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VALOUR AND MERCY.

THAT Mercy can dwell only with Valour, is an old sentiment, or proposition, which, in Johnson, again receives confirmation. Few men on record have had a more merciful, tenderly affectionate nature, than old Samuel. He was called the Bear, and did indeed too often look and roar like one, being forced to it in his own defence; yet within that shaggy exterior of his there beat a heart warm as a mother's, soft as a little child's. Nay, generally his very roaring was but the anger of affection; the rage of a bear, if you will; but of a bear bereaved of her whelps. Touch his religion; glance at the Church of England, or the divine right; and he was upon you! These things were his symbols of all that was good and precious for men: his very ark of the covenant; whoso laid his hand on them tore asunder his heart of hearts. Not out of hatred to the opponent, but of love to the opposed, did Johnson grow cruel, fierce, contradictory: this is an important distinction, never to be forgotten in our censure of his conversational outrages. But observe also with what humanity, what openness of love, he can attach himself to all things to a blind old woman, to a Doctor Levett, to a Cat Hodge-"His thoughts in the latter part of his life were fre

quently employed on his deceased friends; he often muttered these or such-like words, 'Poor man! and then he died!"" How he patiently converts his poor home into a Lazaretto; endures, for long years, the contradiction of the miserable and unreasonable with him unconnected, save that they had no other to yield them refuge! Generous old man! Worldly possessions he has little, yet of this he gives freely; from his own hard-earned shilling, the half-pence for the poor, that waited his coming out, are not withheld; the poor waited the coming out of one not quite so poor! A Sterne can write sentimentalities on dead asses: Johnson has a rough voice, but he finds the wretched daughter of vice fallen down in the streets, carries her home on his own shoulders, and, like a good Samaritan, gives help to the half-needy, whether worthy or unworthy. Carlyle.

Il n'y a que les personnes qui ont de la fermeté qui puissent avoir une veritable douceur: celles qui paroissent douces n'ont ordinairement que de la foiblesse qui se convertit aisement en aigreur. Rochefoucault.

"It is the best metal that bows best," says Fuller: and "the sweet wine that makes the sharpest vinegar," says an old proverb.

HONESTY

DоTH not consist in the doing of one, or one thousand, acts never so well, but in the spinning on the delicate thread of life, though not exceeding fine, yet free from breaks and stains.

Sidney.

Of great deeds I make no account; but a great life I reverence.- Splendida facinora every sinner may perpe

trate.

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Richter.

What is to be undergone only once we may undergo: what must be comes almost of its own accord. The courage we desire and prize is, not the courage to die decently, but to live manfully.

Carlyle.

SOWING THE SEED.

Σπείρειν τε καρπον Χαριτος ἡδιστης Θεων.

Two travellers happened to be passing through a town while a great fire was raging.

One of them sat down at the inn, saying, "It is not my business." But the other ran into the flames, and saved much goods and some people.

When he came back, his companion asked him, "And who bid thee risk thy life in others' business?"

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"He," said the brave man, "who bade me bury seed that may one day bring forth increase."

"But if thou thyself hadst been buried in the ruins ?”

"Then should I myself have been the seed."

German.

"FUN IN THE OLD FIDDLE.”

As Wilhelm, contrary to his usual habit, let his eye wander inquisitively over the room, the good old man said to him, "My domestic equipment excites your attention. You see here how long a thing may last; and one should make such observations, now and then, by way of counterbalance to so much in the world that rapidly changes and passes away. This same tea-kettle served my parents, and was a witness of our evening family assemblages; this copper fire-screen still guards me from the fire, which these stout old tongs help me to mend ; and so it is with all throughout. I had it in my power to bestow my care and industry on many other things, and I did not occupy myself in the changing these external necessaries, a task which consumes so many people's time and resources. An affectionate attention to what we possess, makes us rich; for thereby we accumulate a treasure of remembrances connected with indifferent things. In us little men such little things are to be reckoned virtue

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Wilhelm Meister.

And as of family, so of national, monuments-" Ce sont les crampons qui unissent une generation à une autre. Conservez ce qu'ont vu vos Pères."

Joubert.

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