SWEEPING CHIMNIES. AN ingenious gentleman proposed as the best and most effectual method of sweeping chimnies, to place a large goose at the top, and then by a string tied round her feet to pull the animal gently down to the hearth. The sagacious projector asserted, that the goose being extremely averse to this method of entering a house would struggle against it with all her might; and during this resistance would move her wings with such force and rapidity as could not fail to sweep the chimney completely." Good God," cried a lady present, "how cruel would that be to the poor goose!"--"Why Madam," replied the gentleman, you think my method cruel to the goose, a couple of ducks will do.” "if THE BELIEVER AND THE ATHEIST. B. THAT is as certain as that God hath made the world. 4. Pshaw! he did not make the world. B. (With surprize) No! Who made it then? 4. Why nobody. It never was made. B. How came it here? A. Why it has been here from all eternity. B. I should never have guessed it to be so old. But still you have not informed me how it exists. A. By chance. B. By chance! A. Yes, unquestionably by mere chance. You have no notion of the power of chance. B. The power of chance !-Chance is blind. A. Blindness does not diminish power. For, even according to your Bible, Samson was able to pull down a house, and smother three thousand Philistines, after he was stone blind. B. Sneering is one thing and reasoning is another. A. Then let us power of chance. into a box, and reason -I speak for the Were a thousand dice put thrown out often enough, there can be no doubt but six thousand would be thrown at last; nay if a hundred thousand were to be rattled and thrown without ceasing, six hundred thousand would appear in process of time at one throw. Why, therefore, may not this world, such as we find it, have been cast up by the mere rattling of atoms? B. I should humbly conceive, that it rather was the production of an almighty intelligent Maker. I am fully convinced that order, uniformity, and exquisite adaptness, must be the work of intelligence and wisdom as well as power. A. "Nec Deus intersit nisi dignus vindice nodus." What do you think of that maxim of Horace ? B. I think it a very good one as he applied it. But I am convinced that Horace, though a heathen, would not have brought it into such an argument as the present. A. Perhaps not, for as you say, he was an ignorant heathen, and believed in gods. B. Had he lived at present he would have confined his faith to one; for independent of the Christian religion, all the improvements that have been made in science since his time lead us to acknowledge a first intelligent Creator and Governor of the universe. A. They lead me to no such things. I adhere to chance and acknowledge no other God. What do you say to that? B. I say, that was I to utter such an impious expression, I should be afraid of going to Hell. A. There again! Why there is no such place. B. How can you be sure of that? A. Because the thing is impossible. B. Did you not assert a little while ago that the world was made by chance? A. I assert so still! B. Then how can you be sure that such a place as Hell is not made by chance also ? This unexpected question seemed to disconcert the philosopher. B. (With a very serious air) Sir, I would not have you to trust entirely to such reasoning, which is wicked as well as inconsistent: and permit me to add a piece of advice, which it greatly imports you to follow-Renounce impiety, that in case there should, by chance or otherwise, be any such place as Hell prepared for blasphemers, you may not be sent to it. OFFICER AND SOLDIER. STRICT discipline is essentially requisite for the well being of an army; without which it degenerates into a lawless mob, more formidable to their friends than enemies; the ravagers, not the defenders of their country. But it is equally essential that discipline be exercised with temper and with justice; a capricious and cruel exertion of power in officers depresses the spirit of the private men, and extinguishes that daring ardour which glows in the breast of a real soldier. Is it possible that a man of a generous mind can treat with wanton cruelty those who are not permitted to resist, or even to expostulate, however brave they may be. For common soldiers gallantly face the enemy, when some officers, who are in the habit of using them with insult and cruelty, shrink from the danger. You are sufficiently acquainted with the condition of private soldiers to know that, when they are treated with all the lenity consistent with proper discipline, still their condition is surrounded with such a variety of hardships, that every person of humanity must wish it were possible to alleviate it. Weak as the impression may be which the soldier's hardships, make on the cold heart of the gentleman politician, one would naturally expect they should meet with sympathy in the breast of their own officers; the men best acquainted with their situation, whom they are constantly serving and obeying, who are acting in the same cause, and exposed to the same dangers though not the same hardships with themselves. It is natural to imagine, that, independent of more generous motives, their own interest, and the idea of self preservation would prompt officers to behave with mildness, at least with equity, to the soldiers under their command. How many officers have been rescued from death, from captivity, by the grateful attachment and intrepidity of the soldiers? But waving every consideration derived from the idea of personal safety, there is a kind of selfishness which might induce officers to behave well to soldiers; that is the pleasure of alleviating in many respects the unavoidable hardships of our fellow-creatures, and the consciousness Next to the of being loved by those around us, approbation of his own conscience, nothing is so grateful to the heart of man as the love and esteem of mankind. He is an object of compassion, in whatever situation of life he be placed, who is not sensible of this from his own may །་ |