then wisdom will press a moment to be heard, afflictions or a bed of sickness will find their hours of persuasion and,

should they fail, there is something yet behind, old age will overtake us at last, and with its trembling hand hold up the glass to us, as it did to the patriarch.

ments

Dear inconsiderate Christians! wait not, I beseech you, till then; take a view of your life now; look back, behold this fair space capable of such heavenly improveall scrawl'd over and defaced with I want words to say with what for I think only of the reflections with which you are to support yourselves, in the decline of a life so miserably cast away, should it happen, as it often does, that ye have stood idle unto the eleventh hour, and have all the work of the day to perform when night comes on, and no one can work.

2ndly. As to the evil of the days of the years of our pilgrimage speculation and We agree

fact appear at variance again. with the patriarch, that the life of man is miserable; and yet the world looks happy enough and everything tolerably at its ease. It must be noted indeed, that the patri

arch, in this account, speaks merely his present feelings, and seems rather to be giving a history of his sufferings, than a system of them, in contradiction to that of the GoD of Love. Look upon the world he has given us,

of the temperate,

observe the riches and plenty which flow in every channel, not only to satisfy the desires but of the fanciful every place is almost a paradise, planted when nature was in her gayest humour.

and wanton

Everything has two views. Jacob, and Job, and Solomon, gave one section of the globe, —and this representation another : truth lieth betwixtor rather, good and evil are mixed up together; which of the two preponderates, is beyond our inquiry; but, I trust it is the good: first, As it

renders the Creator of the world more dear and venerable to us; and, secondly, Because I will not suppose, that a work intended to exalt his glory, should stand in want of apologies.

or

Whatever is the proportion of misery in this world, it is certain, that it can be no duty of religion to increase the complaint, to affect the praise which the Jesuits' college of Granada gave their Sanchez, -That

though he lived where there was a very sweet garden, yet was never seen to touch a flower; and that he would rather die than eat salt or pepper, or aught that might give a relish to his meat.

I pity the men whose natural pleasures are burdens, and who fly from joy (as these splenetic and morose souls do), as if it was really an evil in itself.

If there is an evil in this world, 'tis sorrow and heaviness of heart.

The loss of of coronets and

occasion sorrow; the rest is fancy,

and dwelleth only in the head of man.

Poor unfortunate creature that he is! as if the causes of anguish in the heart were not but he must fill up the measure with those of caprice; and not only walk in a vain shadow, but disquiet himself in

enow

vain too.

We are a restless set of beings; and as we are likely to continue so to the end of the world, the best thing we can do in it, is to make the same use of this part of our character, which wise men do of other bad propensities when they find they can

not conquer them,

they endeavour, at least, to divert them into good channels.

If therefore we must be a solicitous race of self-tormentors, let us drop the common objects which make us so, and for God's sake be solicitous only to live well.

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