Katherine I loved naturally."
"How naturally?"
"Is it not natural to love your relatives?" said Julia
in surprise.
"No," was the brief answer.
"Surely, Charles Weston, you think me a simpleton.
Does not every parent love its child by natural
instinct?"
"No: no more than you love any of your
amusements from instinct. If the parent was
present with a child that he did not know to be his
own, would instinct, think you, discover their
vicinity?"
"Certainly not, if they had never met before; but
then, as soon as he knew it to be his, he would
love it from nature."
"It is a complicated question, and one that involves
a thousand connected feelings," said Charles. "But
all love, at least all love of the heart, springs from
the causes you mentioned to your aunt--good
offices, a dependence on each other, and habit."
"Yes, and nature too," said the young lady rather
positively; "and I contend, that natural lore, and
love from sympathy, are two distinct things."
"Very different, I allow," said Charles; "only I very
much doubt the durability of that affection which
has no better foundation than fancy."
"You use such queer terms, Charles, that you do
not treat the subject fairly. Calling innate evidence
of worth by the name of fancy, is not candid."
"Now, indeed, your own terms puzzle me," said
Charles, smiling. "What is innate evidence of
worth?"
"Why, a conviction that another possesses all that
you esteem yourself, and is discovered by congenial
feelings and natural sympathies.
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