"Exempt from public haunt, Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, He who draws out the hidden harmonies of nature into new combinations, possesses a fountain of pure and inexhaustible gratification. The musician has a perpetual resource against ennui; he can sooth the heart, while he delights the ear; his art, like charity, is twice blessed-" it blesseth him that gives, and him that takes ;" he is generally a happy man. We have considered some of those avocations that associate us with nature and the physical world; let us now briefly notice some of those that place us in relation with man and morals, beginning with the professions. Nothing so strikingly illustrates the total nullity and blindness to which human reason may be reduced by the force of long continued habit, titular honours, and external pomp, as the fact, that men of even good sense and humanity can become enamoured of a military life. As a matter of necessity, I arraign not its existence; but that it should be ever embraced as an affair of preference, is somewhat astounding. Strip it of its externals, view it abstractedly, analyze its nature and object, and if the word glory cannot alter the immutable truth of principles, nor a gold epaulette metamorphose every action of its wearer, we cannot cease to wonder that men should be so infatuated as to worship a painted devil for an angel. That it is the road to wealth, honours, rank, may be very true; but does it conduce to happiness? That is an inquiry which may be left to its professors to solve. Medicine and surgery will hold out few attractions to those who are not prepared to sear their hearts as a preliminary qualification for their practice. Painful and distressing profession! that turns to us perpetually the darkest side of human nature, subjects us to the harrowing repetition of mental wo and bodily anguish, to sickness, decay, death; while it exposes to us moral as well as physical deformity, by bringing to our cognisance the selfishness of friends, the hollowness of relatives, the hypocrisy of heirs. It has been observed, that as we become acquainted with physical evils we despise death, and as we are familiarised with the evils of society we despise life. Medical men are liable to both impressions, and the result is not unfrequently manifest in their sentiment and temperament, which are rarely enviable. There may be some, who, in the lofty consciousness of dispensing health or allaying pain, of preserving domestic ties unsevered, and the link of friendship unbroken, enjoy an exquisite gratification, that atones to them for manifold annoyances and miseries. Let such men be venerated; for what are the momentary sufferings of the martyr, who gives his body to the flames, compared to his who offers up his mind as a perpetual and living sacrifice for the good of others? The law is nothing but a vast arena of the vices and evil passions of mankind, where its professors, stripping off their moral clothing, appear as gladiators to fight for victory, not for justice! To stand in the midst of a wrangling crowd, and constitute a focus for all its hateful feelings, to be made the confident of "wretched rogues forlorn," to be the depositary of their offences, to witness perjury, to advocate wrong, and oppose truth and justice, when hired to do it by a client; and finally, to be promoted to the bench, that you may listen all day long to the evidence of repulsive crimes, and condemn their miserable perpetrators to the prison or the gallows: this, too, is a course which, as society is constituted, must be run by some, and may be run by many, with public applause and the rewards of dignity and riches; but is it a career to be selected by him who is balancing as to what course of life to choose? I submit questions without presuming to apply an answer. But the church- -ay, here, indeed, we cannot be at a loss; and he who feels within himself that he can faithfully, conscientiously, and holily discharge the duties of a minister of the gospel, may be assured that he is embracing the happiest and most dignified of all professions. But if he be actuated by the spirit of a church rather than of a religion-if the odium theologicum can find a place in his bosom, and he seek to establish or oppose a sect rather than a principle-above all, if he be capable of desecrating the office, by associating it with political feeling and interested motives-let him pause upon the threshold, for he cannot probably step forward with advantage to others, and certainly not with benefit to himself. The career of politics will find few advocates among those who are more solicitous for mental peace than for worldly advancement. The field is narrow, the combatants fierce: cupidity and shame. embitter their exertions: triumph is exposed to acerbity and perpetual irritation; failure adds the stings of envy to the mortification of defeat. Such are the trials to which the actors are exposed, and even the writers upon politics cannot altogether escape the contagion of their hatefulness. Machiavel could not have been a happy man, any more than the kings, ministers, and diplomatists, who were eager to avail themselves of his crooked, unprincipled, and heartless subtlety. This analysis might easily be extended; but if I have not said enough to determine "What life to choose," I have at least indicated what to avoid; so that if the reader be wise in his wishes, I may safely ejaculate, in bidding him adieu-" Dii tibi dent quæ velis !" 109 MIND AND BODY. Veluti in speculum. SAYS mind to body, t'other day, That youthful face, which bloom'd as sleek The crow's fell foot hath set its sign Beside that eye which dimly twinkles; Gadzooks, my friend, you're getting wrinkles! That form, which ladies once could praise, At sight of that mismantled top, My very heart, I must confess, aches: Once famous as a Brutus crop, You now are balder than Lord Essex. Since Wayte's decease your teeth decline: Behold! your cheeks are quite bereft The fashions which you used to lead, Stop, stop, cries body-let us pause The sword, you know, wears out the sheath; The surface must be torn and shatter'd. Have not your passions, hopes, and fears, To cause the ravage you 're declaring? If you yourself no symptoms show If yet to sordid sins unknown, No avarice in your breast has started: You still are young, and o'er my face Expression is the face's soul, The head and heart's joint emanation; Free from the body's devastation. If you're still twenty, I'm no more: Counting by years, how folks have blunder'd Voltaire was young at eighty-four, And Fontenelle at near a hundred! ACCOUNT OF AN APPARITION, Seen at Star Cross, in Devonshire, the 23d of July, 1823. ""Tis true, 'tis certain, man, though dead, retains POPE. I AM perfectly aware of the predicament in which I am placing myself, when, in the present age of incredulity, I venture to commit to paper, in all sincerity of spirit and fulness of conviction, a deliberate |