The sister is not quite a woman, the brother not quite a young man, and
each is sometimes disposed to demand an attention which the other is not
quite willing to yield on demand--each would yield, perhaps, if it were
asked as a favor--but the spirit of an independent existence is
beginning to rise, and that spirit spurns any claim. This spirit is
generally the stronger in the brother than in the sister, and he
therefore sins most frequently against the law of love, and he will
treat his sister as he will allow no other young man to do, and will
treat every other young lady with more politeness and courtesy than he
does his own noble-hearted and loving sister. Oh, there is many a
brother, who, if any young man were to say and do what he says and does
to his sister, he would consider him to be no gentleman and a scoundrel.
Now, I would ask, does the fact of your being a brother alter the nature
of your conduct? You are her brother, and therefore may act
ungentlemanly and like a scoundrel! Why, oh, shame, cowardly shame!
because there is no one to resent your ill-treatment--there is no one to
defend a sister from the unkindness of a brother, or to defend the
brother, I may add, from the sister's unkindness; for though I speak to
the brother, let each sister who reads this, ask her conscience whether
her own sister's heart condemn her not.
Time will not allow me to enter into any great detail, in illustrating
the frequency of these violations of the law of family affection, nor
indeed is it needed.
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