The men whom moral duty guides And pure religion charms, with God himself Hold converfe; grow familiar, day by day, With his conceptions, act upon his plan; And form to his, the relish of their fouls. LONDON: PRINTED FOR JOHN WALLIS, NO. 16, LUDGATE◄ STREET; AND LEE AND HURST, PATER NOSTER-ROW. MDCC XCVIII, M. THE celebrity of Dr. BLAIR has been long eftablished as a claffical writer, a critic, a moralift, and a divine. His works recommend themselves, as well by the weight and importance of his observations, as by the strength and beauty of his language. The paffages here felected are not frittered down to mere apothegms, and fingle maxims; but contain fine illustrations, and, in fome inftances, complete effays on the refpective fubjects. They are adorned with all the charms which language will admit, without injury to its ftrength. It may not be unneceffary to point out the advantages of fuch a companion for the pocket. Could we estimate the time wafted in the intervals of business and amufement, it would be found to bear a confiderable proportion to the length A 2 length of human life. But he that carries a book of this nature in his pocket, will be able to redeem many valuable hours: not to fay how useful it must be to have such a Monitor at hand; from how many fcenes of diffipation it may guard, or how many acts of folly it may prevent. Those who compare this Edition with the former, will immediately perceive it to be more than doubled in its fize. The enlargements have been chiefly from the two laft volumes of the Author's Sermons, which were not published when the former appeared. The EDITOR has only to add, that, if the Reader receives as much pleasure and inftruction from the perufal, as he did in the compilation, he will be more than fatisfied-he will be highly gratified. T. W. CON |