PERSUASION.

But 'tis but for that fit; where others, drawn
By softness and example, get a habit :
Then if they stray, but warn 'em, and the same
They would for virtue do, they'll do for shame.
Ben Jonson.

Yet bold it more humane, more heav'nly, first, By winning words, to conquer willing hearts, And make persuasion do the work of fear.

Milton. PETITIONS-Various Demands of.

A place there is, betwixt earth, air, and seas,
Where from ambrosia Jove retires for ease;
There in his seat two spacious vents appear;
On this he sits, to that he leans his ear,
And hears the various vows of all mankind.
Some beg an eastern, some a western wind:
All vain petitions mounting to the sky,
With reams abundant this abode supply.
Amused he reads, and then returns the bill,
Sign'd with that ichor which the gods distil.

'Tis not wit merely, but temper, which must form the well-bred man. In the same manner, 'tis not a head merely, but a heart and resolution, which must complete the real philosopher. Shaftesbury.

PHILOSOPHY.

PHILOSOPHER (Religious) - Exalted Character of a.

The world cannot show us a more exalted character, than that of a truly religious philosopher, who delights to turn all things to the glory of God; who, in the objects of his sight, derives improvement to his mind; and in the glass of things temporal, sees the image of things spiritual. Jones of Nayland.

PHILOSOPHER (A Sceptical)-an Object of Compassion.

He who can imagine the universe fortuitous or self-created, is not a subject for argument, provided he has the power of thinking, or even the faculty of seeing. He who sees no design, cannot claim the character of a philosopher: for philosophy traces means and ends. He who traces no causes, must not assume to be a metaphysician; and if he does trace them, be must arrive at a First Cause. And he who perceives no final causes, is equally deficient in metaphysics and in natural philosophy; since, without this, he cannot generalize,-can discover no plan, where there is no purpose. But if he who can see a Creation, without seeing a Creator, has made small advances in know ledge, so he who can philosophize on it, and not feel the eternal presence of its Great Author, is little to be envied, even as a mere

philosopher; since he deprives the universe of all its grandeur, and himself of the pleasures springing from those exalted views which soar beyond the details of tangible forms and common events. And if, with that presence around him, he can be evil, he is an object of compassion, for he will be rejected by Him whom he opposes or rejects. Macculloch.

Not harsh and crabb'd, as dull fools suppose, But musical as is Apollo's lute;

Milton

And a perpetual feast of nectar'd sweets,
Where no crude surfeit reigns.
PHILOSOPHY-Two Kinds of.

Philosophy is of two kinds: that which relates to conduct, and that which relates to knowledge. The first teaches us to value all things at their real worth, to be contented with little, modest in prosperity, patient in trouble, equal-minded at all times. It teaches us our duty to our neighbour and ourselves. But it is he who possesses both that is the true philo sopher. The more he knows, the more he is

PHILOSOPHY-of Life.

What is life worth without a heart to feel
The great and lovely, and the poetry

1 And sacredness of things? For all things are
Sacred-the eye of God is on them all,
And hallows all unto it. It is fine
To stand upon some lofty mountain-height
And feel the spirit stretch into a view
To joy in what might be, if will and power
For good would work together but one hour.
Yet millions never think a noble thought,
But with brute hate of brightness, bay a mind
Which drives the darkness out of them, like
hounds.

PHILOSOPHY-Minute.

Bailey.

We deal largely in general knowledge-an excellent article, no doubt; but one may have too much of it. Sometimes ignorance is really bliss. It has not added to my personal comfort to know to a decimal fraction what proportion of red earth I may expect to find in my cocoa every morning; to have become knowingly conscious that my coffee is mixed with ground liver and litmus, instead of honest chicory; and that bisulphuret of mercury forms the basis of my Cayenne. It was once my fate to have a friend staying in my house who was one of these minute philosophers. He used to amuse himself after breakfast by a careful analysis and diagnosis of the contents of the teapot, laid out as a kind of hortus siccus on his plate. "This leaf now," he would say, "is fuchsia: observe the serrated edges; that's no tea leaf-positively poisonous. This, now, again, is blackthorn, or privet-yes, privet; you may know it by the divisions in the panicles: that's no tea leaf." A most uncomfortable guest he was; and though not a bad companion in many respects, I felt my appetite improved the first time I sat down to dinner without him. It won't do to look into all your meals with a microscope. Of course there is a medium between these over-curious investigations and an implicit faith in everything that is set before you. PHILOSOPHY-Objects of.

Sala.

Keats.

PHILOSOPHY-a Modest Profession. Philosophy is a modest profession, it is all reality and plain dealing; I hate solemnity and pretence, with nothing but pride at the bottom. Pliny.

PHILOSOPHY-Pursuits of.

Some few, whose lamps shone brighter, have been led

From cause to cause to nature's secret head,
And found that one first principle must be:
But what or who that universal He;
Whether some soul encompassing this ball,
Unmade, unmoved, yet making, moving all;
Of various atoms' interfering dance
Leap'd into form, the noble work of chance;
Or this great all was from eternity:
Not ev'n the Stagirite himself could see,
And Epicurus guess'd as well as he.
As blindly groped they for a future state,
As rashly judged of Providence and fate.
But least of all could their endeavours find
What most concern the good of human kind;
For happiness was never to be found,
But vanish'd from them like enchanted ground.
One thought content the good to be enjoyed;
This ev'ry little accident destroy'd;
The wiser madmen did for virtue toil;
A thorny, or at best a barren soil:
In pleasure some their glutton souls would
steep,

But found their lines too short, the well too deep,

And leaky vessels, which no bliss could keep.
Thus anxious thoughts in endless circles roll,
Without a centre where to fix the soul.
In this wild maze their vain endeavours end;—
How can the less the greater comprehend?
Or finite reason reach infinity?
For what could fathom God were more than He.
Dryden.

PHILOSOPHY-Real.

Many persons have been injured by the imposing name of PHILOSOPHY. Philosophy, when it is employed in promoting good morals, in cultivating liberal arts, in strengthening social union, in contemplating the works of creation, and thus leading man to acknowledge and adore the Supreme Being, is a noble science it is noble, because true; and true, because consistent and corresponding with the nature of man, and with the relations he bears to his fellow-creatures, and to his Maker. But that which assumes the name of philosophy,

A picture is an intermediate something between a thought and a thing. Coleridge. PICTURE-Idea and Realization in a.

I often think what interest there is in a picture quite independent of its subject, or its merit, or its author. I mean the interest belonging to the history of it, as a work of some one man's labour. I can imagine he was so joyous in the beginning of it: the whole work was already done, perhaps, in his mind, where the colours are easily laid on, while the canvass yet was white. Then there were the early sketches. He finds the idea is not so easy after all to put on canvass. At last a beginning is made; and then the work proceeds for a time rapidly. How often he draws back, from the canvass, approaches it again, looks at it fondly yet wistfully, as a watching mother at a sick child. He is interrupted, tries to be courteous or kind, as the occasion requires, but is delighted when the door closes and leaves him alone with the only creature whose presence he cares much for just now. All day long his picture is with him in the background of his mind. He goes out the bright colours in the shops, the lines of buildings, little

children on the door-steps, all show him something; and when he goes back, he rushes into his painting-room, to expend his fresh vigour and his new insight upon the work of his heart. So it goes on. Let us hope that it prospers. Then there comes a time when the completion of the picture is foreseen by him, when there is not much room for more to be made of it, and yet it is not nearly finished. He is a little weary of it. Observe this, Ellesmere, there is the same thing throughout life, in all forms of human endeavour. These times of

weariness need watching. But our artist is patient and plods on. The end of the drama approaches, when the picture is to go into a gilt frame, and be varnished, and hung uplike the hero of a novel upon whom a flood of good fortune is let in at last. Ruskin.

PICTURES-Influence of.

without pictures, differ by nearly as much as

A room with pictures in it, and a room

a room with windows and a room without

windows; for pictures are loopholes of escape to the soul, leading it to other scenes and other spheres, as it were, through the frame of an exquisite picture, where the fancy for a moment may revel, refreshed and delighted. Pictures are consolers of loneliness; they are a sweet flattery to the soul; they are a relief to the jaded mind; they are windows to the imprisoned thought; they are books; they are histories and sermons-which we can read without the trouble of turning over the leaves. They are, as Ugo Foscolo has well said, the chickweed to the gilded cage, and make up for the want of many other enjoyments to those whose life is mostly passed amidst the smoke and din, the bustle and noise of an over-crowded city. Gilbert.

PICTURES-Life in.

It is by seizing the leading lines, when we cannot seize all, that likeness and expression are given to a portrait, and grace and a kind of vital truth, to the rendering of every natural form. I call it vital truth, because these chief lines are always expressive of the past history and present action of the thing. They show, in a mountain, first, how it was built or heaped up; and secondly, how it is now being worn away, and from what quarter the wildest storms strike it. In a tree they show what a kind of fortune it has had to endure from its childhood; how troublesome trees have come in its way, and pushed it aside, and tried to strangle or starve it; where and when kind trees have sheltered it, and grown up lovingly together with it, bending as it bent; what winds torment it most; what

PICTURES.

boughs of it behave best, and bear most fruit, and so on. In a wave or cloud these leading lines show the run of the tide and of the wind, and the sort of change which the water or vapour is at any moment enduring in its form, as it meets shore or counter wave, or melting sunshine. Now, remember, nothing distinguishes great men from inferior men more than their always, whether in life or art, knowing the way things are going. Your dunce thinks they are standing still, and draws them all fixed; your wise man sees the change or changing in them, and draws them so the animal in its motion, the tree in its growth, the cloud in its course, the mountain in its wearing away.

PICTURESQUE-The.

Ruskin.

Compare a new field-gate, square and tight, with a nodding, crazy, weather-stained stile. The latter goes into the sketch-book as picturesque, the former is instinctively avoided for any such purpose. The difference consists, in the first place, in the character of the lines, proportions, and colours. The lines of the stile are broken, opposed, and combined in a variety of angles. In the gate they are straight, and their angles are right angles. The shadows of the stile are naturally the more complex, with its greater complexity of form; and the colours are alike enriched, subdued, and blended; while those of the gate are crude and staring. In these distinctions we find the primary causes of the picturesqueness of the one object as compared with the other. But far more important are those which belong to the character, purpose, history, of the object itself. See how the stile appeals in these respects to the imagination, while the gate has nothing to say! The stile leans with the stress and weight of wear, its feet are buried in herbage, its bars are held together by extra clamps, empty holes betray the loss of rusted nails, worms have covered it with elaborate tracery, lichens have crept into every cranny. It is bleached from many a sun and shower; polished by the hands, and grated by the feet, of many a labourer, who, morning and evening, and year after year, has crossed it on his outward and homeward way. It is scored and hacked by generations of school-boys; and it is cunningly inscribed with the joint initials of whispering lovers. The gate, in its naked newness, speaks of nothing but the carpenter's shop and the paint pot. The stile is a poem, the gate a mechanical fact. The one is picturesque; it demands, as it is fitted for, artistic expression; the other is unpicturesque, and no considerations of usefulness or fitness can make it otherwise. Gilbert.

PIETY.

PICTURESQUENESS.

architecture. The architects, I presume, did Picturesqueness is the very soul of Gothic not aim at it, probably never troubled their heads about it, perhaps had not even any word to express it. They aimed at beauty, solemnity, | and an imposing effect, and knew how to obtain it; but the picturesqueness came naturally and without intention. It was a part of the character of the age. Whatever they did was necessarily picturesque; they could not help it. Perhaps a future generation may find out some pervading characteristic of have not any word to express. our own age, of which we are unconscious, and Now we aim at picturesqueness; we discover in it a great source of beauty, and therefore endeavour to obtain it by every means in our power. love of it is shown in imitations of Swiss cottages, Italian villas, buildings crowded with gables, and all sorts of useless projections that may give a varied outline, and productions of the most fanciful and incongruous nature. But an artificial picturesqueness, as we have observed, is all but valueless; and when it is artificial, it is almost impossible to disguise it; we see at once whether the effect results from the honest adaptation of a building to its professed purposes, and its truth of construction, or from artifice; and we esteem it accordingly. Petit.

PIETY-Filial.

Our