one perpetual round of poverty, and distress from the moment he starts, to the time of his death. His fortune spent, his friends (but fuch men merit not the name) deaf to his entreaties, his relations dead, poor, unpitied he knows not whither to fly for shelter, till his misery becomes no longer able to remain in contact with the natural gloom of an English difpofition, and his laft care is to obtain a loaded pistol-here let us drop the curtain, to screen an object from our fight whose affliction awakens our piety, and shuts out the remembrance of his paft conduct, while it holds. forth the last dread fcene of his life, clad in all its horrors. If Religion had ever fhed her kind influence on his youthful mind, it might have proved a balm to heal the laft rent of his mental illness; but his parents, too much addicted the mania of getting money, had probably neglected this, the moft effential part of their fon's education; or perhaps what little of religious knowledge he imbibed from their lips, was fown upon a barren foil, where it took a feeble root, and became quite choaked in the days of his affluence; or had fome good friend laid open to him thofe facred volumes, which inftruct us how to live, and by the bleffed example they afford us for our pattern, will ever prevent those from laying rash hands on themfelves, who study and regard them; had fuch been his cafe, he would not have rushed into the prefence of the Almighty with all his imperfections on his head, but by the precepts of the former, or by the joint force of precept and example in the latter, have been fnatched from the brink of that precipice, to the horrors of which fo many of our unhappy countrymen give themfelves up defpairing victims; when reflection has yielded up the fway fhe had over them, nor longer whifpers that by flying from worldly evils, they run the risk of bringing down accumulated pain upon their head, and plunging themfelves into a ftate of endless punishment. In neither of these examples is the object of our fearch to be met with; whither then fhall we go to feek her? In the higher ftages of life fhe is not; and among the lower, Penury, I fear, holds men with too tight a gafp for them even to enjoy the fweets of Happiness: the life of a fhepherd has long been fung, as a scene of bliss unknown to other ranks of life; but the laurels of Paftoral feem to have drooped their once gay heads, and like those they crowned, are known no more. This felicity, 1 of fherherds, I fufpect, has ever been confined to the Poet's brain, and all the defcriptions of their Elyfian fcenes, are rather the exaggerated fables of a fond, enraptured bard, than an account of the true ftate of paftoral affairs. At prefent, we are not to look for happiness among this clafs; the profeffion of tending theep is much declined in its fame fince the days of Paris; Taffo, indeed, paints a fhepherd and his family prettily, with whom the lovely Erminia takes refuge, but Taflo was a poet, and fiction, every one knows, is the foul of poetry. It is plain that happiness is confined to no particular clafs; and from the examples here. given, a great fortune often proves an expedient diametrically oppofite in its effects, to what is expected; it is equally certain that where money is the ftandard of the value of all the neceflaries and accommodations of life;' no one can live without it; a competent share, therefore, of riches is abfolutely requifite to place a man in a comfortable fituation, and ftand the corner ftone of his happiness in life. But this acquifition, however neceffary a step, is by no means the only machine which must work our profperity; a naturally good and kind difpofition, improved by a polifhed education, ftrengthened by our connection with men of fenfe, and foftened by our intercourfe with women of delicacy and gentle manners, is what adapts us to that state we look for: thus equipped, our pretenfions seem no ways ill founded. A man of the above ftamp is certainly entitled to happiness, and if he fucceeds not, it will be owing to his want of judgment in the selection of his friend, not to any defect in his own fituation. To whom can Riches give Repute, or Truft, Matrimony is the wreath which must grace his fmile-decked brow to round the fum of his blifs in the arms of a fine and virtuous woman he will find himself in a state of paradife, which nothing but a loving and beloved progeny can enhance the value of, nothing can impair but that cruel ftroke which fooner or later muft fever him from all this hoard of fweets. After all, it is certain that the happiness of every man depends more upon the state of his own mind than upon any one external circumftance; nay, more than upon all external things put together: unless we have a good confcience, and a well governed mind, difcon tent will blaft every enjoyment, and the highest prosperity will prove only disguised misery. NUMBER XII. And wing with joy my filent hours. AN ODE TO MEDITATION. SWEET Child of Reafon! maid ferene; Would Mem'ry picture to my heart. The Hermit from the world retir'd, By calm Religion's voice inspir'd, |