NUMBER XXIII.

OF SAYING TOO MUCH.

THE art of holding the tongue, is quite as necessary as the art of speaking, and, in some instances, it is even more difficult to learn.

In a biographical notice of a celebrated speaker in the British House of Commons, it is remarked that "he never said too much." This is, in truth, a rare commendation of a public speaker. One who, without circumlocution or parade, comes to the matter in hand at once, and pertinaciously sticks to it throughout-who seizes on the strong points in the argument, and sets them to view in the clearest light-who says all that is proper and nothing more- whose every sentence, and almost every word, strikes home, and who "minds to leave off when he has done”—such a public speaker, whether in the Forum, in the Pulpit, or at the Bar, will never tire his hearers.

But my present business is not with Speakers, but with Talkers; the last being much the most numerous tribe, and entitled, of course, to the first notice.

Man, or even woman, when enjoying freedom of the tongue, and gifted with the faculty of using it fluently, is a great deal more apt to say too much than too little.

When a room full of ladies are all speaking at the same instant, only with this difference, that some tune their voices higher and some lower, it is pretty clear that they say too much. But this is tender ground, on which I would tread lightly.

They who expect to be listened to by every body, but are unwilling, themselves, to listen to any body; who will hold you by the sleeve or button, if you attempt to escape them, and din you the harder, the more you show signs of weariness;-this tribe of talkers (as all but themselves will readily admit) say too much.

Persons, who have wit, or (what is as bad) who think they have it, are in particular hazard of saying too much. It is one of the hardest things in the world, to make a temperate use of real or of self-supposed wit, and more particularly, of the talent for raillery. And hence many a one, not wanting in good nature, and meaning nothing more than to show off his wit, multiplies enemies, and sometimes wounds his best friends. To make use

of a line in one of Crabbe's poems,

"He kindles anger by untimely jokes."

They who talk merely with the intent to shine in company, or for the sake of showing off to advantage their own parts and learning, always say too much.

The fond pair, who entertain their visitors, by the hour, with setting forth the excellent qualities, or clever sayings of their own children, or with mawkish details of the rare conjugal affection that subsists between themselves,-say too much.

Those who are inordinately fond of speaking in the first person-I myself,—it is more than an even chance that they will say too much. When a young man, whose stock of wisdom is small, is more eager to expend it in talking, than to increase it by patient listening-he is very apt to say too much.

Old men are prone to say too much, when, getting into the preter-pluperfect tense, they represent the former days as every way better than these. As if the human family, notwithstanding the perpetual accumulation of experience, were constantly retrograding instead of advancing; and as if men and women, nowadays, were like grasshoppers in comparison of their progenitors.

י

It is seldom that men do not say too much, in their convivial moments. It is then, that they are peculiarly apt to let off with the tongue something which they are sorry for on the morrow; for "when wine is in, discretion is out."

As to those persons, whose staple of conversation is telling stories in long metre, though it is hardly to be expected that they can be prevailed with either to refrain or to abridge, yet the following direction from Chesterfield travestie, may be of use to them, as a general regulator." When you mean to introduce an interesting story, make out a kind of preface about an hour's length, by way of impressing upon your hearers the pleasure they are about to receive. If they should be disappointed, that is not your fault. You did your best; and so much time has been passed away, at least to your own satisfaction.”

I will conclude with a caution.-Let not him that talketh not, despise him that talketh. There have been some wights of the human family, both male and female, who have obtained the reputation of abilities and wisdom by their grave taciturnity,

every body thinking that they could say a great deal if they would--when in sober truth, their habitual silence was owing rather to dearth of ideas or to dulness.

To be humdrum in company, is as wide from the true mark as to be garrulous.

L

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NUMBER XXIV.

OF THE SALUTARY EFFECTS OF THE NECESSITY, LAID UPON MAN, TO LABOR.

NECESSITY is the mainspring of industry, and the mother of useful arts. The earth was given to the children of men, in a rude and forlorn condition. And why? Assuredly, not because it was out of the power, or beyond the benevolence of the Creator, to have rendered the whole face of it "like blooming Eden, fair," and so fertile every where, as to yield a plentiful abundance for human sustenance, without any human labor, care, or forethought. This did not, however, consist with the plan of Divine Wisdom.

Man is a being compounded of mind and matter; and a great part of his necessary employment is such, as tends to evince the superiority of the former over the latter. The stubborn glebe he meliorates, softens, and fructifies. Regions of forest he subdues, and turns them into fruitful fields, and blooming gardens. The droughty soil he irrigates, and the fenny he