"A Christian Exhortation to

lished sermon, innocent Anger."

THE Kirk of Scotland may do good without intending it. Poetry is really a bad trade. Sir WALTER SCOTT tells us, in his "Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border," that a poor scholar in Scotland was publicly obliged to renounce “the unprofitable and ungodly art of poetry!"

WHAT a lordly age of poetry is this! They quite elbow poor poets out of the vestibule of Parnassus. Lord Byron, Lord Carlisle, Lord Holland, Lord Strangford, Lord Thurlow, Lord Glenbervie, Lord Porchester, and several others, besides some in training; and yet, says Selden, ""Tis ridiculous for a Lord to print verses; 'tis well enough to make them to please yourself, but to make them to please the public, is foolish. If a man is a private character, twirl his bandstrings, or play with a rush to please himself, 'tis well enough; but if he should go into Fleet-street, and sit upon a stall, and twirl a band-string, or play with a rush, then all the boys in the street would laugh at him.”

HENAULT.

THIS French poet “was a man of genius and erudition,” says his biographer, “but strangely wrong-headed in one respect; he professing Atheism, and priding himself in his opinion with a most detestable affectation and fury. He had drawn up three different systems with regard to the mortality of the soul, and went to Holland purposely to visit Spinosa, who, nevertheless, did not much esteem his erudition. But things wore a quite different face at his death, he being a convert to the other extreme; for his confessor was forced to prevent his receiving the viaticum or sacrament with a halter about his neck, in the middle of his chamber."

MALLET'S INFIDELITY.

MALLET was not only a great free-thinker, but a very free speaker of his free thoughts. He made no scruple to disseminate his sceptical opinions wherever he could with any propriety introduce them. At his own table, indeed, the lady of the house, who was a staunch advocate for her husband's opinions, would often, in the

warmth of argument, say, Sir, we Deists.”She once made use of this expression, in a mixed company, to David Hume, who refused the intended compliment, by asserting that he was a very good Christian; for the truth of which, he appealed to a worthy clergyman present; and this occasioned a laugh, which a little disconcerted the lady and Mr. Mallet.

The lecture upon the non-credenda of the Free-thinkers was repeated so often, and urged with so much earnestness, that the inferior domestics soon became as able disputants as the heads of the family. The fellow who waited at table being thoroughly convinced that for any of his misdeeds he should have no afteraccount to make, was resolved to profit by the doctrine, and made off with many things of value, particularly plate. Luckily he was so closely pursued, that he was brought back with his spoil to his master's house, who examined him before some of his select friends. At first the man was sullen, and would answer no questions put to him; but being urged to give a reason for his infamous behaviour, he resolutely said, "Sir, I had heard you so often talk of the impossibility of a future state, and that after

death there was no reward for virtue, or punishment for vice, that I was tempted to commit the robbery." "Well, but, you rascal !" replied Mallet, “had you no fear of the gallows?”— "Sir," said the fellow, looking sternly at his master," what is that to you, if I had a mind to venture that? You had removed my greatest terror, why should I fear the lesser?”

WALLER.

THIS poet, on his death-bed, professed his Christian faith with great earnestness, telling his children that he remembered, when the Duke of Buckingham once talked profanely before King Charles, he told him, "My Lord, I am a great deal older than your Grace, and believe I have heard more arguments for Atheism than ever your Grace did; but I have lived long enough to see there is nothing in them, and so I hope your Grace will.”

MENAGE'S MEMORY.

MENAGE wrote verses in complaint of his loss of memory. We will quote the (translated) sense of his fine Latin Hymn to the Goddess of Memory:" O Mnemosyne! venerable mo

ther of the Muses, thou great favourite of Jove himself, the father of the gods, dost thou withdraw thy patronage from me, thy faithful client? Alas! I remember when in my youthful days I could have recited the names of a thousand philosophers and a thousand sects, and relate a thousand passages of history, and give an account of all the nations upon earth. Now, I have forgotten all these names; I hardly remember my own. I remember when I could repeat great part of Homer and Ovid, and the whole Works of Virgil; but now, I have lost all that treasure of poetry. I cannot so much as repeat the verses which I composed but the other day myself. The great Bignon, the wonder of France, wondered to hear me repeat the whole heads of the law. When I was young, I used to relate the pleasant tales and acute sayings of the philosophers to crowds of admiring youth. That faculty by which I made myself agreeable to the young ladies, is no more ; I am now become their scorn. I remember when they used to be swallowed up in attention while I spoke; but now, when I repeat the same tales, the same verses as before, (not dreaming that they were the same they had formerly heard