Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

MORAL.

10. And now that my fable is pretty near ended,
I think there should be a brief moral appended;
Beware how you let evil habits grow up;

While feeble and young, you to crush them may hope;
But let them remain

Till strength they attain,

You may find your best efforts to conquer them vain.

JOHN ALCOHOL, MY JOE.*

1. John Alcohol, my Joe, John,
When we were first acquaint,
I'd money in my pockets, John,
Which now I know there ain't.
I spent it all in treating, John,
Because I loved you so―

But mark me how you've treated me,
John Alcohol, my Joe.

2. John Alcohol, my Joe, John,

We've been too long together,
So you must take one road, John,
And I will take the other;
For we must tumble down, John,
If hand in hand we go,

And I will have the bill to foot,
John Alcohol, my Joe.

*The above is a parody on the celebrated song-"John Anderson, my Joe," and, unlike most parodies, conveys a must useful piece of instruction.

MEMORABILIA.*

"It is very wonderful," says Addison, "to see persons of the best sense, passing away a dozen hours together in shuffling and dividing a pack of cards, with no other conversation but what is made up of a few game phrases, and no other ideas but those of black or red spots ranged together in different figures. Would not a man laugh to hear any one of his species complaining that life is short?

GREAT WITS AND SMALL WITS.

"As it is characteristic of great wits," says Rochefoucault, "to say much in a few words, so it is of small wits, to talk much, and say nothing."

WHAT BRINGS RUIN.

"We are ruined," says Colton, "not by what we really want, but by what we think we do; therefore, never go abroad in search of your wants; for if they be real wants, they will come home in search of you. He that buys what he does not want, will soon want what he cannot buy."

SLEEPING IN CHURCH.

"It is a shame," says Fuller, "when the church itself is made a cemetery, where the living sleep above ground, as the dead do beneath."

WAY TO GAIN REPUTATION.

"The way to gain a reputation," says Socrates, "is to endeavor to be what you desire to appear."

WHAT MAKES ONE RICH.

"He is rich," says Bruyere, "whose income is more than his expenses; and he is poor whose expenses exceed his in

come."

* See note, page 58.

WAY TO CRUSH CALUMNY.

"Boerhaave," says Johnson, "was never soured by calumny and detraction, nor ever thought it necessary to confute them; for, said he, they are sparks, which, if you do not blow them, will go out of themselves." And, says Cato, "We cannot control the evil tongues of others, but a good life enables us to despise them."

GREAT AND SMALL.

"The superiority," says the same writer, "of some men is merely local. They are great, because their associates are little."

THE HAPPY MAN.

"He is happy," says Hume, "whose circumstances suit his temper; but he is more excellent, who can suit his temper to any circumstances."

EXCESSIVE SORROW.

Bion seeing a person who was tearing the hair off his head for sorrow, said: "Does this man think that baldness is a remedy for grief?"

WHAT MAN IS TO MAN.

"Man is," says Cowley, "to man all kinds of beasts: a fawning dog, a roaring lion, a thieving fox, a robbing wolf, a dissembling crocodile, a treacherous decoy, and a rapacious vulture."

GO AND COME.

A gentleman in Surry had a farm worth £200 per annum, which he kept in his own hands, but running out every year, he was necessitated to sell half of it to pay his debts, and let the rest to a farmer for one-and-twenty years. Before the term was expired, the farmer one day bringing his rent, asked him if would sell his land. Why," said the gentleman,

66

"will you buy it?" "Yes, if you please," said the farmer. "How!" returned he; "that's strange! Tell me how this comes to pass, that I could not live upon twice as much, being my own; and you upon the half, though you have paid rent for it, are able to buy it?" "Oh, sir!" said the farmer, "but two words made the difference: you said, go; and I said, come." "What's the meaning of that?" says the gentleman. "Why, sir," replied the other, "you lay in bed, or took your pleasure, and sent others about your business; and I rose betimes, and saw my business done myself."

SET YOUR MARK HIGH.

"I recollect," says Sir John Barrington, "in the Queen's County, to have seen a Mr. Clerk, who had been a working carpenter, and when making a bench for the session justices. at the court-house, was laughed at for taking peculiar pains in planing and smoothing the seat of it. He smilingly observed, 'that he did so to make it easy for himself, as he was resolved he would never die till he had a right to sit thereupon,' and he kept his word. He was an industrious man-honest, respectable, and kind-hearted. He succeeded in all his efforts to accumulate an independence-he did accumulate it, and uprightly. His character kept pace with the increase of his property, and he lived to sit as a magistrate on that very bench that he sawed and planed."

SILENCE SOMETIMES THE PART OF WISDOM.

"Wise men," says Selden," say nothing in dangerous times. The lion, you know, called the sheep to ask her 'if his breath smelt?' She said, 'Ay.' He bit off her head for a fool. He called the wolf, and asked him. He said, 'No.' He tore im in pieces for a flatterer. At last he called the fox, and sked him. Truly, he had got a cold, and could not smell !'"

[ocr errors]

Gold! gold! gold!

GOLD.

Bright and yellow, hard and cold,

Molten, graven, hammered, and rolled,
Heavy to get, and light to hold,

Hoarded, bartered, bought, and sold,
Stolen, borrowed, squandered, doled,
Spurned by the young, but hugged by the old
To the very verge of the church-yard mould;
Pride of many a crime untold;
Gold! gold! gold! gold!
Good or bad a thousandfold,

How widely its uses vary:

To save, to ruin, to curse, to bless;

Now stamped with the image of the good queen Bess,
And now of "Bloody Mary."

Hood.

THE POND.-BYROM.

1. ONCE, on a time, a certain man was found,
That had a pond of water in his ground:
A fine large pond of water fresh and clear,
Enough to serve his turn, for many a year.
Yet so it was—a strange, unhappy dread
Of wanting water seiz'd the fellow's head:
When he was dry, he was afraid to drink
Too much at once, for fear his pond should sink.

2. Perpetually tormented with this thought, He never ventured on a hearty draught; Still dry, still fearing to exhaust his store, When half refresh'd, he frugally gave o'er; Reviving of himself reviv'd his fright, "Better," quoth he, "to be half chok'd than quite."

3. Upon his pond continually intent,

In cares and pains his anxious life he spent ;

« AnteriorContinuar »