golden fruit is like the book in the Apocalypse; its grateful taste goes no further than the mouth; in digestion it is bitter; it corrodes the vitals, and empoisons the springs of life. The career of the imprudent is seldom bounded, until he is stopped by ruin. He dissipates to-day the provision for to-morrow: debts are accumulated; and every creditor is as a link to a chain, which in time will fetter the whole man. In vain he struggles to numb his feelings; to hood-wink memory; and to impose upon the world by false and specious glosses: his ostentatious largesses, whether in splendid treats or glittering acts of munificence, are drained, and where is his resource? Look at Timon of Athens, and he will answer you. Not with the lovers of pleasure, who have revelled at his board: they hate any fellowship with complaint, and turn from him at the first word.. Will those whom his charity dried of their tears, smile upon him? Yea, and laugh at him too; for the hands of his lawful masters are upon him! His creditors shackle him with bonds of his own forging; and commit him to the custody

of that justice, whose rights he despised. No. one sincerely thanks an extravagant man, for the use of his purse: the benefitted person knows, that pretended beneficence is the traffic of vanity; and temporary flattery supplies the place of gratitude. The prodigal speaks, moves, loves, hates, gives and receives, and all by vanity vanity and himself are one: all is sacrificed to that brazen calf; and strange , to tell, so absurd is the devotion, that the selfdeified fool perishes at last, in the very fire which he vainly kindled to his honour! This is the fate of the spendthrift: and though it be his punishment, yet it is not necessary to believe that every man who falls into the same extremities, has incurred them by similar crimes. There are misfortunes which reverse the wisest plans, and render the most honourable intentions abortive: and there are wretches, who having a little brief authority over such men, enjoy nothing so much as oppressing characters which they cannot equal; and of making them suffer whom they cannot degrade. This happens in particular cases; but it does not, for that reason, invalidate the as

sertion, that prudence is the surest foundation of that independence which is the best guard of integrity. The true manly character, belongs to him who rejects every luxury that would bribe from him any part of his proper self, the free-agency of his mind! that, he ought to hold subservient to no will but the will of God. The will of God, and the dictates of right reason, unite in the same truth. The Almighty stamped his own image on our souls at their creation; and though it is perverted and obscured by the rebellious propensities of our present natures, yet we still have a pattern of the All-good, a luminous guide to virtue! When we chuse to look up, the pillar of light is always before us, to lead us to the promised land; and if we do not manacle our senses, our understandings, and our liberties, by bartering this noble estate in reversion, for the poor trifles of a transitory life, we may live here not only peaceably, respectfully, and happily, but probably more magnificently than our imprudent competitors. Nothing has such effect in causing a man to be revered, as a general conviction, that he reverences

himself: he that places his temporal consequence on his merit, and not on his situation, fixes it on a ground which all the world cannot remove. Prudence is this man's steward; Independence, his herald; and Beneficence, led by Justice, his almoner.

EVIL.

1.

CONTINUANCE of evil, doth of itself in

crease evil.

Remark.

The animal economy is worn, by too severe a tension to support itself under repeated attacks of misfortune; and therefore, persons of weakened nerves often appear to be more affected with the continuance of a calamity, than by the violence of its first shock.

2.

There is nothing evil but what is within us; the rest is either natural or accidental.

Remark.

Our griefs, as well as our joys, owe their strongest colours to our imaginations. There is nothing so grievous to be borne, that pondering upon will not make heavier; and there is no pleasure so vivid, that the animation of fancy cannot enliven.

PAIN.

It is the nature of pain, (the present being intolerable,) to desire change, and put to adventure the ensuing.