"Well, my dear Miss Holmes, no one will impeach your consistency; for you are, without exception, one of the most decidedly religious I ever knew." "Yes," said Emma, "my sister goes rather too far; and I sometimes tell her that she is in danger of becoming a Pharisee. She sees, or think she sees, a dangerous moral tendency in almost every amusement; and such is the influence she possesses over the fears of our parents, that they are kept in a state of constant terror lest I should read a novel or dance a polka." "And is it possible, my dear Miss Holmes, that either you or your parents can object to dancing!--an exercise so conducive to health--so calculated to give elegance to the form, to the walk, and to the action--an accomplishment of so much importance, that no female can be fit to move in polished society who has not attained it? I believe you learned at school, dear Emma; did you not?" "Yes; but now I am not permitted to go out to parties, which I consider very mortifying. My parents allowed me to learn; and now I have learned, and am fond of the amusement, they will not suffer me to practise, except at home, where we never have any dancing parties." "This is sadly mortifying." "They permitted you to learn dancing," replied her sister, "that you might derive from it those personal accomplishments which Miss Orme has so well described; but as they are aware of its dangerous moral tendency, they very properly object to your going into large mixed parties." "Then ought they not to have refused letting me learn to dance, if they intended to deny me the pleasure of it?[23] This is like a father teaching his son the art of engraving, and then taking away his tools lest he should be transported for coining."