CLERICAL FOPS.

There is a class of fops not usually designated by that epithet-men clothed in profound black, with large canes, and strange, amorphous hats-of big speech, and imperative presence-talkers about Plat‣ -great affecters of senility-despisers of women, and all the graces of life-fierce foes to common-sense— abusive of the living, and approving no one who has not been dead for at least a century. Such fops, as vain and as shallow as their fraternity in Bondstreet, differ from these only as Gorgonius differed from Rufillus. Sydney Smith.

LYING.

Although the devil be the father of lies, he seems, like other great inventors, to have lost much of his reputation, by the continual improvements that have been made upon him.-Swift.

THE HEALTHY MAN.

Of all the know-nothing persons in this world, commend us to the man who has "never known a day's illness." He is a moral dunce, one who has lost the greatest lesson in life; who has skipped the finest lecture in that great school of humanity, the sick-chamber. Let him be versed in mathematics, profound in metaphysics, a ripe scholar in the clas sics, a bachelor of arts, or even a doctor in divinity; yet is he as one of those gentlemen whose education

has been neglected. For all his college acquirements, how inferior is he in useful knowledge to a mortal who has had but a quarter's gout, or half a year's ague -how infinitely below the fellow-creature who has been soundly taught his tic-douloureux, thoroughly grounded in the rheumatics, and deeply red in scarlet fever! And yet, what is more common than to hear a great hulking, florid fellow, bragging of an ignorance, a brutal ignorance, that he shares in common with the pig and bullock, the generality of which die, probably, without ever having experienced a day's indisposition?—Hood.

PLAIN TRUTH.

One of the sublimest things in the world, is plain truth!-Bulwer.

SELF-IMPORTANCE.

Of such mighty importance every man is to himself, and ready to think he is so to others; without once making this easy and obvious reflection, that his affairs can have no more weight with other men than theirs have with him; and how little that is, he is sensible enough.-Swift.

MISERS.

The passion for wealth has worn out much of its grossness by tract of time. Our ancestors certainly conceived of money as able to confer a distinct gratification in itself, not alone considered simply as a sym

bol of wealth. The oldest poets, when they introduce a miser, constantly make him address his gold as his mistress; as something to be seen, felt, and hugged; as capable of satisfying two of the senses at least. The substitution of a thin, unsatisfying medium for the good old tangible gold, has made avarice quite a Platonic affection in comparison with the seeing, touching, and handling pleasures of the old Chrysophilities. A bank-note can no more satisfy the touch of a true sensualist in this passion, than Creusa could return her husband's embrace in the shades.

A miser is sometimes a grand personification of Fear. He has a fine horror of Poverty; and he is not content to keep Want from the door, or at arm's length-but he places it, by heaping wealth upon wealth, at a sublime distance!-Lamb.

TAVERNS.

Dr. Johnson breaks out into a high encomium upon taverns: "There is no private house," he remarks, "in which people can enjoy themselves so well as at a capital tavern. Let there be ever so great plenty of good things, ever so much grandeur, ever so much elegance, ever so much desire that every body should be easy, in the nature of things it cannot be there must always be some degree of care and anxiety. The master of the house is anxious to entertain his guests; the guests are anxious to be agreeable to him; and no man, but a very impudent dog indeed, can as freely command what is in another

man's house as if it were his own: whereas, in a tavern, there is a general freedom from anxiety. You are sure you are welcome; and the more noise you make, the more trouble you give, the more good things you call for, the welcomer you are. No servant will attend you with the alacrity which waiters do, who are incited by the prospect of an immediate reward in proportion as they please. No, sir; there is nothing which has yet been contrived by man, by which so much happiness is produced, as by a good tavern or inn."

Archbishop Leighton used often to say, that if he were to choose a place to die in, it should be an inn.

MISTAKE ON BOTH SIDES.

Voltaire was one day speaking warmly in praise of the physician Haller, in presence of a person who was living in his house. "Ah, sir," said this person, "if M. Haller would but speak of your works as you speak of his." 'Possibly we are both mistaken,"

said Voltaire.

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PRESENTS.

If presents be not the soul of friendship, doubtless they are the most spiritual part of the body in that intercourse. There is too much narrowness of thinking on this point! The punctilio of acceptance, methinks, is too confined and straitened. I should be content to receive money, or clothes, or a joint of meat from a friend. Why should he not send me a

dinner as well as a dessert? I would taste him in the beasts of the field, and through all creation.-Lamb.

INFANTS.

Some admiring what motives to mirth infants meet with in their silent and solitary smiles, have resolved, how truly I know not, that they converse with angels; as, indeed, such cannot among mortals find any fitter companions.-Fuller.

DISCRETION.

There is no talent so useful towards rising in the world, or which puts men more out of the reach of fortune, than that quality generally possessed by the dullest sort of men, and in common speech called discretion; a species of lower prudence, by the assistance of which, people of the meanest intellects, without any other qualification, pass through the world in great tranquillity, and with universal good treatment, neither giving nor taking offence.-Swift.

INTELLIGIBILITY.

It would be well, both for the public and the writers themselves, if some authors would but adopt Lord Falkland's method, before publishing his works, who, when he doubted whether a word was perfectly. intelligible or not, used to consult one of his lady's chambermaids, (not the waiting-woman, because it was possible she might be conversant in romances,) and by her judgment was guided whether to receive