But, unfortunately,
"Look round the habitable world, how few
Know their own good, or, knowing it, pursue." [6]
It would be a great thing if people could be brought to realize that they
can never add to the sum of their happiness by doing wrong. In the case of
children, indeed, we recognize this; we perceive that a spoilt child is
not a happy one; that it would have been far better for him to have been
punished at first and thus saved from greater suffering in after life.
It is a beautiful idea that every man has with him a Guardian Angel; and
it is true too: for Conscience is ever on the watch, ever ready to warn us
of danger.
We often feel disposed to complain, and yet it is most ungrateful:
"For who would lose,
Though full of pain, this intellectual being,
Those thoughts that wander through Eternity;
To perish rather, swallowed up, and lost
In the wide womb of uncreated thought." [7]
But perhaps it will be said that we are sent here in preparation for
another and a better world.
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