dence, has not enough to speak ill of her before her face. Such majesty she carries about her that her most prosperous enemies are fain to whisper their treason. All the power upon the earth can never extinguish her. She has lived in all ages; and, let the mistaken zeal of prevailing authority christen any opposition to it with what name they please, she makes it not only an ugly and unmannerly, but a dangerous thing to persist. She has lived very retired indeed—nay, sometimes so buried, that only some few of the discerning part of mankind could have a glimpse of her. With all that, she has eternity in her; she knows not how to die, and from the darkest clouds that shade and cover her, she breaks from time to time with triumph for her friends and terror to her enemies. Marquis of Halifax, Character of a Trimmer. TRUTH. ACCORDING to Democritus, Truth lies at the bottom of a well, the depth of which, alas! gives but little hope of release. To be sure, one advantage is derived from this, that the water serves for a mirror, in which Truth may be reflected. I have heard, however, that some philosophers, in seeking for Truth to pay homage to her, have seen their own image and adored it instead. Richter. TRUTH. THREE degrees of latitude overthrow all jurisprudence. A meridian determines truth, or a few years of possession. Fundamental law changes; right has its epochs; a pretty sort of justice that is bounded by a river or a mountain ! Truth on this side of the Pyrenees may be error on the other. Pascal.. TRUTH. THE difficulty of ascertaining precisely whether it be truth which we have attained, is, in many cases, much greater than the difficulty of the actual attainment. Philosophy has in this respect been compared, by a very happy illustration, which, therefore, homely and familiar as it is, I make no scruple to quote, to 'a game at which children play, in which one of them with his eyes bandaged, runs after the others. If he catch any one, he is obliged to tell his name; and if he fail to name him, he is obliged to let him go, and to begin his running once more. It is the same' says Fontenelle, the author from 'in our seeking after truth. bandaged, we do sometimes catch it; but then we cannot maintain with certainty that it is truth which we have caught, and in that moment it escapes from us.' whom I borrow this image, Though we have our eyes Dr. Thomas Brown, Lectures on Philosophy of Mind. TRUTH. BEFORE thy mystic altar, heavenly Truth, Sir W. Jones, Conclusion of Berkeley's Siris imitated. UNIVERSE. THERE is something very engaging to the fancy, as well as to our reason, in the treatises of metals, minerals, plants, and meteors. But when we survey the whole earth at once, and the several planets that lie within its neighbourhood, we are filled with a pleasing astonishment, to see so many worlds, hanging one above another, and sliding round their axles in such an amazing pomp and solemnity. If, after this, we contemplate those wide fields of æther that reach in height as far as from Saturn to the fixed stars, and run abroad almost to an infinitude, our imagination finds its capacity filled with so immense a prospect, and puts itself upon the stretch to comprehend it. But if we yet rise higher, and consider the fixed stars as so many vast oceans of flame, that are each of them attended with a different set of planets, and still discover new firmaments and new lights that are sunk farther in those unfathomable depths of æther, so as not to be seen by the strongest of our telescopes, we are lost in such a labyrinth of suns and worlds, and confounded with the immensity and magnificence of nature. Addison, Spectator, No. 420. UNIVERSITIES. I REGARD our public schools and universities, not only as nurseries of men for the service of the church and state, but also as places designed to teach mankind the most refined luxury, to raise the mind to its due perfection, and give it a taste for those entertainments which afford the highest transport, without the grossness or remorse that attend vulgar enjoyments. In those blessed retreats men enjoy the sweets of solitude, and yet converse with the greatest genii that have appeared in every age, wander through the delightful mazes of every art and science, and as they gradually enlarge their sphere of knowledge, at once rejoice in their present possessions, and are animated by the boundless prospect of future discoveries. There, a generous emulation, a noble thirst of fame, a love of truth and honourable regards, reign in minds as yet untainted from the world. There the stock of learning transmitted down from the ancients, is preserved, and receives a daily increase; and it is thence propagated by A A men, who, having finished their studies, go into the world, and spread that general knowledge and good taste throughout the land, which is so distant from the barbarism of its ancient inhabitants, or the fierce genius of its invaders. Berkeley, Guardian, No. 62. VANITY. VANITY is so rooted in the heart of man, that a common soldier, a scullion, will boast of himself, and will have his admirers. It is the same with the philosophers. Those who write would fain have the fame of having written well, and those who read it, would have the glory of having read it; and I, who am writing, probably feel the same desire, and not less those who shall read it. VANITY. Pascal, EVERY man is prompted by the love of himself to imagine that he possesses some qualities superior, either in kind or in degree, to those which he sees allotted to the rest of the world; and, whatever apparent disadvantages he may suffer in the comparison with others, he has some invisible distinctions, some latent reserve of excellence, which he throws into the balance, and by which he generally fancies that it is turned in his favour. ohnson, Rambler, No. 21. VANITY. Now to confess the honest truth, I am afraid if this evil weed were totally eradicated, so as to leave no fibre of it remaining anywhere, we should find business of all kinds go on very slowly in the world: for we have for the most part such a lumpish indolence in the clay of our composition, such an insensibility to all beyond the present impulse of appetite, as cannot ordinarily be roused to action without this fiery drug; or where other passions do instigate, they would make mad work unless this were employed to check them by its counter-action. Tucker, Light of Nature. WOMAN OF VANITY. VANITY maketh a woman tainted with it so top-full of herself that she spilleth it upon the company and because her own thoughts are entirely employed in self-contemplation, she endeavoureth, by a cruel mistake, to confine her acquaintance to the same narrow circle of that which only concerneth her Ladyship, forgetting that she is not half that importance to the world that she is to herself; so mistaken she is in her value by being her own appraiser. She will fetch such a compass in discourse, to bring in her beloved self, and rather than fail, her fine petticoat, that there can hardly be a better scene than such a trial of ridiculous ingenuity. It is a pleasure to see her angle for commendations, and rise so dissatisfied with the ill-bred company if they will not bite. To observe her throwing her eyes about to fetch in prisoners, and go about cruizing like a privateer, and so out of countenance if she return without booty, is no ill piece of comedy. She is so eager to draw respect, that she always misseth it, yet thinking it so much her due, that when she faileth, she groweth waspish. Good words of any other lady are so many stones thrown at her, she can by no means bear them; they make her so uneasy, that she cannot keep her seat, but she riseth and goeth home half burst with anger and strait-lacing. If by great chance she saith anything that hath sense in it, she expecteth such an excessive rate of commendations, that to her thinking, the company ever riseth in her debt. She looketh upon rules as things made for the common people, and not for persons of her rank; and this opinion sometimes tempteth her to extend her prerogative to the dispensing with the commandments. |