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THRESHER.

Thump after thump, resounds the constant flail,
That seems to swing uncertain, and yet falls
Full on the destin'd ear.

Cowper's Task, b. 1.

TIME.

Still on it creeps,

Each little moment at another's heels,

Till hours, days, years, and ages are made up
Of such small parts as these, and men look back,
Worn and bewildered, wond'ring how it is.
Thou trav❜llest like a ship in the wide ocean,
Which hath no bounding shore to mark its progress.
Joanna Baillie's Rayner, a. 5, s. 2.

The bell strikes one. We take no note of time,
But from its loss. To give it then a tongue,
Is wise in man. As if an angel spoke,

I feel the solemn sound. If heard aright,

It is the knell of my departed hours:

Where are they? With the years beyond the flood. It is the signal that demands dispatch:

How much is to be done!

Young's Night Thoughts, n. 1.

Youth is not rich in time, it may be poor;
Part with it as with money, sparing; pay
No moment, but in purchase of its worth;

And what it's worth, ask death-beds; they can tell.

Ibid. b. 2. Time, in advance, behind him hides his wings,. And seems to creep, decrepit with his age; Behold him, when past by: what then is seen, But his broad pinions swifter than the winds? And all mankind, in contradiction strong,

Rueful, aghast! cry out on his career.

Young's Night Thoughts, b. 2.

The day in hand,

Like a bird struggling to get loose, is going,
Scarce now possess'd, so suddenly 'tis gone.

Young's Night Thoughts, n. 4.

What does not fade? the tower that long had stood
The crush of thunder and the warring winds
Shook by the slow, but sure destroyer, time,
Now hangs in doubtful ruins o'er its base.
And flinty pyramids, and walls of brass,
Descend the Babylonian spires are sunk;
Achaia, Rome, and Egypt moulder down.
Time shakes the stable tyranny of thrones,
And tottering empires crush by their own weight.
Armstrong's Art of Preserving Health, b. 2.

Time hurries on

With a resistless, unremitting stream,

Yet treads more soft than e'er did midnight thief,
That slides his hand under the miser's pillow,

And carries off his prize.

Blair's Grave.

Time as he passes us, has a dove's wing,
Unsoil'd and swift, and of a silken sound.

Cowper's Task, b. 4.

TITLES.

Titles of honour add not to his worth,
Who is himself an honour to his title.

Ford's Lady's Trial.

Titles, the servile courtier's lean reward,
Sometimes the pay of virtue, but more oft

The hire which greatness gives to slaves and sycophants.

Rowe's Jane Shore, a. 2, s. 1.

With their authors in oblivion sunk

Vain titles lie, the servile badges oft

Of mean submission, not the meed of worth.

Thomson.

TO-MORROW.

To-morrow's action? Can that hoary wisdom
Borne down with years, still doat upon to-morrow?
That fatal mistress of the young, the lazy,
The coward, and the fool, condemn'd to lose
An useless life in wishing for to-morrow,
To gaze with longing eyes upon to-morrow,
Till interposing death destroys the prospect!
Strange! that this general fraud from day to day
Should fill the world with wretches undetected.
The soldier lab'ring thro' a winter's march,
Still sees to-morrow dress'd in robes of triumph;
Still to the lover's long expecting arms,
To-morrow brings the visionary bride;
But thou, too old to bear another cheat,
Learn, that the present hour alone is man's.

Dr Johnson's Irene.

In human hearts what bolder thought can rise,
Than man's presumption on to-morrow's dawn?
Where is to-morrow? In another world.
For numbers this is certain; the reverse
Is sure to none; and yet on this " perhaps,"
This "peradventure," infamous for lyes,
As on a rock of adamant we build

Our mountain hopes; spin out eternal schemes,
As we the fatal sisters could out-spin,

And, big with life's futurities, expire.

Young's Night Thoughts, n. 1.

To-morrow, didst thou say?

Methought I heard Horatio say, to-morrow.
Go to-I will not hear of it-to-morrow!
'Tis a sharper who stakes his penury

Against thy plenty-who takes thy ready cash,

And pays thee nought but wishes, hopes, and promises, The currency of idiots. Injurious bankrupt,

That gulls the easy

creditor! To-morrow!

It is a period no where to be found

In all the hoary registers of time,

Unless perchance in the fool's calendar,

Wisdom disclaims the word, nor holds society

With those that own it. No, my Horatio,

'Tis fancy's child, and folly is its father:

Wrought on such stuff as dreams are; and baseless As the fantastic visions of the evening.

Cotton.

TORTURE.

Bring forth the rack :

Fetch hither cords, and knives, and sulphurous flames, He shall be bound and gash'd, his skin flee'd off, and

burnt alive :

He shall be hours, days, years, a dying.

Lee's Edipus.

Wire draw his skin, spin all his nerves like hair,
And work his tortur'd flesh as thin as flame.

Lee's Constantine.

Thou shalt behold him stretch'd in all the agonies
Of a tormenting and shameful death!

His bleeding bowels, and his broken limbs,
Insulted o'er by a vile butchering villain.

Otway's Venice Preserved.

TRAVELLER.

This is a traveller, Sir, knows men and
Manners, and has plow'd up sea so far,
Till both the poles have knock'd; has seen the sun
Take coach, and can distinguish the colour

Of his horses, and their kinds, and had a

Flanders mare leap'd there.

Beaumont and Fletcher's Scornful Lady.

TREASON.

The man, who pauses on the paths of treason,
Halts on a quicksand, the first step engulphs him.
Hill's Henry V.

Is there not some chosen curse,

Some hidden thunder in the stores of Heav'n
Red with uncommon wrath, to blast the man,
Who owes his greatness to his country's ruin ?

He, who contends for freedom,

Can ne'er be justly deem'd his sovereign's foe:
No, 'tis the wretch who tempts him to subvert it,
The soothing slave, the traitor in the bosom,
Who best deserves that name.

Thomson's Edward and Eleanora, a. 1, s. 1.

The man who rises on his country's ruin,
Lives in a crowd of foes, himself the chief:
In vain his power, in vain his pomp and pleasure!
His guilty thoughts, those tyrants of the soul,
Steal in unseen, and stab him in his triumph.

Martyn's Timoleon.

It is the curse of treachery like mine,
To be most hated, where it most has serv'd.

Havard's Regulus.

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