At our entrance into the world, when health and vigor give us fair promises of time sufficient for the regular ripening of our schemes, and a long enjoyment of our requisitions*, we are eager to seize the present moment; we pluck every gratification within our reach, without suffering it to ripen into perfection, and crowd all the varieties of delight in a narrow compass. But age seldom fails to change our conduct; we grow negligent of time in proportion as we have less remaining, and suffer the last part of life to steal from us in languid preparations for future undertakings or slow approaches to remote advantages, in weak hopes of some fortuitous occurrence.

The torment of expectation is, indeed, not easily to be borne at a time when every idea of gratification fires the blood, and flashes on the fancy; when the heart is open to every fresh form of delight, and has no rival engagements to withdraw it from the importunities of a new desire. Yet since the fear of missing what we seek must always be proportionable to the happiness expected from possessing it, the passions, even in this tempestuous state, might be somewhat moderated by frequent inculcations of the mischief of temerity, and the hazard of losing that which we endeavour to seize before our time.

He that too early aspires to honors must resolve to encounter not only the opposition of interest, but the malignity of envy. He that is too eager to be rich, generally endangers his fortune in wild adventures and uncertain projects; and he that hastens too speedily to reputation often raises his character by artifices and fallacies, decking himself in colors which quickly fade, or in plumes which accident may shake off or competition pluck away. Samuel Johnson.

* Requisitions, demands (granted by anticipation as it were).

YOUTH AND AGE.

VERSE, as breeze 'mid blossoms straying,
Where Hope clung feeding like a bee;
Both were mine! Life went a-Maying,
With Nature, Hope, and Poesy,

When I was young!
When I was young? Ah, woful then!
Ah, for the change 'twixt now and then,
This breathing house not built with hands,
This body that does me grievous wrong,
O'er airy cliffs and glittering sands,
How lightly then it flashed along :
Like those trim skiffs unknown of yore,
On winding lakes and rivers wide,

That ask no aid of sailor oar,

That fear no spite of wind or tide!

Nought cared this body for wind and weather,
When youth and I lived in 't together.
Flowers are lovely; Love is flower-like;
Friendship is a sheltering tree;

Oh! the joys that came down shower-like,
Of Friendship, Love, and Liberty,

Ere I was old!
Ere I was old? Ah, woful ere,
Which tells me Youth's no longer here!
O Youth! for years so many and sweet,
"Tis known that thou and he were one;
I'll think it but a fond conceit —
It cannot be that thou art gone!
Thy vesper bell hath not yet tolled,
And thou wert aye a masker bold!
What strange disguise is now put on,
To make believe that thou art gone!
I see these locks in silvery slips,
This drooping gait, this altered size;

But springtide blossoms on thy lips,
And tears take sunshine from thine eyes!
Life is but thought, so think I will
That Youth and I are housemates still.

Dewdrops are the gems of morning,
But the tears of mournful eve!
Where no hope is, life's a warning,
That only serves to make us grieve,

When we are old:

That only serves to make us grieve,
With oft and tedious taking leave;
Like some poor nigh-related guest,
That may not rudely be dismissed,
Yet hath outstayed his welcome while,
And tells the jest without the smile.

Coleridge.

LIFE'S DECAY.

THAT time of year thou may'st in me behold
When yellow leaves or none or few do hang
Upon those boughs which shake against the cold
Bare ruined choirs where late the sweet birds sang.
In me thou seest the twilight of such day

As after sunset fadeth in the west,
Which by and by black night doth take

away

Death's second self that seals up all in rest. In me thou seest the glaring of such fire,

That on the ashes of his youth doth lie, As the death-bed whereon it must expire,

Consum'd with that which it was nourished by. This thou perceiv'st, which makes thy love more strong, To love that well which thou must leave ere long.

Shakspeare.

ONLY A WEED.

It was a bright summer's day, and I sat upon a garden seat, in a sheltered nook towards the south, having come out of my study to enjoy the warmth, like a fly who has left some snug crevice to stretch his legs on the unwontedly sunny pane in December. My little daughter came running up to my knees, holding up a straggling but pretty weed. Then with great earnestness, and as if fresh from some controversy on the subject, she exclaimed

"Is this a weed, Papa? is this a weed?"

"Yes; a weed:" I replied.

With a look of disappointment she moved off to the one she loved best amongst us, and asking the same question, received the same answer.

"But it has flowers!" the child replied.

“That does not signify; it is a weed," was the inexorable answer.

Presently, after a moment's consideration, the child ran off again, and meeting the gardener just near my nook, though out of sight from where I sat, she coaxingly addressed him:

Nicholas, dear, is this a weed?"

"Yes, Miss; they call it Shepherd's Purse."

A pause ensued: I thought the child was now fairly silenced by authority, when all at once the little voice

began again:

"Will you plant it in my garden, Nicholas dear? Do plant it in my garden!"

There was no resisting the anxious entreaty of the child, and man and child moved off together to one of those plots of ground which the children walk about upon a good deal, and put branches of trees in and grown-up flowers, and then examine the roots (a system as encouraging as other systems of education I could name), and which they call their gardens. Helps.

TO THE DAISY.

A HUNDRED times, by rock or bower,
Ere thus I have lain crouch'd an hour,
Have I derived from thee, sweet flower,
Some apprehension.

Some shady love, some brief delight,
Some memory that had taken flight,
Some chime of fancy, wrong or right,
Or stray invention.

If stately passions in me burn,

And one chance look to thee should turn,
I drink out of a humbler urn,

A lowlier pleasure:

The homely sympathy that heeds,
The common life our nature breeds,
A wisdom fitted to the needs,
Of hearts at leisure.

And all day long I number yet,
All seasons through, another debt,
Which I, wherever thou art met,
To thee am owing.

An instinct call it, - a blind sense,

A happy, genial influence,

Coming, one knows not how, nor whence,
Nor whither going.

Child of the year that round dost run

-

Thy pleasant course, when day's begun,
As ready to salute the sun,