True Dignity.-BEATTIE.

VAIN man, is grandeur given to gay attire?
Then let the butterfly thy pride upbraid;-
To friends, attendants, armies, bought with hire?
It is thy weakness that requires their aid ;—
To palaces, with gold and gems inlaid?
They fear the thief, and tremble in the storm ;—

To hosts, through carnage who to conquest wade?
Behold the victor vanquished by the worm!
Behold what deeds of wo the locusts can perform!

True dignity is his, whose tranquil mind

Virtue has raised above the things below;

Who, every hope and fear to Heaven resigned, Shrinks not, though fortune aim her deadliest blow.

Beauty.-GAY.

WHAT is the blooming tincture of the skin
Το
peace of mind and harmony within?
What the bright sparkling of the finest eye
To the soft soothing of a calm reply?
Can comeliness of form, or shape, or air,
With comeliness of words or deeds compare?
• No:-those at first the unwary heart may gain;
But these, these only, can the heart retain.

Indolence.-THOMSON.

THEIR Only labor was to kill the time;
And labor dire it is, and weary wo.

They sit, they loll, turn o'er some idle rhyme:
Then, rising sudden, to the glass they go,
Or saunter forth, with tottering step and slow:
This soon too rude an exercise they find;

Straight on their couch their limbs again they throw,
Where, hours on hours, they, sighing, lie reclined,
And court the vapory god, soft-breathing in the wind..

Change.-YOUNG.

OOK nature through; 'tis revolution all :

change; no death. Day follows night, and night
dying day; stars rise, and set, and rise;
h takes the example. See, the Summer, gay
her green chaplet and ambrosial flowers,
ps into pallid Autumn: Winter, gray,
-id with frost, and turbulent with storm,
s Autumn, and his golden fruits, away;—
melts into the Spring. Soft Spring, with breath
onian, from warm chambers of the south,
alls the first. All, to re-flourish, fades;
na wheel, all sinks to re-ascend-
lems of man, who passes, not expires.

LESSON VI.

Contrasted Soliloquies.-JANE TAYLOR.

As!" exclaimed a silver-headed sage, "how narrow utmost extent of human science!-how circumthe sphere of intellectual exertion! I have spent in acquiring knowledge; but how little do I know! ther I attempt to penetrate the secrets of nature, the am bewildered and benighted. Beyond a certain is but confusion or conjecture; so that the advanthe learned over the ignorant, consists greatly in scertained how little is to be known.

true that I can measure the sun, and compute the s of the planets; I can calculate their periodical nts, and even ascertain the laws by which they pereir sublime revolutions; but with regard to their tion, and the beings which inhabit them, what do I ore than the clown?

ghting to examine the economy of nature in our own have analyzed the elements; and have given names

to their component parts. And yet, should I not be as much at a loss to explain the burning of fire, or to account for the liquid quality of water, as the vulgar, who use and enjoy them without thought or examination ?

I remark that all bodies, unsupported, fall to the ground; and I am taught to account for this by the law of gravitation. But what have I gained here more than a term? Does it convey to my mind any idea of the nature of that mysterious and invisible chain, which draws all things to a common centre? I observe the effect, I give a name to the cause; but can I explain or comprehend it?

"Pursuing the track of the naturalist, I have learned to 1istinguish the animal, vegetable and mineral kingdoms; and to divide these into their distinct tribes and families: but can I tell, after all this toil, whence a single blade of grass derives its vitality? Could the most minute researches enable me to discover the exquisite pencil, that paints and fringes the flower of the field? Have I ever detected the secret, that gives their brilliant dye to the ruby and the emerald, or the art that enamels the delicate shell?

"I observe the sagacity of animals; I call it instinct, and speculate upon its various degrees of approximation to the reason of man. But, after all, I know as little of the cogitations of the brute, as he does of mine. When I see a flight of birds overhead, performing their evolutions, or steering their course to some distant settlement, their signals and cries are as unintelligible to me, as are the learned languages to the unlettered rustic: I understand as little of their policy and laws, as they do of Blackstone's Commentaries.

"But, leaving the material creation, my thoughts have often ascended to loftier subjects, and indulged in metaphysical speculation. And here, while I easily perceive in myself the two distinct qualities of matter and mind, I am baffled in every attempt to comprehend their mutual dependence and mysterious connexion. When my hand moves in obedience to my will, have I the most distant conception of the manner in which the volition is either communicated or understood? Thus, in the exercise of one of the most simple and ordinary actions, I am perplexed and confounded, if I attempt to account for it.

gain, how many years of my life were devoted to the ition of those languages, by the means of which I explore the records of remote ages, and become familth the learning and literature of other times. And have I gathered from these, but the mortifying fact, at as ever been struggling with his own impotence, and endeavoring to overleap the bounds which limit hs is inquiries?

las! then, what have I gained by my laborious rees, but an humbling conviction of my weakness and nce? How little has man, at his best estate, of which st! What folly in him to glory in his contracted powto value himself upon his imperfect acquisitions!"

ell," exclaimed a young lady, just returned from "my education is at last finished!-indeed, it would nge, if, after five years' hard application, any thing eft incomplete. Happily, that is all over now; and I othing to do, but to exercise my various accomplish

t me see !-As to French, I am mistress of that, and t, if possible, with more fluency than English. Italian ead with ease, and pronounce very well; as well, at s any of my friends; and that is all one need wish for an. Music I have learned till I am perfectly sick of t, now that we have a grand piano, it will be delightplay when we have company; I must still continue to e a little;-the only thing, I think, that I need now e myself in. And then there are my Italian songs! every body allows I sing with taste; and as it is what people can pretend to, I am particularly glad that

drawings are universally admired,-especially the nd flowers, which are beautiful, certainly besides have a decided taste in all kinds of fancy ornaments. en my dancing and waltzing,-in which our master owned that he could take me no farther;-just the or it, certainly; it would be unpardonable if I did el.

"As to common things, geography, and history, and poetry, and philosophy,thank my stars, I have got through them all! so that I may consider myself not only perfectly accomplished, but also thoroughly well informed.-Well, to be sure, how much I have fagged through!-the only wonder is, that one head can contain it all!"

LESSON VII.

To the Rainbow.-CAMPBELL.

TRIUMPHAL ARCH, that fill'st the sky
When storms prepare to part,

I ask not proud philosophy

To teach me what thou art.

Still seem, as to my childhood's sight,

A midway station given,

For happy spirits to alight

Betwixt the earth and heaven.

Can all, that optics teach, unfold

Thy form to please me so,

As when I dreamed of gems and gold,
Hid in thy radiant bow?

When Science from Creation's face
Enchantment's veil withdraws,
What lovely visions yield their place
To cold material laws!

And yet, fair bow, no fabling dreams,
But words of the Most High,
Have told why first thy robe of beams
Was woven in the sky.