72 
THE “HAPPY FAMILY” OF SMILES. 

Sweet smile! that lights the baby cheek, 
Where ne’er the touch of woe has been ; 
Whose dimples innocently speak 
How guileless is the heart within :— 
O! how thy radiance, purely bright, 
Illumes the little cherub’s eye, 
As if a ray of heavenly light 
Had dropt upon it from the sky! 
Fonp smile! that o’er the mother’s brow, 
Whilst gazing on her infant’s face, 
Kindles with rapture’s purest glow, 
The features of the sire to trace: 
How dost thou light her lucid eye, 
Distilling fast the tender tear, 
With alla mother’s ecstacy, 
And yet with all a mother’s fear! 
Dear smile! that round the husband’s lip 
Curls into anxious tenderness, 
Whilst from Joy’s cup he seems to sip 
Whate’er may charm, whate’er can bless ; 
Whilst gazing on the loveliest thing 
His heart adores beneath the skies, 
Thou tell’st that woe’s envenom’d sting 
Has not yet cursed his Paradise. 
Sort smile! that when his growing boy 
Pursues his gambols at his side, 
Becomes the index of his joy, 
And beams with all the father’s pride,— 
"Tis beautiful to see thee play 
O’er his rough features bronzed and dun, 
Like light, ere yet the early day 
Has ushered up the brighter sun. 
Cuaste smile! that o’er the kindling blush 
Of innocence so purely steals, 
Adding new graces to the flush, 
Which all the guileless heart reveals,— 
How lovely to behold thee there, 
O’er ev’ry feature brightly beaming, 
Like meteor in the spring-tide air, 
Around the moon’s fair circle streaming! 
Kino smile! that kindles when the rod 
Of stern affliction has been broken, 
Trradiate from the throne of God, 
And of his love the purest token ; 
When round the lips thy beauties hover, 
Like brightest stars in summer weather, 
Thou dost the heart and soul discover, 
And shed thy light on both together. 
Pore smile! that innocently steals 
Over religion’s lovely features, 
And to the guilty heart appeals 
Of God’s poor woe-benighted creatures,— 
Thou, mutely eloquent, to all 
Tell’st of impieties forgiven, 
And from affliction’s heavy thrall, 
Cheerest the struggling soul to Heaven. 
Bee. 

HUMAN SORROW. 

The soul that hath not sorrow’d 
Knows neither its own weakness nor its strength. 

KIDD’S OWN JOURNAL. 
THOUGHTS ON HABIT. 
BY J. A. SYMONDS, M.D. 

AS TO HABITS OF ACTION, it is obvious 
that the great use they serve is the economy 
oftime. What would man have accomplished 
by the end of his life, had it been needful for 
him to attend to his movements in standing, 
| walking, and using his hands and fingers ? 
What progress would thought make, were 
speakers to be thinking of the sounds they 
utter, and to be consciously directing and 
adjusting their vocal apparatus ? 
And where would be the literature of the 
world, were the mind compelled to pass from 
its sublime contemplations to the muscular 
actions which guide the movements of the 
pen ? 
But the more we consider the subject, 
whether as to the development of those 
actions which characterise the species, or as 
to those acquired accomplishments and dex- 
terities which range from the humblest handi- 
crafts to the loftiest triumphs of the imagina- 
tive arts, the more we shall be struck by the 
gradually increasing subordination and sub- 
jugation of the mechanical processes to the 
more exalted faculties of the mind. This 
view would at first, perhaps, make us inquire 
whether, as these volitional movements which 
we have been considering ultimately become 
automatic, it would not have enlarged the 
capacities of man, had they begun as instincts; 
just as some of them really are found in the 
lower animals, instead of going through so 
long a process of evolution and education ? 
A foolish question, as every question must 
be which proposes an arrangement of events 
different from what is obviously a part of the 
plan of God’s universe. 
Take away the struggling, striving will, 
even from these corporeal actions; remove 
effort, resolution, the conscious initiation of 
action, perseverance, training, and education, 
and what is human life reducedto? Gigantic 
as man’s powers become, he was not intended 
to spring from the earth in their full equip- 
ment. Survey him in his infancy, childhood, 
youth, adolescence, and manhood ; and while 
you become convinced that his gradual ac- 
quirements bring hima multitude of enjoy- 
ments, as well as difficulties and disasters, 
you cannot but see that what is evolving in 
him bears a strict correlation to the powers, 
emotions, sentiments, and virtuous actions of 
those who, having arrived at the maturity of 
their powers, are to help him ; to whom he is 
bound, as they to him, by ties which make 
the affinities of the human family infinitely 
transcend the transitory parental instincts 
and gregarious associations of the lower 
animals ; for they live and grow up almost as 
they were born, devoid of progress, not one 
whit wiser or more skilful than the first pair 

