thing unlawful in our wishing to be freed from whatever is difagreeable, and to obtain a fuller enjoyment of the comforts of life. But when these wishes are not tempered by reason, they are in danger of precipitating us into much extravagance and folly. You have ftrayed, my friends, from the road which conducts to felicity; you have dishonoured the native dignity of your fouls, in allowing your wishes to terminate in nothing higher than worldly ideas of greatnefs or happiness. Your imagination roves in a land of fhadows. Unreal forms deceive you. It is no more than a phantom, an illufion of happiness which attracts your fond admiration; nay, an illufion of happiness which often conceals much real mifery. Do you imagine, that all are happy, who have attained. to those summits of diftinction, towards which your wishes afpire? Alas! how frequently has experience fhewed, that where rofes were fupposed to bloom, nothing but briars and thorns grew? Reputation, beauty, riches, grandeur, nay, royalty itfelf, would, many a time, have been gladly exchanged by the poffeffors, for that more quiet and humble ftation, with which you are now diffatisfied. With all that is fplendid and fhining in the world, it is decreed that there fhould mix many deep fhades of woe. On the elevated Р elevated fituations of fortune, the great calamities of life chiefly fall. There the ftorm fpends its violence, and there the thunder breaks; while fafe and unhurt the inhabitant of the vale remains below.-Retreat, then, from those .vain and pernicious excurfions of extravagant defire. Satisfy yourselves with what is rational and attainable. Train your minds to moderate views of human life and human happiness, IN INTEMPERANCE. N all the pleasures of fenfe, it is apparent, that only when indulged within certain limits, they confer fatisfaction. No fooner do we pafs the line which temperance has drawn, than pernicious effects come forward and fhew themfelves. Could I lay open to your view the monuments of death, they would read a lecture in favour of moderation, much more powerful than any that the moft eloquent preacher can give. You would behold the graves peopled with the victims of intemperance. You would behold those chambers of darknefs hung round, on every fide, with the trophies of luxury, drunkenness, and fenfuality. So numerous would you find those martyrs of iniquity, that it may fafely be afferted, afferted, where war and peftilence have flain their thoufands, intemperate pleasure has flain its ten thousands. THE MODERATION. HE man of moderation brings to all the natural and innocent pleasures of life, that found, uncorrupted relish, which gives him a much fuller enjoyment of them, than the palled and vitiated appetite of the voluptuary allows him to know. He culls the flower of every allowable gratification, without dwelling upon it until the flavour be loft. He taftes, the fweet of every pleasure, without pursuing it till the bitter dregs arife. Whereas the man of oppofite character dips fo deep, that he never fails to ftir an impure and noxious fediment, which lies at the bottom of the cup.-In the pleasures, befides, which are regulated by moderation, there is always that dignity which goes along with innocence. No man needs to be ashamed of them. They are confiftent with honour; with the favour of God, and of man. But the fenfualift, who difdains all restraint in his pleasures, is odious in the public eye. His vices become grofs; P 2 his his character contemptible; and he ends in being a burden both to himself and to fociety. HAPPINESS. IF you would judge whether a man be really happy, it is not folely to his houfes and his lands, to his equipage and his retinue, you are to look. Unless you could fee farther, and difcern what joy, or what bitterness, his heart feels, you can pronounce nothing concerning him. That proud and wicked man whom you behold furrounded with ftate and fplendour, and upon whom you think the favours of Heaven fo improperly lavished, may be a wretch, pining away in secret, with a thousand griefs unknown to the world. That poor man, who appears neglected and overlooked, may, in his humble ftation, be partaking of all the moral, and all the focial joys, that exhilarate the heart; may be living cheerful, contented and happy. Cease then to murmur against difpenfations of Providence, which are, to us, fo imperfectly known. Envy not the profperity of finners. Judge not of the real condition of men, from what floats merely on the furface of their ftate. GOOD THE GOOD-NATURE. HE good qualities which fome men poffefs, border on certain weaknesses of the mind; and these weakneffes are apt to betray them infenfibly into vices, with which they are connected. Good-nature, for inftance, is in danger of running into that unlimited complaifance, which af fimilates men to the loofe manners of those whom they find around them. Pliant, and yielding in their temper, they have not force to stand by the decifions of their own minds, with regard to right and wrong. Like the animal which is faid to affume the colour of every object to which it is applied, they lofe all proper character of their own; and are formed by the characters of those with whom they chance to associate. The mild are apt to fink into habits of indolence and floth. The cheerful and gay, when warmed by pleasure and mirth, lose that sobriety and self-denial, which is effential to the fupport of virtue.-Even modefty and fubmiffion, qualities fo valuable in themfelves, and fo highly ornamental to youth, sometimes degenerate into a vicious timidity; a timidity which reftrains men from doing their duty with firmness; which cannot stand the frown of |