Page:The Clergyman's Wife.djvu/382

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REST.


How does the world, in general, define rest? Is it not as a state of perfect quietude and absence from all occupation? as a folding of the hands and reposing of the limbs? as a waking slumber? Certes, this rest, when it succeeds great and prostrating physical or intellectual labor, is refreshing and delicious; but is it the only, is it the most restoring, the most invigorating rest? We think not.

Change of employment, that turns the current of thought and action into new channels, often ensures more effectual delassement. Rest to earnest spirits, to well-developed minds, comes not in the shape of indolence; to them idleness would only generate a new form of weariness. Pleasurable activity, the summoning of unworn faculties into play, impart to energetic temperaments the rest they could never find in a dormant suspense of their powers. When their attention is engrossed by eager pursuit of some desirable object, they experience no sense of toil; when they are engaged in congenial occupation, especially when it has

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