£73) ont of li, ifey—in cultivation of Babits. 542 
constantly. exercised in labours like these, and he will 
not soon find the breaches of age. Years will steal 
upon him insensibly ; he will grow old by degrees 
and without feeling it ; nay, when he comes tb break 
at last the house will crumble gently, and fall down 
_so slowly as not to give him any great uneasinefs.” 
Thus has the master of Roman eloquence delight- 
fully examplified in Cato, the advantage that arises 
from continuing those exercises of the memory and 
judgement, in which manhood had formerly been oc- 
cupied, without the dangerous fervor of, imaginati- 
on, or too much activity either of body or of mind ; 
and although every man in ‘age must be regulated 
in his’ amusement, by the bent of his genius, and 
the fund of his former experience, yet in the inno- 
cent, healthful, and useful occupations of agricul. 
ture and gardening, it would seem that every man, 
let his condition have been whatsoever, will find great 
€ontentment and advantage ; and it is in the uniform 
variety united to simplicity that much of this plea. 
sure consists, as the cultivated mind will evidently 
perceive in the affectionate reception which he giveth 
‘to the unadorned and simple description of the Co- 
tycian swain, the old man of virgils tv Georgic, with 
which I fhall conclude my present lucubration.* 
# Now where with stately towers Tarentum stands, 
And deep Galesus soaks the yellow sands, 
I chanc’d an old Corycian swain to know, 
Lord of few acres, and these barren too; 
Unfit for theep or vines, and more unfit to sow: 
_ * The latin quototion is omitted om account of our general read~ 
ers, and the translation by Dryden, is substituted in its place, Edit, 
