I. ET your promifes be fincere, and fo prudently confidered, as not to exceed the reach of your ability: he who promises more than he is able to perform, difgraces himself; and he who does not perform what he has promifed, is falfe to his friend. THE immortal mind, perhaps, will quit a cottage with lefs regret than it would leave the fplendour of a palace; and the breathlefs duft fleep as quietly beneath the graffy turf, as under the parade of a coftly monument. These are infignificant circumftances, to a fpirit doomed to an endless duration of mifery or bliss. AS the belief of a God is the foundation of all religion, there can be no religion without faith; but as true religion includes virtue, religion cannot be perfect without works. AMAZ'D, the wonders of thy God behold! Oh! happy time, when fhaking off this clay, REFLECTION S. WHAT, oh! my heart, overflowing with happinefs! are the fentiments that ought to fpring up in thee, when admitted, either in the folemnities of public worfhip, or the retiredness of private devotion, into the more immediate prefence of thy Maker, who does not govern, but to blefs! whofe divine commands are fent to fuccour human reafon in search of happiness! Let thy law, Almighty! be the rule, and thy glory the conftant E 2 end, end, of all I do. Let me not build virtue on any notions of honour, but of honour to thy name. Let me not fink piety in the boast of benevolence; my love of God in the love of my fellow-creatures. Can good be of human growth? No; it is thy gift, Almighty, and All-good! Let not thy bounties remove the donor from my thought; nor the love of pleasures make me forfake the fountain from which they flow. When joys entice, let me afk their title to my heart; when evils threaten, let me fee thy mercy fhining through the cloud, and difcern the great hazard of having all to my wifh. In an age of fuch licentiousness, let me not take comfort from the number of thofe who do amifs; an omen rather of public ruin, than of private fafety. Let the joys of the multitude lefs allure than alarm me; and their danger, not example, determine my choice. In this day of domineering pleasures, fo lower my tafte, as to make me relish the comforts of life. And in this day of diffipation, O give me thought fufficient to preferve me from being fo defperate, as in this perpetual flux of things, and as perpetual fwarm of accidents, to depend on tomorrow; a dependence that is the ruin of to-day, as that is of eternity. Let my whole existence be ever be. fore me, nor let the terrors of the grave turn back my furvey. When temptations arife, and virtue ftaggers, let imagination found the final trumpet, and judgment lay hold on eternal life. In what is well begun, grant me to perfevere, and to know, that none are wife, but they who determine to be wiser ftill. And fince, O Lord! the fear of thee is the beginning of wisdom, and, in its progrefs, its fecret fhield, turn the world intirely out of my heart, and place that guardian angel, thy bleffed fear, in its ftead. Turn out a foolish world, which gives its money for what is not bread; which hews out broken cifterns, that hold no water; a world, in which even they, whofe hands are mighty, have found nothing. There is nothing, Lord God Almighty! in heaven, in earth, but thee I will feek thy face; blefs thy name; fing thy praifes; love thy law; do thy will; enjoy thy peace; hope thy glory, till my final hour! Thus Thus fhall I grafp all that can be grafped by man. This will heighten good, and soften evil, in the prefent life; and when death fummonfes, I fhall fleep fweetly in the duft, till his mighty Conqueror bids the trumpet found, and then shall I, through his merits, awake to eternal glory. ALL pleasures are imperfect here below; CONTENTED poverty's no difmal thing, The Divine Prefence. THE high and mighty King of kings Where'er I am, howe'er oppreft, At night, before His prefence can the paffions lay, Thro' all the future ills of life, So when thro' death's dark vale I move, And mark me out fome bleft employ. WHEN the oil of grace actuates the foul, the wheels of obedience move with celerity; but when this is wanting, every duty, if not neglected, will be indifferently performed. TRUE TRUE happiness is of a retired nature, and an enemy to pomp and noife: it arifes, in the first place, from the enjoyment of one's felf; and, in the next, from the friendship and converfation of a few felect companions. It loves fhade and folitude, and naturally haunts groves and fountains, fields and meadows: in fhort, it feels every thing it wants within itself, and receives no addition from multitudes of witneffes and fpectators. On the contrary, false happiness loves to be in a crowd, ånd to draw the eyes of the world upon her. She does not receive any fatisfaction from the applaufes which the. gives herself, but from the admiration which the raises in others. She flourishes in courts and palaces, theatres. and affemblies; and has no existence, but when she is looked upon. IF good we plant not, vice will fill the mind, Where fear difturbs not, nor poffeffion cloys; LEARN to pursue virtue from the man that is blind, who never makes a ftep, without first examining the ground with his staff. |