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truly we know not) that, at the birth of Christ, this famed oracle became dumb; and when Augustus, who was a most devout worshipper of the god, inquired the cause, the oracle replied, that in Judea a child was born who was the son and image of the true God, and who had commanded it to depart, and give no more answers. His other noted oracles were those of Delos, Claros, Tenedos, Cyrrha, and Patara. His worship was universal; and he had temples and statues in every country, and especially in Egypt, Greece, and Italy. His statue at Mount Actium served as a beacon to mariners, to avoid the dangerous coasts. It was visible a great distance at sea. Augustus, before the battle of Actium, invoked it for victory. After the battle, he built a temple for Apollo on Mount Palatine, which he furnished with a valuable library.

because he, as the sun, nourishes all things by his heat. He was styled Paan, either from his alleviating sorrows and healing diseases, or from his skill in striking with darts. By this name, his mother Latona and the spectators cheered him when combatting the Python, frequently crying out, "Strike him, Pæan, with thy darts." | By the same name, the diseased invoked his aid, saying, "Heal us, Pæan." Hence, hymns in praise of Apollo were called Paanes. But from the tendency of language to assume the ornate or figurative sense, and to apply itself to objects resembling in some respects those to which it is primarily applied, this term was at length appropriated to songs of victory in general. Hence, a hymn celebrating a victorious battle, is denominated a pœan. He was called Phoebus, from his great swiftness. He was called Liber Pater, from his literary character. And finally, he was denominated Pythius, not only from the name of the serpent which he killed, but from his being so much consulted through his oracles.

We come now to the exploits of Apollo. Esculapius his son was the most famous physician of all antiquity. He prolonged the lives of so many mortals, that Pluto, fearing that his infernal realm would not be peopled, entered a complaint to Jupiter, who thereupon killed Esculapius with lightning. Enraged at this, Apollo with arrows killed the Cyclops, those huge, onebolts of Jupiter. For this act, Jupiter expelled him from heaven, and undeified him. Thus situated, he was necessitated to seek employment, as a means of subsistence. Accordingly, he engaged himself as a shepherd to Admetus, king of Thessaly, in which capacity he served nine years; from which circumstance he was called the god of shepherds. As a reward for the kindness of Admetus to him, he gave him a chariot drawn by a lion and a bull, which enabled Admetus to obtain in marriage Alceste, the daughter of Pelias. He likewise promised him, that when his hour of dissolution should arrive, he should be spared, provided he could get another to die in his stead. Sometime afterwards, a mortal disease seized him, when his wife, Alceste, offered herself in his place-an act of affection that has been the theme of much praise.

In the cut at the head of this article, he is represented as a beardless, handsome youth, with graceful locks, surmounted with a laurel crown, and surrounded with rays of light. He is arrayed in a garment embroidered with gold, holding in his right hand a bow, and in his left a harp, with a quiver of arrows slung upon his shoulder. He is sometimes represented as seated in a car, called the charriot of the sun, drawn by horses which no hand besides his own could controul. At other times he is described as holding in the one hand a shield, and the Graces in the other; and, as he pre-eyed giant workmen of Vulcan that forged the thundersided over poetry, he is often represented in company with the Muses on Mount Parnassus. He is frequently represented with a harp, a shield, and arrows; the harp signifying his authority in heaven, where all is harmony; the shield, his protective power on earth, giving health and safety to terrestrial creatures; the arrows, his authority in hell, inasmuch as those stricken by them were sent thither. He is sometimes represented with a crow and a hawk hovering over his head, a wolf and a laurel tree on the one side of him, and a swan and a cock on the other, with grasshoppers in motion beneath his feet. The crow and the griffin were consecrated to him because of their foresight; the hawk, on account of its bright and piercing eyes; the swan, because it foresees its happiness in death, and sings itself away in strains of rapture; the wolf because it spared his flock when he was a shepherd, and because its sharp eyes denote foresight; the laurel, because of its ever flourishing nature, conducing to divination and poetic inspiration, its very leaves, put under one's pillow, causing pleasant dreams, whence the laurel crown of poets; the olive and the palm, because they can flourish only in warm climates; the cock, because it foretels Apollo's rising; and the grasshoppers, because their ephemeral existence depends directly on his genial warmth and influence; and on this account, it was customary with the Athenians, to fasten golden grasshoppers to their hair, in honour of the god. Wolves and hawks were sacrificed to him, as being the natural enemies of the flocks over which he presided. Bullocks and lambs were likewise offered to him in sacrifice.

Apollo, as well as Jupiter, had a great variety of names. The Latins called him Sol, because there is but one sun; the Greeks, Apollo, for the same reason, or, as some say, because he drove away diseases, or darted his rays so vigorously. He was denominated Cynthius, from the mountain Cynthus, in his native isle Delos; and Delius, from the island itself; or, according to some, because he by his light makes all things manifest; and for this reason he was likewise denominated Phanæus. He was denominated Delphinius, because he killed the serpent Python or Delphis; or else because, in the form of a dolphin, he guided Castilius, a Cretan, when he carried men to the plantations. He was entitled Delphicius, from the city of Delphi, where was his celebrated oracle already described. He was called Didymæus, because he was a twin. He was called Nomius, or Nomion, as already mentioned, because he gave severe laws to the Arcadians, or, as some suppose, because he served Admetus as a shepherd; or again,

Although Apollo was the god of music, yet Mercury is said to have invented his lyre, and presented it to him; in return for which, Apollo gave him the famed caduceus, with which he had been accustomed to drive the flocks of Admetus. He raised the walls of Troy by the power of his music; but Laomedon, the king of the country, refusing to give him the promised reward, he swept off the inhabitants by a pestilence. So magical was his music, that, happening to lay down his lyre upon a stone, the latter became so melodious, that, whenever it was struck, it emitted sounds like a lyre. Being challenged in music by Marsyas, a conceited musician, and having overcome him, he flayed him alive for his temerity, and transformed him into the river of that name in Phrygia. Apollo and Pan had likewise a trial of their musical powMidas, king of Phrygia, acted as judge on this occasion. But having stupidly decided the case in favour of Pan, Apollo stretched his ears to the length, and transformed them into the shape, of the ears of an ass. Poor Midas attempted to conceal his deformity with his hair; but as his barber discovered it, he prevailed on him not to divulge what he saw. The barber, however, went and dug a hole, and whispered into it these words: King Midas has asses' ears." The very reeds that afterwards grew out of this hole, would, if agitated by the least wind, ever after utter the same words:-"King Midas has asses' ears." Prejudice, partiality, and want of correct taste, make many Midases in every age.

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Apollo having unfortunately killed Hyacinthus, a beautiful boy whom he tenderly loved, with a quoit, which Zephyrus through envy blew against the boy's head, he caused his blood to produce the flower that bears his name. He changed Cyparissus, another beloved boy, into a cypress tree, because he, having acci

dentally killed a favourite deer, for which he was exces-rein his own coursers. Phaeton was directed by his sively grieved, besought the god, that his mourning might father to observe the middle path, and was otherwise be perpetual. Inflamed with love for the modest Da- instructed in relation to his hazardous enterprise.— phne, he gave her pursuit; but she, fleeing from him, Transported with joy, he mounted the blazing chariot, was changed into a laurel. He disgraced Leucothoe, and commenced his fearful excursion. But the horses the daughter of Orchamus, king of Babylon; upon finding him unable to controul them, dashed from their which her father buried her alive. At this, Apollo was wonted course, and set heaven and earth on fire. To so grieved, that, unable to restore her to life, he poured preserve the universe from a general conflagration, Jupinectar on her body, and turned it into a frankincense tree. ter let fly his thunderbolts, and precipitated him headThe attachment between Leucothoe and Apollo was dis-long into the river Po. His sisters, Lampethusa, Lamcovered to her father by her sister Clytie, whom Apollo petia, and Phæthusa, called also the Heliades, inceshad formerly loved, but now abandoned; which she santly deplored his fate, and were at length metamorperceiving, pined away, with her eyes continually look-phosed into poplars, and wept amber instead of tears. ing upwards towards the sun, (or Apollo,) and was at length changed into a heliotrope, or sun-flower.

He slew with his darts the seven sons of Niobe, because she, envying his mother Latona on account of the divine honours paid to her, ventured to speak contemptuously of her, saying that she herself, on account of the number of her children, was better entitled to worship than the mother of Apollo and Diana. Grieved for the loss of her children, in whom she had so prided herself, she was at length turned into stone.

There seems to be a degree of confusion in the case of the identity of Apollo and the Sun; some asserting that Apollo, the Sun, Phoebus, and Hyperion, were all different characters. But they are indentified in so many particulars, that, however inconsistent the poets may have been in making them different in a few cases, we prefer preserving the identity throughout. We shall, nevertheless, notice the cases wherein special actions and circumstances are attributed to the Sun, as the sun, in contradistinction to Apollo.

The father of the Sun was Hyperion; his mother was unknown. He was nephew to ther. The poets make five Sols or Suns, and yet they commonly apply the actions of all of them to this one.

The Persians call the Sun Mithra, or Mithras, considering him the greatest of their gods. They worship him in a cave. His statue has the head of a lion, on which is placed a turban called tiara. It is attired in Persian style, and with both hands holds a mad bull by the horns. It was necessary for noviciates to pass a severe probation, before their admission to his priesthood and mysteries. It was unlawful for the Persian kings to drink intemperately, excepting upon the day in which sacrifices were offered to him.

The Egyptians called the sun Horus; whence the portions of time into which the day is divided, were denominated Hore, (hours.) These Hore were the daughters of Sol and Chronis, (sun and time.) Early in the morning, they prepared their father's horses and chariot, and opened the gates of day. There was a statue of the Sun at Rhodes, called the Colossus, so large, that a ship might sail into port between its legs. it was one of the seven ancient wonders of the world. We shall describe it more particularly when we treat on those wonders. This Colossus is likewise called by some the statue of Apollo. This is an instance of the confusion that prevails in the story of this deity; and another instance is to be found in the case of Phaeton, who is by some said to have been the son of Apollo, and by others, the son of Sol. Considering Apollo and Sol but different names for the same character, and that both mean the Sun, we will give the story of Phaton, with which we will close.

Epaphus, a son of Jupiter, having a quarrel with Phæton, told him the Sun was not his father; whereupon Phaeton, by the advice of Clymene his mother, repaired to the royal palace, to procure testimonials of his sonship. His father, desirous of affording him full satisfaction on the point, swore by the Styx, (an oath which not even a god dared violate,) that he would grant him any thing he might ask; upon which he requested the privilege of driving for a single day the chariot of his father the Sun. The request was reluctantly granted, as none but the Sun himself could

NATURAL HISTORY.

MAN.

AT the head of the animal kingdom stands Man, proudly pre-eminent both with regard to physical construstion, and intellectual capacity;-the lord of this mundane sphere, and the noblest production of nature. To him, therefore, may properly be assigned the first place in natural history.

In treating of man, the first consideration that presents itself is the radical difference between him and all other animals in point of mental qualities. The usual distinction made by writers in this respect, is not without good cause. So great is the difference, so material, so essential, that while the one may be said to possess reason, the other can only be allowed to have instinct. That all animal existences have minds, is admitted. They know; they think; they act intelligently. But man alone progresses in knowledge from generation to generation. All other animals remain stationary. One generation is no wiser than a preceding one. There is no increase of knowledge among them. Age after age, they run the round; they keep within the same limits; following the same natural impulsions, the same instinctive track. Whereas man not only controuls and regulates the impulses of his nature by reason, but, reasoning from what is already known, he stretches off into trackless regions to eke out new discoveries, and moves onward from improvement to improvement in endless progression. It comes not within the scope of our work, and especially of this department of it, to treat of the nature of the soul-its immateriality and its immortality, This belongs to theology. But this much, as mere naturalists, we may, nay, we must say that man, as an intellectual being, is radically different from all other animals. The line of separation in this respect is broad and deep; so broad and so deep, that there is no gradation, no connecting link, no demi-man-demi-beast non-descript, to intervene for the formation of that fanciful chain in nature which some in their pleasing imaginings have supposed they had discovered. Between the most degraded of the human species and the most sagacious brute, the same radical difference obtains. Make your selection where you please; among the flat-faced Tartars, or the tawny Malays; among the copper-coloured Aborigines of America, or the woolly headed natives of Van Dieman's Land; and you will find every where a susceptibility of progressive and unlimited improvement. But take your boasted monkey, or your still more boasted ourang outang, and apply to him all your skill; continue your discipline to his posterity from age to age; and see how much wiser the last generation will be than the first.

Enough, we presume, has been said, to evince the difference under consideration, and to prepare the reader to view his species in the proper light;-not as superiour brutes, but as men.

Notwithstanding the great diversity observable among the human species; notwithstanding the numerous shades of colour, from lily white to jet black; notwithstanding the various languages, and the many minor differences that are to be found; the whole may be thrown into five general classes, viz. the European or white, the Tartar

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the purpose; and this you may prove, as I have often done, by killing the snake, and examining it, by which you will exasperate the men exceedingly."

THERE are several passages in Scripture which allude to the commonly received opinion in the East, that serpents are capable of being rendered docile, or at least harmless, by certain charms or incantations. The most The account of Mr. Johnson certainly appears the remarkable of these texts is that of the 58th Psalm, more probable version of this extraordinary story; yet where the wicked are compared to "the deaf adder that enough remains to surprise, in the wonderful command stoppeth her ear, which will not hearken to the voice of which these people possess over the reptiles that they charmers, charming never so wisely;" and that of the have deprived of their power of injury, and taught to 8th chap. of Jeremiah, "I will send serpents and cocka- erect themselves, and make a gentle undulating movetrices among you, which will not be charmed." Dr. ment of the head, at certain modulated sounds. There Shaw says, that a belief that venomous serpents might can, we think, be no doubt that the snake is taught to be rendered innoxious by songs or muttered words, or do this, as the bear and the cock of the Italians are inby writing sentences or combinations of numbers upon structed to dance, as described in our last number. The scrolls of paper, prevailed through all those parts of Bar-jugglers are very expert in the exercise of the first branch bary where he travelled. In India at the present day, of the trade, that of catching the snakes. They discothe serpent-charmers are a well-known division of the ver the hole of the reptile with great ease and certainty, numerous caste of jugglers that are found in every dis- and digging into it, seize the animal by the tail with the trict. Mr. Forbes, in his Oriental Memoirs,' appears to left hand, and draw the body through the other hand attach some credit to their powers of alluring the Cobra- with extreme rapidity, till the finger and thumb are di-Capello and other snakes from their hiding-places, brought up to the head. The poisonous fangs are then by the attraction of music. Mr. Johnson, however, in removed, and the creature has to commence its mystehis Sketches of India Field Sports,' says, "The pro- rious course of instruction. According to Mr. Johnson, fessed snake-catchers in India are a low caste of Hindoos, however, the business of the snake-charmer is a somewonderfully clever in catching snakes, as well as in prac- what perilous one. In catching the reptiles, they are tising the art of legerdemain: they pretend to draw them generally provided with a hot iron to sear the flesh, from their holes by a song, and by an instrument some- should they be bitten; and the following anecdote, given what resembling an Irish bagpipe, on which they play a by Mr. Johnson, would show that the danger is not complaintive tune. The truth is, this is all done to deceive. pletely avoided, even when the venomous fangs are reIf ever a snake comes out of a hole at the sound of their moved.-"A man exhibited one of his dancing cobramusic, you may be certain that it is a tame one, trained di-capellos before a large party. A boy about sixteen to it. deprived of its venomous teeth, and put there for years old was teasing the animal to make it bite him,

which it actually did, and to some purpose, for in an hour | after, he died of the bite. The father of the boy was astonished, and protested it could not be from the bite; that the snake had no venomous teeth; and that he and the boy had often been bitten by it before, without any bad effect. On examining the snake, it was found that the former fangs were replaced by new ones, not then far out of the jaw, but sufficient to bite the boy. The old man said that he never saw of heard of such a circumstance before."-Penny Magazine.

SHOES AND SANDALS.

Shoes or slippers were worn in the East, but sandals, which leave the toes bare, very seldom. The Egyptians made their shoes of papyrus or palm leaves.. The Greeks and Romans of both sexes wore rich sandals of gold, silk, or other precious stuffs; the soles were of cork, which for that reason was called sandal wood, and they were, in general, at least one finger thick; sometimes they sewed five soles one over another. They were covered within and without with leather broader than the cork. Sandals were among the early, but not the later, Anglo-Saxons.

The shoe is of white kid leather, calashed with black velvet. There are marks of stitches by which ornaments had been affixed to it. Its clog is simply a straight piece of stout leather, inserted in the under leather at the toe, and attached to the heel. That such were walked in is certain; that the fair wearers could have run in them is impossible to imagine.

BIOGRAPHY.

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The preceding cut is of a "very curious sandal," from one made of leather, partly gilt, and variously coloured. It was formerly in the possession of Mr. Bailey, leatherstainer, Little Wild-street, Drury-lane, and afterwards in that of Mr. Samuel Ireland, of Norfolk-street, by whose permission, an engraving on copper was made by Mr. J. T. Smith, of the British Museum, and from this the present representation is given. The age of the sandal is not by the writer determinable, but as a remarkable relic of antiquity, its form and make deserve preservation. It will be observed, that it belonged to the left foot of the wearer; so that if other evidence could not be adduced, this is proof that "rights and lefts" are only "an old, old, very old" fashion revived.

The following cut represents a shoe that was in fashion in England at the period of the Restoration. It will undoubtedly amuse our readers, as some of our own fashions will amuse future generations.

A LADY'S OLD SHOE AND CLOG.

TOPHAM, THE STRONG MAN.

The most extraordinary instance of human strength recorded in modern times, is that of Thomas Topham, a man who kept a public-house at Islington. Mr. Hutton, in his History of Derby, gives this account of him:He performed surprising feats of strength-as breaking a broom-stick of the first magnitude by striking it against his bare arm, lifting two hogsheads of water, heaving his horse over the turnpike-gate, carrying the beam of a house as a soldier carries his firelock, &c. When this second Sampson appeared at Derby as a performer in public, at a shilling each, upon application to Alderman Cooper for leave to exhibit, the magistrate was surprised at the feats he proposed, and as his appearance was like that of other men, he requested him to strip, that he might examine whether he was made like them; but he was found to be extremely muscular. What were hollows under the arms and hams of others, were filled up with ligaments in him.

> He appeared nearly five feet ten, turned of thirty, well made, but nothing singular; he walked with a small limp. He had formerly laid a wager, the usual decider of disputes, that three horses could not draw him from a post which he should clasp with his feet; but the driver giving them a sudden lash, turned them aside, and the unexpected jerk had broken his thigh.

The performances of this wonderful man, in whom were united the strength of twelve, were, rolling up a pewter dish of seven pounds as a man rolls up a sheet of paper; holding a pewter quart at arm's length, and squeezing the sides together like an egg-shell; lifting two hundred weight with his little finger, and moving it gently over his head. The bodies he touched seemed to have lost their powers of gravitation. He also broke a rope fastened to the floor, that would sustain twent hundred weight. He lifted an oak table six feet long with his teeth, though half a hundred weight was hung to the

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extremity; a piece of leather was fixed to one end for his teeth to hold, two of the feet stood upon his knees, and he raised the end with the weight higher than that in his mouth. He took Mr. Chambers, Vicar of All Saints, who weighed twenty-seven stone, and raised him with one hand. His head being laid on one chair, and his feet on another, four people, fourteen stone each, sat upon his body, which he heaved at pleasure. He struck a round bar of iron, one inch diameter, against his naked arm, and, a one stroke, bent it like a bow. Weakness and feeling seemed fled together.

of the voice of the morning. Exult, then, () sun! in the strength of thy youth! Age is dark and unlovely; it is like the glimmering light of the moon, when it shines through broken clouds, and the mist is on the hills; the blast of the north is on the plain, the traveller shrinks in the midst of his journey."

FILIAL AFFECTION OF THE MOORS.

A Portuguese surgeon was accosted one day by a young Moor from the country, who, addressing him by Being a master of music, he entertained the company requested him to give him some drogues to kill his father, the usual appellation of foreign doctors in that place, with Mad Tom. I heard him sing a solo to the organ and, as an inducement, promised to pay him well. The in St. Werburgh's church, then the only one in Derby; but though he might perform with judgment, yet the surgeon was a little surprised at first, as might be expecvoice, more terrible than sweet, scarcely seemed human.ted, and was unable to answer immediately; but quickly Though of a pacific temper, and with the appearance of recovering himself, (for he knew the habits of the people a gentleman, yet he was liable to the insults of the rude. well,) replied with sang froid equal to the Moor's, "Then The ostler at the Virgin's Inn, where he resided, having you don't live comfortably with your father, I suppose?" given him disgust, he took one of the kitchen spits from "Oh, nothing can be better," returned the Moor; "he the mantle-piece, and bent it round his neck like a hand- has made much money, has married me well, and enkerchief; but as he did not choose to tuck the ends in dowed me with all his possessions; but he cannot work the ostler's bosom, the cumbrous ornament excited the any longer, he is so old, and he seems unwilling to die." laugh of the company, till he condescended to untie his The doctor, of course, appreciated the amiable philosoiron cravat. Had he not abounded with good nature, phy of the Moor's reasoning, and promised to give him the men might have been in fear for the safety of their what he desired. He accordingly prepared a cordial persons, and the women for that of their pewter-shelves, potion, more calculated to restore energy to the old man, as he could instantly roll up both. One blow from his than to take it away. The Moor paid him well, and fist would for ever have silenced those heroes of the departed. About eight days after, he came again, to Bear-garden, Johnson and Mendoza. say that his father was not dead. "Not dead!" exclaimed the apothecary, in well-feigned surprise; "he will which he received an equal remuneration, and assured die." He composed accordingly another draught, for the Moor that it would not fail in its effects. In fifteen days, however, the Moor came again, complaining tha

At the time of his death, which happened 10th of August, 1749, he kept a public-house in Hog-lane, Shoreditch. Having, two days before, a quarrel with his wife, he stabbed her in the breast, and immediately gave himself several wounds, which proved fatal to him, but his wife recovered.-Anecdote Library.

MISCELLANY.

OSSIAN'S EFFUSIONS.

We intend to enrich our miscellaneous department with copious extracts from the sublime and ravishing strains of Ossian. His effusions have been the delight and admiration of every age, from the time he wrote to the present. He was the favourite author of Napoleon, and was that in the field of poesy which the latter was in the field of battle-resplendent, magnificent, sublime.

Ossian was a rude Caledonian, and is supposed to have flourished in the fourth century, and to have been the son of Fingal. He wrote in Gaelic; and his effusions partake of all the wildness and romance of the age and country in which he lived. He was certainly a writer of a rare description. Like Homer and Milton, he was blind; but in proportion as physical light was excluded from his eyes, the light of genius illumed his soul. In the following exquisite production, he alludes to the circumstance of his blindness.

ADDRESS TO THE SUN.

"O thou that rollest above, round as the shield of my fathers! Whence are thy beams, O sun! thine everlasting light? Thou comest forth in thy awful beauty: the stars hide themselves in the sky; the moon, cold and pale, sinks in the western wave. But thou thyself movest alone; who can be a companion of thy course? The oaks of the mountains fall, the mountains themselves decay with years; the ocean shrinks and grows again; the moon herself is lost in heaven; but thou art for ever the same, rejoicing in the brightness of thy course. When the world is dark with tempests; when thunder rolls and lightning flies; thou lookest in thy beauty from the clouds, and laughest at the storm. But to Ossian, thou lookest in vain; for he beholds thy beams no more; whether thy yellow hairs flow on the eastern clouds, or thou tremblest at the gates of the west. But thou art perhaps like me, for a season; thy years will have an end, Thou shalt sleep in the clouds, careless

his father thrived better than ever. "Don't be discour aged," said the doctor, who doubtless found these perio dical visits by no means unprofitable; “give him ano other potion, and I will exert all my skill in its prepara tion." The Moor took it, but returned no more. One day, the surgeon met his young acquaintance in the of no avail," he replied mournfully; "my father is in street, and inquired the success of the remedy. "It w efforts; there is no doubt that he is a Marabout”—(a God has preserved him from all our Saint.)

excellent health.

APHORISMS.
(Original.)

was

Few know enough to know, that they know but little The more a man knows, the less he thinks he knows, and vice versa.

Genius without judgment, is like a ship carrying heavy sail, but no ballast,

Some men have all kinds of sense but common sense.
True greatness never affects to be great, but is so.
The inaccessible are unworthy of access.

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PASCAL.

Truth, no less than virtue, not unfrequently forms the middle path between two extremes.-LACON.

"I will admit all the world," said Hogarth, "to be competent judges of my pictures, except those who are of the profession."

Ray observes, that an obscure and prolix author may not improperly be compared to a cuttle fish, since he may be said to hide himself under his own ink.

Milton, when blind, married a shrew. The Duke of “I am no judge of colBuckingham called her a rose. ours," replied Milton, "but I dare say you are right, for I feel the thorns daily,"

An eccentric individual once concluded a somewhat personal story, by saying, "I will not mention the gentleman's name, for he is now Chancellor of the Exchequer."

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