Julia_Chapter_16

The next day came, and with it Julia's purpose of reform, but with a new subject for agitating reflection; her spirits depressed; her mind perturbed and restless, she felt very unfit for the task she proposed. A task which however it may be recommended and adorned by the past, is one that requires the strongest motives of duty, the greatest selfcommand; the most enduring patience and continued perserverance. It would indeed be a delightful task to rear the tender mind and teach the young idea how to shoot. If the mind yielded to the instructor, with as little resistance, as the plant does to the gardener--the twig is bent without difficulty and the tree fashioned at will--but not so the human plant, the training of which is a task, for whose performance affection and duty only can impart sufficient perseverance. Often not only wearisome to the teacher, but likewise to the pupil. The restlessness and gaiety of childhood are difficult to regulate, and yet more so, its indolence and caprice. But this like every other duty brings its own reward and { ?} of {trial?} and perseverance are well repaid by the improvement of a beloved child. This satisfaction Julia had once enjoyed, when with all her thoughts at home, her passions calm, her affections fixed, she found a charm in every duty and happiness in a tranquil and self approving mind.--But now how attuned. All within her bosom was conflict and tumult and she found it impossible so to command her attention and pin her thoughts as to perform this simple task.

She {resorted} {however?} to attempt it, and ringing the bell, ordered the servant to summon Rosa. he returned and said Miss Rosa was playing and did not want to come. again sent, he again returned and said Miss Rosa would not come. Julia felt angry, and ordered the nurse should be sent for her, and that she should be fored to come. In a few minutes she heard Rosa's shrieks, as she came through the passage, the door was pushed open and the poor child dragged in, struggling in all the violence of passion. On former occasions, Julia would calmly and mildly have expostulated with her little girl and by gentle and {judicious?} means have enquired this forwardness; but now the postulation and instability of her own feelings, destroyed this self command, and her angry and authoritative tones confirmed the obstinacy and increased the violence of the exasperated child--when her mother, pulling her suddenly forwards and holding her fast, opened the task and bade Rosa say her lesson; Rosa maintained in sullen silence--every means of { ?} was resorted to--but the right means, the little mute would not articulate a sound, and rudely and obstinately struggled to get free, till out of all patience she snatched the book out of her mother's hand and threw it out of the window, and Julia provoked beyond endurance, struck the child, who till that moment had never felt the pressure of its mother's hand, except in some fond caress. The next moment, from the impulse of sudden and repentant tenderness, she caught her little girl in her arms, pressed her to her bosom, wet her face with her tears and called herself cruel and unkind. Unhappy child; the subject not only of thy own passions and caprices, but the victim of the more turbulent and less excusable passions and caprices of a mother. Such is the deportation and disorder which the indulgence of irregular passions introduce the human bosom, yes, of a simple passion--yes, even a virtuous passion-when it obtains an undue sway, it destroys that equilibrium which is necessary for the maintenance of {house?} and order and without which, misery and confusion must ensue. Rosa was subdued by her mother's tenderness, but they

were both too much agitated to resume the proposed lessons and she was allowed to return to her spirits and her play mates-Julia, conscious of her own weakness--and Rosa of her own favor, did not very soon make any new attempts at giving or taking lessons, and this lovely child was more than ever abandoned to it-self and the improper companions that chance afforded; generally they were the little black children of the family. Fraud and falsehood, tho' not regular to slaves, are as inevitably the growth of slavery, as weeds are of an uncultured soil. The interests of the Master and the slave are so diametrically opposed, that slavery is a state of constant warfare, and to defraud and deceive a master, instead of being considered as enemies, are looked upon by the slaves, as the natural and lawful means of promoting his own interest, and evading the hard or unjust claims of one whom he looks upon as his natural enemy. From infancy, the young slave is trained to have { ?} self defence and acquire habits of falsehood, deception and artifice. Am { ?} such vices are not practiced. To each other they are just-true and kind. Therefore those vices should be imputed rather to their condition, than to their character. There are indeed many noble and affecting exceptions to these general observations--many individuals and even whole families of slaves, who identify their interest with their masters interest and attach themselves with fondness and devote them selves with a fidelity seldom found among the whites.--But such attachment and devotion are too rare, to allow them to regulate the general intercourse between Master and Slave, in order to preserve the morals of children, it is necessary to separate {them} from this unfortunate class of their fellow beings. To what dangers then, was the lovely little Rosa exposed by the neglect of her weak and erring mother--a danger which few parents sufficiently estimate, and to which from thoughtlessness, rather than want of affection they thus subject these children. Julia was a fond, a devotedly fond mother, never was the sentiment of maternal affection stronger than it had once been in her bosom--but it was now, not destoryed, but lost and bewildered as it were, in the new and conflicting affections--in the restlessness and confusion which there now

feelings occasioned. Not only maternal, but even other interests were absorbed and swallowed up by this dominant sentiment. Her friendship for Madam Luneville, the pleasures of general society--her literary pursuits, her amusing occupations--her care for her house-hold--all were forgotten and neglected while she gave up whole days to listlessness and { ?} and unmindful of the realities of life {kind amidst?} the creations of fancy, to which Capt Mirvan, who was the principled object owed his greatest power to charm, for it was not a being such as he was in reality--but such as her fancy had made him that had usurped such power over her. How easily might this new overwhelming sentiment have been visited at first. Like the crevices in the embank- --------------------------------------------ments which exclude the These lines crossed out. if not stopped the moment they were discovered this mighty never forcing itself or passage where its entrance might have been so easily prevented in its devastating carry- ing ruin and death along before it ------------------------------Next three lines hard to read

Had Julia been a woman of strong passions--or fixed principles she would not have been thus long vacillating between right and wrong. Either her passsions would have carried her headlong into the vortex of criminal indulgence, or her principles would have controlled and governed her conduct, and her moral and religious opinions, changed with changing circumstances, and were as variable and fluctuating as her feelings. When gratified vanity diffused that delicious self-complacency whikch like warm sunshine, animates and enlivens every object it falls on; when her excited tenderness, was more than reciprocated and the heart was full to overflowing, Julia, contented with the present, thought not of a future existence. But when neglect or unkindness destroyed this complacency or chilled the glow of tenderness--when the world frowned, or friends were cold--she keenly felt the inadequacy of

present and worldly joys--her ambitious mind and ardent heart would confess a dreary void, and she would grasp with anxiety at the hopes of a future, and happier state of being. Weak and wavering as she was, the dignity of mind and pride of intellect preserved her from the degradation of vice; that delicacy and refinement of sentiments, which is the result of an exalted imagination and cultivated mind, secured her from the debasing power of the senses, while at the same time it {answered the acuteness and susceptibility of her naturally keen sensibility. Too many like Julia believe themselves innocent while their actions are conformable to the decorums of society and the precepts of morality, and think it neither dangerous or criminal to allow their fancies to revel in forbidden joys, or their hearts to indulge forbidden affections. They persuade themselves that such indulgences, tho' fatal to their own, cannot impair the peace of others. "Actions", as it affects the welfare of society, is justly amenable to its tribunal, but feeling, sentiment is my own--nor { ?}accountable to any one, which I conceal it within the recesses of my own bosom--and as it cannot injure--it cannot be criminal;-for crime,--as injury", said Julia--and thus have thousands of others said and like her have been misled and deceived. But action is as naturally and as necessarily the product of the feelings in the heart, as plants are of the seed deposited in the soil; if the seed is good, so will the plant be--if the feelings are virtuous--so will the actions be. Would, that the example of Julia, could convince others of the falacy of her arguments and prove that the indulgence of any one feeling, incompatible with any one duty, inevitably lead to the neglect of all, and by the consequent disorder and confusion which it introduces into action, as such as sentiment, proves destructive not only of virtue, but of happiness; since by a moral law of our nature, virtue and happiness are inseperable.