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course of a gentle river that rolled among the trees, and watered a large region with innumerable circumvolutions. In these amufements, the hours paffed away unaccounted; his deviations had perplexed his memory, and he knew not towards what point to travel. He ftood pensive and confused, afraid to go forward left he fhould go wrong, yet conscious that the time of loitering was now past. While he was thus tortured with uncertainty, the fky was overfpread with clouds; the day vanished from before him; and a fudden tempeft gathered round his head. He was now roufed by his danger to a quick and painful remembrance of his folly; he now faw how happiness is loft when eafe is confulted; he lamented the unmanly impatience that prompted him to feek fhelter in the grove; and defpifed the petty curiofity that led him on from trifle to trifle. While he was thus reflecting, the air grew blacker, and a clap of thunder broke his meditation.

He now refolved to do what yet remained in his power, to tread back the ground which he had paffed, and try to find fome iffue where the wood might open into the plain. He proftrated himself on the ground, and recommended his life to the Lord of Nature. He rofe with confidence and tranquillity, and preffed on with refolution. The beafts of the defert were in motion, and on every hand were heard the mingled howls of rage and fear, and ravage and expiration. All the horrors of darkness and folitude furrounded him : the winds roared in the woods; and the torrents tumbled from the hills.

Thus forlorn and diftreffed, he wandered through the wild, without knowing whither he was going, or whether he was every moment drawing nearer to fafety, or to deAtruction. At length, not fear, but labour, began to overcome him; his breath grew fhort, and his knees trembled ; and he was on the point of lying down in refignation to his fate, when he beheld, through the brambles, the glimmer of a taper. He advanced towards the light; and finding that it proceeded from the cottage of a hermit, he called humbly at the door, and obtained admiffion. old man fet before him fuch provisions as he had collected for himself, on which Obidah fed with eagerness and gratitude.

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When the repaft was over, "Tell me," faid the hermit, by what chance thou haft been brought hither? I have been now twenty years an inhabitant of the wilderness, in

which I never faw a man before." Obidah then related the occurrences of his journey, without any concealment or palliation."

"Son," faid the hermit, "let the errors and follies, the dangers and escape of this day, fink deep into thy heart. Remember, my fon, that human life is the journey of a day. We rife in the morning of youth, full of vigour, and full of expectation; we fet forward with fpirit and hope, with gaiety and with diligence, and travel on a while in the direct road of piety towards the mansions of reft. In a fhort time, we remit our fervour, and endeavour to find some mitigation of our duty, and some more eafy means of obtaining the fame end. We then relax our vigour, and refolve no longer to be terrified with crimes at a distance; but rely upon our own conflancy, and venture to approach what we refolve never to touch. We thus enter the bowers of eafe, and repofe in the shades of fecurity. Here the heart foftens, and vigilance fubfides; we are then willing to inquire whether another advance cannot be made, and whether we may not, at least, turn our eyes upon the gardens of pleasure. We approach them with fcruple and hesitation : we enter them, but enter timorous and trembling; and always hope to pafs through them without lofing the road of virtue, which, for a while, we keep in our fight, and to which we purpose to return. But temptation fucceeds temptation, and one compliance prepares us for another; we in time lofe the happiness of innocence, and folace our difquiet with fenfual gratifications. By degrees, we let fall the remembrance of our original intention, and quit the only adequate object of rational defire. We entangle ourselves in bufinefs, immerge ourselves in luxury, and rove through the labyrinths of inconftancy; till the darkness of old age begins to invade us, and disease and anxiety obstruct our way. We then look back upon our lives with horror, with forrow, with repentance; and wifh, but too often vainly wish, that we had not forfaken the ways of virtue. Happy are they, my fon, who shall learn from thy example, not to despair; but fhall remember, that, though the day is paft, and their ftrength is waited, there yet remains one effort to be made that reformation is never hopeless, nor fincere endeavours ever unaffited; that the wanderer may at length return after all his errors; and that he who implores ftrength and courage from above, shall find danger

and difficulty give way before him. Go now, my fon, to thy repofe; commit thyfelf to the care of Omnipotence; and when the morning calls again to toil, begin anew thy journey and thy life."

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CHAP. III. <

DIDACTIC PIECES.

SECTION I.

DR. JOHNSON.

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The Importance of a good Education.

I CONSIDER a human foul, without education, like marble in the quarry which fhows none of its inherent beauties, until the fkill of the polifher fetches out the colours, makes the furface fhine, and difcovers every ornamental cloud, fpot, and vein, that runs through the body of it. Education, after the fame manner, when it works upon a noble mind, draws out to view every latent virtue and perfection, which, without fuch helps, are never able to make their appearance.

If my reader will give me leave to change the allusion fo foon upon him, I fhall make ufe of the fame inftance to illuftrate the force of education, which Ariftotle has brought to explain his doctrine of fubftantial forms, when he tells us that a ftatue lies hid in a block of marble; and that the art of the ftatuary only clears away the fuperfluous matter, and removes the rubbish. The figure is in the ftone, and the sculptor only finds it. What sculptor is to a block of marble, education is to a human foul. The philofopher, the faint, or the hero, the wife, the good, or the great man, very often lies hid and concealed in a plebeian, which a proper education might have difinterred, and have brought to light. I am therefore much delighted with reading the accounts of favage nations; and with contemplating thofe virtues which are wild and uncultivated to fee courage exerting itself in fierceness, refolution in obftinacy, wifdom in cunning, patience in fullennefs and defpair.

Men's paffions operate variously, and appear in different kinds of actions, according as they are more or lefs rectified and fwayed by reason. When one hears of negroes, who, upon the death of their mafters, or upon changing their fervice, hang themselves upon the next tree,

as it fometimes happens in our American plantations, who can forbear admiring their fidelity, though it expreffes itfelf in fo dreadful a manner? What might not that favage greatness of foul, which appears in thefe poor wretches on many occafions, be raised to, were it rightly cultivated? And what colour of excufe can there be, for the contempt with which we treat this part of our fpecies; that we should not put them upon the common foot of humanity; that we should only fet an infignificant fine upon the man who murders them; nay, that we should, as much as in us lies, cut them off from the profpects of happiness in another world, as well as in this; and deny them that which we look upon as the proper means for attaining it?

It is therefore an unfpeakable bleffing to be born in thofe parts of the world where wifdom and knowledge flourish; though, it must be confeffed, there are, even in thefe parts, feveral poor uninftructed perfons, who are but little above the inhabitants of thofe nations of which I have been here fpeaking; as thofe who have hrad the advantages of a more liberal education, rife above one another by feveral different degrees of perfection. For, to return to our statue of the block of marble, we fee it fometimes only begun to be chipped, fometimes rough hewn, and but juft sketched into a human figure; fometimes, we fee the man appearing diftinctly in all his limbs and features; fometimes, we find the figure wrought up to a great elegancy; but feldom meet with any to which the hand of a Phidias or a Praxiteles could not give several nice touches and finishings.

SECTION II.

On Gratitude.

ADDISON.

THERE is not a more pleafing exercise of the mind, than gratitude. It is accompanied with fo great inward fatisfaction, that the duty is fufficiently rewarded by the performance. It is not, like the practice of many other virtues, difficult and painful, but attended with fo much pleasure, that were there no pofitive command which enjoined it, nor any recompenfe laid up for it hereafter, a generous mind would indulge in it, for the natural gratification which it affords.

If gratitude is due from man to man, how much more from man to his Maker: The Supreme Being does not only confer upon us those bounties which proceed more immediately from his hand, but even thofe benefits which are

conveyed to us by others. Every bleffing we enjoy, by what means foever it may be derived upon us, is the gift of him who is the great Author of good, and the Father of mercies.

If gratitude, when exerted towards one another, naturally produces a very pleafing fenfation in the mind of a grateful man, it exalts the foul into rapture, when it is employed on this great object of gratitude; on this beneficent Being, who has given us every thing we already poffefs, and from whom we expect every thing we yet hope for.

SECTION III.

On Forgiveness.

ADDISON.

THE moft plain and natural fentiments of equity concur with divine authority, to enforce the duty of forgiveness. Let him who has never in his life done wrong, be allowed the privilege of remaining inexorable. But let fuch as are confcious of frailties and crimes, confider forgiveness as a debt which they owe to others. Common failings are the ftrongeft leffons of mutual forbearance. Were this virtue unknown among men, order and comfort, peace and repofe, would be ftrangers to human life. Injuries retaliated according to the exorbitant meafure which paffion prescribes, would excite refentment in return. The injured perfon would become the injurer; and thus wrongs, retaliations, and fresh injuries, would circulate in endless fuccesfion, till the world was rendered a field of blood Of all the paffions which invade the human breaft, revenge is the moft direful. When allowed to reign with full dominion, it is more than fufficient to poifon the few pleafures which remain to man in his prefent ftate. How much foever a perfon may fuffer from injuftice, he is always in hazard of fuffering more from the profecution of revenge. The violence of an enemy cannot inflict what is equal to the torment he creates to himself, by means of the fierce and defperate paffions which he allows to rage in his foul.

Thofe evil fpirits who inhabit the regions of misery are reprefented as delighting in revenge and cruelty. But all that is great and good in the univerfe, is on the fide of clemency and mercy. The almighty Ruler of the world, though for ages offended by the unrighteoufnefs, and infulted by the impiety of men, is "long fuffering and flow to anger." His Son, when he appeared in our nature, ex

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