Percy, laughing; "positively, child, you are fit for nothing but to pray all day." "If my fitness for prayer is to be measured by my need of it," said Ellen, "you are right for I feel that need every moment." "You!" said Flora; "O your humility deceives you: perfection, you know, cannot admit of improvement." Ellen made no answer to this sarcastic speech, but bent her eyes on her work. 66 See," exclaimed her brother, "how she sits there darning an old petticoat, as if her life depended on drawing her needle sixtyone times in a minute." "Indeed I am not darning it," said Ellen, laughing: "I wish, Percy, you understood the nature of my work as well as you do Flora's, for then, perhaps, you would help me." "You are in a mighty hurry, truly," observed Flora. "If you were going to an assembly, Flora, would you not be anxious to make every needful preparation?" 66 Yes, but I presume you are not going to an assembly; or if for variety you should enter such a scene of pollution, that you will not do it in such a dress as that; but, perhaps, I may be mistaken; as singularity seems to be your aim, you may, for the sake of distinction, appear there in a camlet gown; it will be a practical lesson on the vanity of dress." "No, no," replied Ellen, with her usual temper, "the assembly I am endeavouring to prepare for is a very different kind from that you speak of; neither am I singular in my preparations: there are many besides me preparing for the assembly I mean, at which there is but one dress that we can with propriety appear in; and with all our time and our utmost dispatch, we shall have but just time sufficient to get it ready, or rather to fit it on, for it is not our own manufacture: the most diligent of us, if we depended on our own industry, would be obliged to appear there naked; for appear we must, whether we have made any preparation or not." "And now that your pretty allegory is finished, Ellen, will you inform me for whom is that elegant dress for which you seem inclined to work your fingers to the bone? " "It is for one of my little scholars, who will not be able to go to school to-morrow unless it is finished." "School!" cried Percy, "there is another of your righteous absurdities: what use is there in teaching the poor to read? It is only enabling them to study Paine and Carlile." They will learn enough of reading for that without our help, Percy; or if they do not, they will get another to read these books for them if they are so inclined. Our aim is not exclusively to teach to read; no, nor even to read the Bible; but to supersede the taste for bad productions by implanting a desire for good when that desire is excited, reading the Bible will profit, but not before." "But will you tell me," persisted her brother, "what is the world better for all your schooling? Are not the present generation remarkable for the same vices which distinguished their fathers? say two-thirds of the poor who once knew nothing, are now taught to read, I ask, are they more industrious? Are they more honest? Are they more submissive to the laws, than they were when the utmost any man knew was to read his neighbour's or write his own name at the bottom of a note of hand?” "That question is not for me to answer," replied Ellen; "the progressive improvement of society makes but little noise; yet I do think, and, I believe, the testimony of thousands will support me in the assertion, that there is an incalculable increase not merely of the form, but of the spirit of religion in the world; and when religion is increased, morality will increase likewise; but even were it otherwise, though the present generation may be nothing better, 'tis to be hoped those which succeed it may." "How should they, if they have the same examples before them?" "True; but they will have learned to see the evil of those examples: to cultivate a people's understanding is the first step towards improving their character. The Prophet |