We seldom find people ungrateful so long as you are in a condition to serve them.

The best government is that in which the law speaks instead of the lawyer.

Truth is as impossible to be soiled by an outward touch as the sunbeam.-Milton.

Commentators too often write on books as men with diamonds write on glass, obscuring light with scratches.

A ship ought not to be fixed by a single anchor, nor life upon a single hope.

If you employ your money in doing good, you put it out at the best interest.

"Men are mortal gods," said an ancient writer, "but gods are immortal men."

Before an affliction is digested, consolation ever comes too soon; and after it is digested, it comes too late.—Sterne. As a tree that is heavily laden with fruit breaks its own boughs, so men, by their own greatness, destroy themselves. Time, with all its celerity, moves slowly on to him whose whole employment is to watch its flight.—Johnson.

When Hofer was led to be shot, he was asked to kneel, but he replied, "I have always stood upright in the presence of my Creator, and in that posture I will give up my spirit to him."

Those men who destroy a healthful constitution of body by intemperance, as manifestly kill themselves as those who hang, or poison, or drown themselves.-Sherlock.

Moral Lesson.

If thou wilt mighty be, flee from the rage
Of cruel will, and see thou keep thee free

From the foul yoke of sensual bondage.

For though thy empire stretch to Indian sea,
And for thy pride tremblest the farthest Thule,
If thy desire have over thee the power,
Subject then art thou, and no governor.

If to be noble and high thy mind be moved,

Consider well thy ground and thy beginning;

For he that hath each star in heaven fixed,

And gives the moon her horns and her eclipsing,
Alike hath made thee noble in his working;

So that wretched no way thou may be,

Except foul lust and vice do conquer thee.

Morality.

Sir T. Wyatt, 1530.

The world was given us for our edification, not for the purpose of raising sumptuous buildings; life for the discharge of moral and religious duties, not for pleasurable indulgences; wealth to be liberally bestowed, not avariciously hoarded; and learning to produce good actions, not empty disputes.-Arabian Author.

Morning.

But who the melodies of morn can tell?
The wild brook babbling down the mountain side;
The lowing herd, the sheepfold's simple bell;
The pipe of early shepherd dim descried
In the lone valley; echoing far and wide
The clamorous horn along the cliffs above;
The hollow murmur of the ocean-tide;
The hum of bees, the linnet's lay of love,
And the full choir that wakes the universal grove.
Beattie.

High life of a hunter! he meets on the hill
The new-waken'd daylight, so bright and so still;
And feels, as the clouds of the morning unroll,
The silence, the splendour, ennoble his soul.
'Tis his o'er the mountains to stalk like a ghost,
Enshrouded with mist, in which nature is lost,
Till he lifts up his eyes, and flood, valley, and height,
In one moment all swim in an ocean of light;
While the sun, like a glorious banner unfurl'd.
Seems to wave o'er a new, more magnificent world.
John Wilson.

It was the lark, the herald of the morn,
No nightingale; look, love, what envious streaks
Do lace the severing clouds in yonder east ;
Night's candles are burnt out, and jocund day
Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops.

With quickened step

Shakespere.

Brown night retires: young day pours in apace,

And opens all the lawny prospect wide.

The dripping rock, the mountain's misty top
Swell on the sight, and brighten with the dawn;

Blue, through the dusk, the smoking currents shine;
And from the bladed field the fearful hare

Limps awkward; while along the forest glade

The wild deer trip, and often turning, gaze
At early passenger. Music awakes

The native voice of undissembled joy ;

And thick around the woodland hymns arise.
Roused by the cock, the soon-clad shepherd leaves
His mossy cottage, where with peace he dwells;
And from the crowded fold, in order, drives

His flock, to taste the verdure of the morn.-Thomson.

— The sweetness of the morning is perhaps its least charm. It is the renewed vigour which it implants on all around that affects us-man, animals, birds, plants, vegetation, flowers. Refreshed and soothed with sleep, man opens his heart; he is alive to nature and to nature's God, and his mind is more intelligent, because more fresh. He seems to drink of the dew like the flowers, and feel the same reviving effect.

Mother's Love.

What is so pure, so good, so fair, so like the realms above,
Within this frail and mortal world, as tender mother's love?
What blessing brought to sinful man, his darksome way to
cheer,

Was e'er bestow'd more beautiful, more eloquently dear?
Oh! who beside will bear the pain, the sorrow, and the woe ?
Those who ne'er felt a mother's love, that love can never know.

It is a love that wearies not, through scenes of bliss and fame, Or when oppress'd by cares of life, by sorrow, or by shame. It is a love, the heavenly saints may worship and revere, When o'er the sorrows of the earth they shed their pitying tear.

A mother's love can ne'er decay, when all the world beside Look on with cold, contemptuous glance, to pity or deride; It is a love the grave alone-the cold, cold grave can close, When, wearied with the cares of earth, at length we seek repose.

Others may love-but, ah! that love it never can compare: With them some earthly passion prompts, some selfish thoughts are there;

A mother's love is ever pure, it emanates from heaven;
To cheer the weary path of man, in pity it was given.

Muddle.

F. B. C.

Muddle is descended from the ancient but dishonourable family of Chaos; she is the child of Indifference and Want of Principle; educated by Dawdling, Hurry, Stupidity, Obstinacy, Meanness, and Extravagance; secretly united at an early age to Self-Conceit; and parent of Procrastination, Falsehood, Dirt, Waste, Disorder, Destruction, and Desolation.-Home Truths.

See COMFORT.

Murderer (The).

A murderer! whom all shun-who preys on
His own kind. The worst of thieves, that breaks ope

The walls of flesh, and steals away the life.

A self-will'd piece of dust, that dares to take

The thunderbolt in its weak hand, and

Launch it where it lists.-Tomlins.

- Innocent blood,

E'en like the blood of sacrificing Abel,

Cries from the tongueless caverns of the earth,
For justice and rough chastisement.-Shakespere.

Music.

An art which strengthens the bonds of civilized society, humanizes and softens the feelings and dispositions of man, produces a refined pleasure in the mind, and tends to raise up in the soul emotions of an exalted nature.—Brougham. There's not the smallest orb which thou behold'st

But in his motion like an angel sings,

Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubim :

Such harmony is in immortal souls ;

But while this muddy vesture of decay

Doth grossly close us in, we cannot hear it.-Shakespere.

Is it not sweet, when music's melting tone
Falls in sweet cadence on the heart alone,
To hear in twilight hour the echoes float
Of pensive lyre, or clarion's wilder note ?

Now with the whispering breeze the murmurs die,
Now gush again in fuller melody;

Each wooded hill the trembling notes prolong,
Whose bubbling waters mingle with the song;
Fainter and fainter on the anxious ear

Swells the rich strain-though distant, ever clear,
Till, lightly floating up the winding glen,
Where jutting rocks reflect them back again,
The echoes die, as when low winds inspire

The softest cadence of Æolian lyre.

Scarce breathe the lips-scarce dare the bosom swell,—
For now the lowest sigh would break the spell,—
Still hopes the heart to catch one murmur more;
Yet hopes in vain-the sounds have died before.

Cochrane.

The winds caught and tamed.-The language of heaven imperfectly lisped on earth.--Creation's gratitude to God, finding utterance.

Mutes.

Solemn funeral performers, who mimic sorrow when the heart's not sad.-Madden.