no lesson of wisdom? Do no strong emotions of love and gratitude arise towards that being who thus delights him with the charms of intellectual enjoyment, and blesses him with the multiplied means of happiness? Harder than the adamant of his own reasoning colder than the abstractions in which he is falsely supposed to move, must be he who, thus conducted by the handmaid of the arts and sciences, through whatever humanizes man; through whatever is sublime in his progress to a highe state; through all the vast machinery, which the Almighty ha made tributary to his comfort, and its happiness, yet feels no livelier sentiment of duty towards him; no kinder or more peaceful spirit towards his fellow man. QUESTIONS. 1. In what light does the student, referred to in this lesson, regard mathematics? 2. What does he find in geometry? 3. In what particulars, does he observe the influence of mathematical science upon society? 4. Through what source, are the laws of the heavenly bodies discovered? 5. What is said of a planet predicted to exist, before any discovery authorized such opinion? 6. What is said of the moral instruction to be derived, from all this? 7. Parse "feels," in the last line but two. ERRORS. - 1. Pro-gress for prog-ress; 2. suf-fa-ces for sur-fa-ces; rhet'ric for rhet-o-ric; 3. ves-tib'-u-le for ves'-ti-bule; 4. s'les-tial for ce-lestial; 5. bal-un-ces for bal-an-ces; con-fer-dunce for con-fi-dence; 9. trib-il-ary for trib-u-ta-ry. SPELL AND DEFINE. - 1. Mathematics; 2. rhetoric; 3. architecture, magnificent; 4. demonstrated; 5. tradition, prediction; 6. revolution; 7. celestial; 9. adamant, machinery. LESSON LXXXIX. Read the last part of each sentence with a full and dis SPELL AND 1. Prelude or Prel'-ude, n. something introductory. Carp'-ing, a. finding fault. 2. Prot-est-a'-tions, n. solemn declara tions. Gra-da'-tions, n. orders, degrees. 3. Pro'-sing, a. tedious, like prose. DEFINE Mar'-gin, n. the border or edge. At'-tar, n. (the same as ot/-ter), the oil 7. Fe-lic'-i-tous-ly, adv. happily. 9. ishment. ON LETTER WRITING.-Blackwood's Magazine. 1. Epistolary as well as personal intercourse is, according to the mode in which it is carried on, one of the pleasantest or most irksome things in the world. It is delightful to drop in on a friend without the solemn prelude of invitation and acceptance, to join a social circle, where we may suffer our minds and hearts to relax and expand in the happy consciousness of perfect security from invidious remark and carping criticism; where we may give the reins to the sportiveness of innocent fancy, or the enthusiasm of warm-hearted feeling; where we may talk sense or nonsense, (I pity people who cannot talk nonsense,) without fear of being looked into icicles by the coldness of unim aginative people-living pieces of clock-work, who dare not themselves utter a word, or lift up a little finger, without first weighing the important point, in the hair balance of propriety and good breeding. 2. It is equally delightful to let the pen talk freely, and unpremeditatedly, and to one by whom we are sure of being understood; but a formal letter, like a ceremonious morning visit, is tedious alike to the writer and receiver-for the most part spun out with unmeaning phrases, trite observations, complimentary flourishes, and protestations of respect and attachment, so far not deceitful, as they never deceive any body. Oh, the misery of having to compose a set, proper, well worded, correctly pointed, polite, elegant epistle!-one that must have a beginning, a middle, and an end, as methodically arranged and portioned out as the several parts of a sermon under three heads, or the three gradations of shade in a school-girl's first landscape! 3. For my part, I would rather be set to beat hemp, or weed in a turnep-field, than to write such a letter exactly every month, or every fortnight, at the precise point of time from the date of our correspondent's last letter, that he or she wrote after the reception of ours-as if one's thoughts bubbled up to the well-head, at regular periods, a pint at a time, to be bottled off for immedi ate use. Thought! what has thought to do in such a correspondence? It murders thought, quenches fancy, wastes time, spoils paper, wears out innocent goose-quills-" I'd rather be a kitten, and cry mew! than one of those same" prosing letter mongers. 4. Surely in this age of invention out to obviate the necessity (if such ing-degrading the human intellect. something may be struck necessity exists) of so taskWhy should not a sort of mute barrel-organ be constructed on the plan of those that play sets of tunes and contra dances, to indite a catalogue of polite epistles calculated for all the ceremonious observances of good breeding? Oh the unspeakable relief (could such a machine be invented) of having only to grind an answer to one of one's "dear five hundred friends!" 5. Or, suppose there were to be an epistolary steam-engine -Ay, that's the thing-Steam does every thing now-a-days, Dear Mr. Brunel, set about it, I beseech you, and achieve the most glorious of your undertakings. The block-machine at Portsmouth would be nothing to it-That spares manual labor -this would relieve mental drudgery, and thousands yet unborn But hold! I am not so sure the female sex in general may quite enter into my views of the subject. 6. Those who pique themselves on the elegant style of their billets, or those fair scribblerinas just emancipated from boarding-school restraints, or the dragonism of their governess, just beginning to taste the refined enjoyments of sentimental, confidential, soul-breathing correspondence with some Angelina, Seraphina, or Laura Matilda; to indite beautiful little notes, with long-tailed letters, upon vellum paper, with pink margins sealed with sweet mottoes, and dainty devices, the whole deliciously perfumed with musk and attar of roses-young ladies who collect "copies of verses," and charades-keep albums-copy patterns—make bread seals-work little dogs upon footstools, and paint flowers without shadow-Oh! no-the epistolary steamengine will never come into vogue with those dear creatures— They must enjoy the "feast of reason, and the flow of soul," and they must write-Yes! and how they do write! 7. But for another genus of female scribes-Unhappy innocents! who groan in spirit at the dire necessity of having to hammer out one of those aforesaid terrible epistles-who having in due form dated the gilt-edged sheet that lies out-spread before them in appalling whiteness-having also felicitously achieved the graceful exordium, "My dear Mrs. P." or "My dear Lady V." or "My dear any thing else," feel that they are in for it, and must say something-Oh, that something that must come of nothing! those bricks that must be made without straw! those pages that must be filled with words! Yea, with words that must be sewed into sentences! Yea, with sentences that must seem to mean something; the whole to be tacked together, all neatly fitted and dove-tailed so as to form one smooth, polished surface! 8. What were the labors of Hercules to such a task! The very thought of it puts me into a mental perspiration; and, from my inmost soul, I compassionate the unfortunates now (at this very moment, perhaps,) screwed up perpendicular in the seat of torture, having in the right hand a fresh-nibbed patent pen, dipped ever and anon into the ink-bottle, as if to hook up ideas, and under the outspread palm of the left hand a fair sheet of best Bath post, (ready to receive thoughts yet unhatched,) on which their eyes are riveted with a stare of disconsolate perplexity infinitely touching to a feeling mind. I re 9. To such unhappy persons, in whose miseries I deeply sympathize Have I not groaned under similar horrors, from the hour when I was first shut up (under lock and key, Í believe,) to indite a dutiful epistle to an honored aunt? member, as if it were yesterday, the moment when she who had enjoined the task entered to inspect the performance, which, by her calculation, should have been fully completed-Í remember how sheepishly I hung down my head, when she snatched from. before me the paper, (on which I had made no further progress than "My dear ant,") angrily exclaiming, "What, child! have you been shut up-here three hours to call your aunt a pismire?" From that hour of humiliation I have too often groaned under the endurance of similar penance, and I have learnt from my own sufferings to compassionate those of my dear sisters in affliction. To such unhappy persons, then, I would fain offer a few hints, (the fruit of long experience,) which, if they have not already been suggested by their own observation, may prove serviceable in the hour of emergency. 10. Let them or suppose I address myself to one particular sufferer-there is something more confidential in that manner of communicating one's ideas. As Moore says, "Heart speaks to heart." I say, then, take always special care to write by candlelight, for not only is the apparently unimportant operation of snuffing the candle in itself a momentary relief to the depressing consciousness of mental vacuum, but not unfrequently that trifling act, or the brightening flame of the taper, elicits, as it were, from the dull embers of fancy, a sympathetic spark of fortunate conception. When such a one occurs, seize it quickly and dextrously, but, at the same time, with such cautious prudence, as not to huddle up and contract in one short, paltry sentence, that which, if ingeniously handled, may be wire-drawn, so as to undulate gracefully and smoothly over a whole page. 11. For the more ready practice of this invaluable art of dila ting, it will be expedient to stock your memory with a large assortment of those precious words of many syllables, that fill whole lines at once; "incomprehensibly, amazingly, decidedly, solicitously, inconceivably, incontrovertibly." An opportunity of using these, is, to a distressed spinner, as delightful as a copy all m's and.n's to a child. "Command you may, your mind from play." They run on with such delicious smoothness! *** QUESTIONS. - 1. How must epistolary intercourse or letterwriting be conducted in order to be agreeable and useful? 2. What manner of conducting it is ridiculed in this lesson ? 3. What is meant by talking nonsense? 4. Parse "ladies," in the 6th paragraph? 5. To what inflections, in this lesson, is Rule II. $3. applicable? ERRORS.- 1. Xep-tance for ac-cept-ance; jine for join; 2. mis'ry for mis-e-ry; 3. pe-ruds for pe-ri-ods; 5. steam-in-gin for steam-en-gine; 7. sued for sewed, (pro. sode); 8. Herc-les for Her-cu-les; 9. pen-unce for pen-ance; 10. suf-frer for suf-fer-er; ap-par-unt-ly for ap-par-ent-ly. SPELL AND DEFINE. 1. Epistolary, social; 3. well-head; 4, obviate; 5. drudgery; 6. emancipated, mottoes, albums; 8. perplexity; 9, emergency; 10, confidential, vacuum, dextrously; 11. dilating. LESSON XC RULE. each word, Be careful to give all the consonants their full sound in SPELL AND DEFINE A-non', adv. soon: here, still and anon means, now and then, frequently. Wince, v. to shrink back as from pain. Chid, v. blamed, reproached. [or troubles. An-noy'-ance, n. any thing which injures Troth, n. truth, veracity. Ex-tremes', n. the greatest degree of dis tress: undeserved extremes means, Tarre, v. (pro. tar), to tease, to set on. |