f connubial love,"
would have little charm in them in reflection, to a mind one degree
above the brutes, were it not for the mystery they include, of their
tendency to give existence to a new human creature like ourselves. Were
it not for this circumstance, a man and a woman would hardly ever have
learned to live together; there scarcely could have been such a thing
as domestic society; but every intercourse of this sort would have been
"casual, joyless, unendeared;" and the propensity would have brought
along with it nothing more of beauty, lustre and grace, than the
pure animal appetites of hunger and thirst. Bearing in mind these
considerations, I do not therefore hesitate to say, that the great
model of the affection of love in human beings, is the sentiment which
subsists between parents and children.

The original feature in this sentiment is the conscious feeling of
the protector and the protected. Our passions cannot subsist in lazy
indolence; passion and action must operate on each other; passion must
produce action, and action give strength to the tide of passion. We do
not vehemently desire, where we can do nothing. It is in a very faint
way that I entertain a wish to possess the faculty of flying; and an
ordinary man can scarcely be said to desire to be a king or an emperor.
None but a madman, of plebeian rank, falls in love with a princess. But
shew me a good thing within my reach; convince me that it is in my power
to attain it; demonstrate to me that it is fit for me, and I am fit for
it; then begins the career of passion. In the same manner, I cannot love
a person vehemently, and strongly interest myself in his miscarriages or
success, till I feel that I can be something to him. Love cannot dwell
in a state of impotence. To affect and be affected, this is the common
nature I require; this is the being that is like unto myself; all other
likeness resides in the logic and the definition, but has nothing to do
with feeling or with practice.

What can be more clear and sound in explanation, than the love of a
parent to his child? The affection he bears and its counterpart are the
ornaments of the world, and the spring of every thing that makes life
worth having. Whatever besides has a tendency to illustrate and honour
our nature, descends from these, or is copied from these, grows out of
them as the branches of a tree from the trunk, or is formed upon them as
a model, and derives from them its shape, its ch