MLXX.

If, besides the accomplishments of being witty and illnatured, a man is vicious into the bargain, he is one of the most mischievous creatures that can enter into a civil society.-Addison.

MLXXI.

Good sense and learning may esteem obtain;
Humour and wit a laugh, if rightly ta'en:
Fair virtue admiration may impart;
But 'tis good-nature only wins the heart:
It moulds the body to an easy grace,
And brightens every feature of the face:
It smooths th' unpolishe'd tongue with eloquence,
And adds persuasion to the finest sense.

MLXXII.

Stilling fleet.

A man who has passed his life on shipboard, will pace the length of his quarter-deck on the terrace before his house, were it a mile in length.-Cumberland.

MLXXIII.

He that gives one himself (if he be worth taking) gives the greatest benefit: so that a brave mind can never want matter for liberality in the meanest condition; for nature has been so kind to us, that where we have nothing of fortune's we may bestow something of our own. -Seneca.

MLXXIV.

They who have never known prosperity, can hardly be said to be unhappy; it is from the remembrance of joys we have lost, that the arrows of affliction are pointed.Mackenzie.

MLXXV.

Pre

Long and curious speeches are as fit for despatch, as a robe, or mantle, with a long train, is for a race. faces, and passages, and excusations, and other speeches of reference to the person, are great wastes of time; and though they seem to proceed of modesty, they are bravery-Lord Bacon.

MLXXVI.

He that seeks safety in a statesman's pity, may as well run a ship upon sharp rocks, and hope a harbour.

Howard.

MLXXVII. ·

Knowledge of books in recluse men, is like that sort of lantern, which hides him who carries it, and serves only to pass through secret and gloomy paths of his own; but in the possession of a man of business, is as a torch in the hand of one who is willing and able to show those who are bewildered, the way which leads to prosperity and welfare.-Spectator.

MLXXVIII.

Good manners are the settled medium of social, as specie is of commercial life; returns are equally expected for both; and people will no more advance their civility to a bear, than their money to a bankrupt.—Chesterfield.

MLXXIX.

The foundation of knowledge must be laid by reading, General principles must be had from books, which, however, must be brought to the test of real life. In conversation you never get a system. What is said upon a subject is to be gathered from a hundred people. The parts of a truth, which a man gets thus, are at such a distance from each other that he never attains to a full view.-Johnson.

MLXXX.

Swift, in his "Scheme to make an Hospital for Incurables," says, by a plain computation, it is evident, that two hundred thousand persons will be daily provided for, and the allowance for maintaining this collection of incurables, may be seen in the following account.

From whence it appears, that the daily expense will amount to such a sum as, in 365 days, comes to

£3,650,000 Swift's Works-Scott's Edit. vol. ix. 8vo. 1814.

MLXXXI.

The same things are said over and over, and there remains nothing new to be said, to the point of truth, though arguments and controversy from given and suppositious premises, will last to the end of the world.Joineriana, 1772.

MLXXXII.

To be a niggard of one's observation, is so much worse than to hoard up one's money, as the former may be both imparted and retained at the same time.-Shenstone.

MLXXXIII.

Doth a man stutter, look asquint, or halt?
Mimics draw humour out of nature's fault;
With personal defects their mirth adorn,
And hang misfortunes out to public scorn.
Churchill.

MLXXXIV.

The manner of saying or of doing any thing goes a great way in the value of the thing itself. It was well said of him that called a good office that was done harshly, and with an ill-will, a stony piece of bread, it is necessary for him that is hungry to receive it, but it almost chokes a man in the going down.-Seneca.

MLXXXV.

A madman loves to be with people whom he fears; not as a dog fears the lash, but of whom he stands in awe.-Johnson.

MLXXXVI.

To buy books, as some do who make no use of them, only because they were published by an eminent printer, is much as if a man should buy clothes that did not fit him, only because they were made by some famous tailor. -Pope.

MLXXXVII.

After all the maxims and systems of trade and commerce, a stander-by would think the affairs of the world were most ridiculously contrived.-Swift.

MLXXXVIII.

The sum of all that makes a just man happy
Consists in the well choosing of his wife;
And there, well to discharge it, does require
Equality of years, of birth, of fortune;
For beauty being poor, and not cried up
By birth or wealth, can truly mix with neither.
And wealth, when there's such difference in years
And fair descent, must make the yoke uneasy.

MLXXXIX.

Massinger.

Positiveness is a good quality for orators, because he that would obtrude his thoughts and reason upon a multitude, will convince others the more, as he appears convinced himself.-Swift.

MXC.

"Tis an ill thing to be ashamed of one's poverty, but much worse not to make use of lawful endeavours to avoid it.Thucidides.

MXCI.

A person's manner is never easy, whilst he feels a consciousness that he is fine. The country fellow, considered in some lights, appears genteel; but it is not when he is dressed on Sundays, with a large nosegay in his bosom: it is when he is reaping, making hay, or when he is hedging in his hurden frock: it is then he acts with ease, and thinks himself equal to his apparel.-Shenstone.

MXCII.

The dialect of conversation is now-a-days so swelled with vanity and compliment, and so surfeited (as I may say) of expressions of kindness and respect, that if a man that lived an age or two ago should return into the world again, he would really want a dictionary to help him to understand his own language, and to know the true intrinsic value of the phrase in fashion, and would hardly at first believe at what a low rate the highest strains and expressions of kindness imaginable do commonly pass in current payment: and when he should come to understand it, it would be a great while before he could bring himself with a good countenance and a good conscience to converse with men upon equal terms, and in their own way.-Tillotson.

MXCIII.

-Men as resolute appear

With too much, as too little fear;
And, when they're out of hopes of flying,
Will run away from death by dying;

Or turn again to stand it out,

And those they fled, like lions, rout.

MXCIV.

Butler.

The vulgar may swallow any sordid jest; any mere drollery or buffoonery; but it must be a finer and truer wit which takes with men of sense and good breeding.Shaftesbury.

one.

MXCV.

However contradictory it may be in geometry, it is true in taste, that many little things will not make a great The sublime impresses the mind at once, and with one great idea; it is a single blow; the elegant, indeed, may be produced by repetition; by an accumulation of many minute circumstances.-Sir J. Reynolds.

MXCVI.

National prejudice is by some called a virtue, but the virtue of it consists only in the proper application and VOL. 1.

T