their idol self, and of that which will afford it present enjoyment. Idleness and profusion are the shapes which selfishness usually takes in early life, as avarice is that which it assumes in age; for youth, somewhat after the manner of the Epicureans, fancies it sees its interest in present enjoyment. Eugenio has obtained the character and reputation of a dashing fellow, because he spends a profusion of money; and, disregarding discipline and constraint, follows all those pleasures which his fortune has placed within his reach, and which fashion tempts him to pursue. "He is the most generous creature in the world," says one of his companions. "His purse is always open," says another. True; his purse is always open, because he is always engaged in such pursuits as require it; but ask him to open it for any other object than that of procuring pleasure for himself, and it will be found to retain its contents with the close grasp of the miser; from whom its possessor differs in a very slight degree. The one adores the money itself; the other its produce; and both are equally careful that no one except themselves shall be a partaker of the enjoyments which accrue to them from their possessions. Adrastus has, in the same pursuit, wasted gifts of nature much more valuable than those of the amplest fortune. Copiously endowed with the former, he has omitted to improve them, from a want of power over himself. His good sense admonishes him not to lose the opportunity of becoming useful to society, by cultivating and exercising his talents, but self has acquired such an ascendancy over him, that it scorns control, and hurries him headlong into the abyss of pleasure. Though limited with regard to fortune, his slender means are no obstacle to his course; the same cause (the gratification of his passion for himself) which urged him to neglect his talents, draws him on into the snares of debt. He obtains trust from creditors whom he knows he can never pay; and thus, step by step, loses all sense of honour and integrity: for, accustomed from youth to consider himself before every body and every thing, it is natural that he should not scruple even to defraud others for his own gratification, and that he should disregard the interests of other men, when put in competition with his own. Many other instances of the various descriptions of youthful selfishness might be enumerated; but I have been contented with these two, as they are the most common, and are sufficient to show the powerful influence and baneful effects of that vice. Let us now consider what it leads to in after-life. Ripening in years, the selfish man still continues to consult his own interest, and that alone, in all his actions and undertakings: he now finds, that it is his interest to obtain authority, influence, or wealth; that the days are past when his idol was to be satisfied with mere pleasure; and that they have been spent in such a manner, that he is unable to appease its present cravings, without making a greater sacrifice than he was wont in his early years. In proportion to the magnitude of the object in view, must be the sacrifice made to attain it. In his youth he disregarded the admonitions of others, and even of his own good sense; his idol now demands a Hecatomb; and in obedience to it, he sets at defiance the dictates of his conscience, which will in vain strive to oppose any measure which interest bids him pursue. To him indeed "Sweet is the scent which from advantage springs, Leonatus was from a boy of a selfish disposition; yet that vice which brought disgrace upon his riper years was scarcely observed in his youth: he always rejoiced in an opportunity to distinguish himself at the expense of any of his companions; he would inwardly chuckle at the prospect of answering a question, which had been fruitlessly proposed to his neighbours; and when his assistance might have saved another from punishment, he invariably withheld it, lest he should lose the opportu nity of publicly showing that he was acquainted with the subject of which his schoolfellow was ignorant. This was kindly attributed to an ardent spirit of emulation, yet he would never sacrifice his own wishes or enjoyments in order to be distinguished;-the selfish path of pleasure held out too many temptations, and he made no effort to forsake it. His idleness and extravagance, which were the consequence of this, received the fashionable appellations of juvenile thoughtlessness and spirit. Thus, while his youth lasted, his selfishness was disguised under various forms and colours; but in his manhood it threw off the mask, and appeared in its distinguishable shape. Over-burdened with debt, the fruit of his pleasures, Leonatus married an heiress, whose fortune he did not scruple to sacrifice to the demands of his creditors, relieved from whom he enjoyed a moderate fortune; but his interest prompted him to increase it; whether the means by which he could accomplish this purpose were creditable or disgraceful, was to him a matter of indifference he chose such measures as would lead him most speedily, and with the least trouble, to the fulfilment of his wishes. The power of the Ministry seemed on the decline; his professed principles had always been in unison with theirs, yet he hesitated not to join a violent Opposition in order to obtain a part of the spoils of his former friends. The exertions which he made to raise himself to consideration in his party were great, and ruinous to his fortune; and after a few years he found that the undertaking in which he had embarked was fruitless, and the ray of hope which had gleamed upon his party proved an ignis fatuus, which led him to the brink of ruin. The alluring prospect of a place tempted him; he perceived interest beckoning to him from the treasury bench; he obeyed her command, received his bribe, and, from the bold and stormy patriot, became the "Placeman, all tranquillity and smiles." This step, though suggested by a regard for his interest, did not prove in the end more beneficial to Leonatus than his former speculation. An opposition was raised against him at the next election, and his constituents, enraged at his parliamentary conduct, declared themselves in favour of his antagonist; and, after having spent the remainder of his shattered fortune in an unsuccessful contest, he lost his seat in parliament, and sunk into the insignificance of a pensioned courtier. Thus all he reaped by his attention to interest in the prime of his life, was a poor miserable old age, embittered by the contempt and disgrace which awaits the apostate, and soured by disappointment, the seldom-failing punishment which hangs over the heads of the ambitious and covetous. The great danger of selfishness to youth is, that working underground and unseen, it saps the foundations of virtue and happiness, for it needs but to be seen in order to be despicable and odious: it has therefore been more the object of this paper, to bring selfishness into the light, stripped of the coverings and disguises which surround it, than to dwell upon its deformity. The manner in which the former may be accomplished, is by examining, not only the actions, faults, and virtues of men as they appear to our view, but also the latent sources from which they arise. These are two in number: one is Generosity, a clear and limpid stream, rising amidst the pure snows of the mountains, gradually expanding into a noble and beneficent river, fertilizing and adorning the land through which it flows; -the other is Selfishness, taking its rise in low swamps and marshes, swelling its polluted tide by receiving the confluent sewers of vice, and spreading noxious and pestilential vapours over the adjacent countries. From the first flow Honour, Friendship, Morality, and Philanthropy; from the latter Idleness, Fraud, Profligacy, and Avarice. The cup of Virtue is replenished from the pure rill of Generosity,-that of Vicious Pleasure with the ditch-water of Interested Selfishness. A. L. B. TANCRED AND SIGISMUNDA. A TALE FROM THE ITALIAN. the TANCRED, Prince of Salerno, was distinguished in age in which he lived for the courtesy of his manners, and the kindness and generosity of his disposition; and he would have preserved this character to his grave, if, in his old age, he had not, by a strange concurrence of events, become the murderer of his child, and of his friend. This child, the only one he ever had, was a daughter; and happier far would it have been for the souls of both, if she had never existed. No father ever loved a daughter with more tenderness; insomuch that it was not until Sigismunda had passed the age usually destined for the marriages of the Italian Princesses that Tancred could prevail upon himself to part from her. She was, however, at length betrothed to the son of the Duke of Capua, who dying within a very short time |