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We have received our earthly existence, not on co. ditions of our own prescribing, but on the conditions prescribed by Him who made us. With respect to the present life, as well as the future one, it is to be expected that the quality of the harvest will be the same as that of the seed. If we sow the seed of idleness and prodigality, we shall reap the tares of poverty and shame. There is no such thing as abolishing, or bending, or evading the fixed laws of nature; whether we like them or not, they will go steadily into effect.

See you a young man, diligent in his business, frugal, provident and sober? You see one who will be respected and respectable; who, in all probability, will enjoy, through life, at least a competence, and who will be a blessing to his family, to his friends, and to society at farge. On the other hand, when you see young men idle, improvident, extravagant, averse from all regular and close attention to useful business, and practically saying, in the general course of their lives, "Go to now, let us enjoy pleasure;" you then see such as are speeding, if not to atrocious crimes, at least to the condition of beggarly want; such as will wring the hearts of fathers, mothers, wives, and children; such as will be moths upon society, rather than its useful and worthy members.

Even worldly interest, imperatively requires selfdenial. One who can deny himself of nothing, will be good for nothing, however excellent be his talents, and however great his advantages. To learn youths the art of self-denial, is one of the essential branches of good education. That is best done by storing their minds, seasonably, with the precepts, prohibitions, and warnings, contained in the Holy Bible. Next to this, they should by all means be kept from contracting habits of idleness and dissipation, and be so inured to some kind of laudable industry, that their very toil, whether of business or of study, will at length be a pleasure.

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CHAP. LIV.

Of Vanity, as making part of the warp of our general nature.

VANITY, or the undefinable human quality called by that name, being the subject now under consideration, the following facetious little story is somewhat proper to open with.

The Baron de Tott, happening to come, suddenly, into the company of a knot of Turkish ladies, who, from the custom of their country and the precepts of their religion, were in duty bound to be veiled always in the presence of strangers of the other sex; he remarks, in the book of his travels, that the elderly matrons made haste to veil themselves, but the young and the handsome remained with their faces uncovered for some time after his entrance.

Now if this be a notable instance of female nature, it springs, nevertheless, from a principle belonging to the general nature of our species, and which operates with nearly equal force, in both sexes. It is not Woman alone, that is vain :-"Surely every Man walketh in a vain show”—at least in some one respect or other.

It is truly wonderful that a creature like man should be affected with the tumor of vanity; a creature so frail and feeble, so entirely the reverse of unerring wisdom and the perfection of moral rectitude-yet so it is. There scarcely is any single ingredient that more thoroughly pervades human nature, than the one that goes by the general name of Vanity. Hence it was to vanity that the cunning tempter addressed his temptation in the garden, with such deplorable success; and to vanity he addressed his temptations in the wilderness, where he was so signally foiled. He knew the weakest side of humanity, and there made his attacks.

The strange quality called vanity, is a particular modification of the general principle of selfishness, and is exactly the reverse of the scriptural precept, Let each esteem other better than himself. It would be dif ficult to define it, and still more difficult to describe it,

in all its symptoms, and trace it throughout all its nu merous branches: and yet, if you observe, with a close and discriminating eye, it is impossible to mistake it; for to the mind's ken, it is clearly visible, in its every shape, however undefinable and indescribable.

Vanity is as it were "the froth of pride," and is distinguishable from downright unmixed pride, which is stiff and unbending: whereas vanity is flexible, and bends any way, and every way, to set itself off. But though vanity is different in some respects from pride, it has, in its nature, perhaps quite as much selfishness; self-display being its constant and invariable object, or rather the pole-star, towards which its every thought and every action tend.

Although the principal food of vanity, is wealth, rank, learning, wit, beauty, eloquence, strength, valor, or the whatever something that distinguishes the individ ual from the multitude; yet it can live, and thrive, on food of almost every kind and nature. "We may see vanity living in a hovel, vanity clothed in rags, vanity begging by the way, vanity conjoined with bodily ugli ness and deformity;" it is to be found, as well in sav age, as in civilized life, as well amongst the squalid and beggarly race of gypsies, as in polished society. In a word, it can find nourishment and gratification in all extremes-in the haggard looks and squalid habiliments of a hermit, provided they confer distinctionas much as in brocades, pearls, and diamonds. It is quite as much gratified with the distinction of Humility, as with that of loftiness and splendor. If a Cardinal of the Romish church is vain of the lofty title, His Eminence, the Greek Patriarch of Constantinople is probably no less vain of the humble title, His Lowli ness. Nor was the vanity of the most lordly and aspiring of all the Popes of Rome, ever more gratified, perhaps, than when, under the gaze of the public, they were employed, upon their knees, in washing the feet of some of their beggarly vassals. In sober truth, vani

*Unmingled pride is portrayed with no less truth than genius, in the Coriolanus of Shakespeare, and in the Princes of the faller angels of Milton.

ity is never more conveniently lodged, than when she lies concealed under the disguise of eminent humility.

Sometimes, Vanity, to gain her point, disclaims even her own existence. I say it without vanity—I speak it without the least ostentation—is often made the prelude to self commendation.

It is questionable whether man would be a laughing animal, if he were not a vain one. But without all question, it is vanity that most generally affects his risibles when he laughs at his fellow man.

In many instances, Public Virtue would never have gone so far, if Vanity had not borne it company. Jehu, for example, never had driven so furiously to carry forward a holy cause, had not vanity rode with him. "Come see my zeal!"

What is called Liberality, frequently is nothing more than the vanity of giving. We are exceedingly prone to give, (whenever we give at all,) hoping to receiveif not in kind, at least in credit and honor. So, also, Vanity gives praise, in hopes of receiving it back with

interest.

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It is owing to vanity that we voluntarily endure unhappiness, to appear happy; that we rób ourselves of necessaries, to appear as if our circumstances were plentiful and affluent. Many a one is at more expense in maintaining Vanity's brood, than it would cost him to bring up, in a plain way, a family of children.

Vanity undervalues itself with a view to extort praise. "When any one" (says Dr. Johnson) "complains of the want of what he is known to possess in an eminent degree, he waits with impatience to be contradicted."

Reproof is often given, not so much to mend the reproved, as to make it appear that the reprover's self is free from the faults which he reproves.

Advice is often offered, rather to give the adviser the air of wisdom, than to benefit the advised.

Secrets oftentimes are divulged, more from the vanity of one's having been intrusted with them, than from any other motive.

As vanity-in various proportions, variously directed, mixed up with different elements, and displaying itself in different forms-is a universal quality or prin

ciple in mankind, 30 it belongs to our species exclusively, perhaps. For we have no reason to think that, either above or below us, in the whole universe of God, there is any other race or order of creatures like man in this respect.

Nor man, nor woman, is there, who hath not so much as a little spice of vanity, either in external conduct, or in the secret folds of the mind. In a moderate degree, this marvellous quality is not inconsistent with real and great moral excellence: but in the extreme, or when it is the master principle, it is then, that plague of the heart which taints all the springs of action. Neither is there any thing more carefully to be guarded against, and nipt in the bud, in the course of early education. Because the extreme of vanity is of near kin to the extreme of avarice. The very vain avaricious one, makes every thing centre in self, and like the very person, will use as many low and vile tricks for applause, as does the other for wealth. Moreover, vanity, like avarice, commonly incroncos with omo and like that

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བསvསབས ་་ས པgཅད ཡ, une unavy more plenteously it is fed, the more voracious becomes its appetite.

A word on Egotism :-it is not always to be censured with asperity. There are egotists of amiable dispositions and estimable characters. The egotism which is the effect of good natured vanity, rather than arrogant self-conceit, is a foible that claims a large share of indulgence. One who has a proper sympathy with poor human nature, will not be strict to mark the little weaknesses and failings from which none are entirely exempt..

CHAP. LV.

Of the rueful consequences of living too fast.

FEw practical errors, of a secular nature, are of so innocent intention, and yet of so direful consequence, as that of OVERLIVING, for the special sake of making a figure. Those who are first the subjects of this er

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