JULY. 18J. 



after remaining with us but to teach us how to love and 

 how to mourn. The birds likewise sojourn with us 

 only long enough to teach us the joy of their presence, 

 and to afford us an occasion of sorrow, when they leave 

 our vicinity. We have hardly grown familiar with 

 their songs, ere they become silent and prepare for their 

 annual migration. They are like those agreeable com- 

 panions among our friends, who are ever roaming about 

 the world, on errands of business, duty, or pleasure, and 

 who only divide with us that pleasing intercourse which 

 they share with other friendly circles in different parts 

 of the earth. 



It is midsummer; already do we perceive the length- 

 ening of the nights, and the -shortening of the earth's 

 diurnal orbit. We are reminded by the first observa- 

 tion of this change, that the summer is rapidly passing 

 away; and we think upon it with a peculiarly realizing 

 sense of the mutability of the seasons. But let us not 

 lament that nature has ordained these alternations; for 

 though there is no change that does not bring with it 

 some lingering sorrows over the past, — yet may it not 

 be that these vicissitudes are the real sources of that 

 happiness, which we ignorantly attribute to another 

 cause ? Every month, while it sadly reminds us of the 

 departed pleasures and beauties of the last, brings with 

 it a recompense in bounties and blessings, which the 

 last month could not afford. While rejoicing, therefore, 

 amid the voluptuous delights of summer, let us not 

 lament that we are not destined to live for ever among 

 enervating luxuries ! With the aid of temperance and^ 

 virtue, all seasons as they come, may be made equally 

 a source of enjoyment. And may it not be, that life 

 itself is but a season in the revolving year of eter- 

 nity — the vernal season of our immortality — that 

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