The Evil Principle

Such a nature is usually frank and generous. It believes in the
affections--it depends upon them. It freely gives its own, but
challenges the equally free and spontaneous gift of yours in return.
It has little faith in the things which fill the hearts of the mere
worldlings. Worldly honors may delight it, but not worldly toys. It
has no veneration for gewgaws. The shows of furniture and of dress
it despises. The gorgeous equipage is an encumbrance to it; the
imposing jewel it would not wear, lest it might subtract something
from that homage which it prefers should be paid to the wearer.
It is all selfish--thoroughly selfish--but not after the world's
fashion of selfishness. It hoards nothing, and gives quite as much
as it asks. What does it ask? What? It asks for love--devoted
attachment; the homage of the loved one and the friends; the
implicit confidence of all around it! Ah! can anything be more
exacting? Cruelly exacting, if it be not worthy of that it asks!

Imagine such a nature, denied from the beginning! The parents of
its youth are gone!--the brother and the sister--the father and the
friend! It is destitute, utterly, of these! It is also destitute
of those resources of fortune which are supposed to be sufficient
to command them. It is thrown upon the protection, the charge of
strangers. Not strangers--no! From strangers, perhaps, but little
could be expected. It is thrown upon the care of relatives--a
father's brother! Could the tie be nearer? Not well! But it had
been better if strangers had been its guardians. Then it might
have learned to endure more patiently. At least, it would have felt
less keenly the pangs inflicted by neglect, contumely, injustice.
In this situation it grows up, like some sapling torn from its parent
forest, its branches hacked off, its limbs lacerated! It grows up
in a stranger soil. The sharp winds assail it from every quarter.
But still it lives--it grows. It grows wildly, rudely, ungracefully;
but it is strong and tough, in consequence of its exposure and its
trials. Its vitality increases with every collision which shakes
and rends it; until, in the pathetic language of relatives unhappily
burdened with such encumbrances, "it seems impossible to kill it!"