849. A poor spirit is poorer than a poor purse. A very few pounds a year would ease a man of the scandal of avarice.-Swift. 850. Fear is implanted in us as a preservative from evil; but its duty, like that of other passions, is not to overbear reason, but to assist it; nor should it be suffered to tyrannize in the imagination, to raise phantoms of horror, or to beset life with supernumerary distresses. Johnson. 851. Marriage.—The married man is like the bee, that fixes his hive, augments the world, benefits the republic, and by a daily diligence, without wronging any, profits all; but he who contemns wedlock, (for the most part) like a wasp, wanders an offence to the world, lives upon spoil and rapine, disturbs peace, steals sweets that are none of his own, and, by robbing the hives of others, meets misery as his due reward. see Im Feltham. 852. Woman.-The bountiful blind woman [Fortune] doth mistake in her gifts to women: for those which she makes fair, she scarce a sau thought to feel that we despise it; that all we respect in our species is what has been created by art; the gaudy dress, the glittering equipage, or even the cultivated intellect. The mere and naked material of nature we eye with indifference or trample on with disdain. Poor child of toil, from the grey dawn to the setting sun, one long task! no idea elicited—no thought awakened beyond those that suffice to make him the machine of others the serf of the hard soil. And then, too, mark how we frown upon his scanty holidays; how we hedge in his mirth, and turn his hilarity into crime! We make the whole of the gay world, wherein we walk and take our pleasure, to him a place of snares and perils. If he leave his labour for an instant, in that instant how many temptations spring up to him! and yet we have no mercy for his errors! the jail, the transport-ship, the gallows; these are our sole lecture-books, and our only method of expostulation. Ah fie on the disparities of the world! they cripple the heart, they blind the sense, they concentrate the thousand links between man and man, into the basest of earthly ties-servility and pride. Methinks the devils laugh out when they hear us tell the boor that his soul is as glorious and eternal as our own, and yet, when in the grinding drudgery of his life, not a spark of that soul can be called forth.-When it sleeps, walled round in its lumpish clay, from the cradle to the grave, without a dream to stir the deadness of its torpor.-Bulwer. 843. Custom is the plague of wise men, and the idol of fools. Anon. 836. Republics.-In republics the sovereign power, or the power over which there is no controul, and which controuls all others, remains where nature placed it, in the people. In a country under a despotic form of Government the Sovereign is the only free man in it. In a republic the people retaining the sovereignty themselves, naturally and necessarily retain freedom with it: for wheresoever the sovereignty is, there must the freedom be: the one cannot be in one place, and the other in another.---Paine. 837. Labour.-- Weariness Can snore upon the flint, when restive sloth, 838. Chance is but a mere name and really means nothing in itself, a conception of our minds, and only a compendious way of speaking, whereby we would express that such effects are commonly attributed to chance, which were verily produced by their true and proper causes, but without their design to produce them.---Bentley. 845. Philosophy consists not In airy schemes, or idle speculation : The rule and conduct of all social life Is her great province. Not in lonely cells All policy but her's is false and rotten; All valour not conducted by her precepts Is a destroying fury sent from hell, To plague unhappy man, and ruin nations.-Thomson. 846. Education.-What sculpture is to a block of marble, education is to a human soul. The philosopher, the saint, and the hero,-the wise, the good, and the great man, very often lie hid and concealed in a plebeian, which a proper education might have disinterred, and have brought to light.-Spectator. 847. Precept and Example.—It is the common custom of the world to follow example rather than precept; but it would be the safer course to learn by precept rather than example.-Anon. 848. Wants.-Poverty wants some, luxury many, and avarice all things.-Cowley. 849. A poor spirit is poorer than a poor purse. A very few pounds a year would ease a man of the scandal of avarice.-Swift. 850. Fear is implanted in us as a preservative from evil; but its duty, like that of other passions, is not to overbear reason, but to assist it; nor should it be suffered to tyrannize in the imagination, to raise phantoms of horror, or to beset life with supernumerary distresses. Johnson. 851. Marriage.—The married man is like the bee, that fixes his hive, augments the world, benefits the republic, and by a daily diligence, without wronging any, profits all; but he who contemns wedlock, (for the most part) like a wasp, wanders an offence to the world, lives upon spoil and rapine, disturbs peace, steals sweets that are none of his own, and, by robbing the hives of others, meets misery as his due reward. Feltham. 852. Woman.-The bountiful blind woman [Fortune] doth mistake in her gifts to women: for those which she makes fair, she scarce makes honest; and those which she makes honest, she makes very illfavouredly. Shakspeare. 853. Justice is commonly believed to consist only in the performance of those duties to which the laws of society can oblige us but justice may be defined, that virtue which impels us to give to every person what is his due. In this extended sense of the word, it comprehends the practice of every virtue which reason prescribes, or society should expect. Our duty to our Maker, to each other, and to ourselves, is fully answered if we give them what we owe them. This, properly speaking, is the only virtue; and all the rest have their origin in it. The qualities of candour, fortitude, charity, and generosity, for instance, are not in their own nature virtues; and if ever they deserve the title, it is owing only to justice, which impels and directs them. Without such a moderator, candour might become indiscretion, fortitude obstinacy, charity imprudence, and generosity mistaken profusion.---Anon. 854. Circumstances.---He is happy whose circumstances suit his temper; but he is more excellent who can suit his temper to any circumstances.---Hume. 855. Reason.---There is a trite error which youth always falls into ; they suppose that Reason presides over the transactions of the world: their disappointment strongly induces them to believe that it ought. Zimmerman. 856. Republics.---In republics the advantages are liberty, or exemption from needless restrictions, equal laws, regulations adapted to the wants and circumstances of the people, public spirit, frugality, averseness to war, the opportunities which democratic assemblies afford to men of every description of producing their abilities and counsels to public observation, and the exciting thereby and calling forth to the service of the commonwealth, the faculties of its best citizens.---Paley. 857. War.---One of the most evil consequences of war is, that it tends to render the hearts of mankind callous to the feelings and sentiments of humanity. When we daily hear of the massacres of such numbers of individuals that memory cannot even recollect their names; when we contemplate the slaughters at Lyons, at Marseilles, at Bourdeaux, at Toulon! the effect must be injurious to the morals of Europe. Fox. 858. Courage.---A coward is not necessarily bad, nor a brave man necessarily good. Courage, like other dispositions, may be applied to wicked purposes. It may be injurious to the courageous persons, and injurious to others. If courage makes men less happy; if it injures the comforts, or destroys the property of others; it is not a virtue, but a vice. Guided by prudence and benevolence, courage is virtuous; but if not guided by these, it may be quite the contrary.---Dr Bowring. 859. Aristocratic Feelings.---There is a fretfulness about every man's position with us, which is positively frightful. He is never easy; for there is always some little line of demarcation between him and his neighbour, which he toils to pass over. The aristocracy descends though every link, from the golden to the copper, of the country. The Duke of Devon is not more exclusive than the Duke's poulterer. Society is a long series of uprising ridges, which, from the first to the last, offer no valley of repose. Wherever you take your stand, you are looked down upon by those above you, and reviled and pelted by those below you. Every creature you see is a farthing Sysyphus pushing his little stone up some Lilliputian mole hill. This is our world.---Bulwer. 860. Democracies.---In Democracies, where the right of making laws resides in the people at large, public virtue and goodness of intention is more likely to be found than in either of the other qualities of government. Popular assemblies are frequently foolish in their contrivance, and weak in their execution; but generally mean to do the thing that is right and just, and have always a degree of patriotism or public spirit.---Blackstone. 861. Music is good or bad as the end to which it tendeth.---Feltham. 862. Speech." The most noble and profitable invention of all others was that of speech; whereby men declare their thoughts one to another for mutual utility and conversation, without which there had been amongst men neither common wealth, nor society, no more than amongst Lions, Bears, and Wolves." (Cuvier.) This is a most important characteristic of man; since it is not born with him, like the voices of animals, but has been framed and brought into use by himself, as the arbitrary variety of different languages incontestibly proves. Man exhibits by external signs, what passes within him : he communicates his sentiments by words; and this sign is universal. The savage and the civilized man have the same powers of utterance; both speak naturally and are equally understood. The possession of speech, therefore, corresponds to the more numerous, diversified, and exalted intellectual and moral endowments of man, and is a necessary aid to their exercise and full development. The under faculties and simple feelings of animals do not require such assistance. The natural language of inarticulate sounds, gestures, and actions, suffices for their purposes. The wonderful discovery of alphabetical writing, and the invention of printing, complete the benefits delived from the noble prerogative of speech. Lawrence's Lectures on Man. 863. Source of Perplexity.—That which makes our view of the present state of the world a source of perplexity and horror, is the consideration, that every human heart bears in itself a type, more or less distinct, of those powers and that happiness which have been the portion of the most exalted minds. There is, perhaps, no spot on earth, however dreary, in which the germs of many plants, and the larvæ of shining and light winged insects, are not hidden, though for thousands of years undeveloped, and still expecting the warm breeze that shall call them out in life and beauty.-Arthur Coningsby. 864. Truth.-I find, with him to whom the tale is told, belief only makes the difference betwixt truth and lies; for a lie believed is true, and truth uncredited, a lie. But certainly there rests much in the hearer's judgment, as well as in the teller's falsehood. It must be a probable lie that makes the judicious credulous; and the relator too must be of some reputation, otherwise strange stories detect some deformity in the mind.-Feltham. 865. Idleness. It is a mistake to imagine, that only the violent passions, such as ambition and love, can triumph over the rest. Idleness, languid as she is, often masters them all; she indeed influences all our designs and actions, and insensibly consumes and destroys both passions and virtues.-Rochefoucault. |