Happiness.

O Happiness! our being's end and aim!

Good, Pleasure, Ease, Content, whate'er thy name:
That something still which prompts th' eternal sigh,
For which we bear to live or dare to die,
Which still so near us, yet beyond us lies,
O'erlook'd, seen double, by the fool and wise.
Plant of celestial seed! if dropp'd below,

Say, in what mortal soil thou deign'st to grow. *

FONTENELLE in his "Conversations on the Plurality of Worlds" designates the planet Mercury "The Bedlam of the Universe"; but the excellent author of the " Night Thoughts" applies this appellation, with much greater propriety, to the Earth. To justify this denomination the inhabitants of our sphere must be considered as madmen, and these insane beings never display their insanity more strongly than by the various methods in which they seek the attainment of happiness.

Happiness is a good that has been and still is sought by every human being, young and old, rich and poor, from the creation to the present moment. "The will never stirs the least step but towards this object;" says the admirable Pascal. "It is the motive of all the actions of all men, not excepting even those who hang and destroy themselves." "It is the same desire attended in each with different views" that makes a Turk seek happiness in

* Pope.

indolence, the Frenchman in activity, and the Dutchman in commerce. Some seek happiness in ambition, some in war, some in love, and others in literature, or the fine arts: yet few-very few, if any, of those who have exhausted their energies and wasted their lives in the "Search after happiness" have succeeded in the attainment of their object. Every body is discontented; princes, nobles, beggars, the old, the young, the strong, the weak, the learned, the ignorant, the healthy, the sick-of all countries, of all times, of all ages, and of all conditions."

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Our ideas of happiness are continually varying, and are seldom fixed for any length of time, for as there is greater pleasure in the anticipation than in the enjoyment of an object, so, when we have obtained the object of our desires, we sigh for some other that we have not, and which, perhaps, we deem the sole thing necessary to the completion of our happiness; but when that also is obtained, we are sure to discover that yet one thing more is wanting and so on to infinity.

G1

Behold the picture of earth's happiest man :
He calls his wish, it comes; he sends it back,
And says, he call'd another; that arrives,
Meets the same welcome; yet he still calls on;
Till One calls him, who varies not His call,
But holds him fast, in chains of darkness bound,
Till nature dies, and judgment sets him free;
A freedom far less welcome than his chain.

* Young.

Childhood is the happiest period of the human life; yet as this is the happiness of ignorance, it is a happiness not to be envied by the full grown man of sense, any more than the happiness of a lazy Turk, or an Indian. Yet though Childhood is comparatively happy, abstractedly considered it is not so. The infant sighs for a drum, a trumpet, or a whistle, and has other wishes and desires which prevent childhood from being a perfectly happy state and like a man, the boy having obtained his drum, his trumpet, and his whistle, and for a short time beaten the former, and blown the latter, soon grows tired of them, throws them aside, and weeps for something else.

Alexander, king of Macedon, imagined that if his ambitious designs were crowned with success he should be happy. He was successful; the known world yielded to the power of his arms, and tributary kings bent to him the vassal knee-but was Alexander the Great happy? No: when he had conquered the world, he wept, he was miserablebecause there were no more worlds to conquer.

I knew Eugenio-he was not happy, "But" said he, "I soon shall be so, when Clarinda shall bless me with her hand, and, ecstatic idea! yield to me her virgin charms. My cup of bliss will then be full, and happiness will ever be my future portion." Eugenio has now been married several years-but is he happy? No: he is now satiated with the

possession of Clarinda; she is indifferent to him, and he is, I understand, become a great devotee at the shrine of Bacchus, in order to banish the fiend Ennui.

Leonatus thought, that had he the power "To scatter plenty over a smiling land," he should be happy: he soon had the power, he was honoured with the distinguished favour of royalty, and to his steady hand was committed the guidance of the helm of government. Was he happy? Alas, no! the nation, to which he was a blessing, execrated his name, he was lampooned, caricatured, and hooted in the streets. If the harvest was scanty and a scarcity ensued, this scarcity was sure to be attributed to Leonatus. Leonatus, the good, the public spirited, the just Leonatus was deemed by both the nobility and the mobility to be the evil genius of the nation, and the original cause of all the misfortunes and accidents that happened to the empire.-Leonatus consequently was not happy. Of Borachio I enquired" What is happiness?" "It is happiness" he replied, " to drown dull care in the delightful fumes of claret; and by the same means to banish prosing morality and 'moping melancholy' from our presence. It is happiness by wine to elevate our faculties above the common level, and by wine it is that we are stimulated to deeds of heroic daring." I again saw Borachio the succeeding morning-he was languid

and ill from the effects of last night's debauch, and moreover he had gained a contusion on his head, by having in a fit of heroic daring assaulted, with his companions, some sturdy guardians of the night. "And this," thought I on leaving him, "is happiness!"

Is gaiety happiness?-By no means! Gaiety and happiness have little connection with each other the former is as often affected as real, and the latter is oftener accompanied by seriousness than gaiety.

Were all men happy, revellings would cease,

That opiate for inquietude within.

Lorenzo! never man was truly blest,

But it compos'd and gave him such a cast,
As Folly might mistake for want of joy.
A cast unlike the triumph of the proud;

A modest aspect and a smile at heart. *

Is learning happiness?-No: abstractedly considered it is not. The learned man has much to suffer from criticism, ignorance, and misrepresentation. He deplores the folly and darkness of mankind, and he laments that life is too short to enable him to perfect his knowledge.

Is genius happiness? Ah no! Genius is often found in an uncongenial soil, where it is exposed to the bitter blast of adversity: where there is no kind hand to cultivate the opening blossom, and where it has to endure the scoff of pride, and envy's frown, and poverty's unconquerable bar!"

* Young.