'
'I know that I must be disappointed if I build upon schemes or
exertions of my own,' said Anne; 'but I should be very conceited--
very presumptuous, I mean--to do so, and I hope I never shall.'
'I cannot think how you, or anybody who thinks like you, can ever
undertake to keep school,' said Helen; 'I never saw how awful a thing
it is, before; not merely hearing lessons, and punishing naughty
children, I am sure I dread it now; I would have nothing to do with
it if Papa did not wish it, and so make it my duty.'
'Nobody would teach the children at all if they thought like you,
Helen,' said Anne; 'and then what would become of them?'
'People who are not fit often do teach them, and is not that worse
than nothing?' said Helen; 'I should think irreverence and false
doctrine worse than ignorance.'
'Certainly,' said Lady Merton; 'and happy it is, that, as in your
case, Helen, the duty of obedience, or some other equally plain,
teaches us when to take responsibility upon ourselves and when to
shrink from it.'
'I must say,' said Anne, 'I cannot recover from hearing Mamma and
Lizzie talk of their "little victims," just in Gray's tone.
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