Chapter II: Part 2

Whoever would entitle himself after death, through the merits of his Redeemer, to the noblest of rewards, let him serve God throughout life in this most excellent of all duties, doing good to our brethren. Whoever is sensible of his offences, let him take this way especially of evidencing his repentance.--ARCHBISHOP SECKER.

I have learned from Jesus Christ himself what charity is, and how we ought to practise it; for He says, "By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye love one another." Never can I, therefore, please myself in the hope that I may obtain the name of a servant of Christ, if I possess not a true and unfeigned charity within me. --ST. BASIL.

There is a debt of mercy and pity, of charity and compassion, of relief and succor due to human nature, and payable from one man to another; and such as deny to pay it the distressed in the time of their abundance may justly expect it will be denied themselves in a time of want. "With what measure you mete it shall be measured to you again."--BURKITT.

We should give as we would receive, cheerfully, quickly, and without hesitation; for there is no grace in a benefit that sticks to the fingers.--SENECA.

As the purse is emptied the heart is filled.--VICTOR HUGO.

Then gently scan your brother man,
Still gentler, sister woman;
Though they may gang a kennin' wrang,
To step aside is human.
--BURNS.

CHEERFULNESS.--Cheerfulness is full of significance: it suggests good health, a clear conscience, and a soul at peace with all human nature.--CHARLES KINGSLEY.

As in our lives so also in our studies, it is most becoming and most wise, so to temper gravity with cheerfulness, that the former may not imbue our minds with melancholy, nor the latter degenerate into licentiousness.--PLINY.

A merry heart doeth good like a medicine: but a broken spirit drieth the bones.--PROVERBS 17:22.

Be of good cheer.--JOHN 16:33.

The mind that is cheerful in its present state, will be averse to all solicitude as to the future, and will meet the bitter occurrences of life with a placid smile.--HORACE.

An ounce of cheerfulness is worth a pound of sadness to serve God with.--FULLER.

If good people would but make their goodness agreeable, and smile instead of frowning in their virtue, how many would they win to the good cause!--ARCHBISHOP USHER.

Between levity and cheerfulness there is a wide distinction; and the mind which is most open to levity is frequently a stranger to cheerfulness.--BLAIR.

You find yourself refreshed by the presence of cheerful people. Why not make earnest effort to confer that pleasure on others? You will find half the battle is gained if you never allow yourself to say anything gloomy.--MRS. L.M. CHILD.

Inner sunshine warms not only the heart of the owner, but all who come in contact with it.--J.T. FIELDS.

The way to cheerfulness is to keep our bodies in exercise and our minds at ease.--STEELE.

Let us be of good cheer, remembering that the misfortunes hardest to bear are those which never happen.--LOWELL.

A cheerful temper, joined with innocence, will make beauty attractive, knowledge delightful and wit good-natured. It will lighten sickness, poverty and affliction, convert ignorance into an amiable simplicity, and render deformity itself agreeable.--ADDISON.

CHILDREN.--If I were to choose among all gifts and qualities that which, on the whole, makes life pleasantest, I should select the love of children. No circumstance can render this world wholly a solitude to one who has this possession.--T.W. HIGGINSON.

I love these little people; and it is not a slight thing when they, who are so fresh from God, love us.--DICKENS.

They are idols of hearts and of households;
They are angels of God in disguise;
His sunlight still sleeps in their tresses;
His glory still gleams in their eyes.
Oh those truants from home and from heaven,
They have made me more manly and mild,
And I know now how Jesus could liken
The kingdom of God to a child.
--DICKENS.

The child is father of the man.
--WORDSWORTH.

The smallest children are nearest to God, as the smallest planets are nearest the sun.--RICHTER.

In trying to teach children a great deal in a short time, they are treated not as though the race they were to run was for life, but simply a three-mile heat.--HORACE MANN.

Childhood shows the man
As morning shows the day.
--MILTON.

Be very vigilant over thy child in the April of his understanding, lest the frost of May nip his blossoms. While he is a tender twig, straighten him; whilst he is a new vessel, season him; such as thou makest him, such commonly shalt thou find him. Let his first lesson be obedience, and his second shall be what thou wilt.--QUARLES.

A child is an angel dependent on man.--COUNT DE MAISTRE.

A child's eyes, those clear wells of undefiled thought--what on earth can be more beautiful? Full of hope, love and curiosity, they meet your own. In prayer, how earnest; in joy, how sparkling; in sympathy, how tender! The man who never tried the companionship of a little child has carelessly passed by one of the great pleasures of life, as one passes a rare flower without plucking it or knowing its value.--MRS. NORTON.

If a boy is not trained to endure and to bear trouble, he will grow up a girl; and a boy that is a girl has all a girl's weakness without any of her regal qualities. A woman made out of a woman is God's noblest work; a woman made out of a man is his meanest.--BEECHER.

Children are the keys of Paradise.
* * * They alone are good and wise,
Because their thoughts, their very lives are prayer.
--STODDARD.

Blessed be the hand that prepares a pleasure for a child, for there is no saying when and where it may bloom forth.--DOUGLAS JERROLD.

Many children, many cares; no children, no felicity.--BOVEE.

If there is anything that will endure
The eye of God because it still is pure,
It is the spirit of a little child,
Fresh from His hand, and therefore undefiled.
Nearer the gate of Paradise than we,
Our children breathe its airs, its angels see;
And when they pray, God hears their simple prayer,
Yea, even sheathes His sword, in judgment bare.
--STODDARD.

Every child walks into existence through the golden gate of love. --BEECHER.

Of all sights which can soften and humanize the heart of man, there is none that ought so surely to reach it as that of innocent children enjoying the happiness which is their proper and natural portion.--SOUTHEY.

Ah! what would the world be to us,
If the children were no more?
We should dread the desert behind us
Worse than the dark before.
--LONGFELLOW.

Jesus was the first great teacher of men who showed a genuine sympathy for childhood. When He said, "Of such is the kingdom of heaven," it was a revelation.--EDWARD EGGLESTON.

Where children are there is the golden age.--NOVALIS.

CHRIST.--The best of men that ever wore earth about him was a sufferer, a soft, meek, patient, humble, tranquil spirit; the first true gentleman that ever breathed.--DECKER.

All the glory and beauty of Christ are manifested within, and there He delights to dwell; His visits there are frequent, His condescension amazing, His conversation sweet, His comforts refreshing; and the peace that He brings passeth all understanding.--THOMAS À KEMPIS.

From first to last Jesus is the same; always the same, majestic and simple, infinitely severe and infinitely gentle.--NAPOLEON I.

He, the Holiest among the mighty, and the Mightiest among the holy, has lifted with His pierced hands empires off their hinges, has turned the stream of centuries out of its channel, and still governs the ages.--RICHTER.

In His death He is a sacrifice, satisfying for our sins; in the resurrection, a conqueror; in the ascension, a king; in the intercession, a high priest.--LUTHER.

Jesus Christ was more than man.--NAPOLEON I.

The sages and heroes of history are receding from us, and history contracts the record of their deeds into a narrower and narrower page. But time has no power over the name and deeds and words of Jesus Christ.--CHANNING.

Alexander, Cæsar, Charlemagne and I myself have founded empires; but upon what do these creations of our genius depend? Upon force. Jesus alone founded His empire upon love; and to this very day millions would die for Him.--NAPOLEON I.

If the life and death of Socrates were those of a sage, the life and death of Jesus were those of a God.--ROUSSEAU.

Those who have minutely studied the character of the Saviour will find it difficult to determine whether there is most to admire or to imitate in it--there is so much of both.

CHRISTIANITY.--A Christian is God Almighty's gentleman.--HARE.

The real security of Christianity is to be found in its benevolent morality, in its exquisite adaptation to the human heart, in the facility with which its scheme accommodates itself to the capacity of every human intellect, in the consolation which it bears to every house of mourning, in the light with which it brightens the great mystery of the grave.--MACAULAY.

It is the truth divine, speaking to our whole being: occupying, calling into action, and satisfying man's every faculty, supplying the minutest wants of his being, and speaking in one and the same moment to his reason, his conscience and his heart. It is the light of reason, the life of the heart, and the strength of the will.--PIERRE.

Since its introduction, human nature has made great progress, and society experienced great changes; and in this advanced condition of the world, Christianity, instead of losing its application and importance, is found to be more and more congenial and adapted to man's nature and wants. Men have outgrown the other institutions of that period when Christianity appeared, its philosophy, its modes of warfare, its policy, its public and private economy; but Christianity has never shrunk as intellect has opened, but has always kept in advance of men's faculties, and unfolded nobler views in proportion as they have ascended. The highest powers and affections which our nature has developed, find more than adequate objects in this religion. Christianity is indeed peculiarly fitted to the more improved stages of society, to the more delicate sensibilities of refined minds, and especially to that dissatisfaction with the present state, which always grows with the growth of our moral powers and affections. --CHANNING.

It is a refiner as well as a purifier of the heart; it imparts correctness of perception, delicacy of sentiment, and all those nicer shades of thought and feeling which constitute elegance of mind. --MRS. JOHN SANFORD.

I desire no other evidence of the truth of Christianity than the Lord's Prayer.--MADAME DE STAEL.

Had it been published by a voice from heaven, that twelve poor men, taken out of boats and creeks, without any help of learning, should conquer the world to the cross, it might have been thought an illusion against all reason of men; yet we know it was undertaken and accomplished by them.--STEPHEN CHARNOCK.

A few persons of an odious and despised country could not have filled the world with believers, had they not shown undoubted credentials from the divine person who sent them on such a message.--ADDISON.

COMPANY.--Nature has left every man a capacity of being agreeable, though not of shining in company; and there are a hundred men sufficiently qualified for both who, by a very few faults, that they might correct in half an hour, are not so much as tolerable.--SWIFT.

It is certain that either wise bearing or ignorant carriage is caught as men take diseases one of another; therefore, let men take heed of their company.--SHAKESPEARE.

The most agreeable of all companions is a simple, frank man, without any high pretensions to an oppressive greatness; one who loves life, and understands the use of it; obliging alike at all hours; above all, of a golden temper and steadfast as an anchor. For such an one we gladly exchange the greatest genius, the most brilliant wit, the profoundest thinker.--LESSING.

No man can possibly improve in any company for which he has not respect enough to be under some degree of restraint.--CHESTERFIELD.

A companion is but another self; wherefore it is an argument that a man is wicked if he keep company with the wicked.--ST. CLEMENT.

Let them have ever so learned lectures of breeding, that which will most influence their carriage will be the company they converse with, and the fashion of those about them.--LOCKE.

CONCEIT.--Be not wise in your own conceits.--ROMANS 12:16.

Conceit is the most contemptible and one of the most odious qualities in the world. It is vanity driven from all other shifts, and forced to appeal to itself for admiration.--HAZLITT.

The certain way to be cheated is to fancy one's self more cunning than others.--CHARRON.

Conceit is to nature what paint is to beauty; it is not only needless, but impairs what it would improve.--POPE.

Be very slow to believe that you are wiser than all others; it is a fatal but common error. Where one has been saved by a true estimation of another's weakness, thousands have been destroyed by a false appreciation of their own strength.--COLTON.

We go and fancy that everybody is thinking of us. But he is not; he is like us--he is thinking of himself.--CHARLES READE.

Seest thou a man wise in his own conceit? There is more hope of a fool than of him.--PROVERBS 26:12.

A man who is proud of small things shows that small things are great to him.--MADAME DE GIRARDIN.

Self-made men are most always apt to be a little too proud of the job.--H.W. SHAW.

Nature has sometimes made a fool, but a coxcomb is always of a man's own making.--ADDISON.

He who gives himself airs of importance exhibits the credentials of impotence.--LAVATER.

The more any one speaks of himself, the less he likes to hear another talked of.--LAVATER.

CONDUCT.--I will govern my life, and my thoughts, as if the whole world were to see the one, and to read the other; for what does it signify to make anything a secret to my neighbor, when to God (who is the searcher of our hearts) all our privacies are open?--SENECA.

The integrity of men is to be measured by their conduct, not by their professions.--JUNIUS.

Have more than thou showest,
Speak less than thou knowest,
Lend less than thou owest,
Learn more than thou trowest,
Set less than thou throwest.
--SHAKESPEARE.

A man, like a watch, is to be valued for his manner of going.--WILLIAM PENN.

I would, God knows, in a poor woodman's hut
Have spent my peaceful days, and shared my crust
With her who would have cheer'd me, rather far
Than on this throne; but being what I am,
I'll be it nobly.
--JOANNA BAILLIE.

Only add
Deeds to thy knowledge answerable, add faith,
Add virtue, patience, temperance, add love,
By name to come call'd charity, the soul
Of all the rest: then wilt thou not be loath
To leave this Paradise, but shalt possess
A Paradise within thee, happier far.
--MILTON.

Take heed lest passion sway
Thy judgment to do aught which else free-will
Would not admit.
--MILTON.

CONFIDENCE.--Whatever distrust we may have of the sincerity of those who converse with us, we always believe they will tell us more truth than they do to others.--LA ROCHEFOUCAULD.

Never put much confidence in such as put no confidence in others.--HARE.

When young, we trust ourselves too much, and we trust others too little when old. Rashness is the error of youth, timid caution of age. Manhood is the isthmus between the two extremes; the ripe and fertile season of action, when alone we can hope to find the head to contrive, united with the hand to execute.--COLTON.

He who believes in nobody knows that he himself is not to be trusted. --AUERBACH.

Trust not him that hath once broken faith.--SHAKESPEARE.

People have generally three epochs in their confidence in man. In the first they believe him to be everything that is good, and they are lavish with their friendship and confidence. In the next, they have had experience, which has smitten down their confidence, and they then have to be careful not to mistrust every one, and to put the worst construction upon everything. Later in life, they learn that the greater number of men have much more good in them than bad, and that even when there is cause to blame, there is more reason to pity than condemn; and then a spirit of confidence again awakens within them. --FREDRIKA BREMER.

Trust him little who praises all, him less who censures all, and him least who is indifferent about all.--LAVATER.

CONSCIENCE.--Conscience is a clock which, in one man, strikes aloud and gives warning; in another, the hand points silently to the figure, but strikes not. Meantime, hours pass away, and death hastens, and after death comes judgment.--JEREMY TAYLOR.

Oh! Conscience! Conscience! Man's most faithful friend,
Him canst thou comfort, ease, relieve, defend:
But if he will thy friendly checks forego,
Thou art, oh! wo for me, his deadliest foe!
--CRABBE.

In the commission of evil, fear no man so much as thyself; another is but one witness against thee, thou art a thousand; another thou mayest avoid, thyself thou canst not. Wickedness is its own punishment. --QUARLES.

A good conscience is a continual Christmas.--FRANKLIN.

Be mine that silent calm repast,
A conscience cheerful to the last:
That tree which bears immortal fruit,
Without a canker at the root;
That friend which never fails the just,
When other friends desert their trust.
--DR. COTTON.

No man ever offended his own conscience, but first or last it was revenged upon him for it.--SOUTH.

He that loses his conscience has nothing left that is worth keeping. Therefore be sure you look to that, and in the next place look to your health; and if you have it praise God and value it next to a good conscience.--IZAAK WALTON.

Our secret thoughts are rarely heard except in secret. No man knows what conscience is until he understands what solitude can teach him concerning it.--JOSEPH COOK.

A man never outlives his conscience, and that, for this cause only, he cannot outlive himself.--SOUTH.

Rules of society are nothing, one's conscience is the umpire.--MADAME DUDEVANT.

A man, so to speak, who is not able to bow to his own conscience every morning is hardly in a condition to respectfully salute the world at any other time of the day.--DOUGLAS JERROLD.

In matters of conscience first thoughts are best; in matters of prudence last thoughts are best--REV. ROBERT HALL.

A man's first care should be to avoid the reproaches of his own heart; his next, to escape the censures of the world. If the last interferes with the former, it ought to be entirely neglected; but otherwise there cannot be a greater satisfaction to an honest mind, than to see those approbations which it gives itself seconded by the applause of the public.--ADDISON.

Conscience raises its voice in the breast of every man, a witness for his Creator.

We should have all our communications with men, as in the presence of God; and with God, as in the presence of men.--COLTON.

I am more afraid of my own heart than of the pope and all his cardinals. I have within me the great pope, self.--LUTHER.

The most reckless sinner against his own conscience has always in the background the consolation that he will go on in this course only this time, or only so long, but that at such a time he will amend. We may be assured that we do not stand clear with our own consciences so long as we determine or project, or even hold it possible, at some future time to alter our course of action.--FICHTE.

There is one court whose "findings" are incontrovertible, and whose sessions are held in the chambers of our own breast.--HOSEA BALLOU.

Trust that man in nothing who has not a conscience in everything. --STERNE.

He that hath a blind conscience which sees nothing, a dead conscience which feels nothing, and a dumb conscience which says nothing, is in as miserable a condition as a man can be on this side of hell. --PATRICK HENRY.

Conscience is its own readiest accuser.--CHAPIN.

If thou wouldst be informed what God has written concerning thee in Heaven look into thine own bosom, and see what graces He hath there wrought in thee.--FULLER.

Yet still there whispers the small voice within,
Heard thro' gain's silence, and o'er glory's din;
Whatever creed be taught or land be trod,
Man's conscience is the oracle of God!
--BYRON.

The world will never be in any manner of order or tranquillity until men are firmly convinced that conscience, honor and credit are all in one interest; and that without the concurrence of the former the latter are but impositions upon ourselves and others.--STEELE.

CONTENTMENT.--To secure a contented spirit, measure your desires by your fortune, and not your fortune by your desires.--JEREMY TAYLOR.

I press to bear no haughty sway;
I wish no more than may suffice:
I do no more than well I may,
Look what I lack, my mind supplies;
Lo, thus I triumph like a king,
My mind's content with anything.
--BYRD.

Enjoy your own life without comparing it with that of another.--CONDORCET.

To be content with little is difficult; to be content with much, impossible.--MARIE EBNER-ESCHENBACH.

My God, give me neither poverty nor riches; but whatsoever it may be Thy will to give, give me with it a heart which knows humbly to acquiesce in what is Thy will.--GOTTHOLD.

One who is contented with what he has done will never become famous for what he will do. He has lain down to die. The grass is already growing over him.--BOVEE.

Contentment is a pearl of great price, and whoever procures it at the expense of ten thousand desires makes a wise and a happy purchase.--BALGUY.

If men knew what felicity dwells in the cottage of a godly man, how sound he sleeps, how quiet his rest, how composed his mind, how free from care, how easy his position, how moist his mouth, how joyful his heart, they would never admire the noises, the diseases, the throngs of passions, and the violence of unnatural appetites that fill the house of the luxurious and the heart of the ambitious.--JEREMY TAYLOR.

He is richest who is content with the least; for content is the wealth of nature.--SOCRATES.

Poor and content, is rich and rich enough;
But riches, fineless, is as poor as winter,
To him that ever fears he shall be poor.
--SHAKESPEARE.

Learn to be pleased with everything, with wealth so far as it makes us beneficial to others; with poverty, for not having much to care for; and with obscurity, for being unenvied.--PLUTARCH.

It is right to be contented with what we have, but never with what we are.--SIR JAMES MACKINTOSH.

Without content, we shall find it almost as difficult to please others as ourselves.--GREVILLE.

True contentment depends not upon what we have; a tub was large enough for Diogenes, but a world was too little for Alexander.--COLTON.

Content with poverty my soul I arm;
And virtue, though in rags, will keep me warm.
--DRYDEN.

Unless we find repose within ourselves, it is vain to seek it elsewhere.--HOSEA BALLOU.

The noblest mind the best contentment has.--SPENSER.

I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content. --PHILIPPIANS 4:11.

CONVERSATION.--The pith of conversation does not consist in exhibiting your own superior knowledge on matters of small consequence, but in enlarging, improving and correcting the information you possess by the authority of others.--SIR WALTER SCOTT.

There are three things in speech that ought to be considered before some things are spoken--the manner, the place and the time.--SOUTHEY.

The secret of tiring is to say everything that can be said on the subject.--VOLTAIRE.

Speak little and well if you wish to be considered as possessing merit.--FROM THE FRENCH.

The less men think, the more they talk.--MONTESQUIEU.

He who sedulously attends, pointedly asks, calmly speaks, coolly answers, and ceases when he has no more to say, is in possession of some of the best requisites of man.--LAVATER.

Amongst such as out of cunning hear all and talk little, be sure to talk less; or if you must talk, say little.--LA BRUYÈRE.

Not only to say the right thing in the right place, but, far more difficult still, to leave unsaid the wrong thing at the tempting moment.--G.A. SALA.

When we are in the company of sensible men, we ought to be doubly cautious of talking too much, lest we lose two good things, their good opinion and our own improvement; for what we have to say we know, but what they have to say we know not.--COLTON.

Never hold any one by the button or the hand in order to be heard out; for if people are unwilling to hear you, you had better hold your tongue than them.--CHESTERFIELD.

There is speaking well, speaking easily, speaking justly and speaking seasonably: It is offending against the last, to speak of entertainments before the indigent; of sound limbs and health before the infirm; of houses and lands before one who has not so much as a dwelling; in a word, to speak of your prosperity before the miserable; this conversation is cruel, and the comparison which naturally arises in them betwixt their condition and yours is excruciating. --LA BRUYÈRE.

Egotists cannot converse, they talk to themselves only.--A. BRONSON ALCOTT.

The extreme pleasure we take in talking of ourselves should make us fear that we give very little to those who listen to us. --LA ROCHEFOUCAULD.

Many can argue, not many converse.--A. BRONSON ALCOTT.

One thing which makes us find so few people who appear reasonable and agreeable in conversation is, that there is scarcely any one who does not think more of what he is about to say than of answering precisely what is said to him.--LA ROCHEFOUCAULD.

The first ingredient in conversation is truth, the next good sense, the third good humor, and the fourth wit.

It is a secret known but to few, yet of no small use in the conduct of life, that when you fall into a man's conversation, the first thing you should consider is, whether he has a greater inclination to hear you, or that you should hear him.--STEELE.

In my whole life I have only known ten or twelve persons with whom it was pleasant to speak--_i.e._, who keep to the subject, do not repeat themselves, and do not talk of themselves; men who do not listen to their own voice, who are cultivated enough not to lose themselves in commonplaces, and, lastly, who possess tact and good taste enough not to elevate their own persons above their subjects.--METTERNICH.

COUNSEL.--I can easier teach twenty what were good to be done, than be one of the twenty to follow mine own teaching.--SHAKESPEARE.

The best receipt--best to work and best to take--is the admonition of a friend.--BACON.

Consult your friend on all things, especially on those which respect yourself. His counsel may then be useful, where your own self-love might impair your judgment.--SENECA.

Let no man value at little price a virtuous woman's counsel.--GEORGE CHAPMAN.

COURAGE.--The conscience of every man recognizes courage as the foundation of manliness, and manliness as the perfection of human character.--THOMAS HUGHES.

To struggle when hope is banished!
To live when life's salt is gone!
To dwell in a dream that's vanished!
To endure, and go calmly on!

The brave man is not he who feels no fear,
For that were stupid and irrational;
But he, whose noble soul its fear subdues,
And bravely dares the danger nature shrinks from.
--JOANNA BAILLIE.

A valiant man
Ought not to undergo or tempt a danger,
But worthily, and by selected ways;
He undertakes by reason, not by chance.
--BEN JONSON.

True courage is cool and calm. The bravest of men have the least of a brutal bullying insolence, and in the very time of danger are found the most serene and free. Rage, we know, can make a coward forget himself and fight. But what is done in fury or anger can never be placed to the account of courage.--SHAFTESBURY.

Much danger makes great hearts most resolute.--MARSTON.

Courage consists not in blindly overlooking danger, but in seeing it and conquering it.--RICHTER.

The truest courage is always mixed with circumspection; this being the quality which distinguishes the courage of the wise from the hardiness of the rash and foolish.--JONES OF NAYLAND.

Physical courage, which despises all danger, will make a man brave in one way; and moral courage, which despises all opinion, will make a man brave in another. The former would seem most necessary for the camp, the latter for council; but to constitute a great man, both are necessary.--COLTON.

He who loses wealth loses much; he who loses a friend loses more; but he that loses his courage loses all.--CERVANTES.

COURTSHIP.--Every man ought to be in love a few times in his life, and to have a smart attack of the fever. You are better for it when it is over: the better for your misfortune, if you endure it with a manly heart; how much the better for success, if you win it and a good wife into the bargain!--THACKERAY.

Men dream in courtship, but in wedlock wake!--POPE.

With women worth the being won,
The softest lover ever best succeeds.
--HILL.

The pleasantest part of a man's life is generally that which passes in courtship, provided his passion be sincere, and the party beloved kind with discretion. Love, desire, hope, all the pleasing emotions of the soul, rise in the pursuit.--ADDISON.

How would that excellent mystery, wedded life, irradiate the world with its blessed influences, were the generous impulses and sentiments of courtship but perpetuated in all their exuberant fullness during the sequel of marriage!--FREDERIC SAUNDERS.

Rejected lovers need never despair! There are four-and-twenty hours in a day, and not a moment in the twenty-four in which a woman may not change her mind.--DE FINOD.

Courtship consists in a number of quiet attentions, not so pointed as to alarm, nor so vague as not to be understood.--STERNE.

COVETOUSNESS.--Covetousness, like a candle ill made, smothers the splendor of a happy fortune in its own grease.--F. OSBORN.

The only instance of a despairing sinner left upon record in the New Testament is that of a treacherous and greedy Judas.

He deservedly loses his own property who covets that of another. --PHAEDRUS.

Covetousness, which is idolatry.--COLOSSIANS 3:5.

There is not a vice which more effectually contracts and deadens the feelings, which more completely makes a man's affections centre in himself, and excludes all others from partaking in them, than the desire of accumulating possessions. When the desire has once gotten hold on the heart, it shuts out all other considerations, but such as may promote its views. In its zeal for the attainment of its end, it is not delicate in the choice of means. As it closes the heart, so also it clouds the understanding. It cannot discern between right and wrong; it takes evil for good, and good for evil; it calls darkness light, and light darkness. Beware, then, of the beginning of covetousness, for you know not where it will end.--BISHOP MANT.

The covetous person lives as if the world were made altogether for him, and not he for the world; to take in everything, and part with nothing.--SOUTH.

Covetous men are fools, miserable wretches, buzzards, madmen, who live by themselves, in perpetual slavery, fear, suspicion, sorrow, discontent, with more of gall than honey in their enjoyments; who are rather possessed by their money than possessors of it.--BURTON.

Why are we so blind? That which we improve, we have, that which we hoard is not for ourselves.--MADAME DELUZY.

If money be not thy servant, it will be thy master. The covetous man cannot so properly be said to possess wealth, as that it may be said to possess him.--BACON.

Those who give not till they die show that they would not then if they could keep it any longer.--BISHOP HALL.

CRITICISM.--He whose first emotion, on the view of an excellent production, is to undervalue it, will never have one of his own to show.--AIKEN.

Neither praise nor blame is the object of true criticism. Justly to discriminate, firmly to establish, wisely to prescribe and honestly to award--these are the true aims and duties of criticism.--SIMMS.

Censure and criticism never hurt anybody. If false, they can't hurt you unless you are wanting in manly character; and if true, they show a man his weak points, and forewarn him against failure and trouble.--GLADSTONE.

It is easy to criticise an author, but it is difficult to appreciate him.--VAUVENARGUES.

It is much easier to be critical than to be correct.--BEACONSFIELD.

There is a certain meddlesome spirit, which, in the garb of learned research, goes prying about the traces of history, casting down its monuments, and marring and mutilating its fairest trophies. Care should be taken to vindicate great names from such pernicious erudition.--WASHINGTON IRVING.

He who would reproach an author for obscurity should look into his own mind to see whether it is quite clear there. In the dusk the plainest writing is illegible.--GOETHE.

A man must serve his time to ev'ry trade,
Save censure; critics all are ready-made.

CUNNING.--In a great business there is nothing so fatal as cunning management.--JUNIUS.

Cunning leads to knavery; it is but a step from one to the other, and that very slippery; lying only makes the difference; add that to cunning, and it is knavery.--LA BRUYÈRE.

Cunning is the art of concealing our own defects, and discovering other people's weaknesses.--HAZLITT.

A cunning man overreaches no one half as much as himself.--BEECHER.

The animals to whom nature has given the faculty we call cunning know always when to use it, and use it wisely; but when man descends to cunning, he blunders and betrays.--THOMAS PAINE.

The most sure method of subjecting yourself to be deceived, is to consider yourself more cunning than others.--LA ROCHEFOUCAULD.

DEATH.--God's finger touch'd him, and he slept.--TENNYSON.

But no! that look is not the last;
We yet may meet where seraphs dwell,
Where love no more deplores the past,
Nor breathes that withering word--Farewell!
--PEABODY.

How beautiful it is for a man to die on the walls of Zion! to be called like a watch-worn and weary sentinel, to put his armor off, and rest in heaven.--N.P. WILLIS.

I looked, and behold a pale horse; and his name that sat on him was Death.--REVELATION 6:8.

When we see our enemies and friends gliding away before us, let us not forget that we are subject to the general law of mortality, and shall soon be where our doom will be fixed forever.--DR. JOHNSON.

I have seen those who have arrived at a fearless contemplation of the future, from faith in the doctrine which our religion teaches. Such men were not only calm and supported, but cheerful in the hour of death; and I never quitted such a sick chamber without a hope that my last end might be like theirs.--SIR HENRY HALFORD.

One may live as a conqueror, a king or a magistrate; but he must die as a man. The bed of death brings every human being to his pure individuality; to the intense contemplation of that deepest and most solemn of all relations, the relation between the creature and his Creator. Here it is that fame and renown cannot assist us; that all external things must fail to aid us; that even friends, affection and human love and devotedness cannot succor us.--WEBSTER.

There is no death. The thing that we call death
Is but another, sadder name for life.
--STODDARD.

To die,--to sleep,--
No more;--and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache, and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to.
--SHAKESPEARE.

All that nature has prescribed must be good; and as death is natural to us, it is absurdity to fear it. Fear loses its purpose when we are sure it cannot preserve us, and we should draw resolution to meet it, from the impossibility to escape it.--STEELE.

There is nothing certain in man's life but this, that he must lose it.--OWEN MEREDITH.

Death robs the rich and relieves the poor.--J.L. BASFORD.

Death is the liberator of him whom freedom cannot release, the physician of him whom medicine cannot cure, and the comforter of him whom time cannot console.--COLTON.

Death, so called, is a thing that makes men weep,
And yet a third of life is pass'd in sleep.
--BYRON.

The finest day of life is that on which one quits it.--FREDERICK THE GREAT.

Death is delightful. Death is dawn--
The waking from a weary night
Of fevers unto truth and light.
--JOAQUIN MILLER.

The hour conceal'd and so remote the fear,
Death still draws nearer, never seeming near.
--POPE.

All that lives must die,
Passing through nature to eternity.
--SHAKESPEARE.

Death gives us sleep, eternal youth, and immortality.--RICHTER.

You should not fear, nor yet should you wish for your last day. --MARTIAL.

No man but knows that he must die; he knows that in whatever quarter of the world he abides--whatever be his circumstances--however strong his present hold of life--however unlike the prey of death he looks--that it is his doom beyond reverse to die.--STEBBING.

It is by no means a fact that death is the worst of all evils; when it comes, it is an alleviation to mortals who are worn out with sufferings.--METASTASIO.

God giveth quietness at last.--WHITTIER.

Death hath ten thousand several doors
For men to take their exits.
--JOHN WEBSTER.

Death will have his day.--SHAKESPEARE.

Death comes but once.--BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER.

It is not I who die, when I die, but my sin and misery.--GOTTHOLD.

Death is the crown of life.--YOUNG.

So live, that, when thy summons comes to join
The innumerable caravan, that moves
To that mysterious realm, where each shall take
His chamber in the silent halls of death,
Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night,
Scourged to his dungeon; but sustain'd and sooth'd
By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave,
Like one that draws the drapery of his couch
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.
--BRYANT.

DEBT.--Who goes a-borrowing goeth a-sorrowing.--TUSSER.

Creditors have better memories than debtors; and creditors are a superstitious sect, great observers of set days and times.--FRANKLIN.

Man hazards the condition and loses the virtues of freeman, in proportion as he accustoms his thoughts to view without anguish or shame his lapse into the bondage of debtor.--LYTTON.

Paying of debts is, next to the grace of God, the best means in the world to deliver you from a thousand temptations to sin and vanity. --DELANY.

Run not into debt, either for wares sold, or money borrowed; be content to want things that are not of absolute necessity, rather than to run up the score.--SIR M. HALE.

Debt is the worst poverty.--M.G. LICHTWER.

DELICACY.--Delicacy is the genuine tint of virtue.--MARGUERITE DE VALOIS.

Many things are too delicate to be thought; many more, to be spoken. --NOVALIS.

An appearance of delicacy is inseparable from sweetness and gentleness of character.--MRS. SIGOURNEY.

True delicacy, that most beautiful heart-leaf of humanity, exhibits itself most significantly in little things.--MARY HOWITT.

Delicacy is to the affections what grace is to the beauty.--DEGERANDO.

Weak men often, from the very principle of their weakness, derive a certain susceptibility, delicacy and taste which render them, in those particulars, much superior to men of stronger and more consistent minds, who laugh at them.--GREVILLE.

Delicacy is to the mind what fragrance is to the fruit.--ACHILLES POINCELOT.

DELUSION.--Delusions, like dreams, are dispelled by our awaking to the stern realities of life.--A.R.C. DALLAS.

No man is happy without a delusion of some kind. Delusions are as necessary to our happiness as realities.--BOVEE.

We are always living under some delusion, and instead of taking things as they are, and making the best of them, we follow an ignis fatuus, and lose, in its pursuit, the joy we might attain.--JAMES ELLIS.

DESPAIR.--It is impossible for that man to despair who remembers that his Helper is omnipotent.--JEREMY TAYLOR.

Despair is the conclusion of fools.--BEACONSFIELD.

He that despairs measures Providence by his own little contracted model.--SOUTH.

Despair is infidelity and death.--WHITTIER.

Despair makes a despicable figure, and descends from a mean original. 'Tis the offspring of fear, of laziness and impatience; it argues a defect of spirit and resolution, and oftentimes of honesty too. I would not despair, unless I saw misfortune recorded in the book of fate, and signed and sealed by necessity.--COLLIER.

Where Christ brings His cross, He brings His presence; and where He is, none are desolate, and there is no room for despair.--MRS. BROWNING.

He is the truly courageous man who never desponds.--CONFUCIUS.

Religion converts despair, which destroys, into resignation, which submits.--LADY BLESSINGTON.

Dreadful is their doom, whom doubt has driven
To censure fate, and pious hope forego.
--BEATTIE.

DIET.--Simple diet is best.--PLINY.

Things sweet to taste prove in digestion sour.--SHAKESPEARE.

In general, mankind, since the improvement of cookery, eat about twice as much as nature requires.--FRANKLIN.

DIFFICULTIES.--Difficulties strengthen the mind, as well as labor does the body.--SENECA.

There is no merit where there is no trial; and, till experience stamps the mark of strength, cowards may pass for heroes, faith for falsehood.--AARON HILL.

Difficulties are God's errands; and when we are sent upon them we should esteem it a proof of God's confidence--as a compliment from God.--BEECHER.

It is difficulties which give birth to miracles.--REV. DR. SHARPE.

What is difficulty? Only a word indicating the degree of strength requisite for accomplishing particular objects; a mere notice of the necessity for exertion; a bugbear to children and fools; only a mere stimulus to men.--SAMUEL WARREN.

Difficulty is a severe instructor, set over us by the supreme ordinance of a paternal guardian and legislator, who knows us better than we know ourselves, as he loves us better too. He that wrestles with us strengthens our nerves and sharpens our skill. Our antagonist is our helper.--BURKE.

There are few difficulties that hold out against real attacks; they fly, like the visible horizon, before those who advance.

DISCIPLINE.--No pain, no palm; no thorns, no throne; no gall, no glory; no cross, no crown.--WILLIAM PENN.

No evil propensity of the human heart is so powerful that it may not be subdued by discipline.--SENECA.

DISCORD.--Our life is full of discord; but by forbearance and virtue this same discord can be turned to harmony.--JAMES ELLIS.

The peacemakers shall be called the sons of God, who came to make peace between God and man. What then shall the sowers of discord be called, but the children of the devil? And what must they look for but their father's portion?--ST. BERNARD.

DISCRETION.--Remember the divine saying, He that keepeth his mouth, keepeth his life.--SIR WALTER RALEIGH.

There are many more shining qualities in the mind of man, but there is none so useful as discretion.--ADDISON.

Discretion in speech is more than eloquence.--BACON.

Discretion and hard valor are the twins of honor.--BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER.

The better part of valor is discretion.--SHAKESPEARE.

Discretion is more necessary to women than eloquence, because they have less trouble to speak well than to speak little.--FATHER DU BOSC.

Let's teach ourselves that honorable stop
Not to outsport discretion.
--SHAKESPEARE.

Discretion is the perfection of reason, and a guide to win all the duties of life.--ADDISON.

Great ability without discretion comes almost invariably to a tragic end.--GAMBETTA.

DISSIMULATION.--Dissimulation, even the most innocent in its nature, is ever productive of embarrassment; whether the design is evil or not, artifice is always dangerous and almost inevitably disgraceful. --LA BRUYÈRE.

DRESS.--In the matter of dress people should always keep below their ability.--MONTESQUIEU.

Those who are incapable of shining but by dress would do well to consider, that the contrast between them and their clothes turns out much to their disadvantage.--SHENSTONE.

And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they toil not, neither do they spin.--MATTHEW 6:28.

A majority of women seem to consider themselves sent into the world for the sole purpose of displaying dry goods; and it is only when acting the part of an animated milliner's block that they feel they are performing their appropriate mission.--ABBA GOOLD WOOLSON.

No man is esteemed for gay garments but by fools and women.--SIR WALTER RALEIGH.

Those who think that in order to dress well it is necessary to dress extravagantly or grandly make a great mistake. Nothing so well becomes true feminine beauty as simplicity.--GEORGE D. PRENTICE.

Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy, but not expressed in fancy; rich, not gaudy; for the apparel oft proclaims the man.--SHAKESPEARE.

No real happiness is found
In trailing purple o'er the ground.
--PARNELL.

If a woman were about to proceed to her execution, she would demand a little time to perfect her toilet.--CHAMFORT.

Men of quality never appear more amiable than when their dress is plain. Their birth, rank, title and its appendages are at best invidious; and as they do not need the assistance of dress, so, by their disclaiming the advantage of it, they make their superiority sit more easy.--SHENSTONE.

It is well known that a loose and easy dress contributes much to give to both sexes those fine proportions of body that are observable in the Grecian statues, and which serve as models to our present artists.--ROUSSEAU.

As soon as a woman begins to dress "loud," her manners and conversation partake of the same element.--HALIBURTON.

Dress has a moral effect on the conduct of mankind. Let any gentleman find himself with dirty boots, old surtout, soiled neckcloth and a general negligence of dress, he will in all probability find a corresponding disposition by negligence of _address_.--SIR JONAH BARRINGTON.

We sacrifice to dress, till household joys
And comforts cease. Dress drains our cellar dry,
And keeps our larder clean; puts out our fires,
And introduces hunger, frost and woe,
Where peace and hospitality might reign.

Dress changes the manners.--VOLTAIRE.

DRINK.--Woe unto them that rise up early in the morning, that they may follow strong drink.--ISAIAH 5:11.

All excess is ill, but drunkenness is of the worst sort. It spoils health, dismounts the mind, and unmans men. It reveals secrets, is quarrelsome, lascivious, impudent, dangerous and mad. He that is drunk is not a man, because he is, for so long, void of reason that distinguishes a man from a beast.--WILLIAM PENN.

Some of the domestic evils of drunkenness are houses without windows, gardens without fences, fields without tillage, barns without roofs, children without clothing, principles, morals or manners.--FRANKLIN.

Drunkenness is the vice of a good constitution or of a bad memory--of a constitution so treacherously good that it never bends till it breaks; or of a memory that recollects the pleasures of getting intoxicated, but forgets the pains of getting sober.--COLTON.

Habitual intoxication is the epitome of every crime.--DOUGLAS JERROLD.

O thou invisible spirit of wine, if thou hast no name to be known by, let us call thee--devil! * * * O, that men should put an enemy to their mouths to steal away their brains; that we should, with joy, revel, pleasure and applause, transform ourselves into beasts! --SHAKESPEARE.

Every inordinate cup is unbless'd, and the ingredient is a devil. --SHAKESPEARE.

It were better for a man to be subject to any vice, than to drunkenness: for all other vanities and sins are recovered, but a drunkard will never shake off the delight of beastliness.--SIR WALTER RALEIGH.

Man has evil as well as good qualities peculiar to himself. Drunkenness places him as much below the level of the brutes as reason elevates him above them.--SIR G. SINCLAIR.

Of all vices take heed of drunkenness; other vices are but fruits of disordered affections--this disorders, nay, banishes reason; other vices but impair the soul--this demolishes her two chief faculties, the understanding and the will; other vices make their own way--this makes way for all vices; he that is a drunkard is qualified for all vice.--QUARLES.

There is scarcely a crime before me that is not directly or indirectly caused by strong drink.--JUDGE COLERIDGE.

Beware of drunkenness, lest all good men beware of thee; where drunkenness reigns, there reason is an exile, virtue a stranger, God an enemy; blasphemy is wit, oaths are rhetoric, and secrets are proclamations.--QUARLES.

DUTY.--Duty grows everywhere, like children, like grass.--EMERSON.

Perish discretion when it interferes with duty.--HANNAH MORE.

The people of this country have shown by the highest proofs human nature can give, that wherever the path of duty and honor may lead, however steep and rugged it may be, they are ready to walk in it.--JAMES A. GARFIELD.

The true way to render ourselves happy is to love our duty and find in it our pleasure.--MME. DE MOTTEVILLE.

Let him who gropes painfully in darkness or uncertain light, and prays vehemently that the dawn may ripen into day, lay this precept well to heart: "Do the duty which lies nearest to thee," which thou knowest to be a duty! Thy second duty will already have become clearer.--CARLYLE.

Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man.--ECCLESIASTES 12:13.

Commonplace though it may appear, this doing of one's duty embodies the highest ideal of life and character. There may be nothing heroic about it; but the common lot of men is not heroic.--SAMUEL SMILES.

Who escapes a duty avoids a gain.--THEODORE PARKER.

Let us do our duty in our shop or our kitchen, the market, the street, the office, the school, the home, just as faithfully as if we stood in the front rank of some great battle, and we knew that victory for mankind depended upon our bravery, strength, and skill. When we do that the humblest of us will be serving in that great army which achieves the welfare of the world.--THEODORE PARKER.

In every profession the daily and common duties are the most useful.

Let men laugh when you sacrifice desire to duty, if they will. You have time and eternity to rejoice in.--THEODORE PARKER.

Be not diverted from your duty by any idle reflections the silly world may make upon you, for their censures are not in your power, and consequently should not be any part of your concern.--EPICTETUS.

It is thy duty oftentimes to do what thou wouldst not; thy duty, too, to leave undone that thou wouldst do.--THOMAS À KEMPIS.

There is no evil that we cannot either face or fly from but the consciousness of duty disregarded. A sense of duty pursues us ever. It is omnipresent, like the Deity. If we take to ourselves the wings of the morning, and dwell in the utmost parts of the seas, duty performed, or duty violated, is still with us, for our happiness or our misery. If we say the darkness shall cover us, in the darkness as in the light our obligations are yet with us. We cannot escape their power, nor fly from their presence. They are with us in this life, will be with us at its close, and in that scene of inconceivable solemnity which lies yet further onward we shall still find ourselves surrounded by the consciousness of duty, to pain us wherever it has been violated, and to console us so far as God may have given us grace to perform it.--WEBSTER.

EARLY RISING.--Whoever has tasted the breath of morning, knows that the most invigorating and most delightful hours of the day are commonly spent in bed; though it is the evident intention of Nature that we should enjoy and profit by them.--SOUTHEY.

Who would in such a gloomy state remain
Longer than nature craves; when ev'ry muse
And every blooming pleasure wait without,
To bless the wildly devious morning walk?
--THOMSON.

The difference between rising at five and seven o'clock in the morning, for the space of forty years, supposing a man to go to bed at the same hour at night, is nearly equivalent to ten additional years to a man's life.--DODDRIDGE.

I would have inscribed on the curtains of your bed, and the walls of your chamber: "If you do not rise early, you can make progress in nothing."--CHATHAM.

When one begins to turn in bed, it is time to get up.--WELLINGTON.

Few ever lived to a great age, and fewer still ever became distinguished, who were not in the habit of early rising.--DR. JOHN TODD.

Next to temperance, a quiet conscience, a cheerful mind and active habits, I place early rising as a means of health and happiness.--FLINT.

Thus we improve the pleasures of the day,
While tasteless mortals sleep their time away.
--MRS. CENTLIVRE.

No man can promise himself even fifty years of life, but any man may, if he please, live in the proportion of fifty years in forty;--let him rise early, that he may have the day before him, and let him make the most of the day, by determining to expend it on two sorts of acquaintance only,--those by whom something may be got, and those from whom something may be learnt.--COLTON.

The famous Apollonius being very early at Vespasian's gate, and finding him stirring, from thence conjectured that he was worthy to govern an empire, and said to his companion, "This man surely will be emperor, he is so early."--CAUSSIN.

EARNESTNESS.--Without earnestness no man is ever great, or does really great things. He may be the cleverest of men, he may be brilliant, entertaining, popular; but he will want weight. No soul-moving picture was ever painted that had not in it the depth of shadow.--PETER BAYNE.