For they are strong supporters; but tell them,
The greatest are but growing gentlemen.

The man who has not anything to boast of but his illustrious ancestors, can safely boast that the only good belonging to him is under the ground.

'Tis poor, and not becoming perfect gentry,
To build their glories at their fathers' cost;
But at their own expense of blood or virtue,
To raise them living monuments; our birth
Is not our own act; honour upon trust,
Our ill-deeds forfeit; and the wealthy sums,
Purchas'd by others' fame or sweat, will be
Our stain, for we inherit nothing truly

But what our actions make us worthy of.

"Who but unhappy descendants will praise their progenitors?" says the Greek proverb.

Family pride entertains many unsocial opinions.

Pride in boasting of family antiquity makes duration stand for merit.

Were honour to be scanned by long descent
From ancestors illustrious, I could vaunt
A lineage of the greatest, and recount
Among my fathers, names of ancient story,
Heroes and god-like patriots, who subdued
The world by arms and virtue;

But that be their own praise,

Nor will I borrow merit from the dead,
Myself an undeserver.

A noble birth and fortune, though they make not a bad man good, yet they are a real advantage to a worthy one, and place his virtues in the fairest light.

When real nobleness accompanies that imaginary one of birth, the imaginary seems to mix with the real, and becomes real too. In peasant life he might have known

As fair a face, as sweet a tone;
But village notes could ne'er supply
That rich and varied melody,
And ne'er in cottage maid was seen
The easy dignity of mien

Claiming respect, yet waving state,
That marks the daughters of the great.

Body.

"I AM fearfully and wonderfully made."-Ps. cxxxix. 14. The body is not one member, but many."-1 Cor. xii. 14. "I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection.”—1 COR. ix. 27.

For contemplation he, and valour form'd;

For softness she, and sweet attractive grace.

It is shameful for man to rest in ignorance of his own body, especially when the knowledge of it mainly conduces to his welfare and directs his application of his own affairs.

How weak a man to reason's judging eye!
Born in this moment, in the next we die.
Part mortal clay, and part ethereal fire;
Too proud to creep, too humble to aspire.

Let our make and place as men remind us of our duty as Christians, which is, always to keep heaven in our eye and the earth under our feet.

Os sublime (Ovid), the sublime countenance-the human form divine.

Fair on the face (God) wrote the index of the mind. All men's faces are true, whatsoever their hands are.

The eye

Read o'er the volume of his lovely face,

And find delight writ there with beauty's pen;

Examine every several lineament,

And what obscure in this fair volume lies,

Find written in the margin of his eyes.

Every man in this age has not a soul

Of crystal, for all men to read their actions through:
Men's hearts and faces are so far asunder that
They hold no intelligence.

Takes in at once the landscape of the world,
At a small inlet which a grain might close,

And half creates the wondrous world we see.

A beautiful eye makes silence eloquent; a kind eye makes contradiction an assent; an enraged eye makes beauty deformed. This little member gives life to every other part about us.

"The light of the body is the eye."

What needs a tongue to such a speaking eye,
That more persuades than winning oratory.

Our eyes when gazing on sinful objects are out of their calling and God's keeping.

"If any man among you seem to be religious, and bridleth not his tongue, but deceiveth his own heart, this man's religion is vain."-JAMES i. 26.

"The tongue can no man tame," but it can be tamed and controlled by God. His grace can effectually subdue and sanctify this unruly member.

By examining the tongue of a patient, physicians find out the diseases of the body, and philosophers the diseases of the mind. Give your tongue more holidays than your hands or your

It is better for one's foot to make a slip than one's tongue. The wisdom of the Creator is in nothing seen more gloriously than the heart. It was necessary that it should be made capable of working for ever without the cessation of a moment, without the least degree of weariness. It is so made; and the power of the Creator in so constructing it, can in nothing be exceeded but by His Wisdom. Its shape is roughly triangular, the base being directed upwards while the apex points downwards, forward and to the left side. It lies between the two lungs. The average weight in man is between nine and ten ounces; in woman between eight and nine ounces.

A millstone and the human heart are driven ever round, If they have nothing else to grind, they must themselves be ground. "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked who can know it?"-JER. xvii. 9.

The hardest trial of the heart is, whether it can bear a rival's failure without triumph.

A man's own heart must ever be given to gain that of another. To man only, God has given a hand-an instrument applicable to every art and occasion both of peace and war. Every effort of the will is answered so instantly as if the hand itself were the seat of that will.

"The hand of the diligent maketh rich."-PROV. x. 4.

The head has the most beautiful appearance, as well as the highest station in a human figure. Nature has laid out all her art in beautifying the face; she has touched it with her vermilion, planted in it a double row of ivory, made it the seat of smiles and blushes, lighted it up with the brightness of the eyes. In short she has designed the head as the cupola to the most glorious of her works.

A heart to resolve, a head to contrive, and a hand to execute. Strange! that a harp of thousand strings

Should keep in tune so long.

Books.

"OF making many books there is no end."-ECCL. xii. 12. Behold, my desire is, that the Almighty would answer me, and that mine adversary had written a book."-JOB Xxxi. 35. "Oh that my words were now written! oh that they were printed in a book!"-JOB xix. 23.

A great book is a great evil.

Cave ab homine unius libri-Beware of the man of one book.
A few books well chosen are of more use than a great library.

This books can do; nor this alone, they give
New views to life, and teach us how to live;

They soothe the grieved, the stubborn they chastise,
Fools they admonish, and confirm the wise.

Nothing can supply the place of books. They are cheering or soothing companions in solitude, idleness, or affliction.

Come and take choice of all my library,

And so beguile thy sorrow.

I have ever gained the most profit, and the most pleasure also, from the books which have made me think the most.

Thou mayst as well expect to grow stronger by always eating, as wiser by always reading Too much over-charges nature, and turns more into disease than nourishment. 'Tis thought and digestion which makes books serviceable, and gives health and vigour to the mind.

We can see and hear comparatively little; we must avail ourselves therefore of the eyes and ears of others; and this is to be done through the medium of books. There the learned and the wise have recorded the results of their observations for our benefit. Those who have but little time should be careful in the selection of what they read.

The most accomplished way of using books at present, says Swift, is to serve them as some do lords; learn their titles, and then brag of their acquaintance.

Books, as Dryden has aptly termed them, are spectacles to read nature. Eschylus and Aristotle, Shakespeare and Bacon expound some of the mysteries of man and the universe, and teach us to understand and feel what we see.

In grave Quinctilian's works we find

The justest rules and clearest method joined.

How easily, how secretly, how safely do books expose our ignorance without putting us to shame! These are the masters that instruct us without rods, without hard words and angerand without money. If you approach them they are not asleep; if investigating, you interrogate them, they conceal nothing; you mistake them they never grumble; if you are ignorant they cannot laugh at you.

if

It is chiefly through books that we enjoy intercourse with superior minds. In the best books great men talk to us and give us their most precious thoughts. Books are the true levellers. They give to all who will faithfully use them, the society, the spiritual presence of the best and greatest of our race. No matter how poor I am, if the sacred writers will enter and take up their abode under the roof of my obscure dwelling; if Milton will cross my threshold to sing to me of Paradise, and Shakespeare to open to me the worlds of imagination and the workings of the human heart; and other great men to enrich me with practical wisdom, I shall not pine for want of intellectual companionship, and I may become a cultivated man though excluded from what is called the best society in the place where I live.

Books are a guide in youth and an entertainment for age. They support us under solitude, and keep us from becoming a burden to ourselves. They help us to forget the crossness of men and things, compose our cares and our passions, and lay our disappointments asleep. When we are weary of the living we may repair to the dead, who have nothing of peevishness, pride or design in their conversation.

Finis! an error or a lie, my friend;

In writing foolish books-there is no end!