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Discontent, and her children are Fear and Sorrow. The former invites us to the moderate enjoyment of the world, and all its tranquil and rational pleasures. The latter teaches us only that man was born to mourn and to be wretched. The former invites us to the contemplation of the various beauties of the globe, which heaven has destined for the seat of the human race; and proves to us that a world so exquisitely framed could not be meant for the abode of misery and pain. The latter exhorts us to retire from the world, to fly from the enchantments of social delight, and to consecrate the hours to solitary lamentation. The former teaches us that to enjoy the blessings sent by our benevolent Creator is virtue and obedience. The latter informs us that every enjoyment is an offence to the Deity, who is to be worshipped only by the mortification of every sense of pleasure, and the everlasting exercise of sighs and tears.

3. Though deep, yet clear, though gentle, yet not dull. Strong without rage, without o'erflowing, full.

4. Knowledge and Wisdom, far from being one,
Have oft-times no connection. Knowledge dwells
In heads replete with thoughts of other men;
Wisdom in minds attentive to their own.
Knowledge, a rude, unprofitable mass,

The mere materials with which Wisdom builds,
Till smoothed and squared, and fitted to its place,
Does but encumber whom it seems to enrich.
Knowledge is proud that he has learned so much;
Wisdom is humble that he knows no more.

5. An upright minister asks what recommends a man ; a corrupt minister asks who recommends him.

6. When the million applaud, you ask what harm you have done; when they censure you, what good.

7. Contemporaries appreciate the man rather than the merit; but posterity will regard the merit rather than the man.

8. Contrasted faults through all his manners reign,

Though poor, luxurious; though submissive, vain,
Though grave, yet trifling; zealous, yet untrue,
And e'en in penance planning sins anew.

The student may now write a list of subjects in pairs, which can be presented in antithesis, and present one or more of them accordingly.

XLII.

PARALLEL.

A parallel, considered as a composition, is a kind of comparison made to exhibit the resemblance between two characters or writings, to show their conformity as it is continued through many particulars, or in essential points. The parallel is sometimes diversified by antitheses, to show in a strong light the points of individual distinction.

Example 1st.

PARALLEL BETWEEN POPE AND DRYDEN.

Pope professed to have learned his poetry from Dryden, whom, whenever an opportunity was presented, he praised through his whole life with unvaried liberality; and perhaps his character may receive some illustration if he be compared with his master.

Integrity of understanding, and nicety of discernment, were not allotted in a less proportion to Dryden than to Pope. The rectitude of Dryden's mind was sufficiently shown by the dismission of his poetical prejudices, and the rejection of unnatural thoughts and rugged numbers. But Dryden never desired to apply all the judgment that he had. He wrote, and professed to write, merely for the people; and when he pleased others he contented himself. He spent no time in struggles to rouse latent powers; he never attempted to make that better which was already good, nor often to mend what he must have known to be faulty. He wrote, as he tells us, with very little consideration; when occasion or necessity called upon him, he poured out what the present moment happened to supply and when once it had passed the press, ejected it from his mind; for, when he had no pecuniary interest, he had no further solicitude.

Pope was not content to satisfy; he desired to excel, and therefore always endeavored to do his best; he did not court the candor, but dared the judgment of his reader, and, expecting no indulgence from others, he showed none to himself. He examined lines and words with minute and punctilious observation, and retouched every part with indefatigable diligence, till he had left nothing to be forgiven. For this reason he kept his pieces very long in his hands, while he considered and reconsidered

them. The only poems which can be supposed to have been written with such regard to the times as might hasten their publication, were the two satires of Thirty-eight; of which Dodsley told me, that they were brought to him by the author, that they might be fairly copied. "Every line," said he, "was then written twice over; I gave him a clean transcript, which he sent some time afterwards to me for the press, with every line written twice over a second time."

His declaration, that his care for his works ceased at their publication, was not strictly true. His parental attention never abandoned them; what he found amiss in the first edition, he silently corrected in those that followed. He appears to have revised the Iliad, and freed it from some of its imperfections; and the Essay on Criticism received many improvements after its first appearance. It will seldom be found that he altered without adding clearness, elegance, or vigor. Pope had perhaps the judgment of Dryden; but Dryden certainly wanted the diligence of Pope.

In acquired knowledge, the superiority must be allowed to Dryden, whose education was more scholastic, and who, before he became an author, had been allowed more time for study, with better means of information. His mind has a larger range, and he collects his images and illustrations from a more extensive circumference of science. Dryden knew more of man in his general nature, and Pope in his local manners. The notions of Dryden were formed by comprehensive speculation, and those of Pope by minute attention. There is more dignity in the knowledge of Dryden, and more certainty in that of Pope. Poetry was not the sole praise of either, for both excelled likewise in prose; but Pope did not borrow his prose from his predecessor. The style of Dryden is capricious and varied; that of Pope is cautious and uniform. Dryden obeys the motions of his own mind, Pope constrains his mind to his own rules of composition. Dryden is sometimes vehement and rapid, Pope is always smooth, uniform, and gentle. Dryden's page is a natural field, rising into inequalities, and diversified by the varied exuberance of abundant vegetation; Pope's is a velvet lawn, shaven by the scythe, and levelled by the roller.

Of genius, that power which constitutes a poet; that quality without which judgment is cold, and knowledge is inert; that energy which collects, combines, amplifies, and animates; the superiority must, with some hesitation, be allowed to Dryden. It is not to be inferred, that of this poetical vigor Pope had only a little, because Dryden had more; for every other writer, since Milton, must give place to Pope; and even of Dryden it must be said, that if he has brighter paragraphs, he has not better poems. Dryden's performances were always hasty, either excited by some external occasion, or extorted by domestie necessity; he composed without consideration, and published without correction. What his mind could supply at call, or gather in one excursion, was all that he sought, and all that he gave. The dilatory caution of Pope enabled him to condense his sentiments, to multiply his images, and to accumulate all that study might produce, or chance might supply. If the flights of Dryden, therefore, are higher, Pope continues longer on the wing. If of Dryden's fire the blaze is brighter, of Pope's the heat is more regular and constant. Dryden often surpasses expectation, and Pope never falls below it. Dryden is read with frequent astonishment, and Pope with perpetual delight.

This parallel will, I hope, where it is well considered, be found just; and if the reader should suspect me, as I suspect myself, of some partial fondness for the memory of Dryden, let him not too hastily condemn me; for meditation and inquiry may, perhaps, show him the reasonableness of my determination.

Example 2d.

PARALLEL BETWEEN JAY AND HAMILTON.

It were, indeed, a bold task to venture to draw into comparison the relative merits of Jay and Hamilton on the fame and fortunes of their country, -a bold task, and yet, bold as it is, we feel impelled at least to venture on opening it. They were undoubtedly par nobile fratrum, and yet not twin brothers, -pares sed impares, like, but unlike. In patriotic attachment equal, for who would venture therein to assign to either the superiority? yet was that attachment, though equal in degree, far different in kind; with Hamilton it was a sentiment, with Jay a principle; with Hamilton, enthusiastic passion, with Jay, duty as well as love; with Hamilton, patriotism was the paramount law, with Jay, a law sub graviori lege. Either would have gone through fire and water to do his country service, and laid down freely his life for her safety, Hamilton with the roused courage of a lion, Jay with the calm fearlessness of a man; or, rather, Hamilton's courage would have been that of a soldier, Jay's, that of a Christian. Of the latter it might be truly said:

"Conscience made him firm,

That boon companion, who her strong breastplate
Buckles on him, that fears no guilt within,
And bids him on, and fear not."

In intellectual power, in depth, and grasp, and versatility of mind, as well as in all the splendid and brilliant parts which captivate and adorn, Hamilton was greatly, not to say immeasurably, Jay's superior. In the calm and deeper wisdom of practical duty, in the government of others, and still more in the government of himself, in seeing clearly the right, and following it whithersoever it led firmly, patiently, self-denyingly, Jay was again greatly, if not immeasurably, Hamilton's superior. In statesman-like talent, Hamilton's mind had in it more of "constructive" power, Jay's of "executive." Hamilton had GENIUS, Jay had WISDOM. We would have taken Hamilton to plan a government, and Jay to carry it into execution; and in a court of law we would have Hamilton for our advocate, if our cause were generous, and Jay for judge, if our cause were just.

The fame of Hamilton, like his parts, we deem to shine brighter and farther than Jay's, but we are not sure that it should be so, or rather we are quite sure that it should not. For, when we come to examine and compare their relative course, and its bearing on the country and its fortunes, the reputation of Hamilton we find to go as far beyond his practical share in it, as Jay's falls short of his. Hamilton's civil official life was a brief and single, though brilliant one. Jay's numbered the years of a generation, and exhausted every department of diplomatic, civil, and judicial trust. fidelity to their country, both were pure to their heart's core; yet was Hamilton loved, perhaps, more than trusted, and Jay trusted, perhaps, more than loved.

In

Such were they, we deem, in differing, if not contrasted, points of character. Their lives, too, when viewed from a distance, stand out in equally striking but much more painful contrast. Jay's, viewed as a whole, has in it a completeness of parts such as a nicer critic demands for the perfection

of an epic poem, with its beginning of promise, its heroic middle, and its peaceful end, and partaking, too, somewhat of the same cold stateliness; noble, however, still, and glorious, and ever pointing, as such poem does, to the stars. Sic itur ad astra. The life of Hamilton, on the other hand, broken and fragmentary, begun in the darkness of romantic interest, running on into the sympathy of a high passion, and at length breaking off in the midst, like some half-told tale of sorrow, amid tears and blood, even as does the theme of the tragic poet. The name of Hamilton, therefore, was a name to conjure with; that of Jay, to swear by. Hamilton had his frailties, arising out of passion, as tragic heroes have. Jay's name was faultless, and his course passionless, as becomes the epic leader, and, in point of fact, was, while living, a name at which frailty blushed, and corruption trembled.

If we ask whence, humanly speaking, came such disparity of the fate between equals, the stricter morals, the happier life, the more peaceful death, to what can we trace it but to the healthful power of religion over the heart and conduct? Was not this, we ask, the ruling secret? Hamilton was a Christian in his youth, and a penitent Christian, we doubt not, on his dying bed; but Jay was a Christian, so far as man may judge, every day and hour of his life. He had but one rule, the gospel of Christ; in that he was nurtured, ruled by that, through grace, he lived,-resting on that, in prayer, he died.

Admitting, then, as we do, both names to be objects of our highest sympathetic admiration, yet, with the name of Hamilton, as the master says of tragedy, the lesson is given "with pity and in fear." Not so with that of Jay; with him we walk fearless, as in the steps of one who was a CHRISTIAN as well as a PATRIOT.

Exercises.

A Parallel between the Old and New Testament.

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between the writings of St. Paul and St. John.
The character of Napoleon and of Washington.
Lord Bacon and Sir Isaac Newton.

The Profession of the Law and that of Divinity.

The invention of the art of printing with the discovery of the application of steam to mechanical purposes.

*

XLIII.

ALLEGORY.

Allegory is a species of writing, in which one thing is ex

*Dr. Blair says, "An allegory is a continued metaphor; as it is the And under the representation of one thing by another that resembles it." head of metaphor he says, "When the resemblance which is the foundation of this figure is long dwelt upon, and carried into all its minute circumstances, an allegory is produced instead of a metaphor."

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