LIGHT-Definitions of. And God called the light day. Prime cheerer, light! Of all material beings, first and best! Thomson. LIGHT-Ethereality of. Light Ethereal, first of things, quintessence pure. LIGHT-Offspring of Heaven. the dark; expose it to full sunshine—that is, Moses. insulate it-for fifteen minutes; lay it on sensitive paper in a dark place, and at the end of twenty-four hours it will have left an impression of itself on the sensitive paper, the whites coming out as blacks. If insulated for a longer time, say an hour, till thoroughly saturated with sunlight, the image will appear much more distinct. Thus there seems to be no limit to the reproduction of engravings. Take a thin tube lined with white, let the sun shine into it for an hour, place it erect on sensitive paper, and it will give the impression of a ring, or reproduce the image of a small engraving and of a variety of objects at pleasure, feathers, figured glass, porcelain, for example. Take, moreover, a sheet of paper which has been thoroughly exposed to the sun, seal it up hermetically in a dark tube, and the paper will retain the light so effectually that after two weeks, perhaps longer, it may be used for taking photographs. Hail, holy light, offspring of Heaven first-born. And never but in unapproachèd light, Ibid. LIGHT-Beautifying Influence of. Marvellons as it may appear, light can actually be bottled up for use. Take an engraving which has been kept for some days in LIGHTFOOTEDNESS. Professor Grove. LIGHTNING-Phenomena of. And their lips grow pale as they upward gaze But to me ye speak, from your thrones of jet, Bears Calvary's print on its bleeding palm. LIKENESSES-Family. Ragg. Behold, my lords, The pretty dimples of his chin and cheek; his The very mould and frame of hand, nail finger. Shakspeare. LILY. LILY (Water)-Beauties of the. Oh! beautiful thou art! Thou sculpture-like and stately river queen Bright lily of the wave! Riding in fearless grace with every swell, Lifting alike thy head Of placid beauty, feminine, yet free, What is like thee, fair flower, Oh! love is most like thee, LITERATURE. LITERATURE-Advance of. Literature, like society, advances step by step. Every treatise and book of value contains some particular part which is of more value than the rest: something by which it has added to the general stock of human knowledge or entertainment :-something, on account of which, it continues to be read and admired while an old one. Now, it is here different portions of every different volume, that united, form the effective literature or knowledge of every civilized nation, and when collected, form the different languages of Europe, the literature and knowledge of the most civilized portion of mankind. It is by these parts of more peculiar and original merit, that these volumes are known: it is these to which every man of matured talents and matured education alone reverts: it is these which he endeavours chiefly to remember: it is these that make up the treasures, and constitute the capital, as it were, of his mind. The remainder of each volume is but that subordinate portion which has no value, but as connected with the other; and is often made up of those errors and imperfections which are, 'Midst life's dark sea. Mrs. Hemans. in fact, the irreparable attendants of every LITERATI-Rewards of the. Speed in composition is a questionable advantage. Poetic history records two names which may represent the rapid and the thoughtful pen-Lope de Vega and Milton. We see one pouring out verses more rapidly than a secretary could write them; the other building up, in the watches of the dark, a few majestic lines. One leaving his treasures to be easily compressed into a single volumethe other to be spread abundantly over fortysix quartos. One gaining fifteen pounds— the other a hundred thousand ducats. One sitting at the door of his house, when the sun shone, in a coarse coat of grey cloth, and visited only by a few learned men from foreign countries the other followed by crowds wherever he appeared, while even the children shouted after him with delight. It is only since the earth has fallen on both, that the fame and the honours of the Spaniard and the Englishman have been changed. He who nearly finished a comedy before breakfast, now lies motionless in his small niche of monumental biography; and he who, long choosing, began late, is walking up and down, in his singing robes, and with laurel round his head, in the cities of many lands; having his home and his welcome in every devout heart and upon every learned tongue of the Christian world. Wilmott, human production, which are observed and avoided by every writer or reasoner who follows, and which gradually become in one age only the exploded characteristics of another. Smyth.! LITERATURE-Blessings of. Experience enables me to depose to the comfort and blessing that literature can prove in seasons of sickness and sorrow;-how power fully intellectual pursuits can help in keeping the head from crazing, and the heart from breaking. Thomas Hood. LITERATURE-Definitions of Wildt. Literature is the thought of thinking souls. England, after Germany, is in literature the only nation whose genius comes from the north, without having passed through Greece or Rome. She has the superiority of originality. This originality has been a little discoloured by the Bible in Milton, and by the Latinity of Horace in Pope, the English Horace. But her veritable giant, Shakspeare, was born, like Antæus, from himself and from the soil. He has impregnated the Anglo-Saxon literary genius with a northern sap, savage, potent, which it can never lose. The free institutions of this nation and her compulsorily naval situation, have given to her incontestable genius the multiple character of her aptitudes. He has need to compensate the pettiness of her territory by an immense and strong personality. The citizen of Great Britain is a patriarch in his home, a poet in his forests, an orator in his public places, a merchant at his counter, a hero in his navy, a cosmopolite on the soil of his colonies, but a cosmopolite carrying with him to every continent his indelible individuality. In the ancient races there are none to resemble him. One cannot define him, in politics or in literature, but by his name-the Englishman is an Englishman. Lamartine. LITERATURE-Pleasures of. How I pity those who have no love of reading, of study, or of the fine arts! I have passed my youth amidst amusements and in the most brilliant society; but I can assert with perfect truth, that I have never tasted pleasures so true as those I have found in the study of books, in writing, or in music. The days that succeed brilliant entertainments are always melancholy, but those which follow days of study are delicious: we have gained something; we have acquired some new knowledge, and we recall the past day not only without disgust and without regret, but with consummate satisfaction. Madame de Genlis. LITERATURE-as a Profession. Literature is a great staff, but a sorry crutch. LIVING-Art of. Our portion is not large, indeed, LIVING-in what it Consists. In my opinion, he only may be truly said to live, and enjoy his being, who is engaged in some laudable pursuit, and acquires a name by some illustrious action or useful art. Sallust. being "genteel." We keep up appearances, too often at the expense of honesty; and, though we may not be rich, yet we must seem to be so. We must be "respectable," though only in the meanest sense-in mere vulgar outward show. We have not the courage to go patiently onward in the condition of life in which it has pleased God to call us; but must needs live in some fashionable state to which we ridiculously please to call ourselves, and all to gratify the vanity of that unsubstantial genteel world of which we form a part. There is a constant struggle and pressure for front seats in the social amphitheatre; in the midst of which all noble self-denying resolve is trodden down, and many fine natures are inevitably crushed to death. What waste, what misery, what bankruptcy, come from all this ambition to dazzle others with the glare of apparent worldly success, we need not describe. The mischievous results show themselves in a thousand ways-in the rank frauds committed by men who dare to be dishonest, but do not dare to seem poor; aud in the desperate dashes at fortune, in which the pity is not so much for those who fail, as for the hundreds of innocent families who are so often involved in their ruin. Smiles. After The more luxuriously you live, the more exercise you require. Exercise, to have its full effect, must be continued till we feel a sensible degree of perspiration (which is the panacea for the prevention of corpulence), and should, at Cotton. least once a day, proceed to the borders of fatigue, but never pass them, or we shall be weakened instead of strengthened. exercise, take care to get cool gradually; when your head perspires, rub it and your face, &c. dry with a cloth. Be content with one dish; as many men dig their grave with their teeth as well as with a tankard. Drunkenness is destructive, but gluttony destroys a hundred to one. The food which we fancy most generally sits easiest on the stomach. To affirm that anything is wholesome or unwholesome, without considering the subject in all the circumstances to which it bears relation, and the unaccountable peculiarities of different constitutions, is, with submission, talking nonsense. What we have been longest used to is most likely to agree with us best. The wholesomeThere is a dreadful ambition abroad for ness, &c. of all food depends very much on the LIVING-in Deeds. We live in deeds, not years; in thoughts, not breaths; In feelings, not in figures on a dial. We should count time by heart-throbs. most lives He Who thinks most, feels the noblest, acts the best. LIVING-too High. Bailey. LIFE. sphinx is this life of ours, to all men and societies of men. Nature, like the sphinx, is of womanly celestial loveliness and tenderness; the face and bosom of a goddess, but ending in claws and the body of a lioness. There is in her a celestial beauty, which means celestial order, pliancy to wisdom; but there is also a darkness, a ferocity, a fatality, which are infernal. She is a goddess, but one not yet disimprisoned; one still half-imprisoned, -the inarticulate, lovely, still encased in the inarticulate, chaotic. How true! And does she not propound her riddles to us? Of each man she asks daily, in mild voice, yet with a terrible significance, "Knowest thou the meaning of this day? What thou canst do to-day, wisely attempt to do." Nature, universe, destiny, existence, howsoever we name this grand unnameable fact in the midst of which we live and struggle, is as a heavenly bride and conquest to the wise and brave, to them who can discern her behests and do them; a destroying fiend to them who cannot. Answer her riddle, it is well with thee. Answer it not, pass on regarding it not, it will answer itself: the solution of it is a thing of teeth and claws. Nature is a dumb lioness, deaf to thy pleadings, fiercely devouring. So live, that, when thy summons comes to join The innumerable caravan, that moves To the pale realms of shade, where each shall take His chamber in the silent halls of death, By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave, There is a greater difference both in the stages of life and in the seasons of the year than in the conditions of men: yet the healthy pass through the seasons, from the clement to the inclement, not only unreluctant but rejoicingly, knowing that the worst will soon finish, and the best begin anew; and we are desirous of pushing forward into every stage of life, excepting that alone which ought reason ably to allure us most, as opening to us the Via Sacra, along which we move in triumph to our eternal country. We labour to get through a crowd. Such is our impatience, such our hatred of procrastination, in everything but the amendment of our practices and the adornment of our nature, one would imagine we were dragging Time along by force, and not be us Landor. LIFE-Seven Stages of. All the world's a stage, And all the men and women merely players: They have their exits and their entrances; And shining morning face, creeping like snail Even in the cannon's mouth: And then, the justice; In fair round belly, with good capon lined, LIFE-Storms of. The firm-set oak must bend before the storm, To change the beauty of the growing spray, Which else had risen high o'er evil's toil. Blasted and warp'd, by sad suspicions fed. Life bears us on like a stream of a mighty nver. Our boat at first glides down the narrow channel, through the playful murmurings of the little brook, and the winding of the grassy borders. The trees shed their blossoma over our young heads, the flowers on the brink seem to offer themselves to our young hands; we are happy in hope, and we grasp eagerly at the beauties around us; but the stream hurries on, and still our hands are empty. Our course in youth and manhood is along a wilder and deeper flood, amid objects more striking and magnificent. We are animated at the moving pictures of enjoyment and industry passing around us; we are excited at some short-lived disappointment. The stream bears us on, and our joys and griefs are alike left behind us. We may be shipwrecked-we cannot be delayed; whether rough or smooth, the river hastens to its home, till the roar of the ocean is in our ears, and the tossing of the waves is beneath our feet, and the land lessens from our eyes, and the floods are lifted up around us, and we take our leave of earth and its inhabitants, until of our further voyage there is no witness save the Infinite and Eternal. Bishop Heber. Beneath me flows the Rhine, and, like the stream of time, it flows amid the ruins of the past. I see myself therein, and know that I am old. Thou, too, shalt be old. Be wise in season. Like the stream of thy life runs the stream beneath us. Down from the distant Alps, out into the wide world, it bursts away, like a youth from the house of his fathers. Broad-breasted and strong, and with earnest endeavours, like manhood, it makes itself a way through these difficult mountain-passes. And at length, in old age, it falters, and its steps are weary and slow, and it sinks into the sand, and through its grave passes into the great ocean, which is its eternity. Thus shall it be with thee. Longfellow. Slow pass our days By swiftly running waters hurried on And isles and whirlpools in the stream, appear |