An happy sensibility to the beauties of Nature should be cherished in
young persons. It engages them to contemplate the Creator in his
wonderful works; it purifies and harmonizes the soul, and prepares it
for moral and intellectual discipline; it supplies an endless source of
amusement; it contributes even to bodily health; and as a strict analogy
subsists between material and mortal beauty, it leads the heart by an
easy transition from the one to the other; and thus recommends virtue
for its transcendent loveliness and makes vice appear the object of
contempt and abomination.
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