THE ORIGIN OF ALL THINGS

Is wonderful, and surpasses our limited conceptions; we still turn our enquiries towards it, though it is impossible to obtain full satisfaction.

"The Mind, with all its powers, loses itself in surveying the works and ways of God. I have a dark indistinct recollection of my first emersion into thought. I can remember some of the impressions made, of the sorrows and joys felt when I was a little child. Soon after I began to exist, I began to perceive that I did exist, but for the knowledge of all that preceded, I stand indebted to a father's intelligence, 'to a mother's tenderness: they are to me the beginning of days and the oracles of truth; their own pittance of illumination flowed in the same channel. But there must have been a point when thought began there must have been an intelligence which could communicate the power of comprehension--there must have been a spirit which could breathe into man's nostrils the breath of life-there must have been a Being without a beginning to make a beginning !"-Dr. Henry Hunter.

THE FRENCHMAN AND ENGLISHMAN

ARE essentially different in disposition and manners--they are a perfect contrast to each other; we may judge from the following por

traits.

"THE Frenchman is as free in a company he never saw before, as if he had seen them

every day of his life; but an Englishman, on the

corner, twist his yes' and 'no' from

contrary, will run into a thumbs, and if you can get him, without stuttering, after he has been there for twelve hours in your company, you may think yourself very well off. I believe that the perpetual gaiety of our neighbours arises from the freedom with which they discourse with one another, and from their running, when they see a croud, and pulling out a snnff box, beginning, without farther ceremony, to chat with every one present about what's passing; by this means they soon forget any little calamity that may afflict them. But if an Englishman labour under any, he will speak to nobody, bat hastening into solitude, mope and drive himself into such a state of melancholy as nothing but hanging can cure. The taciturnity of an Englishman admits a contradiction in one sense. He is the most perfect living thermometer and barometer in the universe: if all his friends had lost their sense of feeling and seeing, they would know as well from him, every time they met him, whether the weather was hot or cold, wet or dry, as if they had the liveliest use of both."

ST. PAUL'S DOME

MUST yield a most delightful prospect of the first City in the world, and of the villages with which it is on every side surrounded.

"I NOW ascended several steps to the great gallery, which runs on the outside of St. Paul's great dome, and here I remained nearly two hours, as I could hardly, in less time, satisfy

myself with the prospect of the various inter. esting objects that lay all around me, and which can no where be better seen than from hence.

"Every view and every object I studied attentively, by viewing them again and again on every side, for I was anxious to make a lasting impression of it on my imagination. Below me lay steeples, houses, and palaces, in countless numbers; the squares, with their grass plots in the middle, that lay agreeably dispersed intermixed with all the huge clusters of build. ings, forming meanwhile a pleasing contrast and a relief to the jaded eye.

"At one end rose the Tower, itself a city, with a wood of masts behind it; and, at the other, Westminster Abbey, with its steeples. There I beheld, clad in smiles, those beautiful green hills that skirt the environs of Padding. ton and Islington; here, on the opposite bank of the Thames, lay Southwark. The city it self it seems to be impossible for any eye to take in entirely, for, with all my pains, I found it impossible to ascertain either where it ended or where the circumjacent villages began far as the eye could reach it seemed to be all one continued chain of buildings.

"It is, however, idle and vain to attempt giv. ing you in words any description, however faint and imperfect, of such a prospect as I bave just been viewing. He who wishes, at one view, to see a world in miniature, must come to the dome of St. Paul's!"

THE CULTIVATION OF THE MIND

Is an essential duty; and of such signal advan tage, that it lies at the foundation of individual and national respectability.

"GREAT and almost incredible have been the effects of diligence and industry in the cultivation of the mind, even in those persons who have enjoyed the fewest advantages; of this our own country has afforded several illustrious examples; many instances have occurred of persons, who, amidst all the disadvantages of poverty, and destitute of the usual means of improvement, have soared to such heights in the regions of literature, as have astonished the world, and will cause their names to be remem bered with veneration and delight, as long as a taste for science continues to exist: the la bours of these untutored geniuses are so many striking proofs of the powerful effects of patient persevering exertion; let the indolent and careless consider this circumstance and blush at their own folly!

"If we take a survey of the state of those countries which have not yet experienced the blessings of civilization, upon whom the light. of the gospel has not yet dawned, nor science shed her divine influence-dreadful indeed are the scenes which will present themselves to our view; ignorance and superstition, maintaining an unlimited ascendency over the hu man mind, and introducing a thousand bar. barous customs, at the thoughts of which the feeling mind turns away with horror and dis gust; the little appearance of religion that is to be found amongst them overclouded with

the most shocking absurdities, and its utility destroyed by the most impious and cruel rites. Can we reflect on these circumstances, and not be sensible of the value of those superior means of improvement which we enjoy? How diligent ought we to be in appropriating them to our own advantage, and in rendering them subservient to the best interests of society!" Maidstone. A.

MOUNT VERNON,

WHERE General Washington resided, and where he closed his days, is a most delightful spot. It is thus pleasingly described.

"THE celebrated seat of the late president Washington is pleasantly situated on the Virtinian bank of the Potomack, where it is nearly two miles wide, and is about two hundred and eighty miles from the sea. It is nine miles below Alexandria. The area of the mount is two hundred feet above the surface of the river, and after furnishing a lawn of five acres in front, and about the same in the rear of the buildings, falls rather abruptly on those two quarters. On the north end it subsides gradually into extensive pasture grounds, while, on the south, it slopes more steeply in a shorter distance, and terminates with the coach-house, stables, vineyard, and nurseries. On either wing is a thick grove of different flowering forest trees. Parallel with them, on the land side, are two spacious gardens, into which we are led by two serpentine gravel walks, planted with weeping willows and shady shrubs. The mansion house appears venerable and conve nient. The superb banquetting room has been