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power, his wisdom, his goodness, and his truth : this man is greater, as well as 

 happier, in his poverty, than the other in his riches. The one is but a little 

 higher than a beast, the other but a little lower than an angel." 



The very leisure for which the wealthy merchant sighed may prove his great- 

 est bane, and, finding time hang heavy, and deprived of the excitement connected 

 with his former pursuits, he may, as a substitute, betake himself to debasing and 

 ruinous ones — to gambling, or dissipation, and perchance impair, if not lose, his 

 fortune, and, to meet the consequences of his extravagance, may oppress his 

 tenants whom he should befriend, and, becoming morose and selfish, introduce 

 misery and distress into his domestic circle. 



" But," says Dr. Drummond, in his excellent Letters to a Young Naturalist, 

 " who are these men to whom time is a burden ? Are they geologists, or astro- 

 nomers, or chemists ? Are they botanists, or landscape painters ? Are they en- 

 tomologists, are they naturalists or philosophers of any kind ? We may safely, I 

 believe, answer in the negative. No one who pursues science is likely to com- 

 plain of the ennui of modern times ; and I feel convinced that science, in union 

 with natural religion, is the pursuit best of all calculated to make our time pass 

 happily, and the world we inhabit seem a paradise." 



Another writer (Dr. Boot) has eloquently said — " There is a mysterious com- 

 munion between the mind and heart of man and the sights and sounds of natural 

 objects. A voice, descending from heaven, and borne upon the breath of morn, is 

 heard along the enamelled mead, or through the mazes of the dark forest, which 

 penetrates to the sources of our thoughts and affections, and which kindles a spirit 

 of devotion to light and warm our own bosoms, to be thence reflected upon all 

 around us. Listen to its instructions in the delightful solitude of your occasion- 

 ally secluded hours, far from the contaminating influence of worldly ambition ; 

 and you will return to society with feelings better adapted to the discharge of your 

 duties there, and in possession of a mean for happiness of which no adversity can 

 rob you, and with a refinement of mind which no prosperity can vitiate." 



Nor is it only in the joyous morn or active noon of life that these things 

 should engage our attention, or are capable of yielding pleasure, and bringing 

 with them their reward. For after a long period of usefulness to ourselves and 

 others, when the sun of our day begins to cast lengthened and prophetic shadows 

 along the vale of life, we naturally feel anxious to retire, to repose and meditate 

 awhile, ere we quit this for another scene of being. Then what occupation can 

 be found so calm and tranquil, so befitting the evening of life, as the contempla- 

 tion of the objects of nature? In observing and considering "the lilies, how they 

 grow," we at once comply with the divine injunction and reap the benefit of our 

 compliance, in finding our minds gradually purified from those stains of earth 

 which even the best of us contract during a lengthened intercourse with the 

 world, and so become progressively prepared for the change which awaits us* — Z. 



