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He is as pious and thankful when a tempest is past, as devout when 'tis present; not clamorous to receive mercies, and tongue-tied to return thanks. Escaping many dangers makes him not presumptuous to run into them.

In taking a prize he most prizeth the men's lives whom he takes; though some of them may chance to be negroes or savages. 'Tis the custom of some to cast them overboard, and there's an end of them for the dumb fishes will tell no tales. But the murder is not so soon drowned as the man. What, is a brother of false blood no kin; a savage hath God to his father by creation, though not the church to his mother, and God will revenge his innocent blood. But our captain counts the image of God, nevertheless his image cut in ebony as if done in ivory.*

headlong in the ways of sin, forgetful of their parents' counsel and their own happiness. Unfortunate old man! how often does he wish he had never been born, or had been cut off before he was a father! no reflection is able to afford him consolation. He grows old betimes; and the afflictions of age are doubled on his head. In vain are instruments of pleasure brought forth. His soul refuses comfort. Every blessing of life is lost upon him. No success is able to give him joy. His triumphs are like that of David. While his friends, captains, soldiers, were rending the air with shouts of victory he, poor conqueror ! "went up," as it is written, "to the chamber over the gate, and wept and as he went, thus he said; O my son Absalom! my son, my son Absalom! would God I had died for thee! O Absalom, my sou, my son!"-Sermon xi. p. 335.

the

* Is not this one of the earliest intercessions on behalf of poor slaves?

In dividing the gains he wrongs none who took

pains to get them.

riners with nothing.

Not shifting off his poor ma

In time of peace he quietly returns home.§ His voyages are not only for profit, but some for honour and knowledge.†

He daily sees, and duly considers God's wonders in the deep.

§ The hour now approached in which it became necessary for General Washington to take leave of his army, who had been endeared to him by a long series of common sufferings and dangers. The officers having previously assembled, General Washington, calling for a glass of wine, thus addressed them :-" With a heart full of love and gratitude, I now take leave of you: I most devoutly wish that your latter days may be as prosperous and happy as your former ones have been glorious and honourable." The officers came up successively, and he took an affectionate leave of each of them: The General then left the room and passed through the corps of light infantry to the place of embarkation, the officers all following him. On his entering the barge to cross the North river, he turned towards the companions of his glory, and by waving his hat bid them farewell. Some answered this last signal of respect and affection with tears, and all hung upon the barge which conveyed him from their sight till they could no longer distinguish in it the person of their beloved commander.-RAMSEY'S America.

+ This is common to all professions: "I hold," says Lord Bacon," that every man is a debtor to his profession, from the which, as men do of course seek to receive countenance and profit, so ought they of duty to endeavour themselves by way of amends, to be a help and ornament thereunto." And Sir Edward Coke, differing as he did from Lord Bacon upon all subjects, except the advancement of their noble profession, expresses the same sentiment almost in the same words. If this," he says, "or any other of my works, may in any

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OF JESTING.

It is good to make a jest, but not to make a trade of jesting. The Earl of Leicester knowing that

sort, by the goodness of Almighty God, who hath enabled me hereunto, tend to some discharge of that great obligation of duty wherein I am bound to my profession, I shall reap some fruits from the tree of life, and I shall receive sufficient compensation for all my labours."

Similar sentiments influenced Sir Matthew Hale, and Harvey, and Syndenham.

This arises out of the social part of our nature; thus beautifully described in a MS. sermon in my possession :-" There is a part of human nature which draws man asunder from his fellow and engages him with his own peculiar interests and affairs; which isolates him and arms him in his own behalf: out of which grows the feeling of property, and personal right, and also of justice; and from the excess of which cometh cunning, and every form of malice and malignity. And to work against this and hinder it from these fearful issues, there is another part of human nature which draws him to his kind, makes him thirst for fellowship and communion with kindred spirits, and which binds him in a thousand associations, out of which arise some of the most exquisite enjoyments of his life. A principle of attraction and communication diverse from and opposite to the other, by which he is carried from himself, and made to have pleasure in the giving to others, that which by his own personal industry he hath acquired. Is knowledge that upon which he hath set his heart? Then he removes himself from affairs, and shuts himself up from company, and subjecteth youthful passions, and abstracteth himself from places of youthful gaiety and folly, that he may dig the mines of knowledge, which are richer than the mines of gold; carrying on the merchandise of wisdom, which is better than the merchandise of silver;-and thereto he hath

Queen Elizabeth was much delighted to see a gentleman dance well, brought the master of a dancing school to dance before her. "Pish," said "it is his profession, I will not see

the queen,

him."

Wanton jests make fools laugh, and wise men frown.

the convenience of a college cell, within gates which are shut betimes, as carefully as a besieged city, it being well thought by the fathers and founders of learning that the outward world is not more adverse to knowledge than to true religion. Here he trims his midnight lamp, and paleth the bloom of his youthful cheek; he stinteth himself of sleep, his books are his silent companions; the thoughts of the learned are his banquet, his inward man engrosses him, his outward man often altogether neglected,-health itself hardly cared for, while he is passing through this chrysalis state of the mind, and obtaining for his soul that plumage, which shall bear it into the regions of thought and fancy, hitherto unexplored, and reward him with discoveries hitherto unknown, and weave a chaplet of laurel for his brow, and bequeath unto his name an immortality of fame. But if I keep my eye on this bookworm, and follow him onward through the more advanced stage of knowledge, then I perceive the selfish, avaricious, and monopolizing feeling which moved him to such sacrifice of his pleasure and health, begin to abate as he becomes well fraught and stored; and as if God used his soul for a transport vessel, which doubtless he doth, he is driven with his spirit full of knowledge, to carry the same abroad, to communicate it to his fellows; he no sooner discovers truth than he hastens to reveal it; he no sooner detects errors than he hastens to warn the world of them,-he joins himself to the societies of the learned, --he enters into fellowships, and academies, and colleges,—he meditates in his mind and stirs up his thoughts, he writes books and communicates his gathered knowledge to all mankind; so that, in the first instance, while there is nothing so avaricious as the spirit of knowledge, there

Jést not with the two-edged sword of God's word. Will nothing please thee to wash thy hands in but the font, or to drink healths in but the church chalice ?§

Let not thy jests, like mummy, be made of dead men's flesh. Abuse not any that are departed, for to wrong their memories is to rob their ghosts of their winding sheets.

Scoff not at the natural defects of

any

which are

is in the next instance nothing so generous. It reveals without being put to the question. It bestows without being besought. The more precious its discoveries, the more it hastens to make them common. If, again, I consider the pursuit of wealth, then I perceive a like correspondence of the selfish and the social. The merchant and tradesman are indefatigable, making the most of every occasion, and driving every bargain with as much nicety as if their all was at stake. They measure with exactness,-they weigh out scrupulously. They gather up the remnants of things and suffer nothing to be lost, -they introduce an economy of time into their business, almost as if every day were the last ;-they lay off the several branches, each to a several hand, and there they ply at their departments with a haste and with an accuracy, which nothing can surpass. Their books are kept like the book of fate; every man's account is there as if it were the book of divine remembrance :-not an error through the whole can escape their view, and when the balance is struck it turns out as just and exact to the uttermost farthing. And to see the house in the work of accumulation, you would suppose every one a niggard and a miser who could part with nothing, and who could not bear that anything should be lost. But this is only half the man; to know him wholly you must see the other half likewise in action. Follow him from his workshop to his house, and you will see a spirit of profusion equalled only by the spirit of accumulation, and often to his cost not equalled by that. Here is generosity in every form. It is lavished on elegancies of the house, on attendants, on equipage, on

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