BOOKS.

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ance, exercise, &c., in that state which has a fall him in the course of the day, if at rising like benign and salutary influence on the he happened to put the left shoe upon the soul. The common practice is exactly the right foot :—but we are not therefore to say, reverse. Men indulge passions in the soul that Augustus Cæsar was a fool. The very which destroy the health of the body, and learned and able Bishop Jeremy Taylor, on a introduce distempers into it which impair certain topic, asserts what was rather suited the powers of the soul. Man being a com- to the notions current in his time, than what pound creature, his happiness is not complete was philosophically true; but it does not foltill both parts of the composition partake of low, that the Holy Living und Dying, in it. This has been well stated by Saurin, which this passage occurs, is therefore a fooldiss. xxiii. p. 200, where mention is made of ish book. He would be indeed a foolish a treatise of Capellus on the state of the soul man, who should catch at such a passage, and after death.

make it a reason for rejecting all the excellent instruction and counsel contained in that

golden treatise. 1. It is with books as with animals : those 8. Bossuet, before he sat down to compose live longest with which their parents go a sermon, read a chapter in the prophet longest before they produce them.

Isaiah, and another in Rodriguez's tract on 2. When we study the writings of men, it Christian perfection. The former fired his is well if after much pains and labor we find genius, the latter filled his heart. Dominisome few particles of truth amongst a great chino never offered to touch his pencil, till deal of error. When we read the Scrip- he found a kind of enthusiasm or inspiration tures, all we meet with is truth. In the for

upon him.—Biog. Dict. mer case, we are like the Africans on the

9. Patrons are but too apt to reward their Dust Coast, of whom it is said, that they dig authors with compliments, when they want pits nigh the water-falls of mountains bread. Sorbiere being treated in this manabounding with gold, and then, with incredi- ner by his friend Pope Clement IX., is ble pains and industry, wash off the sand, till said to have complained in the following they espy at the bottom two or three shining humorous terms :- “ Most Holy Father, grains of the metal, that pays them only as you give ruffles to a man who is without a laborers. In the latter case, we work in a shirt." mine sufficient to enrich ourselves and all 10. Valesius used to say, he learned more

from borrowed books than from his own; 3. Of the Spanish books, says Montesquieu, because, not having the same opportunity of the only one good for anything is that which reviewing them, he read them with more was written to show that all the rest were care. good for nothing.

11. Some books, like some fields, afford 4. Sir Peter Lely made it a rule, never to plenty of provision for varions creatureslook at a bad picture, having found by expe- while, as to others, rience that, whenever he did so, his pencil took a tint from it, Apply this to bad books Jejuna quidem clivosi glarea ruris and bad company:

Vix humiles apibus oasias roremque ministrat :

Et tophus scaber, et nigris exesa chelydris 5. I have said, and I abide by it, cries Creta, negant alios æque serpentibus agros Voltaire, that the fault of most books is their Dulcem ferre cibum, et curvas præbere latebras.

GEORG. ii. 212 being too long. A writer who has reason on his side will always be concise.

The coarse lean gravel, on the mountain sides, 6. The books which composed the Alex- Scarce dewy bev'rage for the bees provides : andrian library were employed to heat the Nor chalk, nor crumbling stones, the food of snakes,

That work in hollow earth their winding tracks. baths in that city, then 4,000 in number;

DRYDEN, 293 yet were they six months in consuming. The reasoning of the Caliph at that time was : 12. The Biographia Britannica, a work Either these books are agreeable to the book which, notwithstanding its singular merit, I of God, or they are not. If they are, the cannot help calling Vindicatio Britannica, or Koran is sufficient without them; if they are a defence of every body. Royal and Noble not, they ought to be destroyed.

Authors, ïï. 68. 7. The greatest and wisest men have not 13. Voltaire's Universal History, a charmbeen proof against the errors and supersti- ing bird's-eye landscape, where one views tions conceits of the age in which they lived. the whole in picturesque confusion, and Augustus Cæsar thought the skin of a sea- imagines the objects more delightful than they calf to be a preservative against lightning; are in reality, and when examined separately, and expected some grievous calamity to be- Ibid. 87.

about us

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14. By the writers of dialogues matters was so fond of her, was her exceeding good are often contrived, as in the combats of temper: she never was seen peevish or out the Emperor Commodus in his gladiatorial of humor ; obliging and civil to all, and capacity. The antagonist of his imperial never forgetful of her former condition. majesty was allowed only a leaden weapon. Coxe, i. 568, from Gordon.—Peter was sub

15. It is said of Ascham, that “he lostject to occasional horrors, which at times no time in the perusal of mean and unprofit- rendered him gloomy and suspicious, and able books.” See the reflection on it in Biog. raised his passions to such a height as to proBr. 2d edit.

duce a temporary madness. In these dread16. “Fronti nulla fides” is a just maxim- ful moments Catharine was the only person otherwise, one should be prejudiced against a who ventured to approach him; and such book with this title-Fog Theologiæ Specu- was the kind of fascination she had acquired lativæ Schema.

over him, that her presence had an instanta17. “To read while eating was always neous effect, and the first sound of her voice my fancy, in default of a tête-á-téte. 'Tis composed his mind and calmed his agonies. the supplement to society I want. I alter- From these circumstances she seemed necesnately devour a page and a piece : 'tis as if sary, not only to his comfort, but to his my book dined with me.” Rousseau, b. 6, very existence : she became his inseparable vol. ii. p. 137.

companion on his journeys into foreign coun18. Genuine knowledge should be diffused. tries, and even in all his military expeditions. “Quid magni faceres, said Archbishop -P. 554. Warham to Erasmus, “ si uno agresti popello predicâris ? Nunc libris tuis omnes doces CHARACTERS AND ACTIONS OF REMARKABLE pastores, fructu longé uberiore.” Cooper's

PERSONS. Charge, p. 22.—“What great work could

1. It will be hereafter with a wicked man, you have wrought, had your preaching been when he is punished for his sins, as it was confined to one small and rustic flock ? But with A pollodorus, when he dreamed that he now, with much more extensive benefit, was flayed and boiled by the Scythians, and your books instruct the shepherds of all other his heart spoke to him out of the cauldron, flocks.”

«Εγω σοι τετων αιτια.-I am the cause of BRACHMANS AND ALEXANDER.

these thy sufferings.” Great indeed was the stateliness of the

2. Lysimachus, for extreme thirst, offered Brachmans! When Alexander expressed a

his kingdom to the Getæ, to quench it. His desire to converse with them, he was told,

exclamation, when he had drank, is wonderthese philosophers made no visits; if he fully striking—“Ah! wretched me! who, wanted to see them, he must go to their for such a momentary gratification, have lost houses. The tradition of a fall and restora- δε ηδονην ατω βαρειαν, εσερομαι βασιλειας τηλε

so great a kingdom! Dev Tns erens yaxias, os, tion was strong among them.

xavtrs.”—How applicable is this to the case

of him, who, for the momentary pleasures of BRIBERY. The Spartans were the only people that

sin, parts with the kingdom of heaven! for a while seemed to disdain the love of employment of man, so it is what great ge

3. Horticulture, as it was the primitive money; but, the contagion still spreading, niuses, after having passed through the busieven they, at last, yielded to its allurements ; est scenes in the political and military world, and every man sought private emoluments, retire to with pleasure towards the close of without attending to the good of his country. their days.-See Sir W. Temple's Gardens _“ That which has been is that which shall of Epicurus.

4. A truly great genius doth not think it OF BUYING BOOKS.

beneath him to attend to little things. When Young men should not be discouraged Paulus Emilius, after his conquest of Macefrom buying books. Much may depend on don, entertained the principal men of Greece, it. It is said of Whiston, that the acci- he showed that he understood the ordering dental purchase of Tacquet's Euclid at an and placing of his guests, and how every auction, first occasioned his application to man should be received according to his mathematical studies. — Biog. Dict. Art. rank and quality, to such an exact nicety, Whiston.

that the Greeks were surprised to find him CATHARINE 1. OF RUSSIA.

so expert and careful even about trifles, and

that a man engaged in so many weighty She was not very brilliant and quick in her affairs should observe a decorum in such understanding ; but the reason why the Czar little matters. He told them, the same spirit

be !"

was required in marshaling a banquet as an | when all his enemies were upon him, and his army. See Plutarch.

affairs seemed absolutely desperate, found lei. 5. The same Paulus Emilius, when he had sure to write a kind of philosophical testafollowed to the grave two of the best of sons, ment in French verse. See Age of Louis one a few days before his triumph, the other XV. ii. 213. a few days after it, told a convention of the 11. Children should be inured as early as Romans, that, after such a tide of success, he possible to acts of charity and mercy. Čonhad feared a reverse of fortune either to them stantine, as soon as his son could write, emor himself; that he now felt his mind per- ployed his hand in signing pardons, and defectly at rest, as, by the stroke falling on him lighted in conveying through his mouth all and his family, he looked upon his country the favors that he granted. A noble introto be safe. There is a generosity and great- duction to sovereignty, which is instituted ness of soul in this behavior not easy to be for the happiness of mankind.-Jortin's Reparalleled, as it came from a heart, says Plu- marks on Ecclesiastical History. tarch, truly sincere, and free from all arti- 12. Cyrus had taken the wife of Tigranes, fice.

and asked him what he would give to save 6. It is finely observed by Plutarch, that, her from servitude? He replied, all that he as that body is most strong and healthful had in the world, and his own life into the which can best support extreme cold and ex- bargain. Cyrus, upon this, very generously cessive heat, in the change of seasons; and restored her, and pardoned what had passed. that mind the strongest and firmest which All were full of his praises upon this occacan best bear prosperity and adversity, and sion, some commending the accomplishments the change from one to the other; so the of his mind, others those of his person. virtue of Emilius was eminently seen, in Tigranes asked his wife whether she did not that his countenance and carriage were the greatly admire him? “I never looked at same upon the loss of two beloved sons, as him," said she. “ Not look at him !" rewhen he had achieved his greatest victories turned he; “ upon whom then did you and triumphs.”—How doth this example re- look?" "Upon him," replied she, “who

“ proach and shame the weakness and incon- offered his own life to redeem me from slastancy of Christians !

very.”- This charming example should be 7. The old proverb, Mocking is catching, copied into our behavior in the house of was remarkably exemplified in the great Mr. God; where we should behold and contemBoyle ; who, when yonng, by imitating stut- plate the beauties and perfections of that tering children, acquired himself a habit of blessed Person alone, who actually did give stuttering, of which he was never after per- his life a ransom for us.—See Xenoph. Cyrofectly cured.

pæd. iii. 147. 8. Lord Orrery (Dr. Bentley's antagonist) 13. When Constantine was instigated by was fond of two sorts of company. He his courtiers to make examples of the Arians, either improved himself by conversing with who had insulted his statues, he silenced men of real genius and learning; or else them by raising his hand to his face, and saydiverted himself with those in whose compo- ing, “For mine own part, I do not feel mysition there was a mixture of the odd and self hurt." ridiculous: the foibles of such he would 14. Would you see human vanity and touch and play off with a delicacy and ten- misery at the highest? Behold the globe of derness that prevented any offence from the world carried in procession before the being taken even by the parties themselves, corpse of the Emperor Charles VII. who, who enjoyed the humor, and joined in the during the short course of his wretched laugh as heartily as the rest of the company. reign, could not keep possession of one small

9. The day after Charles V. (one of the unfortunate province. wisest as well as most fortunate of princes) 15. Victor Amadeus, tired of business and had resigned all his kingdoms to his son of himself, capriciously abdicating his crown, Philip, he introduced, and recommended to and a year afterwards as capriciously repenthis service, his faithful counsellor and secre- ing, and desiring to have it again, displayed tary, with these remarkable words : “ The fully the weakness of human nature, and how present I make you to-day is a far more difficult it is to gratify the heart, either with valuable one than that I made you yester- or without a throne.

a day.”

16. Claude Lorrain studied his art in the 10. I am ashamed to think, that a little open field, where he frequently continued business and few cares should indispose and from the rising to the setting sun. He sketchhinder me in my religious exercises, when I ed whatever he thought beautiful or striking, read, that Frederic, king of Prussia, at a time and marked, in similar colors, every curious

-Pent in his cage tinge of light on all kinds of objects. These were afterwards improved into landscapes, His eye is rais'd to heav'n. Though many a moon

Th' imprison'd eagle sits, and beats his bars; universally allowed to be superior to those Has seen him pine in sad captivity of all other artists who have painted in the

still he thirsts to dip same style. In like manner Shakspere and His daring pinions in the fount of light.

Poetical Epistle to Anstey, on the Eng. Poets Ben Jonson travelled and associated with all sorts of people, to mark different traits in

23. In treating of the human mind, and the characters and tempers of mankind, the management of it, the two great sources which were afterwards worked up into their of illustration are agriculture and medicine. inimitable plays. Every writer should fol- -Bacon's Advancement of Learning, vii. low these examples, and take down thoughts 3.–Our Saviour therefore so frequently apas they occur in reading or conversing, to be plied to them (as the prophets had done beready for use afterwards when he sits down fore) for the illustration of his doctrine. to compose.

24. Champagne, a celebrated painter, was 17. To the hasty correctors of the sacred given to understand, he might have anything text may be applied what an ingenious au- from Cardinal Richelieu, if he would leave thor has observed, when speaking of the the service of the queen mother—“ Why," critics on classical writers.—“ The learning said he, “ if the cardinal could make me a of the ancients had been long ago obliterated, better painter, the only thing I am ambitious had every man thought himself at liberty to of, it would be something ; but since that corrupt the lines which he did not under- is impossible, the only honor I beg of his stand.” Adventurer, vol. ii. p. 189. No. 58. eminency is the continuance of his good

, 18. Obscurity of expression is elegantly graces.” called, by Mrs. Montague, “that mist com

25. It was a saying of Lord Clarendon's mon to the eve and morn of literature, which father, that he never knew a man arrive to in fact proves it is not at its high meridian." any degree of reputation in the world who See Essay on Shakspere, p. 286.

chose for his friends and companions persons 19. Some make the discharge of the Chris- in their qualities inferior, or in their parts tian ministry to consist in asserting the rights not much superior to himself

. And Huetius, of the church, and the dignity of their func- I think, tells us, that as often as he heard of tion; others, in a strenuous opposition to the

any one of very eminent character in the prevailing sectaries, and a zealous attachment republic of letters, he never rested till, by to the established church government; a

some means or other, he had obtained an third sort, in examining the speculative introduction to his acquaintance, and this points and mystical parts of religion; few, from his earliest youth. in the meantime, considering either in what

26. It happened formerly that a Rotterthe true dignity of the ministerial character dam produced an Erasmus. And it hapconsists; or the only end for which church pened lately, as the General Evening Post government was at all established; or the (March 14, 1771,) informs us, that a goose practical influence, which can alone make hatched four-and-twenty canary birds. But speculative points worth our attention—the these are events that do not happen every reformation of the lives of men, and the pro- day. motion of their truest happiness here and

27. When the Mexican Emperor Gatimohereafter. Gilpin's Life, p. 160.

zin was put upon the rack by the soldiers of 20. It is observed of King, Bishop of Lon- Cortes, one of his nobles, who lay in tortures don, in 1611, that he was so constant in at the same time, complained piteously to preaching, after he was a bishop, that he his sovereign of the pain he endured. « Do never missed a Sunday when his health per- you think,” said Gatimozin, “ that I lie upon mitted. Biog. Dict. from Fuller.

roses ?" The nobleman ceased moaning, and 21. The morning after the massacre of expired in silence.—When a Christian thinks Paris, when the streets were covered with his sufferings for sin, in sickness, pain, &c.; the bodies of slaughtered men, women, and intolerable, let him remember those of his children, before they were thrown into the Lord, endured patiently on that bed of Seine, the Catholics bethought themselves of sorrow, the cross; and he will think so no a charitable device, which was, to strip them longer. naked, in order to distribute their bloody 28. When Gatimozin, just taken, was clothes to the poor —Saint Foix, Histoire de brought into the presence of. Cortes, he l'Ordre du S. Esprit.

(Cortes) gave strict orders that the Mexican 22. To the soul confined in this material noblemen taken with the emperor should be world, but aspiring to another and a better, secured and strictly looked to, lest they apply the following lines :

should escape.

“ Your care," said Gatimo

e

zin, “is needless ; they will not fly; they became Bishop of Winton, a distant relation, are come to die at the feet of their sovereign!" a blacksmith, applied to him to be made a -Such should be the disposition and resolu- gentleman, i. e. to be ordained, and provided tion of the disciples and soldiers of Christ. with a good benefice. No said the bishop,

29. Little circumstances convey the most you shall have the best forge in the county; characteristic ideas; but the choice of them but—every man in his own order and station. may as often paint the genius of the writer, 37. It was a good rule of Dr. Hammond's as of the person represented.-Well exem- always to have a subject in hand; in which plified in the instance of the Duchess of case he observed, that, whatever course of Marlborough. See Royal and Noble Authors, reading he happened to be in, he never failed vol. ii. 200.

of meeting with something to his purpose. 30. Inscription (not perfectly Augustan) For this reason, no sooner had he finished on the Earl of Shrewsbury's sword: “Sum one sermon, or tract, but he immediately put Talboti, pro occidere inimicos.”—“I am another upon the stocks. Thus he was never Talbot's, for to slay his foes.”

idle, and all his studies turned to present ac31. Wraxall, speaking of a cathedral, or count. He never walked out alone without abbey, in Livonia, demolished by the Rus- a book, and one always lay open in his chamsians, expresses himself thus :— * Posterity ber, from which his servant read while he will see the standard wave where the crucifix dressed or undressed himself. His Life by has stood, and the matin bell will be suc- Fell, though written in a style far from clear ceeded by the trumpet.”—P. 278.

and agreeable, is one of the most improving 32. In former times, when Lord Keeper books I ever read. North applied close to his studies, and spent 38. Jordano (Luca) the painter was so his days in his chamber, he was subject to engaged in his business, that he worked at it the spleen, and apprehensive of many imagi- even on holidays. Being reproached for nary diseases; and, by way of prevention, this by a brother artist — Why,” said he, he went thick clad, wore leather skull-caps,“ if I was to let my pencils rest, they and inclined much to physic. But now, would grow rebellious, and I should not be when he was made attorney-general, and busi- able to bring them to order, without trampness flowed in upon him, his complaints ling on them.”—This man had so happy a vanished, and his skull-caps were destined to memory, that he recollected the manner of lie in a drawer, and receive his money.-Life all the great masters, and had the art of imiof Lord Keeper North.

tating them so well as to occasion frequent 33. As men are preferred, their zeal and mistakes. diligence often remit, instead of increasing. 39. Grove, the Presbyterian, published in Urban III. thus inscribed a letter to Arch- 1728 a funeral sermon on the Fear of Death. bishop Baldwin—“Monacho ferventissimo, The subject was treated in so masterly a Abbati calido, Episcopo tepido, Archiepis- manner, that a person of considerable rank copo remisso.”—“ Most fervent as a Monk, in the learned world declared, that, after warm as an Abbot, lukewarm as a Bishop, cold reading it, he could have laid down and died, as an Archbishop.”—Life of Baldwin in Biog. with as much readiness and satisfaction, as he Britan.

had ever done anything in his life.-Biog. 34. To instruct, and to govern, are two Dict. Art. Grove.—The sermon must have things; and a man may do the former well, been a good one to have wrought such a perwho does the latter very indifferently. It is suasion : but how the persuasion would have part of Dr. Allestry's character, as drawn kept its ground, had the person been taken at in his epitaph: “ Episcopales infulas cadem his word, and ordered to prepare for instant industria evitavit, quâ alii ambiunt ; cui death, is another question. rectius visum ecclesiam defendere, instruere,

40. Remarkable is the following passage ornare, quam regere.”—He shunned the mitre of Josephus, relative to the wickedness of as industriously as others seek it; he chose his countrymen before Jerusalem was berather to defend, edify, and adorn, than sieged by the Romans—“ That time abounded govern the church.”-Biog. Brit.

with all manner of iniquity, so that none 35. Bishop Andrews, when a lad at the was left undone. Yea, though one enuniversity, used every year to visit his friends deavored to invent some new villany, yet in London, and to stay a month with them. could he invent none that was not then pracDuring that month, he constantly made it a tised.” rule to learn, by the help of a master, some 41. Sauveur, the French mathematician language, or art, to which he was before a when he was about to court his mistress stranger. No time was lost.

would not see her till he had been with a 36. When the same eminent person first I notary, to have the conditions on which he

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