precarious and oft a painful tenure of decadency and pain, decreasing hourly to a dwindled span, and thence translated to another bourn illimitable and interminable. Haply may its bliss be the appointed lot of all human creatures. I feel thankful to have been preserved to old age in physical strength of frame, and not inefficient in the mental powers and faculties which have been bestowed on me, although of a mediocre degree, yet they suffice for the purposes of a more vigorous aim and end of wordly pursuits than I have employed or exerted through life; yet humbly conscious they should be estimated far below mediocrity. I may be time honoured for grey hairs only, yet unrenowned in written chronicles, and unentitled to the meed of public celebrity and fame, either at the present or posthumous period.

Those who live secluded in the unostentatious career of private existence, whether shorn of, or uninvested with, honors or riches, may be fully compensated for such deficiences by enjoying a state of unembittered quiescence and contentment, a sort of negative temperament of the mind, which we consider the best preparatives, and humbly trust may prove an auspicious felicitous advent to that rest which, under Providence, can no more be disturbed by change, chaos, or corruption in the regions of eternity. In coelo quies.

REMINISCENCY OF EARLY ATTACHMENTS.

'Tis the first impulse of the soul to love,
And all its fond bewilderments to prove.
Junction of soul and flesh then oft unite
To lead a new and lengthen'd life, by right
Of matrimonial rite, for day and night.

Witness the youthful aspirant for admission tó á female heart, whilst he vociferates his passion in loud avowals, seasoned with alternate whispers in ardent protestations. Anon kneeling in prayer for her acceptance of his vows; panting for her responsive sighs and smiles which his inamorato reserves in abeyance until the spirit-stirring influence within becomes reciprocal. Then both are in love-in uno.

The lady idol is enshrined in his heart, to whom he offers his incense, and pours out some nonsence in quick rapturous flights of metrical or prosaic fancy in flattering, improvisatori, the ready coinage of excited imagination, imbued with real tenderness and esteem. Comme il faut.

The first command in the decalogue strictly enjoins to man no worship to any other Gods but the alpha and omega-the Lord above. Yet it conveys no in

terdict against the adoration of Goddesses, who are not unusually the terrestrial deities of man's homage or devotion whenever, especially, he is head over ears enamoured of the fair, or "drowned in love." At such a juncture he finds his penates, his household gods, amongst fascinating mortals in the circle of his associates, and adulates the softer sex with devoted assiduity. Not forgetting, we trust, the higher and sole claim for man's worship and reverence to Him who has created all things for our use; who has bestowed those charms and qualities on womankind; and endowed men's hearts with feelings to appreciate, respect, and cherish them in their respective phases and positions of virgins and daughters, wives and mothers. We must revere them, however, only as mortal beings, although trusting they may be admitted as coheirs of eternity, and attain to the inheritance of immortality in heaven's futurity.

Love is an innate, undefinable mystery; sometimes a poison in nectar; the poetry of the soul; imprudence in many of its votaries; advantageous to the great majority who practise social moral duties. Providence has implanted its first impulses within us. We are intrusted with the guidance and the chances of its promoting our happiness when directed by judgment and reason. The pursuit is intoxicating to ardent enthusiastic souls, in whose day dreams and night thoughts nature infuses its opium, its elixir of hope and

fond desire. This affection of the heart appears to be the summum bonum, the summer of the mind, in all seasons, even winter inclusive. It seems to make multum in parvo by its circaen wand, which fetters all the senses, and like the talismanic magician can conjure up a fair bright Eden. May it ever be unintruded upon by the wily serpent who beguiled and fascinated our mother Eve and brought evil on mankind.

The besoin d'aimer is a universal impression, exciting a corresponding sympathy in such as may entertain a similar sensation in conventional intercourse with each other. If not mutual, love is neither deep nor durable; but when reciprocal, its power is electromagnetic in the rapid communication from soul to soul. Presto passi. The contact or collision is instinctive, if not inspirative.

Lip larcenies are often perpetrated by juvenile knaves of hearts on the cheek of the image of their true affection and esteem. In the dawn of this sentiment the stricken one is silent, for language is not required to express what the eyes convey to the elected favorite in mute eloquence. In its meridian career words are employed to make vows and assurances of the unremitting continuance of the attachment which rules the heart, where it sits in halcyon meditation. Epistles are its mercurial messengers when absence prompts the pen to reiterate the avowals, to feed the flame which warms the breast of the enamoured suitor. The ancient bards typified this passion in beauteous symbols, raised fanes and altars, offered votive incense to the parent of love, and the attribute cf friendship

career.

In

and esteem is implanted in the human breast. youth when it flames brightest, in succeeding maturer years it burns uniformly, until the approach of death when its ineffectual fire is pale and lambent. Is it not the basis of human existence and all the social amenities of the social compact? Morality and happiness are its concominants and allies; the graces add their attractive charms, and dispensate the power of pleasing. Love is a tender plant; bodes evil; is unfructious in ungracious soils, producing hasty ill-assorted marriages, brimstone matches, repinings and reproaches, or in sensual celibacy and profligacy amongst the dissolute, with a disreputable unsatisfactory termination of life's The word love is formed from two softest vowels and consonants in our language. Amour sounds softly. Venus, the titular goddess, shines with three vowels in her mellifluous cognomen. The dove, the swan, the myrtle, and the rose were sacred to her, as we read. When attired by the graces she presents an allegory conveying moral precepts, susceptible of improvement to juvenile minds, and pourtrays the loveliest attributes of the female sex in sterling worth and beauty's pride. A virtuous woman is a crown to her husband; a watch tower and a bright shining beacon to their children. Youth and beauty though they bloom but to fade, and wither but to die, yet fade to bloom again with renovated charms fit for the society of angels, and the spirits of "just men made perfect" in that boundless region wherein celestial glory reigns eternally. "Another commandment give I unto you," (saith the Saviour) "That ye love one another."