When the skull rose aloft with so sudden a spell,
As to bound like a ball on the roof of the cell.

Next time he put in Alexander the Great,

With a garment that Dorcas had made-for a weight;
And though clad in armor from sandals to crown,
The hero rose up, and the garment went down.

A long row of alms houses, amply endowed, By a well-esteemed pharisee, busy and proud, Now loaded one scale, while the other was prest By those mites the poor widow dropped into the chest ;— Up flew the endowment, not weighing an ounce,

And down, down, the farthing's worth came with a bounce.

Again, he performed an experiment rare;
A monk, with austerities bleeding and bare,
Climbed into his scale; in the other was laid
The heart of our Howard, now partly decayed;

When he found, with surprise, that the whole of his brother

Weighed less, by some pounds, than this bit of the other.

By further experiments (no matter how)

He found that ten chariots weighed less than one plough.
A sword, with gilt trappings, rose up in the scale,
Though balanced by only a ten-penny nail;

A shield and a helmet, a buckler and spear,
Weighed less than a widow's uncrystallized tear.
A lord and a lady went up at full sail,

When a bee chanced to light on the opposite scale.
Ten doctors, ten lawyers, two courtiers, one earl,
Ten counsellor's wigs full of powder and curl,

All heaped in one balance, and swinging from thence,
Weighed less than some atoms of candor and sense ;—
A first-water diamond, with brilliants begirt,

Than one good potato, just washed from the dirt;
Yet, not mountains of silver and gold would suffice,
One pearl to outweigh—'t was the "pearl of great price.”

At last the whole world was bowled in at the grate; With the soul of a beggar to serve for a weight, When the former sprang up with so strong a rebuff, That it made a vast rent, and escaped at the roof; Whence, balanced in air, it ascended on high, And sailed up aloft, a balloon in the sky; While the scale with the soul in, so mightily fell, That it jerked the philosopher out of his cell.

MORAL.

Dear reader, if e'er self-deception prevails,
We pray you to try The Philosopher's Scales:
But if they are lost in the ruins around,
Perhaps a good substitute thus may be found:-
Let judgment and conscience in circles be cut,
To which strings of thought may be carefully put :
Let these be made even with caution extreme,
And impartiality use for a beam:

Then bring those good actions which pride overrates,
And tear up your motives to serve for the weights.

XVI.

A PERSON OF CONSEQUENCE.

HAVING announced in the title what sort of company may be expected, our readers, we hope, will prepare themselves with their best bows and most courteous behavior. Perhaps they may imagine they already hear the rattling of wheels, the trampling of horses, and then the thundering rap that bespeaks high company. Whether they will be disappointed or otherwise, will depend upon their respective tastes and habits, when we beg leave to introduce little Betsey Bond, daughter of John Bond, the journeyman carpenter. The truth is, that until her present introduction to the readers of the Youth's Magazine, she, like Cowper's lace-maker,

"Had ne'er been heard of half a mile from home."

So that it behoves us to give our reasons for denominating this poor child, who is but just turned of twelve years old, a person of conse

quence.

Now if our readers could but take a walk into a neighboring village, and enter the cottage where Betsey lives;-if they could only know how much she had been missed, and how often she had been wanted, only during her present absence from home, the thing would explain itself.

Those persons are of most consequence in the world, who would be most missed if they were out of it. By missed, it is not merely meant that the places and persons that now know them would then know them no more; for this meaning would apply to the most insignificant or the most troublesome people that breathe; but by missed we understand that their place in society, whether it be high or low, large or small, is not likely to be so well filled up. Now, according to this explanation, how many persons of consequence there are, who are, really, of no consequence at all!

Betsey's parents are but poor people; they have a large family, and her mother has an ill state of health.-In order to make a little addition to her husband's earnings, she exhibits in her cottage window a few articles for sale:-such as, a scanty assortment of tea, tobacco, and snuff; papers of pins, shoestrings, and gingerbread; twopenny loaves, brass thimbles, and suckers; earthenware, buttonmoulds, and red-herrings. Now with this concern, bad health, and always a baby in arms, "what she should do," as she says, "if it was not for her Betsey, she can't tell, nor nobody else. There are five little boys, of no use in the world, that have to be looked to; and there's the baby! and there 's the shop! so that, if it was n't for Betsey!"why Betsey is up by times in the morning, long before her mother is stirring; lights the fire, sweeps the

house; washes and dresses her little brothers, gives them their breakfasts, and gets them ready to go off to school; and all this by the time her mother comes down stairs: and what a comfort it is to her, to see all this done for her, so poorly as she is of a morning! Then nobody knows but they that see it, what a good hand Betsey is for minding the shop. Though she is always busy at her needle, or washing, or ironing, or something of the kind, yet the moment the bell rings, there she is behind the counter, with a smiling face, and a civil word for every body: yes, and just as civil to a child that only comes for a farthing sucker, as to a customer who wants two ounces of green tea. Who is it that mends John Bond's shirts so neatly; and that runs his stockings at the heel, so that they last as long again? O, why it is his daughter Betsey. And who is it that waits on her mother when she is ill, like an old nurse; or rather unlike an old nurse ?— this too, is Betsey. So that we may fairly appeal to our readers, whether, according to the strictest sense of the word, little Betsey Bond is not a person of consequence.

To render this more apparent, let us for a moment bring forward another visiter. But do let us allow poor Betsey to make her escape first; for she would color down to her fingers' ends to be detained before such grand company. Go then Betsey; run home to your mother as fast as you