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"The amiable creature feemed afflicted at my fickness; and fhe appeared to have fo much concern and care for me, as raifed in me a great inclination and tenderness for her. She came every day into my chamber to inquire after my health; I afked who the was, and I was answered, that she was niece to the countess of Venofki.

"I verily believe that the conftant fight of this charming maid, and the pleature I received from her careful attendance, contributed more to my recovery than all the medicines the phyficians gave me. In short, my fever left me, and I had the fatisfaction to fee the lovely creature overjoyed at my recovery. She came to fee me oftener as I grew better; and I already felt a ftronger and more tender affection for her, than I ever bore to any woman in my life: when I began to perceive that her conftant care of me was only a blind, to give her an opportunity of feeing a young Pole whom I took to be her lover. He feemed to be much about her age, of a brown complexion, very tall, but finely fhaped. Every time fhe came to fee me, the young gentleman came to find her out; and they ufually retired to a corner of the chamber, where they feemed to converfe with great earneftnefs. The afpect of the youth pleafed me wonderfully; and if I had not fufpected that he was my rival, I fhould have taken delight in his perfon and friendship.

"They both of them often asked me if I were in reality a German? which when I continued to affirm, they feemed very much troubled. One day I took notice that the young lady and gentleman, having retired to a window, were very intent upon a picture; and that every now and then they caft their eyes upon me, as if they had found fome refemblance betwixt that and my features. I could not forbear to ask the meaning of it; upon which the lady anfwered that if I had been a Frenchman, fhe fhould have imagined that I was the perfon for whom the picture was drawn, becaufe it exactly resembled me. I defired to fee it. But how great was my furprise, when I found it to be the very painting which I had fent to the queen five years before, and which the commanded me to get drawn to be given to my children! After I had viewed the piece, I caft my eyes upon the young lady, and then upon the gentleman I had thought to be her lover. My heart beat, and I felt a fecret emotion which filled me with wonder. I thought I traced in the two young perfons fome of

my own features, and at that moment I faid to myfelf, Are not these my children ? The tears came into my eyes, and I was about to run and embrace them; but conftraining myself with pain, I asked whose picture it was? The maid, perceiving that I could not speak without tears, fell a weeping. Her tears abfolutely confirmed me in my opinion; and falling upon her neck, Ah, my dear child,' faid I, 'yes, I

am your father!' I could fay no more. The youth feized my hands at the fame time, and kifling, bathed them with his tears. Throughout my life, I never felt a joy equal to this; and it must be owned, that nature infpires more lively emotions and pleafing tenderness than the paffions can poffibly excite." Spectator.

§ 12. Remarks on the Swiftnefs of Time.

The natural advantages which arife from the pofition of the earth which we inhabit, with respect to the other planets, afford much employment to mathematical fpeculation, by which it has been difcovered, that no other conformation of the system could have given fuch commodious diftributions of light and heat, or imparted fertility and pleafure to fo great a part of a revolving fphere.

It may be perhaps obferved by the moralift, with equal reafon, that our globe feems particularly fitted for the refidence of a Being, placed here only for a fhort time, whofe task is to advance himfeif to a higher and happier ftate of existence, by unremitted vigilance of caution, and activity of virtue.

The duties required of man are fuch as human nature does not willingly perform, and fuch as those are inclined to delay who yet intend fome time to fulfil them. It was therefore neceffary that this univerfal reluctance fhould be counteracted, and the drowfinefs of hesitation wakened into refolve; that the danger of procraftination fhould be always in view, and the fallacies of fecurity be hourly detected.

To this end all the appearances of nature uniformly confpire. Whatever we fee on every fide, reminds us of the lapfe of time and the flux of life. The day and night fucceed each other, the rotation of feafons diverfifies the year, the fun rifes, attains the meridian, declines and fets; and the moon every night changes its form.

The day has been confidered as an image of the year, and a year as the repre

fentation

fentation of life. The morning anfwers to the spring, and the spring to childhood and youth; the noon corresponds to the fummer, and the fummer to the ftrength of manhood. The evening is an emblem. of autumn, and autumn of declining life. The night with its filence and darkness thews the winter, in which all the powers of vegetation are benumbed; and the winter points out the time when life fhall ceafe, with its hopes and pleafures.

He that is carried forward, however fsiftly, by a motion equable and eafy, perceives not the change of place but by the variation of objects. If the wheel of life, which rolls thus filently along, paffed on through undistinguishable uniformity, we fhould never mark its approaches to the end of the courfe. If one hour were like another; if the paffage of the fun did not thew that the day is wafting; if the change of feafons did not imprefs upon us the fight of the year; quantities of duration equal to days and years would glide unobferved. If the parts of time were not varioully coloured, we fhould never difcern their departure or fucceflion, but fhould live thoughtless of the paft, and carelefs of the future, without will, and perhaps without power to compute the periods of life, or to compare the time which is already loft with that which may probably re

main.

But the courfe of time is fo vifibly marked, that it is even obferved by the pallage, and by nations who have raised their minds very little above animal infinct: there are human beings, whofe language does not fupply them with words by which they can number five, but I have read of none that have not names for Day and Night, for Summer and Winter.

Yet it is certain that thefe admonitions of nature, however forcible, however importunate, are too often vain; and that many who mark with fuch accuracy the courfe of time, appear to have little fenAbility of the decline of life. Every man has fomething to do which he neglects; every man has faults to conquer which he delays to combat.

So little do we accuftom ourfelves to conûder the effects of time, that things necetary and certain often furprife us like nexpected contingencies. We leave the beauty in her bloom, and, after an abfence of twenty years, wonder, at our return, to find her faded. We meet those whom we left children, and can fcarcely perfuade

ourselves to treat them as men. The traveller vifits in age thofe countries through which he rambled in his youth, and hopes for merriment at the old place. The man of bufinefs, wearied with unfatiffactory profperity, retires to the town of his nativity, and expects to play away the laft years with the companions of his childhood, and recover youth in the fields where he once was young.

From this inattention, fo general and fo mischievous, let it be every man's ftudy to exempt himself. Let him that defires to fee others happy, make hafte to give while his gift can be enjoyed, and remember, that every moment of delay takes away fomething from the value of his benefaction. And let him who proposes his own happiness, reflect, that while he forms his purpofe the day rolls on, and the night cometh, when no man can work.' Idler.

13. The Folly of mif-Spending Time.

An ancient poet, unreasonably difcontented at the prefent ftate of things, which his fyftem of opinions obliged him to reprefent in its worft form, has obferved of the earth, "That its greater part is covered by the uninhabitable ocean; that of the reft, fome is encumbered with naked mountains, and fome loft under barren fands; fome fcorched with unintermitted heat, and fome petrified with perpetual froit; fo that only a few regions remain for the production of fruits, the pafture of cattle, and the accommodation of man."

The fame obfervation may be tranfferred to the time allotted us in our prefent state. When we have deducted all that is abforbed in fleep, all that is inevitably appropriated to the demands of nature, or irrefiftibly engroffed by the tyranny of cuftom; all that pailes in regulating the fuperficial decorations of life, or is given up in the reciprocations of civility to the difpofal of others; all that is torn from us by the violence of difeafe, or ftolen imperceptibly away by laffitude and languor; we shall find that part of our duration very fmall of which we can truly call ourfelves mafters, or which we can fpend wholly at our own choice. Many of our hours are loft in a rotation of petty cares, in a conftant recurrence of the fame employments; many of our provifions for eafe or happinefs are always exhausted by the prefent day; and a great part of our

C 2

exiflence

existence ferves no other purpose, than that of enabling us to enjoy the rest.

Of the few moments which are left in our difpofal, it may reasonably be expected, that we should be fo frugal, as to let none of them flip from us without fome equivalent; and perhaps it might be found, that as the earth, however ftraitened by 10ck and waters, is capable of producing more than all its inhabitants are able to confume, our lives, tho' much contracted by incidental distraction, would yet afford us a large space vacant to the exercife of reafon and virtue; that we want not time, but diligence, for great performances; and that we fquander much of our allow ance, even while we think it sparing and infufficient.

This natural and neceffary comminution of our lives, perhaps, often makes us infenfible of the negligence with which we fuffer them to flide away. We never confider ourselves as poffeffed at once of time fufficient for any great defign, and therefore indulge ourfelves in fortuitous amufements. We think it unneceflary to take an account of a few fupernumerary moments, which, however employed, could have produced little advantage, and which were expofed to a thousand chances of difturbance and interruption.

It is obfervable, that, either by nature or by habit, our faculties are fitted to images of a certain extent, to which we adjust great things by divifion, and little things by accumulation. Of extenfive furfaces we can only take a furvey, as the parts fucceed one another; and atoms we cannot perceive, till they are united into maffes. Thus we break the vait periods of time into centuries and years; and thus, if we would know the amount of moments, we must agglomerate them into days and weeks.

The proverbial oracles of our parfimonious ancestors have informed us, that the fatal waste of fortune is by fmall expences, by the profufion of fums too little fingly to alarm our caution, and which we never fuffer ourselves to confider together. Of the fame kind is the prodigality of life: he that hopes to look back hereafter with fatisfaction upon pait years, muit learn to know the prefent value of fingle minutes, and endeavour to let no particle of time fall ufelefs to the ground.

It is ufual for thofe who are advised to the attainment of any new qualifications, to

look upon themfelves as required to change the general courfe of their conduct, to difmifs their business, and exclude pleasure, and to devote their days or nights to a particular attention. But all common degrees of excellence are attainable at a lower price; he that fhould fteadily and refolutely align to any fcience or language thofe interstitial vacancies which intervene in the most crowded variety of diverfion or employment, would find every day new irradiations of knowledge, and dicover how much more is to be hoped from frequency and perfeverance, than, from violent efforts and fudden defires; efforts which are foon remitted when they encounter difficulty, and defires which, if they are indulged too often, will shake off the authority of reafon, and range capricioufly from one object to another.

The difpofition to defer every important defign to a time of leisure, and a itate of fettled uniformity, proceeds generally from a falfe eftimate of the human powers. If we except thofe gigantic and ftupendous intelligences who are faid to grafp a system by intuition, and bound forward from one feries of conclufions to another, without regular steps through intermediate propofitions, the moft fuccefsful ftudents. make their advances ia knowledge by fhort flights, between each of which the mind may lie at reft. For every fingle act of progreffion a fhort time is fuficient; and it is only neceffary, that whenever that time is afforded, it be well employed.

Few minds will be long confined to fevere and laborious meditation; and when a fuccefsful attack on knowledge has been made, the ftudent recreates himfelf with the contemplation of his conqueit, and forbears another incurfion till the new-acquired truth has become familiar, and his curiofity calls upon him for fresh gratifications. Whether the time of intermiflion is fpent in company, or in folitude, in neceffary bufinefs, or in voluntary levities, the underftanding is equally abilracted from the object of enquiry; but, perhaps, if it be detained by occupations lefs pleafing, it returns again to ftudy with greater alacrity than when it is glutted with ideal pleasures, and furfeited with intemperance of appli cation. He that will not fuffer himself to be difcouraged by fancied impoffibilities, may fometimes find his abilities invigo rated by the neceffity of exerting them infhort intervals, as the force of a current is encreafed by the contraction of its channel.

From

From fome caufe like this, it has probably proceeded, that among thofe who have contributed to the advancement of learning, many have rifen to eminence, in oppofition to all the obitacles which external circumstances could place in their way, amidst the tumult of bufinefs, the diftreffes of poverty, or the dissipations of a wandering and unfettled ftate. A great part of the life of Erafmus was one continual peregrination: il fupplied with the gifts of fortune, and led from city to city, and from kingdom to kingdom, by the hopes of patrons and preferment, hopes which always fattered and always deceived him; he yet found means, by unshaken conftancy, and a vigilant improvement of those hours, which, in the midst of the moft reftlefs activity, will remain unengaged, to write more than another in the fame condition would have hoped to read. Compelled by want to attendance and folicitation, and fo much verfed in common life, that he has tranfmitted to us the most perfect delineation of the manners of his age, he joined to his knowledge of the world fuch application to books, that he will ftand for ever in the fir rank of literary heroes. How this proficiency was obtained, he fufficiently difcovers, by informing us, that the Praife of Folly, one of his moft celebrated performances, was compofed by him on the road to Italy; ne tetum illud tempus quo equo fuit indendam, illiteratis fabulis tereretur, left the hours which we was obliged to spend on horieback fhould be tattled away without regard to literature.

An Italian philofopher expreffed in his motio, that time was his estate; an estate indeed, which will produce nothing without cultivation, but will always abundantly repay the labours of induftry, and fatisfy the at extensive defires, if no part of it be fanered to lie wafte by negligence, to be over-run with noxious plants, or laid out for fhew rather than for use. Rambler.

14. The Importance of Time, and the proper Methods of pending it.

We all of us complain of the fhortnefs of time, faith Seneca, and yet have much more than we know what to do with. Our Eves, fays he, are fpent either in doing nothing at all, or doing nothing to the purpole, or in doing nothing that we ought to do. We are always complaining our days are few, and acting as though there would be no end of them. That noble philofopher has defcribed our inconfiftency with

ourselves in this particular by all thofe various turns of expreffion and thought which are peculiar in his writings.

I often confider mankind as wholly inconfiftent with itfelf, in a point that bears fome affinity to the former. Though we feem grieved at the fhortness of life, in general, we are withing every period of it at an end. The minor longs to be at age, then to be a man of buuinefs, then to make up an eftate, then to arrive at honours, then to retire. Thus, although the whole of life is allowed by every one to be fhort, the feveral divifions of it appear long and tedious. We are for lengthening our span in general, but would fain contract the parts of which it is compofed. The ufurer would be very well fatisfied to have all the time annihilated that lies between the prefent moment and the next quarter-day. The politician would be contented to lofe three years in his life, could he place things in the pofture which he fancies they will stand in after fuch a revolution of time. The lover would be glad to strike out of his existence all the moments that are to pafs away before the happy meeting. Thus, as faft as our time runs, we fhould be very glad, in moit parts of our lives, that it ran much faster than it does. Several hours of the day hang upon our hands; nay, we with away whole years, and travel through time, as through a country filled with many wild and empty waites which we would fain hurry over, that we may arrive at thofe feveral little fettlements or imaginary points of reft which are dif perfed up and down in it.

If we divide the life of moft men into twenty parts, we fhall find that at leaft nineteen of them are mere gaps and chafms, which are neither filled with pleasure nor bufinefs. I do not however include in this calculation the life of thofe men who are in a perpetual hurry of affairs, but of those only who are not always engaged in fcenes unacceptable piece of fervice to thefe perof action; and I hope I fhall not do an fons, if I point out to them certain methods for the filling up their empty spaces of life. The methods I fhall propose to them are as follow:

The firft is the exercife of virtue, in the moft general acceptation of the word. That particular fcheme which comprehends the focial virtues, may give employment to the most induftrious temper, and find a man bufinefs more than the moft active ftation of life. To advife the ignorant,

relieve

relieve the needy, comfort the afflicted, are duties that fall in our way almoft every day of our lives. A man has frequent opportunities of mitigating the fierceness of a party; of doing juftice to the character of a deferving man; of foftening the envious, quieting the angry, and rectifying the prejudiced; which are all of them employments fuitable to a reasonable nature, and bring great fatisfaction to the perfon who can bufy himfelf in them with difcretion. There is another kind of virtue that may find employment for those retired hours in which we are altogether left to ourfelves, and deftitute of company and converfation; I mean that intercourfe and communication which every reasonable creature ought to maintain with the great Author of his being. The man who lives under an habitual fenfe of the divine prefence, keeps up a perpetual chearfulness of temper, and enjoys every moment the fatisfaction of thinking himfelf in company with his dearest and beft of friends. The time never lies heavy upon him: it is impoffible for him to be alone. His thoughts and paffions are the most bufied at fuch hours when thofe of other men are the most unactive. He no fooner steps out of the world but his heart burns with devotion, fwells with hope, and triumphs in the confcioufnefs of that prefence which every where furrounds him; or, on the contrary, pours out its fears, its forrows, its apprehenfions, to the great Supporter of its exiftence.

I have here only confidered the neceflity of a man's being virtuous, that he may have fomething to do; but if we confider further, that the exercife of virtue is not only an amufement for the time it lafts, but that its influence extends to thofe parts of our existence which lie beyond the grave, and that our whole eternity is to take its colour from thofe hours which we here employ in virtue or in vice, the argument redoubles upon us, for putting in practice this method of paling away our time.

When a man has but a little flock to improve, and has opportunities of turning it all to good account, what fhall we think of him if he fuffers nineteen parts of it to lie dead, and perhaps employs even the twentieth to his ruin or difadvantage? But becaufe the mind cannot be always in its fervours, nor ftrained up to a pitch of virtue, it is neceflary to find out proper employments for it, in its relaxations.

The next method therefore that I would

propofe to fill up our time, fhould be ufeful and innocent diverfions. I muft confefs I think it is below reasonable creatures to be altogether converfant in fuch diverfions as are merely innocent, and have nothing elfe to recommend them, but that there is no hurt in them. Whether any kind of gaming has even thus much to fay for itfelf, I fhall not determine; but I think it is very wonderful to fee perfons of the beft fenfe paffing away a dozen hours together in fhuffling and dividing a pack of cards, with no other converfation but what is made up of a few game phrafes, and no other ideas but those of black or red spots ranged together in different figures. Would not a man laugh to hear any one of this fpecies complaining that life is short?

The ftage might be made a perpetual fource of the most noble and useful entertainments, were it under proper regulations.

But the mind never unbends itself fo agreeably as in the converfation of a wellchofen friend. There is indeed no bleffing of life that is any way comparable to the enjoyment of a discreet and virtuous friend. It cafes and unloads the mind, clears and improves the understanding, engenders thought and knowledge, animates virtue and good refolution, foothes and allays the paffions, and finds employment for most of the vacant hours of life.

Next to fuch an intimacy with a parti cular perfon, one would endeavour after a more general conversation with such as are capable of edifying and entertaining those with whom they converfe, which are qualities that feldom go afunder.

There are many other useful amusements of life, which one would endeavour to multiply, that one might, on all occafions, have recourfe to fomething rather than fuffer the mind to lie idle, or run adrift with any paffion that chances to rife in it.

A man that has a tafte in mufic, painting, or architecture, is like one that has another fenfe, when compared with fuch as have no relish of thofe arts. The florift, the planter, the gardener, the husbandman, when they are only as accomplishments to the man of fortune, are great reliefs to a country life, and many ways useful to those who are poffeffed of them.

Spectator.

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