life, with the most regular attention, affection, and respect, whose conduct towards their offspring, through every stage of their existence, has been marked by undeviating principles, and everwatchful care-by salutary severity, tempered by parental tenderness; and who laid down for their education rules of right acting, which they enforced by habitual firmness-rules, that like the steady flame which guided the children of Israel at night from the land of Egypt, led them safely through the dangers of childhood, and quitted them not till every peril was past.

The incidents of real life are sometimes more incredible than any thing we read of in fictitious history, and most of us can remember, probably, some well-authenticated fact which hap pened in our memory, that has called forth the sneer of incredulity, when it has, at a distant period, been communicated to others.

Love casts its own hue over all that it beholds. As a Claude Lorraine gloss sheds one equal and beautifying tint over every landscape, and every cloud, giving warmth to coldness, and cloth ing barren scenes in beauty, so love gives a charm even to unamiable qualities in the eyes of an ardent lover.

It is impossible to calculate on the probable obliquity of human nature, especially on that part of it denominated "temper."

When one is on the brink of eternity and of final judgment one self, how poor, how weak, how wicked, must appear all earthly enmities!

All trials of temper are salutary, and as this world is a state of probation, and the little daily trials of life are perhaps more difficult to be borne than great and unusual ones, I cannot allow myself to think any dispensation other wise than a kind one, which calls into use those serviceable and Christian virtues, patience and forbearance.

With many persons who are sincere believers in the truth of Christianity, religious faith is a thing which they are contented to know that they possess, without bringing it into every day's use they seem to consider it like family jewels, not fit for every day's wear. -Its efficacy as a daily guide, as the impeller to good feelings, and the restrainer of unkind ones, and as a purifier and regulator of the thoughts and actions, is never present to their minds; and any persons who should venture to

make it evident that with them such an influence is perpetually present, they would be apt to stile methodists or fanatics.

There is nothing that rouses the resentment of a generous heart more than unjust accusations of the amiable and the innocent.

It is a painful truth that the operation of fear is more sure and more frequent than that of love, in influencing the conduct of human beings towards each other, and that the power possessed by the meek, the tender, and the benevolent in both sexes, is a non-entity compared to the dominion enjoyed by the violent, the selfish, and the overbearing.

Moral virtues are durable, and therefore precious, only as far as they are derived from religious belief, and are the consequence of it. Without that, all morals are built on a sandy foundation, and are liable to be swept away by the flood of strong temptation. Morality cannot stand long without the aid of religion, and the mere moralist in a time of affliction may learn to know, that the only refuge in sorrow and in trial are the Rock of ages and the promises of the Gospel.

There are two sorts of jealousy-the one struts a heroine with a poisoned bowl and bloody dagger-the other is only armed with pins and needles, and is no heroine at all; but she makes such a use of her weapons, that she does as much, or even more harm to domestic happiness, and to the interests of society, than her more lofty and impassioned sister.

Beauty, and even that power of attraction denominated charm in woman, which is perhaps meant by the cestus, supposed to be worn by Venus, must lose its influence by custom over any husband, however fond, unless it may be maintained by solid and superior qualities of mind and heart, which, like pure gold on which enamel had been worked, retain their value when the enamel is worn away.

There are men in whom the habit of constancy, and of undeviating attachment, is as strong and unconquerable as in virtuous women; and ill befall that wife, who, though conscious of her happiness in possessing the faithful tenderness of a devoted husband, can dare to abuse the power which she possesses and to tyrannize, because she may do so with impunity, over the heart that loves her even with her faults.

"Well might the wise man say, nobody need look out of a window with out seeing a miracle! Who would have expected to see you, Sir Phineas Polycarp, Knight and M.D. who have lived twenty years in the country on fresh air and old wine, tollotating, as you used to say, in the streets of London?" "That is the very reason, Lady Tormentor; a man must be in perpetual motion all his life, and that is as much as the Board of Longitude will ever find out. Forty years he must run after his own affairs, and the other twenty he must take his rounds, a poor decrepit watchman, to guard other people."

Wisely said, Sir Phineas, and you know the comfort of being in a state of progression."

.6

No, I don't know any in a progress towards trouble; and I see nothing else in progression except my son-in-law's follies and my neice's wedding dress."

"What a consolation to have neither neice nor daughter on your hands! Pray who has taken Celandine?"

"A wise man, you may be sure, for she was a very pretty simpleton; and my daughter being a clever girl, chose a foolish husband."

66

Every body thought her mother clever too. I hope you consoled yourself by giving her nothing?"

"No, I gave her ten thousand pounds

for I did not think she chose ill. A wife

ought to thank her stars, Madam, for her husband's faults, because they bring him nearer on a level with her. Besides, she need not be so much afraid of a witless man-it is next to his being dead-she has a right to administer.'

"Well, Sir Phineas, I dare say she is of your opinion. And what is to be your neice's consolation ?"

"I don't know what hers may be, but I know mine. She has never cost me any thing."

"Now, Sir! that is impossible, if you educated her tolerably. If she is an ideot as you say, and you sent her to school, she must have cost a great deal more than she is worth."

"A woman always does that, Lady Tormentor. But the truth is, I never

educated her at all. Girls should learn nothing while they are young girls. Let the mind (if they have any) grow to its full size before it is drest, or its clothes will never fit it. Who would furnish a half-built house?"

"Very true, Sir Phincas, especially if it can be let unfurnished. However, I shall call on the bride, if you will let me know her abode, for a proper chaperone is as necessary as her knocker."

But the entrée of both the lady and gentleman gave an earlier date to our acquaintance, and I had the pleasure of congratulating my nephew, Sir Tristram Cragenmoss, the subject of one of my former sections, on his marriage with my old friend's neice. He made several apologies for not having notified his good fortune to me in due form; and as I perfectly understood his reasons, I felt myself entitled to the usual consolation. His bride was the very counterpart of the "Sweet Highland Girl" described by Wordsworth:

"She did seem

Like something fashioned in a dream;
Such forms as from their covert peep
When earthly cares are laid asleep.
She wore upon her forehead clear
The freedom of a mountaineer,
Sweet looks, by human kindness bred!
A face with gladness overspread!
Her courtesies, about her play'd;
And seemliness complete, that sway'd
With no restraint, but such as springs
From quick and eager visitings
Of thoughts, that lie beyond the reach
Of her few words of modest speech:
A bondage sweetly brooked-a strife
That gives her gestures grace and life."

Sir Tristram, however, had symptoms of shy distress in his demeanor, which indicated no great confidence in my disposition to receive my new relative amicably. But whether he recollected the advantage my notice would give to her first appearance, or the consolation which my heritable property promised to those who fulfilled due civilities, I have never been able to discover; only the result seemed to be a resolution to conciliate me. We interchanged visits accordingly, and notwithstanding my just sense of some

thing like a manoeuvre in my cynical physician's conduct, I found my curiosity to trace the means, superior to the contempt it ought to have produced. A young girl brought up so obscurely could not have seconded her soi-disant uncle's plans so well by engaging my nephew, a man well accomplished, of high birth and fortune, and almost middle without fine natural talents for fascination; and I determined to take a generous revenge for clandestine marriage, by consoling him for the ill consequences.

age,

Nobody can rightly understand the art of consoling people unless they reside in the same house. Sir Tristram invited me to spend the fashionable winter with his lady, and three months gave me some pleasant opportunities to study her character. Probably he did not omit them himself, for he said one day, “I think, Lady Tormentor, we are almost too happy.'

"If you are, there is consolation always ready at the breakfast - table. Laurence Sterne's wife was afraid, as you are, of being too happy, and she bought an ill-pouring tea-pot, lest she should forget the patience and fortitude necessary in this world. But it was soon put upon the shelf, and so, I fancy, you may put your fears."

"My dear Madam, your sagacity anticipates my candour. The truth is, I chose this young uneducated creature, because it is a kind of refreshment to find any thing unfrenched, unmusicked, and unmystified. And as I have always thought home a woman's best school, I also think a wife may learn most happily in her own."

it is very

"So you really expect her to nail herself there, like one of your stair-carpets! I cannot tell whether your scheme would succeed, but I can assure you needless. Without knowing a note of music, or a syllable of any language but her own, she has learned a harmony of speech, which requires more study, and has more power, than all the harmonies of all the instruments in the world."

"Rightly guessed, Lady Tormentor: she has to unlearn, not to learn. And I suspect her uncle, who thinks all men fools, by which I judge him to be both knave and fool, has given her this curious Art of Tuning,' as her only dower."

He departed, leaving it in my hands. It was, indeed, a rare compilation, and I must transcribe it, to do its merits and meaning full justice.

He is odd, so much the better:there are few oddities which may not claim noble precedents.-The Emperor Julian inked his fingers on purpose. Commodus powdered his wig with golddust, and Julius Cæsar wore a green one. Fontenelle cared for nothing but asparagus fried in oil; Sir Isaac Newton forgot his dinner, and Moliere consulted an old gentlewoman.

He is a Sloven.-Better still-he is no worse than eight or ten learned men now living, and half a hundred dead. It is a sign he does not admire himself too much, and a comfortable security that nobody else will.

He is always abroad. He will come home when he is tired. Birds return to their nests, but seldom to their cages.

He loves bustle.-Good!-People in a hurry are like hailstones, which leap about with great noise, and then settle very quietly. Bustle is a healthy exercise in all climates; even savages have their game, called "worree." Besides, a fidgetting person is only an idle one in a fever. He has lost half an hour in the morning, and runs after it the whole day.

He loves money. That is a great comfort. Flints yield oil sometimes, and the greatest misers may be talked out of it. Old Elwes used to say, young Pitt could have persuaded him to empty

his purse at any time:-besides, the money itself is good, and a miser is no more to be considered than the bag which holds it. One may find the opening if one can.

He loves wine.-Another comfort, for then the money will not be kept very safely; and it causes interregnums of intellect which make the wife regent. Besides, if he will reduce himself to a brute, he can have no reasonable objec tion to being beaten. A noted bibber returned non compos one day, found his wife's cloak, rolled himself in it, and fell asleep. Her father came in, and seeing her thus disgraced, remembered the Russian law which inflicts the batogs on ladies who drink before nine o'clock. Thinking he had not ceded his right to chastise, as Russian fathers do, he brought two sticks and applied them with great perseverance and effect.