and by the same means, acquired sufficient self-control to prevent
others from suffering ill-effects from that which would in such a case
be only a fancied improvement in yourself. Further, let it be your care
to bestow more attention than before on that external form which you are
now learning to estimate as the living, breathing type of that which is
within. Finally, while your increased thoughtfulness and the developed
powers of your reason will give you an insight in dangers and evils
which others never dream of, be careful to employ your knowledge only
for the improvement or preservation of the happiness of your friends.
Guard within your own breast, however you may long for the relief of
giving a free vent to your feelings, any sorrows or any apprehensions
that cannot be removed or obviated by their revelation. Thus will you
unite in yourself the combined advantages of the frivolous and
intellectual; your society will be loved and sought after as much as
that of the first can be, (only, however, by the wise and good--my
assertion extends no further,) and you will at the same time be
respected, consulted, and imitated, as the clever and educated can alone
be.

I have hitherto spoken only of the unmarried among your acquaintance:
let us now turn to the wives and mothers, and observe, with pity, the
position of her, who, though she may be well and fondly loved, is felt
at the same time to be incapable of bestowing sympathy or counsel. It is
indeed, perhaps, the wife and mother who is the best loved who will at
the same time be made the most deeply to feel her powerlessness to
appreciate, to advise, or to guide: the very anxiety to hide from her
that it is the society, the opinion, and the sympathy of others which is
really valued, because it alone can be appreciative, will make her only
the more sensibly aware that she is deficient in the leading qualities
that inspire respect and produce usefulness.