PART II. 



IMPROVEMENT OF RESIDENCES. 



685 



ture, we find an order, harmony, and beauty, which captivate 

 the soul and expand the faculties of mind, coincide with and 

 promote the love of virtue, and check the selfish passions ; while, 

 by storing the mind with the most pleasing, varied, and sublime 

 images, the imagination is thence enabled to select, combine, 

 and, if not to " body forth the forms of things unseen/' at least 

 to conceive abundance of pleasing imagery, wherever we may 

 be placed. Thus no vacuum in life ever need occur, no mo- 

 ments which we are at a loss how to spend, nor any spent which 

 will not afford pleasure in future contemplation — whatever cir- 

 cumstances we may be placed in, whether in liberty or confine- 

 ment, abroad or at home, in the gaiety of youth or the serenity 

 of age, still we can draw upon the endless sources of the ima- 

 gination for a supply of ideas suited to circumstances which 

 may pass across our minds, or which we may wish to converse 

 or reflect upon. Scenery or the objects of taste, used in any 

 other way — mere feeling, without judgment or discrimination, 

 either in reading poetry, viewing nature, or examining pictures, 

 may serve very well as pastime while youth and vigour last; 

 but when these fail, our pleasure or amusement in such sub- 

 jects will be curtailed in proportion to our want of knowledge 

 or judgment. The progress of human happiness is from the 

 pleasures of sense to those of pure intellect. 



With respect to the influence of rural improvement on our 

 families, the difference between children, especially females, 



