Miscellaneous Pieces in Prose

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Page 36 - I am found, said she, in the vale, and I illuminate the mountain : I cheer the cottager at his toil, and inspire the sage at his meditation. I mingle in the crowd of cities, and bless the hermit in his cell. I have a temple in every heart that owns my influence ; and to him that wishes for me I am already present. Science may raise...
Page 66 - ... and profit. * Could I but get over some nice points, and conform to the practice and opinion of those about me, I might stand as fair a chance as others for dignities- and preferment.
Page 64 - But is it not some reproach upon the economy of Providence that such a one, who is a mean dirty fellow, should have amassed wealth enough to buy half a nation?" Not in the least. He made himself a mean dirty fellow for that very end. He has paid his health, his conscience, his liberty for it; and will you envy him his bargain? Will you hang your head and blush in his presence because he outshines you in equipage and show?
Page 61 - Every thing is marked at a settled price. Our time, our labor, our ingenuity, is so much ready money, which we are to lay out to the best advantage. Examine, compare, choose, reject ; but stand to your own judgment, and do not, like children, when you have purchased one thing, repine that you do not possess another which you did not purchase.
Page 26 - I was indulging the agreeable reveries which the objects around me naturally inspired. I immediately found myself in a vast extended plain, in the middle of which arose a mountain higher than I had before any conception of. It was covered with a multitude of people, chiefly youth ; many of whom pressed forwards with the liveliest expression of ardour in their countenance, though the way was in many places steep and difficult. I observed...
Page 26 - I observed, that those who had but just begun to climb the hill thought themselves not far from the top ; but as they proceeded, new hills were continually rising to their view, and the summit of the highest they could before discern seemed but the foot of another, till the mountain at length appeared to lose itself in the clouds. As I was gazing on these things with astonishment, my good genius suddenly appeared : The mountain before thee, said he, is the Hill of Science.
Page 30 - After I had noticed a variety of objects, I turned my eye towards the multitudes who were climbing the steep ascent; and observed amongst them a youth of a lively look, a piercing eye, and something fiery and irregular in all his motions. His name was Genius. He darted like an eagle up the mountain ; and left his companions gazing after him with envy and admiration : but his progress was unequal, and interrupted by a thousand caprices. When Pleasure warbled in the valley, he mingled in her train.
Page 28 - ... broken ruins of ancient buildings, which the travellers were obliged to climb over at every step ; insomuch that many, disgusted with so rough a beginning, turned back, and attempted the mountain no more: while others, having conquered this difficulty, had no spirits to ascend...
Page 31 - Pleasure warbled in the valley, he mingled in her train. When Pride beckoned towards the precipice, he ventured to the tottering edge. He delighted in devious and untried paths; and made so many excursions from the road, that his feebler companions often outstripped him.
Page 62 - If you preserve your integrity, it must be a coarse-spun and vulgar honesty. Those high and lofty notions of morals which you brought with you from the schools, must be considerably lowered, and mixed with the baser alloy of a jealous and worldly-minded prudence.

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