in their train timidity, fufpicion, an high opinion of the power of wealth to command respect, or any other feeling or perfuafion which is adapted to excite or to confirm a propensity to avarice; that propensity finds in the antecedent pursuits and habits and fentiments of men encouragements and fupports which among individuals of the female fex it experiences in a less degree or not at all. Among the aged, however, of the female fex, there are examples of covetoufnefs fufficient to authorise a deliberate admonition against it.

A deficiency in tender concern for the interefts of others is occafionally perceptible in the aged. Of the ties which united them to the world, many are broken. The honours, the purfuits, the profits, even the temporary happiness and misfortunes of individuals, now appear to them in the light in which they ought to be feen by every individual of the human race, as trifles when contrafted with eternity. The fenfations too become blunted; and the inert

nefs

nefs of the body weighs down the activity of the mind. Hence the liveliness and warmth of benevolence are fometimes impaired. To preferve them undiminished in the midst of infirmity and pain, and while perfonal connection with mortal events is daily becoming loofer and loofer, is one of the noblest and most endearing exertions of old age.

Affectionate tendencies, however, in the bofoms of the old proceed, in fome instances, to an extreme; and require, though not to be checked, yet to be regulated. Fondness attaches itself with pernicious eagerness to one of the children of the family; refts not without the presence of the favourite object; deftroys its health by pampering it with dainties; and stimulates and strengthens its paffions by immoderate and indifcriminate gratification. Many a child, whom parental difcipline would have trained in the paths of knowledge and virtue, has been nurfed up in ignorance and prepared for vice by the blind indulgence

Unwil

of the grandmother and the aunt. lingness to thwart the wishes of old age, curtailed of many enjoyments and impatient of contradiction, frequently reftrains the parent from timely and effectual interference. Were this obvious circumftance confidered beforehand, and with due feri

oufnefs, by women advanced in years, they would lefs frequently reduce those with whom they live to the embarraffing dilemma of performing a very irksome duty, or of acquiefcing in the danger and detriment, perhaps in the ruin, of their offspring.

Among the defects of old age querulousnefs is esteemed one of the most prominent. Complaint is the natural voice of suffering; and to fuffer is the common lot of declining years. Even in the earlier periods of life, women of weak health and irritable fpirits not seldom contract a habit of complaining; and though when called to fevere trials, they difclofe exemplary patience, yet they indulge in common life a frequent recurrence of the tones and language of queruloufnefs.

I

toufness. The inward trouble feems ever on the watch for opportunities of revealing itself; and any little mark of regard, any expreffion of tenderness, from a husband or a brother, immediately calls forth the intimation of an ailment. In age, when the affection of children and near relations is rightly diftinguished by particular affiduity and folicitude; when, if the hand of Providence withholds acutenefs of pain, fome degree of infirmity and suffering is merci fully allowed to give almost conftant admonitions of an event which cannot be remote; when garrulity, no longer employed on the variety of fubjects which once interested the mind, dwells with augmented eagerness on prefent objects and prefent fenfations; it is not furprifing that a difpofition to complaint should gather ftrength. But let all who fuffer remember, that it is not by continual lamentation that the largest meafure of compaffion is to be obtained. Reiterated impreffions lofe their force. The ear becomes dull to founds to which it is habitu

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habituated. A part of the uneafineffes described by the fufferer is attributed to ima gination; and the mind of the hearer, instead of estimating the amount of the remainder, wonders and regrets that they are not borne better. Among the strongest fupports of pity is the involuntary reverence commanded by filent refignation.

Another of the unfavourable characteristics by which age is sometimes diftinguished, is a peevish and dissatisfied temper. To those who are converfant with a narrow circle of objects, trifles fwell into importance. Small disappointments are permitted to affume the form of serious evils; inadvertence and unintentional omiffions are construed into pofitive unkindness. Novelties of every fort difguft; and every little variation is a novelty. All things appear to have changed, and to have changed for the worfe. Manners are no longer fimple, as they were once: fashions are not rational and elegant, as heretofore: youth is become