THK INFLUENCE OF AGED PEOPLE. 65 



action, to organize new schemes, and to help along church and school. To 

 unmas'c abuses, to do that work in a great city which otherwise goes 

 undone ; that is part of a good woman's work, which may amply repay an 

 hour's thought. 



The scheme for Protestant sisterhoods, which is looked upon with alarm 

 by man}- most thoughtful people, as opening a door for that purposeless 

 conventual seclusion and life of imprisonment and ritualistic mummery in 

 which we Protestants do not believe, has grown out of the necessity which 

 unmarried women feel for a vocation. 



There can be no harm in the institution of Protestant sisterhoods so 

 long as the sisters take no positive vow. It will not hurt women to enter 

 a religious house, work under a lady superior in instructing the ignorant, 

 raising the fallen, helping the poor, so long as they do not lock the door 

 on themselves and give the key into another hand. There is no one who 

 can be trusted with the custody of our liberty but ourselves. A clergy- 

 man may be a very good man, but he is still simply a fallible man ; and 

 he may mistake very much his duty when a Protestant sister tells him 

 that she desires to leave her work if he tells her that she can not. She 

 may know very much better than he. It is all very well to bind one's 

 self to a good work fora year or two years, that there may be consistency 

 in the enterprise ; but a longer or a final term is not consistent with that 

 freedom which God has given us. 



XL 

 THE INFLUENCE OF AGED PEOPLE. 



iu: is no genre picture so ornamental to the fireside as an old lady with 



Home should alway contain a grandmother, old aunt, or some 



relative who has seen the world, lived her life, and who is now wait 



gently for the news which came to Christiana in the " Pilgrim's Progress," 



aking a pleasant interest in the little tragedy or comedy of 



iy life, and being the particular providence of the younger chil- 



ich .in oM lady U as agreeable as she is ornamental. So important 



ility of a virtuous ancestor to the nouveau rich<\ that 



: his immortal way, of the Veneering, " that, it' they had 



i, th"V WOOld have Ordered him fresh from I'\>rlnnm'> 



ni's. He \vouM have come round with the pick! 



A grand fall i ,1 article, whether to <piote from or to enjoy 



daily. An agreeable old man is the mo^t delightful acquisition to any 



