< Page:Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin (Pennell, 1885).djvu
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LIFE AS GOVERNESS.

actually change her nature, or to influence her for life; and, in the second place, she was not allowed to have her own way with her pupils. Had she been free she would have been more apt to encourage a spirit of piety, and inculcate a fine moral sense. For she was at that period in a deeply religious frame of mind, while she did all she could to counteract what she considered the deteriorating tendencies of the children's home training. Her sorrow was deep that her pupils' lives were such as to render sustained study and and religious habits of mind alike difficult.

This caused her much unhappiness. Her anxiety developed into positive illness. After she had been with them some months, the strain seemed more than she could bear, as she confessed to Mr. Johnson, to whom she wrote from Dublin on the 4th of April:—

I am still an invalid, and begin to believe that I ought never to expect to enjoy health. My mind preys on my body, and, when I endeavour to be useful, I grow too much interested for my own peace. Confined almost entirely to the society of children, I am anxiously solicitous for their future welfare, and mortified beyond measure when counteracted in my endeavours to improve them. I feel all a mother's fears for the swarm of little ones which surround me, and observe disorders, without having power to apply the proper remedies. How can I be reconciled to life, when it is always a painful warfare, and when I am deprived of all the pleasures I relish? I allude to rational conversations and domestic affections. Here, alone, a poor solitary individual in a strange land, tied to one spot, and subject to the caprice of another, can I be contented? I am desirous to convince you that I have some cause for sorrow, and am not without reason detached from life. I shall hope to hear that you are well, and am yours sincerely,

Mary Wollstonecraft.

The family troubles followed Mary to Ireland. The news which reached her from home was discouraging. Edward Wollstonecraft at this period declared he

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