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The centre mov'd, a circle ftrait fucceeds,
Another ftill, and still another spreads;

Friend, parent, neighbour, first it will embrace;
His country next, and next all human race;
Wide and more wide, th' o'erflowings of the mind
Take ev'ry creature in, of ev'ry kind;

Earth fmiles around, with boundless bounty bleft, And Heav'n beholds its image in his breast.

IN

DISCONTENT.

N the humble and feemingly quiet fhade of private life, as well as among the great and mighty, Difcontent broods over its imaginary forrows; preys upon the citizen no less than the courtier, and often nourishes paffions equally malignant in the cottage and in the palace. Having once feized the mind, it fpreads its own 'gloom over every furrounding object; it every where fearches out materials for itself, and in no direction more frequently employs its unhappy activity, than in creating divifions among mankind, and in magnifying flight provocations into mortal injuries.

In fituations where much comfort might be enjoyed, this man's fuperiority, and that man's

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neglect, our jealoufy of a friend, our hatred of a rival, and imagined affront, or a mistaken point of honour, allow us no repofe. Hence difcord in families, animofities among friends, and wars among nations! Look round us! every where we find a bufy multitude. Reflefs and uneafy in their prefent fituation, they are inceffantly employed in accomplishing a change of it; and as foon as their wifh is fulfilled, we difcern by their behaviour, that they are diffatisfied as they were before. Where they expected to have found a paradife, they find a defart.

The man of bufinefs pines for leifure; the leifure for which he had longed, proves an irkfome gloom, and through want of employment, he languifhes, fickens, and dies.

The man of retirement fancies no ftate fo happy, as that of active life; but he has not long engaged in the tumults and contefts of the world, until he finds caufe to look back with regret on the calm hours of his privacy and retreat.

Beauty, wit, eloquence, and fame, are eagerly defired by perfons of every rank of life. They are the parent's fondeft wifh for his child; the ambition of the young, and the admiration of the

old;

old; and

yet in what numberless inftances have they proved, to those who poffeffed them, no other than fhining fnares, feductions to vice, inftigations to folly, and, in the end, fources of mifery.

THE

GRATITUDE.

HERE is not a more pleafing exercife of the mind than Gratitude. It is accompanied with fuch an inward fatisfaction, that the duty is fufficiently rewarded by the performance. It is not like the practice of many other virtues, difficult and painful, but attended with fo much pleafure, that were there no pofitive command which enjoined, nor any recompence laid up for it hereafter, a generous mind would indulge it for the natural gratification that accompanies it. If Gratitude is due from man to man, how much more from man to his Maker. The Supreme Being does not only confer upon us thofe bounties, which proceed more immediately from his hand, but even thofe benefits which are conveyed to us by others. Every bleffing we enjoy, is the gift of him who is the great Author of Good, and Father of Mercies.

THE

THE FOLLY OF

ANTICIPATING MISFORTUNES.

THE

'HERE is nothing recommended with greater frequency among the gayer poets of antiquity, than the fecure poffeffion of the prefent hour, and the difmiffion of all the cares which intrude upon our quiet, or hinder, by importunate perturbations, the enjoyment of those delights which our condition happens to fet before us.

The ancient poets are, indeed, by no means unexceptionable teachers of morality; their precepts are to be always confidered as the fallies of a genius, intent rather upon giving pleasure than inftruction, eager to take every advantage of infinuation, and, provided the passions can be engaged on its fide, very little folicitous about the fuffrage of reafon.

The darkness and uncertainty through which the heathens were compelled to wander in the purfuit of happinefs, may, indeed, be alledged as an excufe for many of their feducing invitations to immediate enjoyment, which the moderns, by whom they have been imitated, have not to plead. It is no wonder that fuch as had no promife of another flate fhould eagerly turn their thoughts upon the improvement of that which was before

them

them; but furely thofe who are acquainted with the hopes and fears of eternity, might think it neceffary to put fome reftraint upon their imagination, and reflect, that by echoing the songs of the ancient bacchanals, and tranfmitting the maxims of paft debauchery, they not only prove that they want invention, but virtue, and fubmit to the fervility of imitation only to copy that of which the writer, if he was to live now, would often be afhamed.

Yet as the errors and follies of a great genius are seldom without fome radiations of understanding, by which meaner minds may be enlightened, the incitements to pleasure, are, in thofe authors, generally mingled with fuch reflections upon life, as well deserve to be confidered diftinctly from the purposes for which they are produced, and to be treasured up as the fettled conclufions of extenfive obfervation, acute fagacity, and mature experience.

It is not without true judgment that on these occafions they often warn their readers against enquiries into futurity, and folicitude about events which lie hid in caufes yet unactive, and which time has not brought forward into the view of reafon. An idle and thoughtlefs refignation to chance, without

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