"Nay," said Jonathan; "not so. I am yet but as a youth in years, and the time sufficeth for all things. Let not the whirl of business and the joy of the honey-moon disturb the virtue that is yet young and frail in my bosom. Of a verity, Ellen Wild will wait till the fall; and if she don't, and my heart should be broken, verily I shall then be better enabled to sympathize with the wretched." Such was the lofty, though new-born virtue of my Jonathan! But of that, as well as our works of benevolence, I shall speak in the following chapters. 5. CHAPTER V. WHICH IS SHORT AND MORAL, AND CAN THEREFORE BE SKIPPED. I have already said that the mere presence of the philanthropic feeling, now infused into my spirit, filled me with happiness, even while I lay upon my back, aching with wounds and bruises. It may be inferred, therefore, that my soul was ecstasy itself, when, restored at last to health and strength, I stalked into the air, dispensing charity with both hands. Of a verity, it was--at least, for a time; and I will say, that, during the first month of my new existence, I experienced a thousand agreeable sensations, such as had never occurred to me in my whole life before. And here let me observe, that, if what I have to add shall show that there are offsets of inconvenience and tribulation even to the satisfaction of the benevolent, I do not design to throw any discredit on the virtue of benevolence itself; which I truly regard as one of the divinest of endowments, angelic in its nature, and blessed in its effects, when practised with discretion; and amiable, if not lovely, even in its folly. I believe, indeed, that if Heaven looks with peculiar indulgence on the errors of any man, it is in the case of him who has the softest judgment for the errors, and the readiest reparation for the miseries, of his fellows. What I wish to be understood is, that man is an unthankful animal, and of such rare inconsistency of temper, that he seldom foregoes an opportunity to punish the virtue which he so loudly applauds.