Lifestyles Books

Recently I set myself to put down what I believe. I did this with no idea of making a book, but at the suggestion of a friend and to interest a number of friends with whom I was associated. We were all, we found, extremely uncertain in our outlook upon life, about our religious feelings and in our ideas of right and wrong. And yet we reckoned ourselves people of the educated class and some of us talk... more...

PREFACE. "Mary's Meadow" first appeared in the numbers of Aunt Judy's Magazine from November 1883 to March 1884. It was the last serial story which Mrs. Ewing wrote, and I believe the subject of it arose from the fact that in 1883, after having spent several years in moving from place to place, she went to live at Villa Ponente, Taunton, where she had a settled home with a garden, and... more...

CONVERSATION I. The rain came down in torrents, and beat violently against the parlour windows, whilst a keen autumnal blast made the children shiver, even by the side of a good fire. Their little hearts glowed with gratitude, when they reflected on their happy lot, sheltered from the bitter wind and driving sleet; and contrasted it with that of many miserable little beings, who were, no doubt,... more...

MY DEAR FRIEND: By your letter of the 5th, N. S., I find that your 'debut' at Paris has been a good one; you are entered into good company, and I dare say you will, not sink into bad. Frequent the houses where you have been once invited, and have none of that shyness which makes most of your countrymen strangers, where they might be intimate and domestic if they pleased. Wherever you have a... more...

A STRING OF BEADS I. "I DIDN'T THINK." "I didn't think!" A woman flings the whiteness of her reputation in the dust, and, waking to the realization of her loss when the cruel glare of the world's disapproval reveals it, she seeks to plead her thoughtlessness as an entreaty of the world's pardon. But the flint-hearted world is slow to grant it, if she be a woman.... more...

MY DEAR FRIEND: 'Molti e felici', and I have done upon that subject, one truth being fair, upon the most lying day in the whole year. I have now before me your last letter of the 21st December, which I am glad to find is a bill of health: but, however, do not presume too much upon it, but obey and honor your physician, "that thy days may be long in the land." Since my last, I have... more...

MCMII Dear Charlie,—Having a spare moment as I crossed the continent last time, I sat down in the rear end of a Lake Shore Limited train, and began to cast about me with a view to hitting upon some way of passing the time amicably with myself. As I looked about the car, I studied the faces and persons of my fellow-travellers, and found them uniformly uninteresting. My mind wandered from them out of... more...

MY DEAR FRIEND: Laziness of mind, or inattention, are as great enemies to knowledge as incapacity; for, in truth, what difference is there between a man who will not, and a man who cannot be informed? This difference only, that the former is justly to be blamed, the latter to be pitied. And yet how many there are, very capable of receiving knowledge, who from laziness, inattention, and incuriousness,... more...

AN AIM IN LIFE. For the sake of girls who are just beginning life, let me tell the stories of some other girls who are now middle-aged women. Some of them have succeeded and some have failed in their purposes, and often in a surprising way. I remember a girl who left school at seventeen with the highest honors. Immediately we began to see her name in the best magazines. The heavy doors of literature... more...

SECTION I. OF THE GENERAL PRINCIPLES OF MORALS. DISPUTES with men, pertinaciously obstinate in their principles, are, of all others, the most irksome; except, perhaps, those with persons, entirely disingenuous, who really do not believe the opinions they defend, but engage in the controversy, from affectation, from a spirit of opposition, or from a desire of showing wit and ingenuity, superior to the... more...