SELECTIONS IN PROSE.

MORAL, RELIGIOUS, AND MISCELLANEOUS PIECES

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SENTENTIOUS MAXIMS.

FIRM belief in a future state is a great consolation to a good man. It is the balsam, that cures all the miseries in this life.

Forget nothing but the injuries done to you.

The sight of a distressed beggar has its use. It awakens our humanity, and makes us contented with our condition.

Think of the distresses of human life; of the solitary cottage, the dying parent, and the weeping orphan.

When blest with health and prosperity, cultivate a compassionate disposition.

A secret is no where so safe as in your own bo

som.

Were the book of Fate laid open to view, no man would enjoy a moment's peace from the day he looked into it.

There is as much to be gained by thinking as by reading.

Never take a thing for granted when it is in your power to reduce it to absolute certainty.

That system of logic, which consists not in abstruse terms, or argumentative certainty, but in the manly exercise of the rational powers, justly claims an important place in every system of education.

Early rising will add many years to your life.

A regular division of time prevents one hour from encroaching upon another.

If an idle man knew the value of time, he would not be so desirous of killing it.

In the morning, think on what you are to do in the day, and at night think on what you have done.

Use yourself to thinking and you will find that you have more in your head than you thought of.

Be not a collector of books without determining to read them.

When religion is made a science there is nothing more intricate, when made a duty there is nothing more easy.

It is a great accomplishment to be able to tell a story well.

In a mixed company let your conversation be very guarded, for without intending it, you may say something, which a person present may consider as personal, and for which you may be obliged to make an apology.

Unless you are perfectly well informed, do not venture to give your opinion upon a work of art. It may injure the artist and probably may occasion your judgment to be brought into question.

Unless your pretensions be very good, avoid being the principal speaker in a large company.

Keep company with learned men, and you will have less occasion for much reading.

A man who is officious to serve you at first sight, should be regarded with caution.

Never borrow money to pay the expenses of a country excursion. If you have not the cash, stay at

home.

Idleness travels very leisurely, and Poverty soon overtakes her.

We call that a contrary wind which is not favorable to ourselves; forgetting that it is blowing a favorable gale for somebody else.

If a great man looks down upon you, don't look up to him.

Whatever your miseries may be, there are others more miserable than yourself.

Envy is a sore eye that cannot bare a bright object. Take away your expensive follies, and you will have little reason to complain of hard times.

Treat every man with civility, but very few with familiarity.

A fine woman ought to add annually to her accom plishments, as much as her beauty loses in the time. Never write a letter in a passion.

He who accustoms himself to buy superfluities, may ere long be obliged to sell his necessaries.

Before you make a promise, consider well its im-portance, and when made, engrave it upon the tablet of your heart.

We are never contented but when our wishes are> gratified, and yet what a strange work would it be if all our wishes were to be gratified.

A good countenance is a letter of recommendation, though an irregular set of features should not raise our prejudice.

It is with men as with barrels, the emptiest make the most noise.

It is a great misfortune to be tired of home.

He who loves to employ himself well, can never want something to do.

When you make a visit of ceremony take care not to make it too long.

When you are about to do a dishonorable act, consider what the world will think of you when it is completed.

Eat and drink with moderation, keep the body open, rise early, take moderate exercise, and you will have little occasion for the physician.

The best throw with dice, is to throw them away. He who has good health is young, and he is rich who owes nothing.

Nothing is so hard to bare well, as prosperity.

He who would have good offices done to him, must do them to others.

A good man is always at home wherever he chances to be.

He is learned enough, who knows how to live well.

When you

fall into a man's conversation, the first thing you should consider is, whether he has a greater inclination to hear you, than that you should hear him.

A man should never be too much addicted to any one thing.

A man's first care should be to avoid the reproach of his own heart; his next to escape the censure of the world.

Express your sentiments with brevity.

It is a certain sign of an ill heart, to be inclined to defamation.

Every person should obtain, if possible a disposition to be pleased.

Without corresponding acts of goodness, faith is of no avail.

There is a laudable virtue in wishing to leave behind us, some memorial of our having lived.

INDUSTRY.

THERE is no one habit, or quality, which exerts such a powerful influence on all the affairs of life, as the strenuous exercise of those active powers which God has implanted in the nature of man. On what but the exertion of these powers, can we depend for the cultivation of the soil, the invention of manufacture, and, in short, for the production of every thing which constitutes the good and the ornament of human life.

It may seem strange, but it is not more strange than true, that if men wish for any thing like pleasurable ease, the only way to obtain it is by patient and persevering industry. For what tends so much to disturb our quiet, to harass our minds, and corrode our hearts, as those vexations and inconveniencies, which the want of exertion is sure to bring upon us. By neglecting the exercise of our active powers, we do not exonerate ourselves from difficulties, or put ourselves out of the reach of sorrow We have all some interests to take care of, some business to manage, some

duties to perform. Now, to neglect these interests, this business, and these duties, is only to run up an account with time, which will accumulate to a sum, that we shall find it painful, if not impossible, to discharge.

In

Nothing gives occasion to so much labor, as idleness, and to labor the most affecting, because accompanied with poignant regret, for our past neglect. all the affairs of life, industry, continual and persevering, saves that labor, which idleness only, accumulates. In our common household concerns, does not the neglect or intermission of vigilance and exertion make our subsequent labor to retrieve the past, greater than it would otherwise have been? Does it not force us to do much in a little time? or, if our idleness be not merely an occasional, but a lasting intermission of exertion, does it not inevitably produce an irretrievable disorder, and ruin in our affairs? Enter the houses of the slothful, and you will behold almost every thing out of place; dirt accumulating for want of cleanliness; the family ragged, and every appearance of squalled poverty in the dwelling. By much slothfulness the building decayeth, and through idleness of the hands, the house droppeth through. In the habitations of the industrious, no repairs are any sooner wanted than they are performed; thus the building is kept compact and weather-proof; but, in the dwellings of the slothful, one little rent in the walls, one broken pane in the casement, or one opening in the roof is left neglected after another, till the whole building is pervious to the wind, or leaks like a sieve. The remark may be applied to many similar cases, in which sloth is suffered, by a gradual accumulation of evil, to produce the most serious mischief, to the temporal, as well as to the moral interests of men, which a little exertion, in the first instance, would easily have prevented. It is idleness, or the unwillingness to exercise our active faculties, which causes our bad habits to become powerful, and our good habits to fall into decay.

Besides, if we regard only present pleasure, industry has greatly the advantage over sloth. Industry,