Page:"The Mummy" Volume 3.djvu/162

woman has excited a tender passion in the breast of a youthful stranger!' Is this so extraordinary an occurrence that it should create such excessive wonder? Are our hearts so dead to beauty that such a catastrophe should occasion surprise? Forbid it, Heaven! No! whilst our hearts still throb in our bosoms, may they ever beat responsive to the attractions of the fair! May we never become insensible to the charms of the loveliest objects of creation! May we ever own their witchery, and bend beneath their magic sway! Or man, degraded man! would soon sink below the level of the brutes. View man as he degenerates when secluded from the influence of female society;—is he not rough, brutal, and unpolished? Does he not want all those winning graces and those delicate attentions that form so undeniably the charm and solace of life? In proportion as our sensibility, as our goodness, and all the best feelings of our nature are awakened, we become susceptible of love. It is indeed, excessive sensibility, and a kindly feeling to our fellow-creatures, that creates it. Does there exist a generous or noble mind that has not felt this pas-