fe to
one I loved, if thrown into sudden and imminent danger; still, I
think I might give pain to that same person many times, by
gratifying myself. For instance, grandfather,--suppose you were to
be led to the stake, to be burned to-morrow,--I would take your
place to save you; yet I do not now do all I possible can, to add to
your happiness. I gratify whims of my own; I idle away hours in the
woods, or by some stream, when I fully know that it would be more
pleasing to you, to see me bending patiently over my Greek and
Latin."

"Very true!" sighed the old man. "You prove your own position, which
is that your ruling love is self-love."

Alfred lifted up his eyebrows, as if he had heard an unwelcome fact.
We are often willing to confess things, which we do not like to have
old us. He fell into deep thought. Finally he said, "It is
universally allowed that virtue is lovely; those who practise it,
appear calm and resigned, and often happy--but, to tell the truth,
such enjoyment seems rather tame and flat. I wish to be in freedom,
to let my burning impulses rush on as they will, without a yoke. I
love, and I hate, as my heart bids me, and I scorn control of any
kind."

"Yet you submit to a yoke, my son; one which is not of your own
imposing either."

"What kind of a yoke?"

"The yoke of society,--you bow to public opinion in a measure. You
avoid a glaring act, often, more because it will not be _approved_,
than because you have a real disinclination for it. Is not that the
case sometimes?"

Alfred did not exceedingly relish this probing, but he was too
candid to cover up his motives from himself. He answered a decided
"yes!" but it was spoken, because he could not elbow himself out of
the self-evident conviction forced upon him.

"Do you think it degrading for a man to conquer and govern the
strongest, as well as the weakest impulses of his soul?" pursued his
grandfather.

"Certainly not degrading,--it is in the highest degree worthy of
praise. It is truly noble! I acknowledge it."

"And yet you deem such enjoyment as would result from this
government, tame and flat."

"I beg pardon; when I spoke of virtue, I referred to that smooth
kind which is current, and seems more passive than active,--that
soft amiability which appears to deaden enthusiasm, and to shut up
the soul in a set of opinions, instead of expanding it widely to
everything noble and generous, wherever it may be found."

"It was not genuine v