Be your own judge and your own
helper. Do not go too soon to any one with your difficulties, but try
to clear them up for yourself.
I think the course of reading you have fallen upon, of late, will be
better for you than such books as you formerly read, addressed rather
to the taste and imagination than the judgment. The love of beauty has
rather an undue development in your mind. See now what it is, and what
it has been. Leave for a time the Ideal, and return to the Real.
I should think two or three hours a day would be quite enough, at
present, for you to give to books. Now learn buying and selling,
keeping the house, directing the servants; all that will bring you
worlds of wisdom if you keep it subordinate to the one grand aim of
perfecting the whole being. And let your self-respect forbid you to do
imperfectly anything that you do at all.
I always feel ashamed when I write with this air of wisdom; but you
will see, by my hints, what I mean. Your mind wants depth and
precision; your character condensation. Keep your high aim steadily in
view; life will open the path to reach it. I think ----, even if she
be in excess, is an excellent friend for you; her character seems to
have what yours wants, whether she has or has not found the right way.
Pages:
374
375
376
377
378
379
380
381
382
383
384
385
386
387
388
389
390
391
392
393
394
395
396
397
398