learn; others run still in the same gyre to weariness, to satiety, our choice is infinite; other labors require recreation; our very labor recreates our sports; we can never want either somewhat to do, or somewhat that we would do. How numberless are the volumes which men have written of arts, of tongues! How endless is that volume which God hath written of the world! wherein every creature is a letter; every day a new page. Who can be weary of either of these? To find wit in poetry; in philosophy, profoundness; in mathematics, acuteness; in history, wonder of events; in oratory, sweet eloquence; in divinity, supernatural light and holy devotion; as so many rich metals in their proper mines; whom would it not ravish with delight? After all these, let us but open our eyes, we cannot look beside a lesson, in this universal book of our Maker, worth our study, worth taking out. What creature hath not his miracle? what event doth not challenge his observation? How many busy tongues chase away good hours in pleasant chat, and complain of the haste of night! What ingenious mind can be sooner weary of talking with learned authors, the most harmless and sweetest companions? Let the world contemn us; while we have these delights we cannot envy them; we cannot wish ourselves other than we are. Besides, the way to all other contentments is troublesome; the only recompense is in the end. But very search of knowledge is delightsome. Study itself is our life; from which we would not be barred for a world. How much sweeter then is the fruit of study, the conscience of knowledge? In comparison whereof the soul that hath once tasted it, easily contemns all human comforts.1 RICHARD LOVELACE. 1618-1658. RICHARD LOVELACE, son of Sir William Lovelace, of Woolwich, in Kent, was born in 1618, and educated at Oxford. Wood says of him, that "he was accounted the most amiable and beautiful person that eye ever beheld: a person also of innate modesty, virtue, and courtly deportment." On leaving the aniversity he obtained a commission in the army, being a very firm loyalist. After the ruin of the king's cause, and of his own fortune, he commanded regiment in the French service, and was wounded at Dunkirk. The lady to whom he was engaged, and to whom he addressed much of his poetry, supposing him dead of his wounds, married another. He returned to England in 1648, and was imprisoned, but was set at liberty on the king's death. After this, he suffered extreme poverty, having spent all his fortune in the service 1 How charming is divine philosophy! Not harsh and crabbed as dull fools suppose; But musical as is Apollo's lute, And a perpetual feast of nectar'd sweets, of his sovereign, and lingered out a wretched life till 1658, when he died of consumption, induced by misery and want. TO ALTHEA. Written in Prison. When love with unconfined wings Hovers within my gates: And my divine Althea brings Stone walls do not a prison make, THE GRASSHOPPER. To my noble friend, Mr. Charles Cotton. Drunk every night with a delicious tear Dropp'd thee from heaven, where now thou'rt rear'd; The joys of earth and air are thine entire, That with thy feet and wings dost hop and fly; Up with the day; the sun thou welcom'st then; But ah! the sickle! golden ears are cropp'd; Sharp frosty fingers all your flowers have topp'd, Thou best of men and friends! we will create Our sacred hearths shall burn eternally Shall strike his frost-stretch'd wings, dissolve, and fly Thus richer than untempted kings are we, That asking nothirg, nothing need; Though ord of all what seas embrace; yet he A CONSPICUOUs place in the prose literature of our language due to the historian and divine, Thomas Fuller. He was the son of a clergyman of the same name, and was born in 1608 at Aldwinkle in Northamptonshire, the native place of Dryden. At the early age of twelve, he was sent to Queen's College, Cambridge, where he distinguished himself for his attainments, and on entering life as a preacher in that city, he acquired the greatest popularity. He afterwards passed through a rapid succession of promotions, until he ac quired (1641) the lectureship of the Savoy Church in London. To show his fidelity to the royal cause, he procured, in 1643, a nomination as chaplain to the royal army. When the heat of the war was passed he returned to London, and became lecturer at St. Bride's church. Subsequently he occupied other situations in the church of England, and at the Restoration (1660) he was chosen chaplain extraordinary to the king. The next year he was prematurely cut off by fever at the age of fifty-three. The works of Fuller are very numerous: the chief of which are the following: 1. "History of the Worthies of England," one of the earliest biographical works in the language; a strange mixture of topography, biography, and popular antiquities. 2. The Holy and Profane State," the former proposing examples for imitation; the latter their opposites, for our abhorrence. Each contains characters in every department of life, as, "the father," "husband," soldier," "divine," &c.; lives of eminent persons, as illustrative of these characters; and general essays. 3. "The History of the Holy War," and The Church History of Britain." There are specimens of historical painting in these works that have perhaps never been excelled. 4. "Good Thoughts in Bad Times." 5. "A Pisgah-sight of Palestine and the Confines thereof; with the History of the Old and New Testament acted thereon." Besides these he published a large number of tracts and sermons on various subjects. Fuller was indeed an extraordinary man. "If ever there was an amusing writer in this world, Thomas Fuller was one. There was in him a combination of those qualities which minister to our entertainment, such as few have ever possessed in an equal degree. He was, first of all, a man of multifarious reading; of great and digested knowledge, which an extraordinary retentiveness of memory preserved ever ready for use, and considerable ac curacy of judgment enabled him successfully to apply. So well does he vary his treasures of memory and observation, so judiciously does he interweave his anecdotes, quotations, and remarks, that it is impossible to conceive a more delightful checker-work of acute thought and apposite illustration. of original and extracted sentiment, than is presented in his works."1 1 Read-án article on Fuller in the "Retrospective Review," . 50. MISCELLANEOUS APHORISMS. Know, next to religion, there is nothing accomplisheth a man more than learning. Learning in a lord is as a diamond in gold. He must rise early, yea, not at all go to bed, who will have every one's good word. He needs strong arms who is to swim against the stream. It is hard for one of base parentage to personate a king without overacting his part. The pope knows he can catch no fish if the waters are clear. The cardinals' eyes in the court of Rome were old and dim ; and therefore the glass, wherein they see any thing, must be well silvered. Many wish that the tree may be felled, who hope to gather chips by the fall. The Holy Ghost came down, not in the shape of a vulture, but in the form of a dove. Gravity is the ballast of the soul. Learning hath gained most by those books by which the printers have lost. He shall be immortal who liveth till he be stoned by one without fault. It is the worst clandestine marriage when God is not invited to it. Deceive not thyself by over-expecting happiness in the married state. Look not therein for contentment greater than God will give, or a creature in this world can receive, namely, to be free from all inconveniences. Marriage is not like the hill Olympus, wholly clear, without clouds. Remember the nightingales, which sing only some months in the spring, but commonly are silent when they have hatched their eggs, as if their mirth were turned into care for their young ones. THE GOOD SCHOOLMASTER.1 There is scarce any profession in the commonwealth more necessary, which is so slightly performed. The reasons whereof I conceive to be these:-First, young scholars make this calling their refuge; yea, perchance, before they have taken any degree in the university, commence schoolmasters in the country, as if nothing else were required to set up this profession but only a rod and a ferula. Secondly, others who are able, use it only as a The remarks of Fuller on this subject are most admirable. How little discrimination parents often evince in placing their children at school; and how many are there who "set up school,” as the phrase is, without any suitable preparation or qualifications for the responsible duty. It is humiliating to reflect how often that profession, for which as much training and study are requisite as for any other, has been assumed merely as the last resort. But a better day is at hand. passage to better preferment, to patch the rents in their present fortune, till they can provide a new one, and betake themselves to some more gainful calling. Thirdly, they are disheartened from doing their best with the miserable reward which in soine places they receive, being masters to their children and slaves to their parents. Fourthly, being grown rich they grow negligent, and scorn to touch the school but by the proxy of the usher. But se how well our schoolmaster behaves himself. His genius inclines him with delight to his profession. God of his goodness, hath fitted several men for several callings, that the necessity of church and state, in all conditions, may be provided for. And thus God mouldeth some for a schoolmaster's life, undertaking it with desire and delight, and discharging it with dexterity and happy success. He studieth his scholars' natures as carefully as they their books; and ranks their dispositions into several forms. And though it may seem difficult for him in a great school to descend to all particulars, yet experienced schoolmasters may quickly make a grammar of boys' natures. He is able, diligent, and methodical in his teaching; not leading them rather in a circle than forwards. He minces his precepts for children to swallow, hanging clogs on the nimbleness of his own soul, that his scholars may go along with him. He is moderate in inflicting deserved correction. Many a schoolmaster better answereth the name paidotribes1 than paidagogos, rather tearing his scholars' flesh with whipping than giving them good education. No wonder if his scholars hate the muses, being presented unto them in the shapes of fiends and furies. Such an Orbilius mars more scholars than he makes. Their tyranny hath caused many tongues to stammer which spake plain by nature, and whose stuttering at first was nothing else but fears quavering on their speech at their master's presence; and whose mauling them about their heads hath dulled those who in quickness exceeded their master. To conclude, let this, amongst other motives, make schoolmas ters careful in their place-that the eminences of their scholars have commended the memories of their schoolmasters to posts. rity. 1 Boy-beater. * He means "boy-teacher,” but the paidagogos (maidaywyos) “pedagogue" of the Greeks, was the servant who conducted the children from their homes to the schools, and not the instructor. * How beautifully the historian Gibbon expresses the obligations due from a scholar to a faithful and competent teacher: "The expression of gratitude is a virtue and a pleasure; a liberal mind wik delight to cherish and celebrate the memory of its parents, AND HE TEACHERS OF SCIENCE ARE THE PARENTS OF THE MIND." Memoirs, ch. iii. |