which is a body composed of many members, and requireth that each member should perform its proper office for the benefit of the whole. 2. Among the ancient Romans there was a law kept inviolably, that no man should make a public feast, except he had before provided for all the poor of his neighbourhood.-So the Gospel“ Thou, when thou makest a feast, call the poor,” &c.-See Rule of Life, 166. * 3. Let him, who has not leisure or ability to penetrate the mysteries of the SS. take comfort in this saying of Austin: "Ille tenet et quod patet et ❝ quod latet in divinis sermonibus, qui charitatem " tenet in moribus."—" He is master of all that is “plain, and all that is mysterious in the Scriptures, “who is possest of the virtue of charity.” 4. The end of knowledge is charity, or the communication of it for the benefit of others. This truth may be finely illustrated by a passage in Milton. P. L. viii. 90 & seq. Consider first, that great 5. It is very remarkable, that Chesterfield, that man of the world, that man of pleasure, places charity to the distressed at the head of rational pleasures. See the Letter on Expences, vol. ii. 800. 6. There is no state of life, which does not furnish employment for care and industry: the mean must serve the great out of necessity; and the great are equally bound to serve the mean out of justice and charity.-Heylyn, ii. 325. 7. At man's first creation, charity was the divine principle implanted in his heart by his Maker. The adversary, by temptation, displaced it, and left self-love in its room, which was cherished by man, to the destruction of himself and his posterity. Thus a certain mischievous bird repairs to the nest of one that is harmless, and having devoured the eggs of the little innocent owner, lays one of her own in their place; this the fond foolish bird hatches with great assiduity, and, when excluded, finds no difference in the great ill-looking changeling from her own. To supply this voracious creature, the credulous nurse toils with unusual labour, no way sensible that she is feeding an enemy to her race, and one of the most destructive robbers of her future progeny.-See Goldsmith, v. 264. 8. It is not easy to conceive, how much sin and scandal is occasioned by a severe quarrelsome temper in the disciples of Christ. It stirs up the corruptions of those with whom they contend; and leads others to think meanly of a profession which has so little efficacy to soften and sweeten the tempers of those who maintain it.-Doddridge, Fam. Expos. ii. 186. 9. Bees never work singly, but always in companies, that they may assist each other.-An useful hint to Scholars and Christians. 10. An abbé, remarkable for his parsimony, happened to be in company where a charitable subscription was going round. The plate was brought to him, and he contributed his louis-d'or. The collector, not observing it, came to him a second time. I have put in, said he. If you say so, I will believe you, returned the collector, though I did not see it.—I did see it, cried old Fontenelle, who was present, but did not believe it. 11. There are many deceptions concerning charity. 1. It may be practised on false motives; interest, custom, fear, shame, vanity, popularity, &c. 2. It is a mistake to imagine it will atone for a want of other virtues, or for a life of vice and dissipation. See Dupré, Serm. iii. Crit, Review, April 1782, p. 260.-Mr. Law's character of Negotius. Voltaire says, "the effect is the same, whatever be "the motive." But surely the worth of every action must be estimated by the motive on which it is performed. He who attends me when I am sick, with a view to the making of my will, and getting my estate, is a very different man from him who does it only because he loves me. Yet the effect may be the same: I may be equally taken care of in either case. We are to be judged by one who knows the thoughts of our hearts, and will judge us accordingly. Charity made consistent with vice-Brown's Sermons, 278.- -See Charity well described under the idea of Generosity, Fitzosborne's Letters, 123. 12. Mickle, the translator of the Lusiad, inserted in his poem an angry note against Garrick, who, as he thought, had used him ill, by rejecting a tragedy of his. Some time afterward, the poet, who had never seen Garrick play, was asked by a friend in town to go to King Lear. He went, and, during the first three acts, said not a word. In a fine passage of the fourth, he fetched a deep sigh, and, turning to his friend, "I wish," said he, "the note was out of my book !"-How often, alas, do we say and write bitter things of a man, on a partial and interested view of his character, which if we knew it throughout, we should wish unsaid or unwritten! CHINESE. 1. It is an odd circumstance, that when a man dies, among the Chinese, the relations and friends wait three days, to see whether he will rise again, before they put the corpse into the coffin. Voyages and Travels, iv. 92, from Navarette. We are told, from the same author, that many in that country, in their life-time, get their coffin made, and give a treat to their acquaintance on the day it comes home. It is customary for the Emperor, in particular, to have his coffin some time with him in the palace. Many keep it in sight for several years, and now and then go into it. Ibid. 2. It should be in an University, as in the Empire of China, where "no husbandman is ever "idle, and no land ever lies fallow." Ibid. 121. 3. Accomplishments of every kind are acquired and preserved by use and practice; and the Scholar and Christian would do well to reflect upon a piece of discipline in the Chinese armies, by which a soldier who suffers his arms to contract the least |