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PREACHING.

Preaching, in the first sense of the word, ceased as soon as ever the gospel was written.

THE BEST PHYSICIAN.

Selden.

He who cures a disease may be the skilfullest, but he that prevents it is the safest physician.

A BOOK-HUNTER.

My poor nephew, Lord

Thomas Fuller.

was deranged.

The first symptom that appeared was his sending a chaldron of coals as a present to the Prince of Wales on learning that he was loaded with debts. He delighted in what is called book-hunting. This notable diversion consisted in taking a volume of a book and hiding it in some secret part of the library, among volumes of similar binding and size. When he had forgot where the game lay, he hunted till he found it. Horace Walpole.

REFORM-WHERE TO BEGIN.

Make yourself an honest man, and then you may be sure that there is one rascal less in the world.

Carlyle.

ANCIENT AND MODERN VALUE OF MONEY. The value of money and the increase of our opulence, might form, says Johnson, a curious subject of research. In the reign of Edward the Sixth, Latimer mentions it as a proof of his father's prosperity, that though but a yeoman, he gave his daughters five pounds each for their portion. At the latter end of Elizabeth's reign, seven hundred pounds were such a temptation to courtship as made all other motives suspected. Congreve makes twelve thousand pounds more than a counterbalance to the affection of Belinda. No poet will now fly his favourite character at less than fifty thousand. Disraeli.

THREE NUMEROUS TRIBES.

There are three tribes in England, not named in the Old Testament, who considerably outnumber all the rest. These are the High Vulgarites, who are the children of Rahank and Phashan; the Middle Vulgarites, who are the children of Mammon and Terade; and the Low Vulgarites, who are the children of Tahag, Rahag, and Bohobtay-il. Southey.

ELEMENTS Of Life.

The bread of life is love; the salt of life is work; The sweetness of life, poesy; the water of life, faith. Jameson.

FORTUNATE IMPOSSIBILITY.

An Italian, who was very poor, and very much addicted to play, used to apostrophise Fortune thus-"Treacherous goddess! thou canst make me lose, but thou canst not make me pay." Menage.

THE PERFECTION OF MODERN TYPOGRAPHY. It appears by a calculation made by the printers of Steevens's edition of Shakespeare, that every octavo page of that work, text and notes, contains 2680 distinct pieces of metal; which in a sheet amount to 42,880-the misplacing of any one of which would inevitably cause a blunder! With this curious fact before us, the accurate state of our printing, in general, is to be admired; and errata ought more freely to be pardoned than the fastidious minuteness of the insect eye of certain critics have allowed.

Disraeli.

PLUTARCH'S Lives.

An author, in sheer ignorance, not humour, discoursing of the difficulty of some pursuit, said, that even if a man had as many lives as a cat, nay, as many lives as one Plutarch is said to have had, he could not accomplish it. Horace Walpole.

THE POET'S OBLIGATIONS TO NATURE.

A poet ought not to pick nature's pocket. Let him borrow, and so borrow as to repay by the very act of borrowing. Examine nature accurately, but write from recollection, and trust more to the imagination than the memory. Coleridge.

CONVENTIONALITY.

Conventionality fetters down society-and especially as regards dinner-parties-with chains of the dullest sameness; and perpetuates all kinds of household absurdities, from laying pokers over expiring fires, to forbidding soup to be taken twice, however fond you may be of it; with many other mistakes too numerous to Albert Smith.

mention.

QUICK WORK.

It was once the fashion to wear coats, the material for which had not long before been on the back of the sheep. For rapidity of work in this way, I know nothing that can compete with the achievement of Coxeter of Greenham Mills, near Newbury. He had a couple of South Down sheep shorn at his factory at five o'clock in the morning, the wool thus produced was put through the usual processes, and by a quarterpast six in the evening it resulted in a complete damson-coloured coat, which was worn at an evening party by Sir John Throckmorton. A wager for a thousand guineas was won by this feat, with three-quarters of an hour to spare. The sheep were roasted whole, and devoured at a splendid banquet. In one day they afforded comfort to both the inner and outward man.

MACAULAY'S LAYS.

Doran.

Joanna Baillie had a great admiration of Macaulay's Roman ballads. "But," said. some one, "do you really account them as poetry?" She replied, "They are poetry, if the sounds of the trumpet be music!" Jameson.

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