Page images
PDF
EPUB

Charitable Judgment.-Charity.

CHARITABLE JUDGMENT.

77

LET us take a furvey of the world, and fee what a mixture there is of amiable and hateful qualities among the children of men. There is beauty and comelinefs; there is vigour and vivacity; there is good humour and compaffion; there is wit, and judgment, and induftry, even among thofe that are profligate and abandoned to many vices. There is fobriety, and love, and honefty, and juftice, and decency amongst men that "know not God," and believe not the gofpel of our "Lord Jefus." There are very few of the fons and daughters of Adam, but are poffeffed of fomething good and agreeable, either by nature or acquirement; therefore, when there is a neceffary occafion to mention the vices of any man, we should not fpeak evil of him in the grofs, nor heap repoaches on him by wholefale. It is very difingenuous to talk fcandal in fuperlatives, as though every man who was a finner, was a perfect villain, the very worlt of men, all over hateful and abominable.-Watts.

CHARITY.

THOUGH the goodness of a man's heart did not incline him to acts of charity, one would think the defire of honour, fhould. For as building fine houfes, purchafing fine clothes, pictures and other fuch like articles ofexpenfe, fhows nothing more than an ambition to be respected above other people: would not one great act of charity, one inftance of redeeming a poor family from all the miferies of poverty, or reftoring an unfortunate tradefman to the means of procuring a livelihood by his induftry, acquire more real refpect and more lafting honour? The former are the works of other people's hands-the latter the acts of his own heart.-Fielding.

THOUGH we may fometimes unintentionally beftow our beneficence on the unworthy, it does not take from the merit of the act for charity doth not adopt the vices of its objects. -Idem.

CHARITY is a virtue of the heart, and not of the hands, fays an old writer. Gifts and alms are the expreflions, not the effence of this virtue. A man may beltow great fumas on the poor and indigent without being charitable, and may be charitable when he is not able to beltow any thing. Charity therefore is a habit of good-will or benevolence in the foul, which difpofes us to the love, affiftance, and relief of mankind,' efpecially of thofe who tand in need of it. The poor man who has this excellent frame of mind, is no lefs cntitled to

the reward of this virtue, than the man who founds a college. For my own part, I am charitable to an extravagance this way: I never faw an indigent perfon in my life, without reaching out to him fome of this imaginary relief. I cannot but sympathife with every one I meet that is in affliction; and if my abilities were equal to my wishes, there should be neither pain nor poverty in the world.—Guardian.

CONFIDENCE.

SELF-confidence is the first requifite to great undertakings; yet he who forms his opinion of himself, without knowing the powers of other men, is very liable to error.-Johnson.

THERE would be few enterprizes of great labour or hazard undertaken, if we had not the power of magnifying the advantages which we perfuade ourselves to expect from them. -Rambler.

[ocr errors]

NOTHING is more fatal to happiness or virtue than that confidence which flatters us with an opinion of our own flrength, and by affuring us of the power of retreat, precipitates us into hazard.-Idler.

CENSURE.

A GOOD confcience is to the foul, what health is to the body; it preferves a constant ease and serenity within us, and more than countervails all the calamities and afflictions which

can poffibly befall us. I know nothing fo hard for a generous mind to get over, as calumny and reproach; and cannot find any method of quieting the foul under them, befides this single one of our being confcious to ourselves that we do not deserve them.-Spectator.

COMPLAISANCE.

THERE are many arts of gracioufnefs and concilation which are to be practised without expence, and by which thofe may be made our friends who have never received from us any real benefit. Such arts, when they include neither guilt nor meannefs, it is furely reasonable to learn; for who would want that love which is fo eafily to be gained?-Rambler.

THE univerfal axiom in which all complaifance is included, and from which flow all the formalities which cuftom has established in civilized nations, is, "That no man fhould give any preference to himself;" a rule fo comprehenfive and certain, that perhaps it is not eafy for the mind to imagine an incivility without fuppofing it to be broken.-Idem.

[merged small][ocr errors]

WISDOM and virtue are by no means fufficient, without the fupplemental laws of good breeding, to fecure freedom from degenerating into rudenefs, or felf-esteem from fwelling. into infolence. A thoufand incivilities may be committed, and a thousand offices neglected, without any remorfe of confcience, or reproach from reafon.-Ibid.

COMPLAISANCE renders a fuperior amiable, an equal agreeable, and an inferior acceptable. It fmooths diftinction, fweetens converfation, and makes every one in company pleased with himself. It produces good-nature and mutual benevolence, encourages the timorous, foothes the turbulent, humanizes the fierce, and diftinguishes the fociety of civilized perfons from a confufion of favages. In a word, complaifance is a virtue that blends all orders of men together in a friendly intercourfe of words and actions, and is fuited to that equality in human nature which every one ought to confider, so far as is confiftent with the order and economy of the world.

If we could look into the fecret anguish and affliction of every man's heart, we should often find, that more of it arifes from little imaginary distress, such as checks, frowns, contradictions, expreffions of contempt, and (what Shakespeare reckons among other evils under the Sun)

-The proud man's contumely,

The infolence of office, and the Spurns
That patient merit of th' unworthy takes,

than from the more real pains and calamities of life. The only method to remove thefe imaginary diftreffes as much as poffible out of human life, would be the univerfal practice of fuch an ingenuous complaifance as I have been here describing, which may be defined to be, a conflant endeavour to please thofe whom we converfe with, fo far as we may do it innocently. Guardian.

CONSOLATION.

NO one ought to remind another of misfortunes of which the fufferer does not complain, and which there are no means propofed of alleviating. We have no right to excite thoughts which neceffarily give pain, whenever they return, and which perhaps might not have revived but by abfurd and unreasonable compaffion.-Rambler.

NOTHING is more offenfive to a mind convinced that its distress is without a remedy, and preparing to fubmit quietly to irresistible calamity, than thofe petty and conjectured comforts which unfkilful officioufnefs thinks it virtue to adminifter. Johnson

CRITICISM.

HE who is taught by a critic to dislike that which pleafed him in its natural ftate, has the fame reafon to complain of his inftructor, as the madman to rail at his doctor, who, when he thought himself master of Peru, phyficked him to poverty. -Idler.

CHEERFULNESS.

IF we confider cheerfulness in three lights, with regard to ourfelves, to those we converse with, and to the great Author of our being, it will not a little recommend itself on each of these accounts. The man who is poffeffed of this excellent frame of mind is not only eafy in his thoughts, but a perfect master of all the powers and faculties of his foul: his imagination is always clear, and his judgment undisturbed: his temper is even and unruffled, whether in action or in folitude. He comes with a relish to all thofe goods which nature has provided for him, taftes all the pleasures of the creation which are poured about him, and does not feel the full weight of thofe accidental evils which may befall him.

If we confider him in relation to the perfons whom he converfes with, it naturally produces love and good-will towards him. A cheerful mind is not only disposed to be affable and obliging, but raifes the fame good humour in those who come within its influence. A man finds himself pleased, he does not know why, with the cheerfulness of his companion. It is like a fudden funfhine that awakens a fecret delight in the mind, without her attending to it. The heart rejoices of its own accord, and naturally flows out into friendship and benevolence towards the perfor who has fo kindly an effect upon it.

When I confider this cheerful flate of mind in its third relation, I cannot but look upon it as a conftant habitual gratitude to the great Author of nature. An inward cheerfulness is an implicit praife and thankfgiving to providence under all its difpenfations. It is a kind of acquicfcence in the state wherein we are placed, and a fecret approbation of the divine will in his condu&t towards man.-Spe&ator.

CUNNING.

CUNNING differs from wifdom as twilight from open day. He that walks in the fun-fhine, goes boldly forward by the acareft way; he fees that when the path is ftrait and even, he be

[merged small][ocr errors]

may proceed in fecurity, and when it is rough and crooked, he easily complies with the turns, and avoids the obstructions. But the traveller in the dusk fears more, as he fees lefs; he' knows there may be danger, and therefore fufpects that he ist never fafe, tries every ftep before he fixes his foot, and shrinks at every noise, left violence fhould approach him. Cunning difcovers little at a time, and has no other means of certainty than multiplication of ftratagems, and fuperfluity of suspicion. Yet men thus narrow by nature, and mean by art, are fometimes able to rife by the mifcarriages of bravery and the openneft of integrity; and by watching failures, and fnatching opportunities, obtain advantages which belong properly to higher characters.-Idler.

CAUSES of WAR.

SOMETIMES a war between two princes is to decide which of them fhall difpoffefs a third of his dominions, whereto neither of them pretend to any right. Sometimes one prince quarreleth with another, for fear the other fhould quarrel with him. Sometimes a war is entered upon, becaufe the enemy' is too ftrong; and fometimes, because he is too weak. Sometimes our neighbours want the things which we have, or have the things which we want; and we both fight till they take ours, or give us theirs. It is confidered a very justifiable cause of war, to invade a country after the people have been wasted by famine, deftroyed by peftilence, or embroiled by factions among themselves. It is juftifiable to enter into a war against our nearest ally, when one of his towns lies convenient for us, or a territory of land, that would render our dominions round and compact. If a prince fends forces into a nation, where the people are poor and ignorant, he may lawfully put half of them to death, and make flaves of the reft, in order to civilize and reduce them from their barbarous way of living.

It is a very kingly, honourable, and frequent practice, when one prince defires the affiftance of another, to fecure him against an invafion, that the affiftant, when he hath driven out the invader, fhould feize on the dominions himself, and kill, imprison, or banish the prince he came to relieve. Alliance by blood or marriage is a frequent caufe of war between princes; and the nearer the kindred is, the greater is their difpofition to quarrel. There is likewife a kind of beggarly princes in Europe, not able to make war by themselves, who hire out their troops to richer nations, for so much a day to

« PreviousContinue »