41. OLIVER GOLDSMITH.

1. Oliver Goldsmith was born in Ireland in 1728, and died in London in 1774. His father was a clergyman. He was admitted to Trinity College, Dublin; took the degree of A. B.; was a rejected candidate for holy orders; tried the study of the law; spent eighteen months as a medical student; was an usher in a school; went to Leyden, and thence set out to travel over Europe, with only his flute, a guinea, and one shirt.

2. Returning to England, he was assistant to a chemist, then a proof-reader, and a hack 'writer for various journals.

He was afterwards a critic, a translator, and a prolific writer in prose and poetry. "The Vicar of Wakefield," and "The Traveller," first brought him into notice. "The Deserted Village" was received with enthusiasm. To his amiable father he has given celebrity in Dr. Primrose in "The Vicar of Wakefield," and in the Preacher in "The Deserted Village."

3. Goldsmith was reckless, thriftless, but gentle, generous, and full of love and pity. A tale of distress would take from him his last penny. His affairs became much deranged; and his circumstances preying upon his mind, exasperated the fever which caused his death in 1774, at the age of forty-six. The great charm of Goldsmith's poetry is its simplicity, its tenderness, its truth to nature, and its perfect and felicitous comparisons. As Dr. Johnson has said: "Whatever Goldsmith wrote, he did it better than any other man; he touched nothing that he did not adorn."

4. Thackeray says of him: "To be the most beloved of English writers, what a title that is for a man! Wander he must, but he carries away a home relic with him, and dies with it on his breast. His nature is truant; in repose, it longs for change, as on the jour

ney it looks back for friends and quiet. What is the charm of his verse, of his style, and humor? His sweet regrets, his delicate compassion, his soft smile, his tremulous sympathy, the weakness which he owns! Your love for him is half pity. You come hot and tired from the day's battle, and this sweet minstrel sings to you.

5. "Who could harm the kind, vagrant harper? Whom did he ever hurt? He carries no weapon, save the harp on which he plays to you; and with which he delights great and humble, young and old, the captains in the tents or the soldiers round the fire, or the women and children in the villages, at whose porches he stops and sings his simple songs of love and beauty.

6. “With that sweet story of 'The Vicar of Wakefield,' he has found entry into every castle and every hamlet in Europe. Not one of us, however busy or hard, but once or twice in our lives has passed an evening with him, and undergone the charm of his delightful music.

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Think of him reckless, thriftless, vain if you like, but merciful, gentle, generous, full of love and pity. He passes out of our life, and goes to render his account beyond it. Think of the poor pensioners weeping at his grave; think of the noble spirits that admired and deplored him; think of the righteous pen that wrote his epitaph, and of the wonderful and unanimous response of affection with which the world has paid back the love he gave it.

8. "His humor delights us still; his song is fresh and beautiful as when first he charmed with it; his words are all in our mouths; his very weaknesses are beloved and familiar. His benevolent spirit seems still to smile upon us; to do gentle kindnesses; to succor with sweet charity; to soothe, caress, and forgive; to plead with the fortunate for the unhappy and poor."

42. THE VILLAGE PREACHER.

Near yonder copse, where once the garden smiled,
And still where many a garden-flower grows wild,
There, where a few torn shrubs the place disclose,
The village preacher's modest mansion rose.
A man he was to all the country dear,
And passing rich with forty pounds a year.
Remote from towns he ran his godly race,

Nor e'er had changed, nor wished to change, his place:
Unskillful he to fawn, or seek for power,
By doctrines fashioned to the varying hour;
Far other aims his heart had learned to prize;
More bent to raise the wretched than to rise.
His house was known to all the vagrant train,
He chid their wanderings, but relieved their pain;
The long-remembered beggar was his guest,
Whose beard descending swept his aged breast ;
The ruined spendthrift, now no longer proud,
Claimed kindred there, and had his claims allowed;
The broken soldier, kindly bade to stay,
Sat by his fire, and talked the night away;
Wept o'er his wounds, or, tales of sorrow done,
Shouldered his crutch, and showed how fields were won.
Pleased with his guests, the good man learned to glow,
And quite forgot their vices in their woe;
Careless their merits or their faults to scan,

His pity gave ere charity began.

Thus to relieve the wretched was his pride,

And e'en his failings leaned to virtue's side;
But, in his duty prompt at every call,

He watched and wept, he prayed and felt, for all;
And, as a bird each fond endearment tries
To tempt its new-fledged offspring to the skies,
He tried each art, reproved each dull delay,

Allured to brighter worlds, and led the way.
Beside the bed where parting life was laid,
And sorrow, guilt, and pain, by turns dismayed,
The reverend champion stood. At his control,
Despair and anguish fled the struggling soul;
Comfort came down the trembling wretch to raise,
And his last faltering accents whispered praise.
At church, with meek and unaffected grace,
His looks adorned the venerable place;
Truth from his lips prevailed with double sway,
And fools, who came to scoff, remained to pray.
The service past, around the pious man,
With ready zeal, each honest rustic ran;

E'en children followed with endearing wile,

And plucked his gown, to share the good man's smile;
His ready smile a parent's warmth expressed,

Their welfare pleased him, and their cares distressed;
To them his heart, his love, his griefs, were given,
But all his serious thoughts had rest in heaven:
As some tall cliff that lifts its awful form,

Swells from the vale, and midway leaves the storm,
Though round its breast the rolling clouds are spread,
Eternal sunshine settles on its head.

From GOLDSMITH'S Deserted Village.

DICTIONARY LESSON. Find the definitions of copse, fawn, sway, vagrant, allure, scoff, rustic, eternal.

1. By civilization is meant the condition of a people in regard to wealth, comfort, government, and culture. All people possess more or less of the elements of civilization. The rude Australian savage who has learnt to make fire by rubbing two sticks together, the Red Indian who has learnt to make a stone mortar for pounding

his corn in, the negro of Central Africa who has learnt how to make an iron spear-head, have all taken the first steps in civilization.

2. All the advanced nations have grown up from lower conditions of civilization. The lowest condition is that state in which men use only bows and arrows and stone hatchets, live by fishing and hunting, dwell in caves or huts, clothe themselves in the skins of wild animals, delight in fighting and bloodshed, and live in small tribes under chiefs. The wild Indians of America, and the natives of many of the Pacific islands, and many negroes of Africa, represent this stage. Races in this condition are pagans, or people who have no correct idea of one God.

3. The next stage of civilization is the middle one. Men have now begun to cultivate the soil; and they keep horses, sheep, camels, and cattle. They may be either nomads, living in tents, and driving their flocks and herds from one pasture ground to another, or they may be people with fixed habitations.

4. They have iron implements and have learnt to manufacture cloth; they may have a written language; they have begun to trade, to have armies and carry on war, and to form governments. The Tartar tribes of Central Asia and the Bedouins of Northern Africa represent this stage.

5. The most advanced state is that in which the great civilized nations now are-with books, machinery, sciences, steamships, railroads, and telegraphs; with governments founded on a written law; with schools, churches, and newspapers; with commerce and great cities.

6. The progress which a people makes in civilization is owing very much to geographical position,-to a fertile soil, favorable climate, mineral resources, and facilities for trading with other people.

COMPOSITION. Write an abstract from memory.