for the prevention of mistake or fraud, we find very soon that the cubit and the ephah grew to be so much shorter and less in the hands of the people, that the difference came at last to be acknowledged and registered:-so unwilling are men to keep up to the full measure ordained by God: and thus it is that we too, having our measure of life laid up unchangeably in the gospel, have come to have a worldly measure also, which falleth far short of it: and this is allowed and acknowledged-but hath God allowed it ?— and when we go from this world with some of these current errors in our mouths, and measure ourselves thereby, are we certain that the measure of the sanctuary will not be brought forth to falsify our bad calculation? nay, are we not sure that it will?

Methinks, therefore, as errors of science are every day fading away before the greater light which seemeth to be leading us on, like the lengthening days of May, to the summer-tide of knowledge, where there shall be no real darkness;—it is of more import to expose the falsity of some of these current sayings, and to bring forth into common use the cubit and ephah of the sanctuary, seeing that sooner or later we must measure our course of life thereby ;-than

to combat many of those mere popular errors in science which are only dragging on a lingering existence, and which will expire altogether in a very few years without any aid of mine. And if by such an examination of common sayings that have thus far passed unquestioned, I may lead men generally to look a little more narrowly into their opinions on such matters; and cultivate in them more rational and logical modes of thinking, so that fallacies shall not, as heretofore, pass undetected through an indolent fear of the trouble of inquiry,-I shall hold myself to have done good service to the world, and not be without hope that I may thereby have rendered my own last account somewhat more satisfactory.

As for other errors of less concernment, some have arisen from witty sayings, which have come to be repeated for the neatness of the expression, till they acquired the weight of a maxim: and some have had their birth in too much learning; inasmuch as not a few writers have treated their own language contemptuously, as deficient in grammatical forms; and so in studying to write Latin they have forgotten how to write English; and thus have fallen themselves, and led others into notable errors of phrase; some of which

12

OF THE CAUSES OF COMMON ERRORS.

out of love to my native tongue, which I hold to be rich in power of expression, when spoken in its purity, I shall take occasion to notice: and doubtless, if we look narrowly into men's notions, Ignorance also will be found to have a large family of errors that call him father: but as I have before said, they are a sickly brood, not likely in most instances to reach maturity; for the which cause I am the less careful about them.

OF VULGAR ERRORS IN THE WAY

OF COMMON SAYINGS.

"A young man must sow his wild oats.”

ABAD and profitless crop at any time, but

worst when sown in a virgin soil; for

then do they grow more rampant, so as utterly to choke all the seed planted by the care of the Divine Husbandman. But to speak of this notion without a figure,-for methinks it is on account of its foulness that it hath been so veiled; and sometimes it is better to show bad things in all their ugliness, that men may eschew them, what doth this phrase of “sowing wild oats" signify? Doth it not amount to this, that man, having lost his primæval innocence, shall take good care that he never regain it? That he doth well, if, after having given all the cream and richness of his life to Belial, he shall haply carry the sour skim milk thereof to God?

I remember once hearing one who had thus

done, and was now grown old, lament himself, in that death was drawing nigh; he being then suffering with gout, and other infirmities of age, come upon him all the sooner for the intemperance of his youth: to the which it was answered, that death was a happy deliverance from the pains of protracted age, and that even had his life formerly been such as he would now wish had been otherwise, yet that for many years he had had no cause for uneasiness on this head; seeing that he had doubtless repented of the past. Methinks I see his countenance now, and hear the tone of his voice when he replied to those well intended consolations-" Yes, I forsook my sins when my sins forsook me," and he paused as if fearing to strengthen by utterance the thought which oppressed him; but after a moment he added, "how can I tell that such repentance is of any avail?” and then, though his age and health required rest, he plunged again into the dissipation of company, in order to get rid of uneasy remembrance, and it may be, of still more uneasy anticipations; and so he died-he had "sown his wild oats," and gathered the fruit.

But say some, and they are women whom Į hear say so, the more the shame and the pity