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the possibility of return, and feeling, at the same time, the irresistible encroachments of age, with its disagreeable appendages, are surprised and disconcerted by a change scarcely expected, or for which, at least, they had made no preparations.

3. A person in this predicament, finding himself no longer capable of taking, as formerly, a part in the busy walks of life, of enjoying its active pleasures, and sharing its arduous enterprises, becomes peevish and uneasy, troublesome to others, and burdensome to himself. Destitute of the resources of philosophy, and a stranger to the amusing pursuits of literature, he is unacquainted with any agreeable method of filling up the vacuity left in his mind, by his necessary recess from the active scenes of life.

4. All this is the consequence of squandering away the days of youth and vigor, without acquiring the habit of thinking. The period of human life, short as it is, is of sufficient length for the acquisition of a considerable stock of useful and agreeable knowledge; and the circumstances of the world afford a superabundance of subjects for contemplation and inquiry. The various phenomena of the moral, as well as the physical world, the investigation of sciences, and the information communicated by literature, are calculated to attract attention, exercise thought, excite reflection, and replenish the mind with an infinite variety of ideas.

5. The man of letters, when compared with one that is illiterate, exhibits nearly the same contrast as that which exists between a blind man and one that can see; and, if we consider how much literature enlarges the mind, and how much it multiplies, adjusts, rectifies, and arranges the ideas, it may be well to reckon it equivalent to an additional sense. It affords pleas ures which wealth cannot procure, and which poverty cannot entirely take away. A well-cultivated mind places its possessor beyond the reach of those trifling vexations and disquietudes,

which continually harass and perplex those who have no resources within themselves, and, in some measure, elevates him above the smiles and frowns of fortune.

NOTE 2. Sentences implying condition, the case absolute, the infinitive mode used as a nominative, the direct address not attended with strong emphasis, and the close of a parenthesis, are some of the specific cases to which Rule 6 also applies.

EXAMPLES.

First, Condition.

1. If thine enemy húnger, give him bread to eat; if he thirst, give him water to drink.

2. If a son ask bread, will he give him a stone? if he ask a físh, will he give him a serpent?

3. If all men were upright, if they were júst, if they were honest, if they were vírtuous, if they were kínd, if they were benévolent, we should have a happier world.

4. If my land cry against mé, or that the furrows likewise thereof complain; if I have eaten the fruits thereof without móney, or have caused the owners thereof to lose their lífe; let thistles grow instead of wheat, and cockles instead of barley.

5. If I have seen any perish for want of clothing, or any poor without covering; if I have lifted up my hand against the fatherless, when I saw my help in the gate; then let mine arm fall from my shoulder-blade, and mine arm be broken from the bone

Second, Case Absolute.

1. The sun being rísen, darkness fled.

2. The general being sláin, the army was routed.

3. Shame being lóst, all virtue is lost.

4. The house falling, the family perished.

5. The discourse being énded, the assembly dispersed.
6. The storm having pást, the sun shone forth.
7. The judge being seated, the trial commenced.
QUESTION. What are the specific cases to which Note 2 applies?

Third, Infinitive Mode.

1. To avoid temptations to évil, is wise.

2. To overcome evil with good, is noble.

3. To use intoxicating drinks, is injurious to health.
4. To acquire knowledge, is the duty of all men.
5. To harbor ill-will, is ignoble. To forgíve, is God-like.

6. To obey our párents, is an incumbent duty.

7. To obey the moral láw, is a divine precept.

Fourth, Direct Address.

1. Fríends, our country must be free.

2. Friends, I come not here to talk.

3. Mén of Gaul! what would you give for freedom?

4. Fáthers, sénators of Rome, árbiters of nations, to you I fly for refuge from the murderous fury of Jugurtha.a

5. Fáthers, pronounce your thoughts; are they still for war— to hold it out, and fight it to the last?

6. Sóldiers, we must finish this campaign like a clap of thunder. 7. This is not the first time, O Rómans, that patricianb arrogance has denied to us the rights of common humanity.

Fifth, Parenthesis.

1. If there's a power above, (and that there is,

All nature cries aloud in all her wórks)

He must delight in virtue.

2. Know ye not, brethren, (for I speak to them that know the láw,) that the law hath dominion over a man as long as he liveth?

3. Would it have been possible, exclaimed Cicero, (addressing himself to Claudius,c) that you should speak with this air of unconcern, unless the charge was purely an invention of your own? An honest man, (says Pópe,d) is the noblest work of God.

a Jugurtha, an ambitious and cruel king of Numidia, a part of the present territory of Tunis and Algiers, in Africa. b Patricians, the name given to certain families in Rome, distinguished for their origin, wealth, and honors, and from which the senators were chosen. • Claudius, (Tiberius,) a Roman emperor, of weak intellect. He died by poison in the year 54, aged 63. d Pope, (Alexander,) a celebrated English poet, born in 1688, and died in 1744.

4. If envious people were to ask themselves, whether they would exchange their situations with the persons envied, (I mean their minds, pássions, nótions, as well as their persons, fórtunes, and dígnities,) I believe the self-love common to human nature, would generally make them prefer their own condition.

EXCEPTION. The pause of suspension, when attended with strong emphasis, sometimes requires the falling inflection, in order to express the true meaning of the sentence.

EXAMPLE.

One who frequently associates with the vile, if he does not actually become bàse, is sure to gain an ill name.

The rising inflection on base, would pervert the meaning of this sentence, and make it mean, if he become base, notwithstanding he continued to associate with the vile, he would not gain an ill name.

SECTION VII.

RULE 7. Language of entreaty and tender emotion, generally inclines the voice to a gentle upward inflection.

EXAMPLES.

1. Then Judah came near unto him, and saíd, Oh my lord, let thy sérvant, I pray theé, speak a word in my lord's ears, and let not thine anger burn against thy sérvant, for thou art even as Pharaoh.

2. Then Esther, the queen, answered and sáid, If I have found favor in thy síght, O kíng, and if it please the king, let my life be given at my petítion, and my people at my requèst; for we are sold, I and my péople, to be destroyed, to be sláin, and to pèrish.

Esther, (Queen,) a Jewess, and wife of Ahasuerus, king of Persia.

QUESTION. What is the rule for language of entreaty and tender emotion?

EXERCISE.

THE HEAD-STONE.-WILSON.

1. The coffin was let down to the bottom of the gráve, the planks were removed from the heaped-up brínk, the first rattling clods had struck their knéll, the quick shoveling was óver, and the lóng, bróad, skillfully cut pieces of turf were aptly joined together, and trimly laid by the beating spáde, so that the newest mound in the church-yard was scarcely distinguishable from those that were grown over by the undisturbed grass and daisies of a luxuriant spring.

2. The burial was soon óver; and the párty, with one consenting mótion, having uncovered their heads, in decent reverence of the place and occasion, were beginning to sépafate, and to leave the church-yard.

3. But two men yet stood together at the head of the gráve, with countenances of sincére, but unimpassioned grief. They were brothers the only sons of him who had been buried. And there was something in their situation that naturally kept the eyes of many directed upon them for a long time, and more inténtly, than would have been the cáse, had there been nothing more observable about them than the common symptoms of a common sorrow. But . these two brothers, who were now standing at the head of their father's grave, had for some years been totally estranged from each other, and the only words that had passed between thém, during all that tíme, had been uttered within a few days pást, during the necessary preparations for their father's fùneral.

4. No deep and deadly quarrel was between these brothers, and neither of them could distinctly tell the cause of this unnatural estrangement. Surely, if any thing could have softened their hearts toward each other, it must have been to

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