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A RAMBLING CHAPTER.

Know then this truth, enough for man to know,
Virtue alone is happiness below.

РОРЕ.

I WILL tell you what I would do if I were a boy. I would sit down and reflect what would be the most valuable acquirements in the world. After finding out what they were, I would ask myself which will be the best method to attain them? and after I had answered this question, I would lose no time in pursuing them. The boy who follows this advice, cannot fail to become a great man.

The error of youth is that of thinking itself as wise as age; and the error of age is that of expecting youth to act as prudently as though it had received the benefit of experience. As you are young, try to avoid them both.

An idle man ought not to complain of any one who robs him, since he himself sets the example. He robs himself of much more by his idleness than a thief can take from him. The drunkard ought not to take it to heart, even though a man should poison him; what he gives to himself takes away the use of his limbs, and deprives him of the use of his reason ; what can poison do more! Idleness and intemperance have led millions to destruction, let them not add you to the number. Always have a good object in view. It should be the object of a

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child, to become a good boy; the endeavour of a boy, to become a good man; and the determination of a man, to be a model of wisdom and virtue in his old age. Childhood, youth, manhood, and old age, every day they live on earth, should try to get nearer to heaven.

If you cannot talk so fast as I can, learn, at least, to think as correctly; and make amends for your want of good words, by an abundance of good desires and benevolent deeds. Some are more eloquent in their silence, than others are in their speech. The eloquence of the tongue is excellent, but it is nothing when compared with the eloquence of the heart.

Open your eyes wide and you will see, not only how blindly others grope their way through the world, but also, the wrong turnings they take, and the quagmires which they fall into.

How careless, how reckless, how wilfully blind,

In their journey through life are the most of mankind!
Each man takes the pathway that pleases him best,
To the north, or the south, to the east or the west.
Pride, interest, and pleasure, exert their control,
And call forth the passions, and poison the soul;
And folly, and fashion, and feeling impart

Their delusions to injure the head and the heart.

Now, if you can see these errors and still fall into them, however excellent you may imagine your eyesight to be, you must be blind in the head, blind in the heart, and blind all over.

Happy is he, who, in regretting his past indiscretions, can say, I never yet led a companion into evil. Let this happiness be yours.

If a boy by accident blacks his face, his comrades will perceive it before himself; and if you have a bad quality in your disposition, you will be the last person in the world to discover it. It is necessary, not only to examine our

selves, but, also, to get others to examine us, if we would have clean faces, and minds free from infirmity.

People of all ages judge favourably of themselves. I often admire my own eloquence, when it fails to excite the admiration of others; and as frequently wonder at my wisdom, when I perceive no astonishment in the faces of my friends. If my humility in avowing this should preserve you from pride, it will in some degree atone for the want of connexion in this rambling chapter.

If you wish to be happy, and to make others happy too, you must be virtuous; for, without virtue, this world is worthless, and a better cannot be attained.

Let the wicked obtain all they wish for, and more;
Let them pile up their pleasures, and gaze on their store :

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