be at his own disposal, and so away he goes, carries his String along with him, and shackles himself in the wood, where he dies for want of food and water. life." ONCE upon a time Death called upon an Old Man, and bade him come along with him. The Man excused himself, that the other world was a great journey to take upon so short a warning, and begged a little time only to make his will before he died. "Why," says Death, "you have had warning enough, one would think, to have made ready before this." "In truth," says the Old Man, "this is the first time I ever saw you in my "That is false," says Death; "for you have had daily examples of mortality before your eyes, in all sorts of people, ages, and degrees; and is not the frequent spectacle of other people's deaths, a memento sufficient to make you think of your own? Your dim and hollow eyes, the loss of your hearing, and the faltering of the rest of your senses, should mind you, that Death has laid hold of you already: and is this a time of day, do you think, to stand shuffling it off still? Your hour, I tell you, is now come, and there is no thought of a reprieve in the case of fate." REFLECTION. It is the great business of life to fit ourselves for our end; and no man can live well, that has not Death in his eye. It is a strange mixture of madness and folly in one solecism, for people to say or imagine, that ever any man was taken out of this world without time to prepare himself for Death: but the delay of fitting ourselves is our own fault, and we turn the very sin into an excuse: every breath we draw is not only a step towards Death, but a part of it. It was born with us, it goes along with us: it is the only constant companion that we have in this world, and yet we never think of it any more than if we knew nothing of it. The text is true to the very letter, that we die daily, and yet we feel it not. Every thing under the sun reads a lecture of mortality to us. Our neigh bours, our friends, our relations, that fall every where round about us, admonish us of our last hour; and yet here is an Old Man, on the wrong side of fourscore, complaining that he is surprised. A CERTAIN Old Man, much infected by superstition, dreamed one night that his only Son was thrown from his horse as he was hunting, and killed upon the spot. This dream made so strong an impression upon the weak and credulous father, that he formed a resolution never more to suffer his son to partake of this his favourite diversion. The next morning that the hounds went out, the young man requested permission to follow them; but instead of receiving it, as usual, his father acquainted him with the dream, and peremptorily enjoined him to forbear the sport. The youth, greatly mortified at this unexpected refusal, left the room much disconcerted, and it was with some difficulty that he restrained his passion from indecently breaking out in his father's presence. But upon his return to his own apartment, passing through a gallery of pictures, in which was a piece representing a company of gypsies telling a country girl her fortune-"it is owing," said he, "to a ridiculous superstition of the same kind with that of this simple wench that I am debarred from one of the principle pleasures of my life:" at the same time, with great emotion, he struck his hand against the canvass; when a rusty old nail behind the picture ran far into his wrist. The pain and anguish of the wound threw the youth into a violent fever, which proved too powerful for the skill of the physicians, and in a few days put an end to his life: illustrating an observation, that an over-cautious attention to avoid evils, often brings them upon us: and that we are frequently thrown headlong into misfortunes by the very means we make use of to avoid them. REFLECTION. The means, suggested by superstition to secure us from misfortune, often brings it upon our heads. |