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debate with a pistol! Had this self-deluded man been apprized, that existence grows more desirable to us the longer we exist, he would then have faced old age without shrinking; he would have boldly dared to to live, and served that society, by his future assiduity, which he basely injured by his dissertion.

ATTACHMENT TO PLACES.

It is natural to retain a tender regard for the country on which we have imprinted our first steps, and where we have passed years, the memory of which is always dear, because they were the preludes of life. I speak here of my infancy, which recalls the idea of what I then was, and what I am no more.

FRIENDSHIP.

We entered arm in arm; it was the manner

in which we usually walked; 'twas emblematical of the union of our souls.

ON ENJOYMENTS OF EARLY TIMES, AND ON LIGHTLY PASSING OVER THE EVILS OF LIFE.

BY DR. GOLDSMITH.

In that

When I reflect on the unambitious retirement in which I passed the earlier part of my life in the country, I cannot avoid feeling some pain in thinking that those happy days are never to return. retreat, all nature seemed capable of affording pleasure. I then made no refinements on happiness, but could be pleased with the most awkward efforts of rustic mirth; thought cross-purposes the highest stretch of human wit, and questions and commands the most rational way of spending the evening. Happy, could so charming an illusion still continue! I find that age and knowledge only contribute to sour our dispositions. My present enjoyments may be more refined, but they are infinitely less pleasing. The pleasure the best actor gives, can no way compare to that I have received from a country wag, who imitated a quaker's sermon. The music of the finest singer is dissonance, to what I felt when our old dairy-maid sung me into tears with Johnny Armstrong's Last Good Night, or the cruelty of Barbara Allen.

Writers of every age have endeavoured to show that pleasure is in us, and not in the objects offered for our amusement. If the soul be happily disposed, every thing becomes capable of affording entertain ment, and distress will almost want a name. Every occurrence passes in review like the figures in a procession; some may be awkward, others ill-dressed; but none but a fool is for this enraged with the master of the ceremonies. I remember to have once seen a slave in a fortification inlanders, who

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appeared no way touched with his situation. He was maimed, deformed, and chained; obliged to toil from the appearance of day till night-fall, and condemned to this for life: yet, with all these circumstances of apparent wretchedness, he sung, would have danced, but that he wanted a leg, and appeared the merriest, happiest man of all the garrison. What a practical philosopher was here! an happy constitution supplied philosophy; and, though seemingly destitute of wisdom, he was really wise. No reading or study had contributed to disenchant the fairy land around him. Every thing furnished him with an opportunity of mirth; and though some thought him, from his insensibility, a fool, he was such an ideot, as philosophers should wish to imitate; for all philosophy is only forcing the trade of happiness, when Nature seems to deny the means. They who, like our slave, can place themselves on that side of the world in which every thing appears in a pleasing light, will find something in every occur. rence to excite their good humour. The most calamitous events, either to themselves or others, can bring no other affliction; the whole world is to them a theatre, on which comedies only are acted. All the bustle of heroism, or the rants of ambition, serve only to heighten the absurdity of the scene, and make the humour more poignant. They feel, in short, as little anguish at their own distress, or the complaints of others, as the undertaker though dressed in black, feels sorrow at a funeral.

Of all

the men I ever read of, the famous Cardinal de Retz possessed this happiness of temper in the highest degree. As he was a man of gallantry, and despised all that wore the pedantic appearance of phi losophy, wherever pleasure was to be sold, he was generally foremost to raise the auction. Being an universal admirer of the fair sex, when he found one lady cruel, he generally fell in love with an

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other, from whom he expected a more favourable reception. If she too rejected his addresses, he never thought of retiring into deserts, or pining in hopeless distress. He persuaded himself, that, instead of loving the lady, he only fancied that he had loved her; and so all was well again. When fortune worę her angriest look, and he at last fell into the power of his most deadly enemy, Cardinal Mazarine, (being confined a close prisoner in the castle of Valenci ennes,) he never attempted to support his distress by wisdom or philosophy, for he pretended to neither: he only laughed at himself and his persecutor, and seemed infinitely pleased at his new situation. In this mansion of distress, though secluded from his friends, though denied all the amusements, and even the conveniences of life, he still retained his good humour; laughed at all the little spite of his enemies; and carried the jest so far, as to be revenged by writ ing the life of his gaoler. All that the wisdom of the proud can teach, is, to be stubborn or sullen under misfortunes. The Cardinal's example will instruct us to be merry in circumstances of the highest affliction. It matters not whether our good humour be construed by others into insensibility, or even idiotism; it is happiness to ourselves; and none but a fool would measure his satisfaction by what the world thinks of it. For my own part, I never pass by one of our prisons for debt, that I do not envy that felicity which is still going forward among those people who forget the cares of the world, by being shut out from its ambition. The happiest silly fellow I ever knew, was of the number of those good-natured creatures, that are said to do no harm to any but themselves. Whenever he fell into any misery, he usually called it seeing life. If his head was broke by a chairman, or his pocket picked by a sharper, he comforted himself by imitating the Hibernian dialect of the one, or the more fashionable cant of the other.

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Nothing came amiss to him. His inattention to moneymatters had incensed his father to such a degree, that all the intercession of friends in his favour was fruitless. The old gentleman was on his death-bed. The whole family, and Dick among the number, gathered around him."I leave my second son, Andrew," said the expiring miser, "my whole estate, and de"sire him to be frugal." Andrew, in a sorrowful tone, as is usual on these occasions, prayed heaven to prolong his life, and health to enjoy it himself. "I recommend Simon, my third son, to the care of his eldest brother, and leave him, beside, four thousand pounds." "Ah! father," cried Simon, (in great af fliction to be sure) "may heaven give you life and health to enjoy it yourself.' "At last, turning to poor Dick, "As for you, you have always been a sad dog; "you'll never come to good; you'll never be rich: "I'll leave you a shilling to buy an halter." "Ah! "father," cries Dick, without any emotion, "may

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heaven give you life and health to enjoy it yourself." This was all the trouble the loss of fortune gave this thoughtless imprudent creature. However, the tenderness of an uncle recompensed the neglect of a father; and my friend is now not only excessively good-humoured, but competently rich, Yes, let the world cry out at a bankrupt who appears at a ball; at an author who laughs at the public which pronounces him a dunce; at a general who smiles at the reproach of the vulgar; or the lady who keeps her good humour in spite of scandal; but such is the wisest be haviour that any of us can possibly assume: it is cer tainly a better way to oppose calamity by dissipation, than to take up the arms of reason or resolution to oppose it. By the first method, we forget our miseries; by the last, we only conceal them from others. By struggling with misfortunes, we are sure to receive some wounds in the conflict; but a sure method to come off victorious, is by running away.

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