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Prosperity has this property, it puffs up narrow souls, makes them imagine themselves high and mighty, and look down upon the world with contempt; but a truly noble and resolved spirit appears greatest in distress, and then becomes more bright and conspicuous.-Plutarch's Lives.

SPRING.

Fled now the sullen murmur of the north,
The splendid raiment of the spring peeps forth;
His universal green, and the clear sky,

Delight still more and more the gazing eye.
Wide o'er the fields, in rising moisture strong,
Shoots up the simple flower, or creeps along
The mellow'd soil; imbibing fairer hues,

Or sweets from frequent show'rs and evening dews;
That summon from its shed the slumb'ring ploughs,
While health impregnates every breeze that blows.
Bloomfield, The Farmer's Boy.

They who suffer the persuasion of a future happiness to operate as it ought on their practice, constantly experience their practice adding strength to their persuasion-the better they become by their belief, the more confirmed they become in it.

Essays on the Employment of Time.

TRUTH." There is nothing," says Plato, "so delightful as the hearing or the speaking of truth"---. for this reason there is no conversation so agreeable as that of the man of integrity, who hears without any intention to betray, and speaks without any intention to deceive.-Dean Sherlock.

Preserve your conscience always soft and sensible. If but one sin force its way into that tender part of the soul, and dwell easy there, the road is paved for a thousand iniquities.

Watts's Miscellaneous Thoughts,

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ETERNITY. The following question is started by one of the schoolmen: Supposing the whole body of the earth were a great ball or mass of the finest sand, and that a single grain or particle of this sand should be annihilated every thousand years; supposing then that you had it in your choice to be happy all the while this prodigious mass of sand was consuming by this slow method, until there was not a grain of it left, on condition you were to be miserable ever after? or supposing that you might be happy for ever after, on condition you would be mise rable until the whole mass of sand were thus annihilated, at the rate of one grain in a thousand years: -which of these two would you make your choice?

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It must be confessed in this case so many thousands of years are to the imagination as a kind of eternity, though in reality they do not bear so great a proportion, to that duration which is to follow them, as an unit does to the greatest number, which you can put together in figures, or as one of those sands to the supposed heap. Reason therefore tells us, without any manner of hesitation, which would be the better part in this choice. But when the choice we actually have before us is this, whether we will choose to be happy for the space of three score and ten, nay perhaps of only twenty or ten years, I might say of only a day or an hour, and miserable to all eternity; or on the contrary miserable for this short term of years, and happy for a whole eternity; what words are sufficient to express that folly and want of consideration which in such a case makes a wrong choice.-Addison.

Raillery and wit serve only to cover nonsense with shame, when reason has first proved it to be mere Watts.

nonsense.

Levellers are generally the dupes of designing men, who taking advantage of their superior abilities, are for pulling all above them down, in order to set themselves up. Thus too, freethinkers, who are naturally impatient of all religious control, decry revelation-not doubting that, if reason be allowed as king, they shall get into the first places of its government.-Dillwyn's Reflections.

The best service we seem capable of rendering to our friends in their dying moments, is, to keep our minds quietly resigned to the event.-Ibid.

The master of a vessel may make a pretty respectable figure on deck, with a leading gale and small sea; but the time for trying his courage and competency for his command, is in violent head winds and midnight storms, when one error in management or direction, would be fatal to ship and cargo. The mere theory of navigation makes but -Ibid. a poor seaman.

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External pomp and visible success
Sometimes contributes to our happiness;
But that which makes it genuine, refin'd,
Is a good conscience and a soul resign'd.
Pomfret's Poems.

LIFE.

Nor love thy life, nor hate, but while thou liv'st
Live well, how long or short permit to Heav'n.
Milton.

No better cosmetics than a severe temperance and purity, modesty and humility, a gracious temper and calmness of spirit; no true beauty without the signatures of these graces in the very countenance.

Ray on the Creation.

The best people need afflictions for trial of their virtue. How can we exercise the grace of contentment, if all things succeed well; or that of forgiveness, if we have no enemies.

Archbishop Tillotson's Common Place Book.

Of all parts of wisdom, the practice is the best. Socrates was esteemed the wisest man of his time, because he turned his acquired knowledge into morality, and aimed at goodness more than greatness.

Ibid.

INTEGRITY. Integrity is a great and commendable virtue-a man of integrity is a true man, a bold man and a steady man. He is to be trusted and relied upon. No bribes can corrupt him, no fear daunt him. His word is slow in coming but sure. He shines brightest in the fire, and his friend hears of him most when he most needs him. His courage grows with danger, and conquers opposition by constancy. As he cannot be flattered or frighted into that he dislikes, so he hates flattery and temporizing in others. He runs with truth and not with the times--with right and not with might--his rule. is straight, soon seen, but too seldom followed.

Wm. Penn's Advice to his Children.

REPENTANCE.-Repentance is an hearty sorrow for our past misdeeds, and a sincere resolution and endeavour to the utmost of our power to conform all our actions to the law of God. So that repentance does not consist in one single act of sorrow, (though that being the first and leading act, gives denomination to the whole,) but in doing works meet for repentance, in a sincere obedience to the law of Christ the remainder of our lives.-Locke.

PUNISHMENT.

A Spartan once the Oracle besought
To solve a scruple which perplex'd his thought,
And plainly tell him if he might forswear
A purse of gold entrusted to his care.

Shuddering the Pythian answered-" Waverer, no:
"Nor shalt thou, for the doubt unpunish'd go."
With that, he hastened to restore the trust;
But fear alone, not virtue, made him just:
Hence he soon proved the Oracle divine,
And all the answer worthy of the shrine;
For plagues pursued his race, without delay,
And swept them from the earth, like dust away.
By such dire sufferings did the wretch atone
The crime of meditated fraud alone!
For, in the eye of Heaven, a wicked deed
Devis'd is done; how then if he proceed

To perfect his device, how will th' offender speed?
Gifford's Juvenal, Sat. xiii.

DEATH.

One world the ambitious youth of Pella found
Too small; and toss'd his feverish limbs around,
And gasp'd for breath, as if confin'd the while,
Unhappy prince, in Gyara's rocky isle ;
But entering Babylon, found ample room
Within the scanty limits of a tomb!
Death, the great teacher, death alone proclaims
The true dimensions of our puny frames.
Ibid. Sat. x.

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There is a nobility without heraldry. Though I want the advantage of a noble birth, said MARIUS, yet my actions afford me a greater one; and they who upbraid me with it, are guilty of an extreme injustice, in not permitting me to value myself upon my own virtue as much as they value themselves upon the virtue of others.-Sallust.

He who foresees calamities, suffers them twice over. Porteus.

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