the branches. At last, the green path began to decline from its first tendency, and to wind among hills and thickets, cooled with fountains, and murmuring with waterfalls. Here Obidah paused for a time, and began to consider whether it were longer safe to forsake the known and common track; but remembering that the heat was now in its greatest violence, and that the plain was dusty and uneven, he resolved to pursue the new path, which he supposed only to make a few meanders, in compliance with the varieties of the ground, and to end at last in the common road.

Having thus calmed his solicitude, he renewed his pace, though he suspected that he was not gaining ground. This uneasiness of his mind inclined him to lay hold on every new object, and give way to every sensation that might sooth or divert him. He listened to every echo; he mounted every hill for a fresh prospect; he turned aside to every cascade; and pleased himself with tracing the course of a gentle river that rolled among the trees, and watered a large region with innumerable circumvolutions. In these amusements, the hours passed away unaccounted his deviations had perplexed his memory, and he knew not towards what point to travel. He stood pensive and confused, afraid to go forward lest he should go wrong, yet conscious that the time of loitering was now past, While he was thus tortured with uncertainty, the sky was overspread with clouds; the day vanished from before him ; and a sudden tempest gathered round his head. He was now roused by his danger to a quick and painful remembrance of his folly; he now saw how happiness is lost when ease is consulted; he lamented the unmanly impa tience that prompted him to seek shelter in the grove; and despised the petty curiosity that led him on from trifle to trifle. While he was thus reflecting, the air grew blacker, and a clap of thunder broke his meditation.

He now resolved to do what yet remained in his power, to tread back the ground which he had passed, and try to find some issue where the wood might open into the plain. He prostrated himself on the ground, and commended his life to the Lord of Nature. He rose with confidence and tranquility, and pressed on with resolution. The beasts of the desert were in motion, and on every hand were heard the mingled howls of rage and fear, and ravage and expiration. All the horrors of darkness and solitude sur.

rounded

rõunded him ; the winds roared in the woods; and the torrents tumbled from the hills.

Thus forlorn and distressed, he wandered through the wild, without knowing whither he was going, or whether he was every moment drawing nearer to safety, or to destruction. At length not fear but labor began to overcome him ;-his breath grew short, and his knees trembled ;* and he was on the point of lying down in resignation to his fate, when he beheld, through the brambles the glimmer of a taper. He advanced towards the light; and finding that it proceeded from the cottage of a hermit, he' called humbly at the door, and obtained admission. The old man set before him such provisions as he had collected. for himself, on which Obidah fed with eagerness and gratitude.

When the repast was over, "Tell me," said the hermit, 66 by what chance thou hast been brought hither? I have been now twenty years an inhabitant of the wilderness, in which I never saw a man before." Obidah then related` the occurrences of his journey, without any concealment or paliation.

.

“Son," said the hermit, "let the errors and follies, the dangers and escape of this day, sink deep into thy heart. Remember, my son, that human life is the journey of a day. We rise in the morning of youth, full of vigor and full of expectation; we set forward with spirit and hope, with gaiety and with diligence, and travel on a while in the direct road of piety towards the mansions of rest. In a short time we remit our fervor, and endeavor to find some mitigation of our duty, and some more easy means of obtaining the same end. We then relax our vigor, and resolve no longer to be terrified with crimes at a distance; but rely upon our own constancy, and venture to approach what we resolve never to touch. We thus enter the bowers of ease, and repose in the shades of security. Here the heart softens, and vigilance subsides; we are then willing to inquire whether another advance cannot be made, and whether we may not, at least, turn our eyes upon the gardens of plea sure. We approach them with scruple and hesitation; we enter them, but enter timorous and trembling and always hope to pass through them without losing the road of virtue, which, for a while, we keep in our sight, and to which we purpose to return. But temptation succeeds temptation,

and

and one compliance prepares us for another; we in time lose the happiness of innocence, and solace our disquiet with sensual gratifications. By decrees we let fall the remembrance of our original intention, and quit the only adequate object of rational desire. We entangle ourselves in business, immerge ourselves in luxury, and rove through the laby. rinths of inconstancy; till the darkness of old age begins to invade us, and disease and anxiety obstruct our way. We then look back upon our lives with horror, with sorrow, with repentance; and wish, but too often vainly wish, that we had not forsaken the ways of virtue. Happy are they, my son, who shall learn from thy example, not to despair ; butshaik remember, that, though the day is past, and their strength is wasted, there yet remains one effort to be made :-that reformation is never hopeless, nor sincere endeavors ever unassisted; that the wanderer may at length return after all his errors; and that he who implores strength and courage from above, shall find danger and difficulty give way before him. Go now, my son, to thy repose; commit thyself to the care of Omnipotence; and when the morning walls again to toil, begin anew thy journey and thy life."

DR. JOHNSON.

I

LESSON XXXVII.

DIDACTIC PIECES.

SECTION I.

The importance of a good education..

CONSIDER a human soul, without education, like marble in the quarry; which shows none of its inherent beauties, until the skill of the polisher fetches out the col ors, makes the surface shine, and discovers every ornamental cloud, spot, and vein, that runs through the body of it. Education, after the same manner, when it works supon a noble mind, draws out to view every latent virtue and per fection, which without such helps, are never able to make their appearance.

If my reader will give me leave to change the allusion

so soon upon him, I shall make use of the same instance to illustrate the force of education, which Aristotle has brought to explain his doctrine of substantial forms; when he tells us, that a statue lies hid in a block of marble; and that the art of the statuary only clears away the superfluous matter, and removes the rubbish. The figure is in the stone, and the sculptor only finds it. What sculpture is to a block of marble, education is to a human soul. The philosopher, the saint, or the hero, the wise, the good, or the great man, very often lies hid and concealed in a plebeian, which a proper education might have disinterred, and have brought to sight. I am therefore much delighted with reading the accounts of savage nations; and with contemplating those virtues which are wild and uncultivated to see courage exerting itself in fierceness, resolution in obstinacy, wisdom in cunning, patience in sullenness and despair.

Men's passions operate variously, and appear in different kinds of actions, according as they are more or less rectified and swayed by reason. When one hears of negroes, who, upon the death of their masters, or upon changing their service, hang themselves upon the next tree, as it sometimes happens in our American plantations, who can forbear admiring their fidelity, though it expresses itself in so dreadful a manner? What might not that savage greatness of soul, which appears in these poor wretches on many occasions, be raised to, were it rightly cultivated? And what colour of excuse can there be, for the contempt with which we treat this part of our species; that we should not put them upon the common foot of humanity; that we should only set an insignificant fine upon the man who murders them; nay, that we should, as much as in us lies, cut them off from the prospects of happiness in another world, as well as in this; and deny them that which we look upon as the proper means for attaining it ?

It is therefore an unspeakable blessing, to be born in those parts of the world where wisdom and knowledge flourish ;though, it must be confessed, there are, even in these parts, several poor uninstructed person's, who are but little above the inhabitants of those nations of which I have been here speaking; as those who have had the advantages of a more liberal education, rise above one another by several different degrees of perfection. For, to return to our statue in the block of marble, we see it sometimes only begun to be chip.

02

ped,

ped, sometimes rough hewn, and but just sketched into a hu man figure; sometimes, we see the man appearing distinctly: in all his limbs and features; sometimes, we find the figure wrought up to great elegancy; but seldom meet with, any to which the hand of a Phidias or a Praxiteles could not give several nice touches and finishings.

SECTION II.

ADDISON.

A suspicious temper the source of misery to its possessor.

As a suspicious spirit is the source of many crimes and calamities in the world, so it is the spring of certain misery: to the person who indulges it. His friends will be few; and small will be his comfort in those whom he possesses. Believing others to be his enemies, he will of course make: them such. Let his caution be ever so great, the asperity of his thoughts will often break out in his behavior! and in return for suspecting and hating, he will incur suspicion and hatred. Besides the external evils which he draws upon. himself, arising from alienated friendship, broken confidence, and open enmity, the suspicious temper itself is one of the worst evils which any man can suffer. If "in all fear there .. is torment," how miserable must be his state who, by living in perpetual jealousy, lives in perpetual dread! Looking upon himself to be surrounded with spies, enemies and designing men, he is a stranger to reliance and trust. knows not to whom to open himself. He dresses his countenance in forced smiles, while his heart throbs within from... apprehensions of secret treachery. Hence fretfulness and ill. humor, disgust at the world, and all the painful sensations of an irritated and embittered mind.

He:

So numerous and great are the evils arising from a sus-picious disposition, that, of the two extremes it is more eligible to expose ourselves to occasional disadvantage from. thinking too well of others, than to suffer continual misery by thinking always ill of them. It is better to be sometimes. imposed upon, than never to trust. Safety is purchased at›. too dear a rate, when, in order to secure it, we are obliged to be always clad in armor, and to live in perpetual hostility; with our fellows. This is, for the sake of living, to deprive, ourselves of the comfort of life. The man of candor enjoys is situation, whatever it is, with cheerfulness and peace. Pendence directs his intercourse with the world; but no

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