intense sun
beat, and was reflected upon us till I felt as if I was being roasted
alive, and exclaimed, "Oh, this is hell itself!" to which he replied
with a grunt of dissatisfaction, "Oh, dear, I hope hell will be a great
deal _warmer_ than this!"

In my observation about the development of our filial affections after
we become parents ourselves, I may have fallen into my usual error of
generalizing from too narrow a basis, and taken it for granted that my
own experience is necessarily that of others.... But after all, though
_everybody_ is not like me, _somebody_ must be, and one's self is
therefore a safe source from whence to draw conclusions with regard to
others, up to a certain point. Made of the same element, however
diversely fashioned and tempered by various influences, we still are all
alike in the main ingredients of our humanity; and it must be quite as
contrary to sound sense to imagine the processes of one's own mind
singular, as to suppose them universal.

Profound truism! but truisms are profound--they lie at the foundations
of existence--for they are truths.

My journal is fast disappearing behind the fire. How I wish I had spent
the time I wasted in writing it, in making extracts from the books I
read!...

I wrote my sister a long answer, by Mrs. Jameson, to her last letter, in
which I entered at some length upon the various objections to a public
life; not that I was then aware of the decision she has now adopted of
going upon the stage--a decision, however, for which I have been
entirely prepared ever since my visit to England and my return home....
I hope she may succeed to the fullest extent of her desires, for I do
not think that hers is a nature that would be benefited by the bitter
medicine of disappointment. Oh, how I wish she could once enter some
charmed sphere of peace and happiness! The discipline of happiness, in
which I have infinite faith, would I think be of infinite use to her,
but--God knows best.... I am anxious, too, that her experiment of a life
of excitement should be the most favorable possible, that, under its
happiest aspect, she may learn how remote it is from happiness.... Had
she remained in England, I should have rejoiced to think that Mrs.
Somerville was her friend: such a friend would be God's minister to the
heart and mind of any young woman. It is not a small source of regret to
me, to think of how much inestimable human intercourse my residence in
America deprive