6. Would not a stranger be led to imagine, by a view of the reigning mode of female education, that human life consisted of one universal holiday,' and that the grand contest between the several competitors was, who should be most eminently qualified to excel and carry off the prize, in the various shows and games which were intended to be exhib ited in it'? and to the exhibitors themselves, would he not be ready to apply Sir Francis Bacon's observation on the Olympian victors, that they were so excellent in these unnecessary things, that their perfection must needs have been acquired by the neglect of whatever was necessary?

7. It will be prudent to reflect, that in all polished countries an entire devotedness to the fine arts has been one grand source of the corruption of the women; and so justly were these pernicious consequences appreciated by the Greeks, among whom these arts were carried to the highest possible perfection, that they seldom allowed them to be cultivated to a very exquisite degree by women of great purity of character. And, while corruption, brought on by an excessive cultivation of the arts, has contributed its full share to the decline of states, it has always furnished an infallible symptom of their impending fall.

8. The satires of the most penetrating and judicious of the Roman poets, corroborating the testimonies of the most accurate of their historians, abound with invectives against the general depravity of manners introduced by the corrupt habits of female education, so that the modesty of the Roman matron, and the chaste demeanor of her virgin daughters, which, amidst the stern virtues of the state, were as immaculate and pure as the honor of the Roman citizen, fell a sacri fice to the luxurious dissipation brought in by their Asiatic conquest; after which, the females were soon taught a complete change of character.

9. They were instructed to accommodate their talents of pleasing to the more vitiated tastes of the other sex; and began to study every grace and every art which might captivate

the exhausted hearts, and excite the wearied and capricious inclinations, of the men; till, by a rapid and, at length, complete enervation, the Roman character lost its signature, and through a quick succession of slavery, effeminacy, and vice, sunk into that degeneracy of which some of the modern Italian states now serve to furnish a too just specimen.

QUESTION.-1. What is the Rule for the use of the inflection, as marked in the 2d, 4th, and 6th paragraphs? See page 26.

EXERCISE V.

I LOVE TO LIVE, AND I LIVE TO LOVE.

I LOVE TO LIVE.

1. "I love to live," said a prattling boy,

As he gayly played with his new-bought toy,
And a merry laugh went echoing forth,
From a bosom filled with joyous mirth.

2. "I love to live," said a stripling bold,

"I will seek for fame, I will toil for gold;"
And he formed in his pleasure many a plan,
To be carried out when he grew a man.

3. "I love to live," said a lover true,

"O, gentle maid, I would live for you;
I have labored hard in search of fame,-
I have found it but an empty name."

4. "I love to live," said a happy sire,

As his children neared the wintry fire;
For his heart was cheered to see their joy,
And he almost wished himself a boy.

5. "I love to live," said an aged one,

Whose hour of life was well-nigh run:
Think you such words from him were wild?
The old man was again a child.

6. And ever thus in this fallen world,

Is the banner of hope to the breeze unfurled;
And only with a hope on' high,
Can a mortal ever love to die.

I LIVE TO LOVE.

7. "I live to love," said a laughing girl,
And she playfully tossed each flaxen curl;
And she climbed on her loving father's knee,
And snatched a kiss in her childish glee.

8. "I live to love," said a maiden fair,

As she twined a wreath for her sister's hair;
They were bound by the chords of love together,
And death alone could these sisters sever.

9. "I live to love," said a gay young bride,
Her loved one standing by her side;
Her life told again what her lips had spoken,
And never was the link of affection broken.

10. "I live to love," said a mother kind,

"I would live a guide to the infant mind;"
Her precepts and example given,
Guided her children home to heaven.

11. “I shall live to love," said a fading form,

And her eye was bright and her cheek grew warm;

As she thought on the blissful world on high,
Where she would live to love and never die.

12. And ever thus in this lower world,

Should the banner of love be wide unfurled,
And when we meet in the world above,
We may LOVE TO LIVE AND LIVE TO LOVE.

EXERCISE VI.

LIFE IS SWEET.

1. "O, life is sweet!" said a merry child, "And I love, I love to roam

(')

In the meadows green, 'neath the sky serene,
O, the world is a fairy home!

There are trees hung thick with blossoms fair,

And flowers gay and bright,

There's the moon's clear ray, and the sun-lit day,
O, the world is a world of light!"

2. "O, life is sweet!" said a gallant youth,
As he conn'd the storied page;

And he pondered on the days by-gone,
And the fame of a former age.

There was hope in his bright and beaming eye,

And he longed for riper years;

He clung to life, he dared its strife,—
He felt nor dread nor fears.

3. "O, life is sweet!" came merrily

From the lips of a fair young bride,
And a happy smile she gave the while

4. "O, life is sweet!" said a mother fond,
As she gazed on her helpless child,
And she closer pressed to her gladdened breast
Her babe, who unconscious, smiled.
"My life shall be for thee, my child,

66

Pure, guiltless, as thou art;

And who shall dare my soul to tear
From the tie that forms a part?"

5. "O, life is sweet!" said an aged sire,

(sl.) Whose eye was sunk and dim;

6.

His heart was bent,-his strength was spent,-
Could life be sweet to hím?

O, yès; for round the old man's chair
His children's children clung;

And each dear face and warm embrace
Made life seem very young.

Thus life is sweet, from early youth

To weak, enfeebled age;

Love twines with life, through care and strife,
In every varied stage.

Though rough, perchance, the path we tread,
And dark the sky above,

In every state there's something yet,

To live for and to love.

QUESTIONS.-1. Why the falling inflection on sweet, in each paragraph? See Rule VIII., page 31. 2. What rule for the rising inflection on him, and the falling on yes, fifth stanza? 3. In what respect do the third and seventh lines of each stanza differ from the rest? 4. How, according to the notation marks, should the first and fifth stanzas be read? See page 40.