its attainment will be attempted; so long as that attainment is doubtful or difficult, so long will there be care and anxiety.
“Cuteness.”
He possessed a great share of that characteristic national trait so happily denominated “cuteness,” which signifies an ability to do everything without trying, to know everything without learning, and to make more use of one’signorancethan other people do of their knowledge.
Making people like us.
It sometimes goes a great way towards making people like us to take it for granted that they do already.
A common mode of reasoning.
She therefore repeated over exactly what she said before, only in a muchlouder tone of voice, and with much more vehement forms of asseveration,—a mode of reasoning which, if not entirely logical, has at least the sanction of very respectable authorities among the enlightened and learned.
Danger in apparent safety.
There is no point in the history of reform, either in communities or individuals, so dangerous as that where danger seems entirely past. As long as a man thinks his health failing, he watches, he diets, and will undergo the most heroic self-denial; but let him once set himself down as cured, and how readily does he fall back to one soft, indulgent habit after another, all tending to ruin everything that he has before done!
Self-deception.
How strange that a man may appear doomed, given up, and lost, to the eye of every looker-on, before he begins to suspect himself!
Convenient duties.
What would people do if the convenient shelter of duty did not afford them a retreat in cases where they are disposed to change their minds?
Too much heart.
A man can sometimes become an old bachelor because he hastoo muchheart, as well as too little.
Privileged truth-tellers.
These privileged truth-tellers are quite a necessary of life to young ladies in thefull tide of society, and we really think it would be worth while for every dozen of them to unite to keep a person of this kind on a salary for the benefit of the whole.
Two kinds of frankness.
There is one kind of frankness which is the result of perfect unsuspiciousness, and which requires a measure of ignorance of the world and of life; this kind appeals to our generosity and tenderness. There is another which is the frankness of a strong but pure mind, acquainted with life, clear in its discrimination and upright in its intention, yet above disguise or concealment; this kind excites respect. The first seems to proceed simply from impulse, the second from impulse and reflection united; the first proceeds, in a measure, from ignorance, the second from knowledge; the first is born from an undoubting confidence in others, the second from a virtuous and well-grounded reliance on one’s self.
Genial and ungenial natures.
There are people who, wherever they move, freeze the hearts of those they touch, and chill all demonstration of feeling; and there are warm natures, that unlock every fountain, and bid every feeling gush forth.
Power of beauty.
“Oh, nonsense! now, John, don’t talk humbug. I’d like to seeyoufollowing goodness when beauty is gone. I’ve known lots of plain old maids that were perfect saints and angels; yet men crowded and jostled by them to get at the pretty sinners. I dare say now,” she added, with a bewitching look over her shoulder at him, “you’d rather have me than Miss Almira Carraway,—hadn’t you, now?”
Growing alike.
“The thing with you men,” said Grace, “is that you want your wives to see with your eyes, all in a minute, what has got to come with years and intimacy, and the gradual growing closer and closer together. The husband and wife, of themselves, drop many friendships and associations that at first were mutually distasteful, simply because their tastes have grown insensibly to be the same.”
A New England woman.
Diana Pitkin was like some of the fruits of her native hills, full of juices which tend to sweetness in maturity, but which, when not quite ripe, have a pretty decided dash of sharpness. There are grapes that require a frost to ripen them, and Diana was somewhat akin to these.
Acceptable advice.
Then he had given her advice which exactly accorded with her own views; and such advice is always regarded as an eminent proof of sagacity in the giver.
Dual nature.
But, reviewing his interior world, and taking a survey of the work before him, he felt that sense of a divided personality which often becomes so vivid in the history of individuals of strong will and passion. It seemed to him that there were two men within him: the one turbulent, passionate, demented; the other vainly endeavoring, by authority, reason, and conscience, to bring the rebel to subjection. The discipline of conventual life, the extraordinary austerities to which he had condemned himself, the monotonous solitude of his existence, all tended to exalt the vivacity of the nervous system, which in the Italian constitution is at all times disproportionately developed; and when those weird harp-strings of the nerves are once thoroughly unstrung, the fury and tempest of the discord sometimes utterly bewilders the most practiced self-government.
Power of an honest character.
“Son, it is ever so,” replied the monk. “If there be a man that cares neither for duke nor emperor, but for God alone, then dukes and emperors will give morefor his good word than for a whole dozen of common priests.”
Relation of age to youth.
“We old folks are twisted and crabbed and full of knots with disappointment and trouble, like the mulberry-trees that they keep for vines to run on.”
Persistence.
“Dis yer matter ’bout persistence, feller-niggers,” said Sam, with the air of one entering into an abstruse subject, “dis yer ’sistency’s a thing what ain’t seed into very clar by most anybody. Now, yer see, when a feller stands up for a thing one day and night, de contrar’ de next, folks ses (an’ naturally enough dey ses), Why, he ain’t persistent—hand me dat ar’ bit o’ corn-cake, Andy. But let’s look inter it. I hope the gent’lmen and de fair sex will scuse my usin’ an or’nary sort o’ ’parison. Here! I’m a tryin’ to get top o’ der hay. Wal, I puts up my larder dis yer side; ’tain’t no go;—den, ’cause I don’t try dere no more, but puts my larder right de contrar’ side, ain’t I persistent? I’m persistent in wantin’ to get up which ary side my larder is; don’t ye see, all on ye?”
The negro love of beauty.
The negro, it must be remembered, is an exotic of the most gorgeous and superb countries of the world, and hehas, deep in his heart, a passion for all that is splendid, rich, and fanciful; a passion which, rudely indulged by an untrained taste, draws on him the ridicule of the colder and more correct white race.
Effect of harshness.
The ear that has never heard anything but abuse is strangely incredulous of anything so heavenly as kindness.
“Blessings brighten as they take their flight.”
Marie was one of those unfortunately constituted mortals, in whose eyes whatever is lost and gone assumes a value which it never had in possession. Whatever she had she seemed to survey only to pick flaws in it; but once fairly away, there was no end to her valuation of it.
Speaking as a friend.
“Now, Miss Nina, I want to speak as a friend.”
“No, you sha’n’t; it is just what people say when they are going to say something disagreeable. I told Clayton, once for all, that I wouldn’t have him speak as a friend to me.”
’Scuses.
“Ah, lots of ’scuses I keeps! I tell you now, ’scuses is excellent things. Why, ’scuses is like dis yer grease dat keeps de wheels from screaking. Lord bless you, de whole worldturns ’round on ’scuses. Whar de world be if everybody was such fools to tell de raal reason for everyting they are gwine for to do, or ain’t gwine for to!”
Use of a chatterbox.
Every kind of creature has its uses, and there are times when a lively, unthinking chatterbox is a perfect godsend. Those unperceiving people who never notice the embarrassment of others, and who walk with the greatest facility into the gaps of conversation, simply because they have no perception of any difficulty there, have their hour; and Nina felt positively grateful to Mr. Carson for the continuous and cheerful rattle which had so annoyed her the day before.
Good and evil inseparable.
It is our fatality that everything that does good must do harm. It is the condition of our poor, imperfect life here.
“Streaked men.”
“But den, you see, honey, der’s some folks der’stwomen in ’em,—one is a good one, and t’oder is very bad. Wal, dis yer was jest dat sort.... He was one of dese yer streaked men, dat has drefful ugly streaks; and, some of dem times, de Lord only knows what he won’t do.”
First steps.
There is something in the first essay of a young man, in any profession, like the first launching of a ship, which has a never-ceasing hold on human sympathies.
From different standpoints.
There is no study in human nature more interesting than the aspects of the same subject seen in the points of view of different characters. One might almost imagine that there were no such thing as absolute truth, since a change of situation or temperament is capable of changing the whole force of an argument.
Fine natures perverted.
As good wine makes the strongest vinegar, so fine nature perverted makes the worst vice.
Lost confidence.
There are some people who involve in themselves so many of the elements which go to make up our confidence in human nature generally, that to lose confidence in them seems to undermine our faith in human virtue.
Wit.
Truly, wit, like charity, covers a multitude of sins. A man who has the faculty of raising a laugh in this sad, earnest world is remembered with indulgence and complacency.
Value of ready expression.
But so it always is. The man who has exquisite gifts of expression passes for more, popularly, than the man with great and grand ideas, who utters but imperfectly.
Opinionated people.
Miss Debby was one of those human beings who carry with them the apology for their own existence. It took but a glance to see that she was one of those forces of nature which move always in straight lines, and which must be turned out for if one wishes to avoid a collision. All Miss Debby’s opinions had been made up, catalogued, and arranged at a very early period of life, and she had no thought of change. She moved in a region of certainties, and always took her own opinions for granted with a calm supremacy altogether above reason. Yet there was all the while about her a twinkle of humorous consciousness, a vein of original drollery, which gave piquancy to the brusqueness of her manner, and prevented people from taking offence.
Difficulty of confession.
It is curious that men are not generally ashamed of any form of anger, wrath, or malice; but of the first step towards a nobler nature,—the confession of a wrong,—they are ashamed.
Animal spirits.
When people work hard all day, and have a good digestion, it is not necessarythat a thing should be very funny to make them laugh tremendously.
First false step.
Boys, and men too, sometimes, by a single step, and that step taken in a sudden hurry of inconsideration, get into a network of false positions, in which they are very uneasy and unhappy, but live along from day to day seeing no way out.
Marks of genius.
“Depend upon it, my dear,” said Mrs. Nut-cracker, solemnly, “that fellow must be a genius.”
“Fiddlestick on his genius!” said old Mr. Nut-cracker; “what does he do?”
“Oh, nothing, of course; that’s one of the first marks of genius. Geniuses, you know, never can come down to common life.”
A busy-body.
Old Mother Magpie was about the busiest character in the forest. But you must know that there is a great difference between being busy and being industrious. One may be very busy all the time, and yet not in the least industrious; and this was the case with Mother Magpie.
She was always full of everybody’s business but her own,—up and down, here and there, everywhere but in her own nest, knowing everyone’s affairs, telling what everybody had been doing or ought to do, and ready to cast her advicegratisat every bird and beast of the woods.
Broken idols.
Do you, my brother, or grown-up sister, ever do anything like this? Do your friendships and loves ever go the course of our Charley’s toy? First, enthusiasm; second, satiety; third, discontent; then picking to pieces; then dropping and losing! How many idols are in your box of by-gone playthings? And may it not be as well to suggest to you, when you find flaws in your next one, to inquire before you pick to pieces whether you can put together again, or whether what you call defect is not a part of its nature? A tin locomotive won’t draw a string of parlor chairs, by any possible alteration, but it may be very pretty for all that it was made for. Charley and you might both learn something from this.
Soul-language.
“There are people in this world who don’t understand each other’s vernacular. Papa and I could no more discuss any question of the inner life together than if he spoke Chickasaw and I spoke French.”
Characters worth exploring.
It is a charming thing, in one’s rambles, to come across a tree, or a flower, or a fine bit of landscape that we can think of afterwards, and feel richer for its being in the world. But it is more, when one is in a strange place, to come across a man that you feel thoroughly persuaded is, somehow or other, morally and intellectually worth exploring. Our lives tend to become so hopelessly commonplace, and the human beings we meet are generally so much one just like another, that the possibility of a new and peculiar style of character in an acquaintance is a most enlivening one.
Unsuspected danger.
The man who has begun to live and work by artificial stimulant never knows where he stands, and can never count upon himself with any certainty. He lets into his castle a servant who becomes the most tyrannical of masters. He may resolve to turn him out, but will find himself reduced to the condition in which he can neither do with nor without him.
In short, the use of stimulant to the brain power brings on a disease in whose paroxysms a man is no more his own master than in the ravings of fever, a disease that few have the knowledge to understand, and for whose manifestations the world has no pity.
Heredity.
Out of every ten young men who begin the use of stimulants as a social exhilaration, there are perhaps five in whose breast lies coiledup and sleeping this serpent, destined in after years to be the deadly tyrant of their life—this curse, unappeasable by tears, or prayers, or agonies—with whom the struggle is like that of Laocoön with the hideous python, yet songs and garlands and poetry encircle the wine-cup, and ridicule and contumely are reserved for him who fears to touch it.
Personality.
We are all familiar with the fact that there are some people who, let them sit still as they may, and conduct themselves never so quietly, nevertheless impress their personality on those around them, and make their presence felt.
Friendly gossip.
A great deal of good sermonizing, by the way, is expended on gossip, which is denounced as one of the seven deadly sins of society; but, after all, gossip has its better side; if not a Christian grace, it certainly is one of those weeds which show a good warm soil.
The kindly heart, that really cares for everything human it meets, inclines toward gossip in a good way. Just as a morning-glory throws out tendrils, and climbs up and peeps cheerily into your window, so a kindly gossip can’t help watching the opening and shutting of your blinds, and the curling smoke from your chimney.
Persistency.
If youwillhave your own way, and persist in it, peoplehave tomake up with you.
Right side of human nature.
Human nature is always interesting, if one takes it right side out.
Human nettles.
It is rather amusing to a general looker-on in this odd world of ours to contrast the serene, cheerful good faith with which these constitutionally active individuals go about criticising, and suggesting, and directing right and left, with the dismay and confusion of mind they leave behind them wherever they operate.
They are often what the world calls well-meaning people, animated by a most benevolent spirit, and have no more intention of giving offence than a nettle has of stinging. A large, vigorous, well-growing nettle has no consciousness of the stings it leaves in the delicate hands that have been in contact with it; it has simply acted out its innocent and respectable nature as a nettle. But a nettle armed with the power of locomotion on an ambulatory tour, is something the results of which may be fearful to contemplate.
Flaws in gems.
Ideal heroes are not plentiful, and there are few gems that don’t need rich setting.
Impossibility of evading trouble.
People who hate trouble generally get a good deal of it. It’s all very well for a gentle, acquiescent spirit to be carried through life byonebearer. But when half a dozen bearers quarrel and insist on carrying one opposite ways, the more facile the spirit, the greater the trouble.