5 You fall at once into a lower key,

That's worse-the drone-pipe of an humblebee.
The southern sash admits too strong a light,

You rise and drop the curtain--now 'tis night.
He shakes with cold--you stir the fire and strive
10 To make a blaze--that's roasting him alive.
Serve him with venison, and he chooses fish ;
With soal-that's just the sort he does not wish.
He takes what he at first professed to loath,
And in due time feeds heartily on both;
15 Yet still, o'erclouded with a constant frown,
He does not swallow, but he gulps it down.
Your hope to please him vain on every plan,
Himself should work that wonder, if he can--
Alas! his efforts double his distress,

20 He likes yours little, and his own still less. Thus always teasing others, always teased, His only pleasure is-to be displeased.

I pity bashful men, who feel the pain Of fancied scorn and undeserved disdain, 25 And bear the marks upon a blushing face Of needless shame, and self-imposed disgrace. Our sensibilities are so acute,

The fear of being silent makes us mute.
We sometimes think we could a speech produce
30 Much to the purpose, if our tongues were loose:
But being tried, it dies upon the lip,

Faint as a chicken's note that has the pip:
Our wasted oil unprofitably burns,

Like hidden lamps in old sepulchral urns.
35 The circle formed, we sit in silent state,
Like figures drawn upon a dial plate ;
Yes ma'am, and no ma'am, uttered softly, show
Every five minutes how the minutes go;
Each individual, suffering a constraint
40 Poetry may, but colours cannot paint;
As if in close committee on the sky,
Reports it hot or cold, or wet or dry;
And finds a changing clime a happy source
Of wise reflection, and well timed discourse.
We next inquire, but softly and by stealth,

45

Like conservators of the public health,

Of epidemic throats, if such there are,

And coughs, and rheums, and phthisic, and catarrh.
That theme exhausted, a wide chasm ensues,

50 Filled up at last with interesting news,

Who danced with whom, and who are like to wed, And who is hanged, and who is brought to bed: But fear to call a more important cause, As if 'twere treason against English laws. 55 The visit paid, with ecstasy we come,

As from a seven years transportation, home, And there resume an unembarrassed brow, Recovering what we lost we know not how, 60 The faculties, that seemed reduced to nought, Expression and the privilege of thought.

41.

Lady Percy to her husband.

Cowper.

Tell me, sweet lord, what is't that takes from thee
Thy stomach, pleasure, and thy golden sleep?
Why dost thou bend thine eyes upon the earth;
And start so often when thou sit'st alone?

Why hast thou lost the fresh blood in thy cheeks;
5 And given my treasures, and my rights of thee,
To thick-ey'd musing, and curs'd melancholy?
In thy faint slumbers, I by thee have watch'd,
And heard thee murmur tales of iron wars :
Speak terms of manage to thy bounding steed;
10 Cry, Courage!-to the field! And thou hast talk'd
Of sallies, and retires; of trenches, tents,
Of palisadoes, frontiers, parapets;

Of basilisks, of cannon, culverin ;
Of prisoners' ransom, and of soldiers slain,
15 And all the 'currents of a heady fight.

Thy spirit within thee hath been so at war,
And thus hast so bestirr'd thee in thy sleep,
That beads of sweat have stood upon thy brow,
Like bubbles in a late disturbed stream;
20 And in thy face strange motions have appear'd,
Such as we see when men restrain their breath

On some great sudden haste. O, what portents are

these?

Some heavy business hath my lord in hand, 25 And I must know it, else he loves me not.

Shakspeare.

42. The exercise of the Memory in learning not sufficient.

To learn, seems, with many, to imply no more than a bare exercise of memory. To read, and to remember is, they imagine, all they have to do. I affirm on the contrary that a great deal more is necessary, as to exer5 cise the judgment and the discursive faculty. I shall put the case, that one were employed to teach you algebra; and instead of instructing you in the manner of stating and resolving algebraic equations, he should think it incumbent on him, only to inform you of all the 10 principal problems, that had at any time exercised the art of the most famous algebraists, and the solutions they had given; and being possessed of a retentive memory, I shall suppose, you have a distinct remembrance both of the questions and the answers; could ye for 15 this, be said to have learnt algebra? No, surely. To teach you that ingenious and useful art, is to instruct you in those principles, by the proper application of which, you shall be enabled. to solve the questions for yourselves. In like manner, to teach you to understand 20 the scriptures, is to initiate you into those general principles, which will gradually enable you of yourselves, to enter into their sense and spirit. It is not to make you repeat by rote the judgments of others, but to bring you to form judgments of your own; to see with 25 your own eyes, and not with other people's. I shall conclude this prelection with the translation of a short passage from the Persian letters, which falls in entirely with my present subject. Rica having been to visit the library of a French convent, writes thus to his friend 30 in Persia concerning what had passed. Father, said I to the librarian, what are these huge volumes which fill the whole side of the library? These, said he, are the Interpreters of the scriptures. There is a prodigious

number of them, replied I; the scriptures must have 35 been very dark formerly and very clear at present. Do there remain still any doubts? Are there now any points contested? Are there, answered he with surprise, Are there? There are almost as many as there are lines. You astonish me, said I, what then have all 40 these authors been doing? These authors, returned he, never searched the scriptures, for what ought to be believed, but for what they did believe themselves. They did not consider them as a book, wherein were contained the doctrines which they ought to receive, 45 but as a work which might be made to authorize their own ideas. For this reason, they have corrupted all the meanings, and have put every passage to the torture, to make it speak their own sense. 'Tis a country whereon people of all sects make invasions, and go for 50 pillage; it is a field of battle, where when hostile nations meet, they engage, attack and skirmish in a thousand different ways. Campbell.

43. Report of an adjudged case.

1 Between Nose and Eyes a strange contest arose
The spectacles set them unhappily wrong;
The point in dispute was, as all the world knows,
To which the said spectacles ought to belong.

2 So Tongue was the lawyer, and argued the cause, With a great deal of skill, and a wig full of learning, While chief baron Ear sat to balance the laws,

So famed for his talent in nicely discerning.

3 "In behalf of the Nose, it will quickly appear,

And your lordship" he said "will undoubtedly find, That the Nose has had spectacles always to wear, Which amounts to possession time out of mind."

4 Then holding the spectacles up to the court"Your lordship observes they are made with a straddle, As wide as the ridge of the Nose is! in short, Designed to sit close to it, just like a saddle.

5 "Again, would your worship a moment suppose

("Tis a case that has happened, and may be again) That the visage or countenance had not a Nose

Pray, who would, or who could, wear spectacles then? 6 "On the whole it appears, and my argument shows, With a reasoning the court will never condemn, That the spectacles plainly were made for the Nose, And the Nose was as plainly intended for them." 7 Then, shifting his side, (as a lawyer knows how) He pleaded again in behalf of the Eyes: But what were his arguments few people know, For the court did not think they were equally wise. 8 So his lordship decreed, with a grave, solemn tone, Decisive and clear, without one if or butThat whenever the Nose put his spectacles on, By day-light or candle-light,-Eyes should be shut!

5

44. Fitz James and Roderick Dhu.

With cautious step, and ear awake,
He climbs the crag and threads the brake;
And not the summer solstice, there,
Temper'd the midnight mountain air,
But every breeze that swept the wold,

Benumbed his drenched limbs with cold.*
In dread, in danger, and alone,

Согорет

Famish'd and chilled, through ways unknown,
Tangled and steep, he journeyed on;

10 Till, as a rock's huge point he turned,
A watch-fire close before him burned.
Beside its embers red and clear,
Basked, in his plaid a mountaineer ;
And up he sprung with sword in hand,-

15

Thy name and purpose! Saxon, stand!"-
"A stranger."- "What dost thou require ?"-
"Rest and a guide, and food and fire.
My life's beset, my path is lost,

The gale has chilled my limbs with frost."