GOLDEN GLEANINGS

MANY of our cares are but a morbid way of looking at our privileges. We let our blessings get mouldy, and then call them curses.

MANY persons confess their depravity, but defend their conduct. They are wrong in general, but right in particular.

YOU may be sufficiently sensitive; but don’t imagine yourself a conductor for everybody’s lightening, running the thing into the ground.

IF you would paint your face all over with tracks, harbour vicious thoughts. If you would be good looking, be good.

PREJUDICES are like rats, and a man’s mind like a trap; they get in easily, and then perhaps can’t get out at all.

A FAREWELL.

My fairest child, I have no song to give you;
No lark could pipe to skies so dull and gray;
Yet, ere we part, one lesson I can leave you
For every day.

Be good, sweet maid, and let who will be clever;
Do noble things, not dream them, all day long;
And so make life, death, and that vast forever,
One grand, sweet song.

MANY men fall in life because when young they frame a false judgment touching their mental capacities and inclinations, and are ever after engaged in the task of proving to themselves and others that their verdict is a just one.

ONE of the surest evidences of friendship that one individual can display to another, is telling him gently of his fault. If any other can excel it, it is listening to such a disclosure with gratitude, and amending the error.

POLITENESS, like running water, smooths the most rugged stone.

WHOEVER is learned will most probably be liberal. This is one of the great benefits of science and philosophy. Knowledge elevates the mind, and a man of extensive and elevated views will not be a bigot; nor will he be intolerant, except towards the obstinate and wilful evil-doer. Indeed, he will pity even such, and seek their reformation.