Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1886-04-30
THE HISTORY OF RASSELAS,
PRINCE OF ABYSSINlA.
CHAPTER NNNI.


The Princess Continues her RemarkS upon
Prirote Life.
Nekayah, perceiving her brothers at
tention fixed, proceeded in her narrative.
SIN families. where there is or is not
poverty. there is commonly discord: if
kingdom be, as Imlac tells us. great
family, family likewise is little king
dom, torn with factions and exposed to
revolutions. An unpracticed observer
expects the love of parents and children
to be constant and equal; but this kind
ness seldom continues beyond the years
of infancy; in short time the children
become rivals to their parents. Benefits
are allayed by reproaches, and gratitude
debased by envy.
''Parents and children seldom act in
concert: each child cndeavOrs to appro-
pirate the esteem or fondness of the par
ents. and the parents. with vet less
temptation. betray each other to their
children: thus some place their conf
dence in the father and some in the
mother, and by degrees the house is fill
ed with articles and feuds.
''1he opinions of children and parents.
of the young and the old. are naturally
opposite. by the contrary effects of hope
and dependence. of expectation and
experience. without crime or folly on
either side. The colors of life in youth
and age appear different. as the face of
nature in spring and winter. And how
can children credit the assertions of par
ents. which their own eyes show them
to be false:
Few parents act in such manner as
much To enforce their maXimS by the
credit of their lives. The old man trusts
wholly to slow contrivance and gradual
progression: the youth expects to force
his way by genius, vigor. and precpi-
lance. The old man pays regard to
riches. and the youth reverenceS virtue.
The old man deities prudence: the youth
commits himself to magnanimity and
chance. The young man. who intends
no i'll. believes that none is intended. and
therefore act with OpenneSS and candor;
but his father, having suffered the in
iuries of fraud, is impelled to suspect
and too often allured to practice it. Age
looks with anger on the temerty of
youth, and youth with contempt on the
scrupulosity of age Thus parents and
children, for the greatest part, live on
TO love less and less and if those whom
nature has thus closely united are the
tOrments of each other. where shall we
look for tenderness and consolation
"Surely," said the prince. ''you must
have been unfortunate in your choice of
acquaintance am unwilling to believe
that the most tender of all relations is
thus impeded in its effects by natural
necessity
domestic discord," answered she. sis
not inevitably and fatally necessary; but
see that a whole family is virtuous; the
good and evil cannot well agree: and the
evil can yet less agree with one another
even the virtuous fall sometimes to vari-
kinds, and tending to extremes. In gen
eral, those parents have most reverence
that most deserve it: for he that lives
well cannot he despised.
"Many other evils infest private life
Some are the slaves of servants whom
they have trusted with their affairs. Some
are kept in continual anxiety by the
caprice of rich relations. whom they can
not please and dare not offend. Some
4 husbands are imperiOuS. and some wives
e perverse: and as it is always more easy
to do evil than good, though the wisdom
or virtue of one can very rarely make
many happy, the folly or vice of one may
r often make many miserable"
T IF such be the general effect OF
e marriage" said the prince, II shall, fol
/ the future, think it dangerous to connec
my interest with that of another, lest
y should be unhappy by my partner,
fault
II have met, said the princess, "witl
many who live single for that reason
q but have never found that their pru
II dence ought to raise envy. They dream
;; away their time without friendship
5 without fondness, and are driven to ri,
Ii themselves of the day, for which they
= have no use, by childish amusements o
vicious delights. They act as being
= under the constant sense of some know
D inferiority, that fills their minds witt
rancor; and their tongues with censure