to cultivate the gentle charities of life. We are, by a consistent walk, to benefit those around us, though we be in an humble vale, and though, like the gentle rivulet, we may attract little attention, and may soon cease to be remembered on earth. Kindness will always do good. It makes others happy, and that is doing good. It prompts us to seek to benefit others, and that is doing good. It makes others gentle and benignant, and that is doing good.

Albert Barnes, New York, 1798-1870.

52. Our Creator.

We are commanded to remember "our Creator in the days of our youth." The days of our youth are the days of our blessings. In those days we enter into life with a shower of God's blessings upon our heads; we come adorned with all the choicest gifts of the Almighty: with strength of body, with activity of limb, with health and vigor of constitution, with everything to fit us both for labor and enjoyment. If not endowed with sufficiency, endowed with what is better, the power of obtaining it for ourselves by an honest and manly industry; with senses keen and observing; with spirits high, lively, and untamable, that shake off care and sorrow whenever they attempt to fasten upon our mind, and that enable us to make pleasure for ourselves where we do not find it, and to draw enjoyment and gratification from things in which they see nothing but pain, vexation, and disappointment.

Chas. Wolfe, Ireland, 1791-1823.

53. True Value.

It is not labor that makes things valuable, but their being valuable that makes them worth laboring for. And God, having judged, in His wisdom, that it is not good for man to be idle, has so appointed things, by His providence, that few of the things that are most desirable can be obtained without labor. It is ordained that man should eat bread in the sweat of his face; and almost all the necessary comforts and luxuries of life are obtained only by labor.

R. Whately, England, 1787-1863.

54. Behind Time.

The best laid plans, the most important affairs, the fortunes of individuals, the weal of nations, honor, life itself, are daily sacrificed because somebody is "behind time." There are men who always fail in whatever they undertake, simply because they are "behind time." There are others who put off reformation year by year, till death seizes them, and they perish unrepentant, because for ever "behind time." Five minutes in a crisis is worth years. It is but a

little period, yet it has often saved a fortune or redeemed a people. If there is one virtue that should be cultivated more than another by him who would succeed in life, it is punctuality; if there is one error that should be avoided, it is being "behind time."

Freeman Hunt, Mass., 1804-1858.

55. Education.

Education is not confined to books alone. The world, with its thousand interests and occupations, is a great school. But the recorded experience and wisdom of others may be of the greatest aid and benefit to us. We can look about us to-day and see many who have brought the light of that intelligence which has been the guiding-star of others to bear upon their own paths, and, by its aid, have achieved an enviable position among men. Honor lies in doing well whatever we find to do; and the world estimates a man's abilities in accordance with his success in whatever business or profession he may engage.

J. T. Trowbridge, New York, 1827—.

56. The Land of Song.

Beautiful, no doubt, are all the forms of Nature, when transfigured by the miraculous power of poetry; hamlets and harvest-fields, and nut-brown waters, flowing even under the forest, vast and shadowy, with all the sights and sounds of rural life. But, after all, what are these but the decorations and painted scenery in the great theater of human life? What are they but the coarse materials of the poet's song? Glorious, indeed, is the world of God around us, but more glorious the world of God within us. There lies the land of song; there lies the poet's native land.

H. W. Longfellow, Maine, 1807-.

57. The Heavens Near Dawn.

It was a mild, serene, mid-summer night; the sky was without a cloud, the winds were whist. The moon, in her last quarter, had just risen, and the stars shone with a spectral luster, but little affected by her presence. Jupiter, two hours high, was the herald of the day; the Pleiades, just above the horizon, shed their sweet influence in the east; Lyra sparkled near the zenith; Andromeda veiled her newly-discovered glories from the naked eye in the South; the steady pointers, far beneath the pole, looked meekly up from the depths of the North to their sovereign.

Such was the glorious spectacle as I entered the train. As we proceeded, the timid approach of twilight became more perceptible; the intense blue of the sky began to soften; the smaller stars, like little children, went first to rest; the sister-beams of the Pleiades soon melted together; but the bright constellations of the west and north remained unchanged. Steadily the wondrous transfigurations went on. Hands of angels, hidden from mortal eyes, shifted the scenery of the heavens; the glories of night dissolved in the glories of the dawn. The blue sky now turned more softly gray; the great watch-stars shut up their holy eyes; the east began to kindle. Faint streaks of purple soon blushed along the sky; the whole celestial concave was filled with the inflowing tides of the morning light, which came pouring down from above in one great ocean of radiance; till, at length, as we

reached the Blue Hills, a flash of purple fire blazed out from above the horizon, and turned the dewy tear-drops of flower and leaf into rubies and dia. monds. In a few seconds the everlasting gates of the morning were thrown wide open, and the lord of day, arrayed in glories too severe for the gaze of man, began his state.

Edward Everett, Mass., 1794-1865.

58. The Best Books.

The books which help you most are those which make you think most. The hardest way of learning is by easy reading; but a great book that comes from a great thinker,—it is a ship of thought, deep freighted with truth and with beauty.

Theo. Parker, Mass., 1810-1860.

59. Character.

The crown and glory of life is character. It is the noblest possession of a man, constituting a rank in itself, and an estate in the general good-will; dignifying every station, and exalting every position in society. It exercises a greater power than wealth, and secures all the honor without the jealousies of fame. It carries with it an influence which always tells,-for it is the result of proud honor, rectitude, and consistency,—qualities which, perhaps, more than any other, command the general confidence and respect of mankind

S. Smiles, England, 1816