The consequence is obvious; in
gay scenes of dissipation we meet the artificial mind and face, for
those who fly from solitude dread next to solitude, the domestic
circle; not having it in their power to amuse or interest, they
feel their own insignificance, or find nothing to amuse or interest
themselves.
Besides, what can be more indelicate than a girl's coming out in
the fashionable world? Which, in other words, is to bring to
market a marriageable miss, whose person is taken from one public
place to another, richly caparisoned. Yet, mixing in the giddy
circle under restraint, these butterflies long to flutter at large,
for the first affection of their souls is their own persons, to
which their attention has been called with the most sedulous care,
whilst they were preparing for the period that decides their fate
for life. Instead of pursuing this idle routine, sighing for
tasteless show, and heartless state, with what dignity would the
youths of both sexes form attachments in the schools that I have
cursorily pointed out; in which, as life advanced, dancing, music,
and drawing, might be admitted as relaxations, for at these schools
young people of fortune ought to remain, more or less, till they
were of age. Those, who were designed for particular professions,
might attend, three or four mornings in the week, the schools
appropriated for their immediate instruction.
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