ESSAY XXI.

On Reflection as the Source of Cheerfulness.

How vain, and how vexatious is the flutter of the world! Even I, who am sufficiently sensible, perhaps too much so, to its pleasures and amusements, can find, after a little while, my spirits quite worn out by them, and learn from a frequent experience, that reflection of the most serious sort, is the only true and lasting source of cheerfulness.

As most of our affections here take their deepest tinge from the workings of imagination, so there are perhaps scarce any, that will maintain their terrifying shapes against the calm efforts of reason: but, when amidst the hurry of a mixed and varied scene, we give them only now and then a transitory glance, these airy phantoms cast a gloom and horror over our whole lives. It is then, that poverty and pain, and sickness, disgrace and disappointment, nay satiety itself, strike upon our unguarded fancies, in the most dreadful manner. Our hearts are filled with sorrow,

and poured out in ungrateful complainings. Cool reflection alone can disdain these bugbears of the mind: and to one who comprehends so far as our bounden understandings, can comprehend, the universal scheme of Providence, few of its particular dispensations will appear severe, while every present suffering is overbalanced by a glorious futurity.

How naturally the contemplation of what is most melancholy, leads to the most enlivening hopes, may be seen in some verses, which I will insert here, and which flowed from a natural chain of thoughts from the trifling, but gloomy incident of a bell tolling at midnight.

Hark! with what solemn toll the midnight bell
Summons Reflection to her dusky cell:

With leaden sound it dully strikes the ear,
Bids Horror wake and careless Fancy hear;
Chill'd Fancy hears with awful gloom opprest,
Thus by the deep-felt worldless voice addrest.
Wake mortal! wake from Pleasure's golden dream,
The present gay pursuit, the future scheme;
The vain regret of hours for ever past,
The vain delights in joys not made to last :
The vainer prying into future days,
Since, re to-morrow's sun exerts its rays,
My toll may speak them vain to thec. Thy fears,
Thy hopes, thy wishes vain, and vain thy tears.

What then to thee, whose folded limbs shall rest
In the dark bosom of the sabled. chest,
What will it then import to thee if fame,
With flatt'ring accents, dwells upon thy name,
Or spurns thy dust, or if, thy mould'ring form
Safe from life's dang'rous calm, or dreadful storm,
Sleeps in the concave of a well-turn'd tomb
By marble Cupids mourn'd amid the gloom
Of some old Abbey, venerably rude,
In Gothic pride: or in some solitude

Beneath the spreading hawthorn's flow'ry shade,
Crown'd with fresh grass and waving fern is laid:
Trod, in some public path, by frequent feet
Of passing swains, or deck'd by vi'lets sweet:
Nameless, unheeded, till a future day

Shall animate to bliss the lifeless clay.

Or whether gaily past thy festive hours,

Bath'd in rich oils, and crown'd with blooming flow'rs; Or pinch'd with want, and pin'd with wasting care,

All joys, all griefs, alike forgotten there.

The part well acted, gracious heaven assign'd,

If of the king, the warrior or the hind,

It matters not: or whether deck'd the scene

With pomp, and show, or humble, poor and mean,
The colouring of life's picture fades away,

When to these shades succeeds a clearer day.
The colouring partial Fortune blindly gave,
Debas'd the imperial figure to a slave.

In glitt❜ring robes, bade shapeless monsters glow,
And in a crown conceal'd the servile brow.
Perhaps false lights on well-drawn figures thrown,
Scarce cautious Virtue would her image own:
But when the gloss of titles, wealth, and pow'r,
Of Youth's short charm, and Beauty's fading flow'r,

Before Truth's dazzling sun shall fade away,
And the bare out-lines dare the piercing ray,
Then if the pencil of thy life has trac'd
A noble form, with full proportion grac'd,
A model of that image heav'n imprest
In the first thoughts of thy untainted breast,
Whate'er the painting Fortune's hand bestow'd,
Whether in crimson folds thy garments flow'd,
Or rags ungraceful, o'er thy limbs were thrown,
Thy ev'ry virtue overlook'd, unknown;
An eye all-judging, an all-pow'rful hand
The bounteous pallet shall at length command,
Reject the vicious shape that shrinks away,
Stript of those robes, that drest it once so gay.
Excuse the imperfect form, if well design'd,

Where the weak stroke betray'd the enlighten'd mind;
Grant every ornament and ev'ry aid

On ev'ry failing cast the proper shade,
And bid each smiling virtue stand display'd;
Improving ev'ry part, with skill divine,

Till the fair piece in full perfection shine.

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ESSAY XXII.

On the Employments of Life.

Why is it that almost all employments are so unsatisfactory, and that when one hath past a day of common life, in the best way one can, it seems, upon reflection, to be so mere a blank? And what is the conclusion to be drawn from so mortifying an observation? Certainly not any conclusion in favour of idleness: for employment, as such, is a very valuable thing. Let us have done ever so little, yet if we have done our best, we have the merit of having been employed, and this moral merit is the only thing of importance in human life.

To complain of the insignificancy of our employments, is but another name for repining at that Providence, which has appointed, to each of us, our station: let us but fill that well to the utmost of our power, and whatever it be, we shall find it to have duties and advantages enough.

But whence, then, is this constant dissatis