DCCCXXXVII.

Prosperity and Adversity.—Every man is rich or poor, according to the proportion between his desires and enjoyments. Of riches, as of every thing else, the hope is more than the enjoyment; while we consider them as the means to be used at some future time for the attainment of felicity, ardour after them secures us from weariness of ourselves, but no sooner do we sit down to enjoy our acquisitions than we find them insufficient to fill up the vacuities of life. Nature makes us poor only when we want necessaries, but custom gives the name of poverty to the want of superfluities. It is the great privilege of poverty to be happy unenvied, to be healthy without physic, secure without a guard, and to obtain from the bounty of nature, what the great and wealthy are compelled to procure by the help of art. Adversity has ever been considered as the state in which a man most easily becomes acquainted with himself, particularly being free from flatterers. Prosperity is too apt to prevent us from examining our conduct; but as adversity leads us to think properly of our state, it is most beneficial to us.-Johnson.

DCCCXXXVIII.

Anticipations. We are now in the transitive state; the mists of ignorance are fast clearing away, and the seeds of knowledge, extensively sown, are springing up amidst a clearer atmosphere. By and by, we may reasonably expect, in communities, what we may now observe in individuals, just notions of their own and other people's rights, more accurate perception of the consequence of

pursuing certain lines of conduct, and an enlightened preference of the right above the wrong.-W. Carpenter.

DCCCXXXIX.

The Poor.-'Twould be a considerable consolation to the poor and discontented, could they but see the means whereby the wealth they covet has been acquired, or the misery that it entails.-Zimmerman.

DCCCXL.

Change of Employment.-Wherever a man betakes himself to an occupation, which, at the time he enters upon it, is useful and necessary to the well-being of society, but which, by the introduction of machinery, or any other unforeseen cause, comes to be afterwards superseded, it is quite monstrous that the person so thrown out of employment should not be made a partaker, to the full extent with others, of the benefit so arising to society by the establishment of a national provision for his support, until he can be otherwise profitably employed.—Gray.

DCCCXLI.

Revolution, in the physical world, means nothing more than harmonious progress, the obedient accommodation of the planetary bodies to the laws of succession and change. Why, in the political world, has it acquired so tremendous a meaning?-Because all motion is attending with resistance, which, up to a certain point, may be a regulating and conservative power, but when accumulated to a degree that would arrest the onward course of things, it gives birth to a violence of reaction that becomes dis

orderly and destructive. Revolution then becomes another name for reform resisted too long and yielded too late.— Eclectic Review.

DCCCXLII.

Opinion is when the assent of the understanding is so far gained by evidence of probability, that it rather inclines to one persuasion than to another, yet not altogether without a mixture of uncertainty and doubting.Zimmerman's Reflections.

DCCCXLIII.

Knowledge Progressive.-As there are some prejudices which are hostile to inquiry, so there are some principles of an opposite character, the full and adequate conviction of which essentially conduces to promote it. Amongst these is the truth that knowledge is progressive, and that in this progress every age is placed in a more advantagcous position for the comprehension of any subject of science than the last. Every inquirer, therefore, finds himself on higher ground than his predecessors; he can avail himself of their latest acquisitions without the labour of original discovery, and thus with unbroken spirits, and ubsubdued vigour, he can commence his career at the ultimate boundary of theirs. Hence, without any presump. tion in the superiority of his faculties, he may hope to attain views more comprehensive and correct, than were enjoyed by men who immeasurably transcended him in capacity. All the advantage, nevertheless, which he has over his precursors, his successors will have over him. All his exertions will tend to place them above him; and the very truths which he discovers, should he be fortunate

enough to discover any, will give them the power of detecting the errors, with which all truths on their first manifestation in any mind are inevitably conjoined.— Essays on the Pursuit of Truth, &c.

DCCCXLIV.

Suicides pay the world a bad compliment. Indeed, it may so happen, that the world has been beforehand with them in incivility. Granted. Even then the retaliation is at their own expense.-Zimmerman.

DCCCXLV.

Unequal Governments are necessarily founded in ignorance, and they must be supported by ignorance; to de. viate from their principle would be voluntary suicide. The first great object of their policy is to perpetuate that undisturbed ignorance of the people, which is the companion of poverty, the parent of crimes, and the pillar of the state.-Barlow.

DCCCXLVI.

Selfishness and Sympathy.—That happiness, perfect and permanent, belongs not to this earth, is a truth, which, however unwilling to believe, we are taught from our cradle, and accredit ere long. But there is much more than we allow, and it is greatly in our power to increase it by the sacrifice of one vice, and the cultivation of one virtue, under which denominations Selfishness and Sympathy may be classed-W. Carpenter.

DCCCXLVII.

Value of Labour.-It is to labour, and to labour only, that man owes every thing possessed of exchangeable value. Labour is the talisman that has raised him from the condition of the savage; that has changed the desert and the forest into cultivated fields; that has covered the earth with cities, and the ocean with ships; that has given us plenty, comfort, and elegance; instead of want, misery, and barbarism.-M'Culloch.

DCCCXLVIII.

Thinking. To little minds those productions are highly agreeable, that entertain without reducing them to the necessity of thinking.-Zimmerman.

DCCCXLIX.

Persecution for Opinion.-He who believes an opinion on the authority of others, who has taken no pains to investigate its claims to credibility, nor weighed the objections to the evidence on which it rests, is lauded for his acquiescence, while obloquy from every side is too often heaped on the man, who has minutely searched into the subject, and been led to an opposite conclusion. There are few things more disgusting to an enlightened mind than to see a number of men, a mob, whether learned or illiterate, who have never scrutinized the foundation of their opinions, assailing with contumely an individual, who, after the labour of research and reflection, has adopted different sentiments from theirs, and pluming themselves on the notion of superior virtue because their understandings have been tenacious of prejudice..