It is not our minor undertakings, but rather our most important
enterprises, that are frustrated by such trifles as these; for it must
be allowed that we strive less tenaciously against an obstacle that
debars us from a pleasure, than against one that separates us from a
duty--in the one case we have to stem the torrent, in the other we
sail with the current.
When we observe some deplorable instance of a wrecked career--when we
see a man starting in life with the most brilliant prospects
collapsing into a dead-weight on his fellows, we are apt to suppose
that some insurmountable barrier must have crossed his path--some
Himalaya, or formidable wall, like that which does not now separate
China from Tartary; but no such thing. Trace the cause to its source,
and what think you is invariably found? A grain of sand; the
unfortunate wretch has had the wind against him--nothing more.
Rescued from the sea, Mary Wolston was now a prey to a raging fever.
Ill or well, at her age there is no medium, either exuberant health or
complete prostration; the juices then are turbulent and the blood is
ardent.
Somehow or other, a good action attaches the doer to the recipient;
so, in the case of Fritz, apart from the brotherly affection which he
had vaguely vowed to entertain for the two young girls that had so
unexpectedly appeared amongst them, he now regarded the life of Mary
as identical with his own, and felt that her death would inevitably
shorten his own existence; "for," said he to himself, "should she die,
I was too late in drawing her out of the water.
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