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The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Elements of Character, by Mary G. Chandler
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Title: The Elements of Character
Author: Mary G. Chandler
Release Date: July, 2005 [EBook #8450]
[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
[This file was first posted on July 11, 2003]
Edition: 10
Language: English
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ELEMENTS OF CHARACTER ***
Produced by Charles Aldarondo, Tiffany Vergon, David Widger,
and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team
THE
ELEMENTS OF CHARACTER.
BY
MARY G. CHANDLER.
"An exclusively intellectual education leads, by a very obvious process,
to hard-heartedness and the contempt of all moral influences. An
exclusively moral education tends to fatuity by the over-excitement of
the sensibilities. An exclusively religious education ends in
insanity, if it do not take a directly opposite course and lead to
atheism."--EDINBURGH REVIEW.
1854
THE REV. E.H. SEARS, MY FORMER PASTOR,
UNDER WHOSE SPIRITUAL GUIDANCE AND INSTRUCTION, MY MIND LEARNED TO DWELL
UPON RELIGIOUS THEMES WITH PLEASURE, WHILE MY HEART FOUND PEACE IN
BELIEVING.
THIS VOLUME IS INSCRIBED, AS A TRIBUTE OF GRATEFUL AFFECTION, BY
THE AUTHOR.
CONTENTS.
CHARACTER.
THE HUMAN TRINITY.
THOUGHT.
IMAGINATION.
AFFECTION.
LIFE.
CONVERSATION.
MANNERS.
COMPANIONSHIP.
CHARACTER.
"We have been taught, consciously or unconsciously, intentionally or
unintentionally, to seek rather what virtue gives than what virtue is;
the reward rather than the service, the felicity rather than the life,
the dowry, let me say, rather than the bride."--T.T. STONE.
"His practice was of a more divine extraction, drawn from the word of
God, and wrought up by the assistance of his Spirit; therefore, in the
head of all his virtues I shall set that which was the head and spring
of them all, his Christianity; for this alone is the true royal blood
that runs through the whole body of virtue, and every pretender to that
glorious family, who has no tincture of it, is an impostor. This is that
same fountain which baptizeth all the gentle virtues that so immortalize
the names of the old philosophers; herein they are regenerated, and take
a new name and nature. Dug up in the wilderness of nature, and dipped
in this living spring, they are planted and flourish in the paradise of
God. By Christianity I intend that universal habit of grace which is
wrought in a soul by the regenerating Spirit of God, whereby the whole
creature is resigned up into the divine will and love, and all its
actions directed to the obedience and glory of its Maker."--MEMOIRS OF
COL. HUTCHINSON, BY HIS WIDOW.
* * * * *
The weakness and helplessness of humanity, in relation to the fortunes
of this life, have been a favorite theme with philosophers and teachers
ever since the world began; and every term expressive of all that is
uncertain, insubstantial, and unstable has been exhausted in describing
the feebleness of man's power to retain in possession the good things of
this life, or even life itself. However firmly the hand of man may seem
to grasp power, reputation, or wealth; however numerous may be the band
of children or friends that surrounds him, he has no certainty that he
may not die friendless and a pauper. In fact, the most brilliant success
in life seems sometimes to be permitted only that it may make the
darkness of succeeding reverses the more profound.
Weak and helpless as we may be in the affairs of this life, there is,
however, one thing over which we have entire control. Riches may take
to themselves wings, though honest industry exert its best efforts to
acquire and retain them; power is taken away from hands that seek to
use it only for the good of those they govern; reputation may become
tarnished, though virtue be without spot; health may vanish, though its
laws, so far as we understand them, be strictly obeyed; but there is one
thing left which misfortune cannot touch, which God is ever seeking to
aid us in building up, and over which he permits us to hold absolute
control; and this is Character. For this, and for this alone, we are
entirely responsible. We may fail in all else, let our endeavors be
earnest and patient as they may; but all other failures touch us only in
our external lives. If we have used our best endeavors to attain success
in the pursuit of temporal objects, we are not responsible though we
fail. But if we do not succeed in attaining true health and wealth
and power of Character, the responsibility is all our own; and the
consequences of our failure are not bounded by the shores of time, but
stretch onward through the limitless regions of eternity. If we strive
for this, success is certain, for the Lord works with us to will and to
do. If we do not strive, it were better for us that we had never been
born.
Character is all we can take with us when we leave this world. Fortune,
learning, reputation, power, must all be left behind us in the region of
material things; but Character, the spiritual substance of our being,
abides with us for ever. According as the possessions of this world have
aided in building up Character,--forming it to the divine or to the
infernal image,--they have been cursings or blessings to the soul.
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