ADVICE TO A YOUNG LADY.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume IX, Issue 947, 28 May 1881, Page 2 (Supplement)

ADVICE TO A YOUNG LADY.

How you read is quite as important as what'you read. Most people waste all the time they spend in reading. Mental dyspepsia is almost as common a disease as physical dyspepsia, and is brought on by the same means—viz., by devouring more food and more rapidly than it can be digested. There is no greater error than to read many books except it be to read hurriedly and without pause. What is not retained in the memory is lost, and memory depends on the amount of attention bestowed, and the time a thought is kept before the mind. The power to fix the attention and to keep a thought before the mind grows imperceptibly, but surely, by use. Consider, then, no book properly read, unless you have made the tone, the spirit, the thought of the author your own. Bead no longer at one time than you feel a vivid interest in your book. And let me insist that you keep an unabridged dictionary always at hand, and let no strange word pass without critical inspection. We think in words, and therefore, to think clearly and to speak accurately, you must know the exact meaning of w’ords. They are, in fact, the key to all knowledge. By no means neglect to read aloud a short time every day, with careful attention to the one golden rule of elocution, viz: Read in the same tone and manner in which you w’ould utter the same sentiments in conversation. This practice will educate your ear as well as your tongue. The cultivation of your voice in ordinary speech is altogether more important to you than all the vocal gymnastics of the opera house. J *

“ Don Cupid hath not in all his quivers choice An arrow for the heart like a sweet voice.” Commit to memory some one passage in prose or verse almost daily, not by any means for quotation, but to give you facility and power of expression. You will have reaped only apart of the benefits of mental culture if you fail to acquire the pow’er of expressing your thoughts in just and appropriate language, and with a distinct clear, well-modulated voice. In the selection of words, avoid the temptation to be fine, flowery, and high-flown. Good taste rejects the star-spangled-banner style in speech and writing, as it does in dress and manners.