I believe that virtue shows quite as well in rags and patches
as she does in purple and fine linen. I believe that she and
every beautiful object in external nature claims some sympathy
in the breast of the poorest man who breaks his scanty loaf of
daily bread. I believe that she goes barefoot as well as shod.
I believe that she dwells rather oftener in alleys and by-ways
than she does in courts and palaces, and that it is good, and
pleasant, and profitable to track her out, and follow her. I
believe that to lay one’s hand upon some of those rejected
ones whom the world has too long forgotten, and too often
misused, and to say to the proudest and most thoughtless, “These
creatures have the same elements and capacities of goodness as
yourselves; they are molded in the same form, and made of the
same clay; and tho ten times worse than you, may, in having
retained anything of their original nature amid the trials and
distresses of their condition, be really ten times better.” I
believe that to do this is to pursue a worthy and not useless
vocation.--CHARLES DICKENS.
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