LOVE OF HOME.
England is, above all other countries, favourable to individual industry, and that energy of character which, developed and well directed, succeeds in the world. Still, failure neither is nor ever has been rare; and private munificence and public benevolence have provided “many happy ports and havens” for those whose evening of life is clouded with storm. We have visited not a few of these sacred places—these palaces of philanthropy; we have gone about their buildings—their noble halls glowing with comfort, and their tables beaming with good cheer. We have for a brief hour enjoyed the quiet of these retreats, and thought how their decayed brethren, jaded with adversity and buffeted with misfortune, may find here that consolation and repose which the outside world has denied them. These may be found in the fellowship of the dining-hall, the social walk in the garden, and the assembling for worship in the chapel. All this, however, is but the bright side of this mode of life; and when the time arrives for the brethren to retire, each to his solitary chamber, then comes the pang of isolation from the world—even the ungrateful world! And, perchance, they look from the casement upon the larger foundation-buildings, and are by them still more forcibly reminded that this noble place is not their own—in short, that it presents not the joys nor the delights which are conveyed to the sensitive heart by that brief but touching word—Home!
It is scarcely possible to overrate the importance of this love of home in our scheme of earthly happiness. Southey has well observed: “Whatever strengthens our local attachments is favourable both to individual and national character. Our home, our birthplace, our native land; think, for a while, what the virtues are which rise out of the feelings connected with these words.”
Then, how is man, in the loneliness we have referred to, parted from the sweet solace he most needs in his hour of woe! Such consolation has been thus picturesquely bodied forth by one of our happiest writers on domestic life: “As the vine, which has long twined its graceful foliage about the oak, and been lifted by it into sunshine, will, when the hardy plant is rifted by the thunderbolt, cling round it with its caressing tendrils, and bind up its shattered boughs; so it is beautifully ordered by Providence, that woman, who is the mere dependent and ornament of man in his happier hours, should be his stay and solace when smitten with sudden calamity; winding herself into the rugged recesses of his nature, tenderly supporting the drooping head, and binding up the broken heart.”[[118]]
[118]. Washington Irving.