DESIRE.
“Dear me! how sharp the man looks!” said Henry.—“Yes,” cried Mr. Willock,“you will observe that this passion brings the eyebrows close together, and forwards the eyes, which are more open than ordinary; the eyeball is inflamed, and places itself in the middle of the eye; the nostrils rise up, and are contracted towards the eyes; the mouth half opens, and the spirits being in motion, give a glowing colour. Desire is most frequently unreasonable; it often pants after things which are improper, or hurtful to itself. Just now, when you expressed such an ardent wish to go to sea, your face had all the expression of Desire.—Now, my dear Henry, we should never desire any thing, without due consideration of its value, or of the propriety of having it as we wish; for instance, you should have thought, ‘It cannot matter much to me whether I spend my days on board of a ship, or on shore among my friends; whether I am brought up to the law, or whether I go into the army; each of these situations have their advantages and their honours; they have, too, their labours and disappointments. I know that my parents would sooner study my inclinations than their own: but then they do not decide from inclination; they are wiser, and have more experience than me, and they judge coolly, and without Desire, what would be most fitting for me, according to all the circumstances of my education, the shew of my talents, and the fortune I may have to set out with in life. It is the novelty of a sea life which gives it attraction; but novelty soon ceases to engage, and decreases in value, the longer we make our visit to it; and then we afterwards wish that we had attended to something better for us, or more adapted to our situation.’
“There are, however, many praiseworthy objects of desire, such as
“A Desire to please God.
“A Desire to improve in learning.
“A Desire to excel in virtue or science, properly called emulation.
“The first of these ought to be the great object of our lives: the second will be a lasting delight and profit to us; it will always secure us a portion of respect in the world, and will stay by us, though by misfortune we should be stripped of all, and left to work for our bread: the third is a passion which makes the great man and the hero; it made such a statesman as Charles Fox, of whom you have heard speak, and such a hero as Lord Nelson.
“With these desires in your breast, poverty will stand no chance of keeping you under. The world, my dear children, is like a market-place, where many different persons bring their wares, their industry, and their trinkets for sale. Those who have the best articles, or who are the best workmen, will find the readiest and most certain sale and profit or employ; those who have more humble talents, or wares of a worse quality, are obliged to wait longer, and sell for less; and such as have only trinkets to offer, find customers only by chance, and are never sure of a market. Last of all, the lazy beggar, who only comes into the market-place in expectation of getting a subsistence from the more industrious, as he has nothing to offer in exchange, meets little or no attention, and hears only the just reproof of ‘Why don’t you get some work to do?’