Yet let me say, that when I asked you for counsel, I
expected not this asperity of rebuke. If I have done wrong in loving
this poor orphan lad more than others of his class, I scarce think the
error merited such severe censure; and if stricter discipline were
required to keep his fiery temper in order, it ought, I think, to be
considered, that I am a woman, and that if I have erred in this
matter, it becomes a friend's part rather to aid than to rebuke me. I
would these evils were taken order with before my lord's return. He
loves not domestic discord or domestic brawls; and I would not
willingly that he thought such could arise from one whom I
favoured--What do you counsel me to do?"
"Dismiss this youth from your service, madam," replied the preacher.
"You cannot bid me do so," said the Lady; "you cannot, as a Christian
and a man of humanity, bid me turn away an unprotected creature
against whom my favour, my injudicious favour if you will, has reared
up so many enemies."
"It is not necessary you should altogether abandon him, though you
dismiss him to another service, or to a calling better suiting his
station and character," said the preacher; "elsewhere he maybe an
useful and profitable member of the commonweal--here he is but a
makebate, and a stumbling-block of offence. The youth has snatches of
sense and of intelligence, though he lacks industry. I will myself
give him letters commendatory to Olearius Schinderhausen, a learned
professor at the famous university of Leyden, where they lack an
under-janitor--where, besides gratis instruction, if God give him the
grace to seek it, he will enjoy five merks by the year, and the
professor's cast-off suit, which he disparts with biennially.
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