Mary Erskine by Jacob Abbott. Page: 1
Mary Erskine
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Title: Mary Erskine
Author: Jacob Abbott
Release Date: December 26, 2004 [EBook #14475]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
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[Illustration: MARY ERSKINE'S FARM]
MARY ERSKINE
A Franconia Story,
BY THE AUTHOR OF THE ROLLO BOOKS.
NEW YORK: HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS. FRANKLIN SQUARE.
Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1850, by HARPER & BROTHERS, In the Clerk's Office for the Southern District of New York.
PREFACE.
The development of the moral sentiments in the human heart, in early life,--and every thing in fact which relates to the formation of character,--is determined in a far greater degree by sympathy, and by the influence of example, than by formal precepts and didactic instruction. If a boy hears his father speaking kindly to a robin in the spring,--welcoming its coming and offering it food,--there arises at once in his own mind, a feeling of kindness toward the bird, and toward all the animal creation, which is produced by a sort of sympathetic action, a power somewhat similar to what in physical philoso