was, by agreement, to have sixty guineas if he restored his patient to any degree of sight. Taylor succeeded in his operation, and Sir William was enabled to read and write, without the aid of spectacles, during the rest of his life. But no sooner was his sight restored, than the baronet began to regret that his agreement had been for so large a sum; he felt no joy as others would have felt, but grieved and sighed over the loss of his sixty guineas! His thoughts were now how to cheat the oculist; he pretended that he had only a glimmering, and could see nothing distinctly; for which reason the bandage on his eyes was continued a month longer than the usual time. Taylor was deceived by these misrepresentations, and agreed to compound the bargain, and accepted twenty guineas, instead of sixty. At the time Taylor attended him, he had a large estate, an immense sum of money in the stocks, and six thousand pounds in the house.

Our last citation exhibits an involuntary case of immolation to Moloch.

A miser, of the name of Foscue, who had amassed enormous wealth by the most sordid parsimony and discreditable extortion, was requested by the government to advance a sum of money, as a loan. The miser, to whom a fair interest was not inducement sufficiently strong to enable him to part with his treasured gold, declared his incapacity to meet this demand; he pleaded severe losses and the utmost poverty. Fearing, however, that some of his neighbours, among whom he was very unpopular, would report his immense wealth to the government, he applied his ingenuity to discover some effectual way of hiding his gold, should they attempt to institute a search to ascertain the truth or falsehood of his plea. With great care and secrecy, he dug a deep cave in his cellar; to this receptacle for his treasure he descended by a ladder, and to the trap-door he attached a spring-lock, so that, on shutting, it would fasten of itself. Byand-by the miser disappeared: inquiries were made; the house was searched; woods were explored, and the ponds were dragged; but no Foscue could they find; and gossips began to conclude that the miser had fled, with his gold, to some part

where, by living incognito, he would be free from the hands of the government. Some time passed on; the house in which he had lived was sold, and workmen were busily employed in its repair. In the progress of their work they met with the door of the secret cave, with the key in the lock outside. They threw back the door, and descended with a light. The first object upon which the lamp reflected was the ghastly body of Foscue the miser, and scattered around him were heavy bags of gold, and ponderous chests of untold treasure; a candlestick lay beside him on the floor. This worshipper of Mammon had gone into his cave, to pay his devoirs to his golden god, and became a sacrifice to his devotion!*

Occasionally these wretched monopolisers of money are really more indulgent to the world than to themselves. Guyot, of Marseilles, was a despised tatterdemalion all his life, yet many benefited by his parsimony. His executors, on opening his will, found these remarkable words :-" Having observed, from my infancy, that the poor of Marseilles are ill-supplied with water, which can only be procured at a great price, I have cheerfully laboured the whole of my life to procure for them this great blessing, and I direct that the whole of my property shall be expended in building an aqueduct for their use!"

We might here glance at the effects of an opposite disposition, as illustrated in a few examples of distinguished benevolence. Alfred the Great, among other noble traits of character, exhibited, on a certain occasion, an instance of exemplary sympathy for the suffering, under circumstances which tested unequivocally the goodness of his heart. Shortly after the retreat from his enemies, a beggar came to his little castle, soliciting alms. The queen informed him that they had but one small loaf remaining, which was insufficient for themselves and their friends, who were gone in quest of food, though with little hope of success. The king replied, " Give the poor Christian one half of the loaf. He that could feed five thousand with five loaves and two fishes, can certainly make that half loaf

suffice for more than our necessity." His fortitude and faith were rewarded, for the messengers and adherents of the monarch soon after returned with a liberal supply of provisions. The late king of Prussia affords another instance of benevolence. On a certain occasion he rang the bell of his cabinet, but, as nobody answered, he opened the door of the ante-chamber, and found his page fast asleep upon a chair. He went up to awake him; but, on coming nearer, he observed a paper in his pocket upon which something was written. This excited his curiosity. He pulled it out, and found that it was a letter from the page's mother, the contents of which were nearly as follows: "She returned her son many thanks for the money he had saved out of his salary, and sent to her, and which had proved a very timely assistance. God would certainly reward him for it, and, if he continued to serve God and his king faithfully and conscientiously, he would not fail of success and prosperity in this world." Upon reading this the king stepped softly into his closet, fetched a rouleau of ducats, and put it, with the letter, into the page's pocket. He then rang the bell again, till the page awoke, and came into his closet. "You have been asleep, I suppose ?" said the king. The page could not deny it, stammered out an excuse (in his embarrassment), put his hand into his pocket, and felt the rouleau of ducats. He immediately pulled it out, turned pale, and looked at the king with tears in his eyes. "What is the matter with you?" said the king. "Oh," replied the page, "somebody has contrived my ruin: I know nothing of this money!" "What God bestows," resumed the king, "he bestows in sleep. Send the money to your mother-give my respects to her, and inform her that I will take care both of her and you."

Take a passage from the Life of Washington: "Reuben Rouzy, of Virginia, owed the General about one thousand pounds. While President of the United States, one of his agents brought an action for the money; judgment was obtained, and execution issued against the body of the defendant, who was taken to jail. He had a considerable landed estate, but this kind of property cannot be sold in Virginia for

debts, unless at the discretion of the owner. He had a large family, and for the sake of his children, preferred lying in jail to selling his land. A friend hinted to him that probably General Washington did not know anything of the proceeding, and that it might be well to send him a petition, with a statement of the circumstances. He did so, and the very next post from Philadelphia after the arrival of his petition in that city, brought him an order for his immediate release, together with a full discharge, and a severe reprimand to the agent, for having acted in such a manner. Poor Rouzy was, in consequence, restored to his family, who never laid down their heads at night without presenting prayers to Heaven for their 'beloved Washington.' Providence smiled upon the labours of the grateful family, and in a few years Rouzy enjoyed the exquisite pleasure of being able to lay the one thousand pounds, with the interest, at the feet of this truly great man. Washington reminded him that the debt was discharged; Rouzy replied, the debt of his family to the father of their country, and the preserver of their parent, could never be discharged and the general, to avoid the pleasing importunity of the grateful Virginian, who would not be denied, accepted the money, only, however, to divide it among Rouzy's children, which he immediately did."

There is an interesting fact related of the hero of Poland, indicative of his customary practice of almsgiving. Wishing to convey a present to a clerical friend, he gave the commission to a young man of the name of Teltner, desiring him to take the horse which he himself usually rode. On his return, the messenger informed Kosciusko that he would never again ride his horse unless he gave him his purse at the same time; and on the latter inquiring what he meant, he replied: "As soon as a poor man on the road takes off his hat and asks charity, the animal immediately stands still, and will not stir till something is bestowed upon the petitioner; and as I had no money about me, I had to feign giving in order to satisfy the horse, and induce him to proceed." This noble creature deserved a pension and exemption from active service for the term of his

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natural life, on account of his superior education and refined moral sensibility.

Among the bright galaxy of noble names, that of John Howard will ever take prominent rank in the list of benefactors. After inspecting the receptacles of crime and poverty throughout Great Britain and Ireland, he left his native country, relinquishing his own ease, to visit the wretched abodes of those who were in want, and were bound in fetters of iron in other parts of the world. He travelled three times through France, four through Germany, five through Holland, twice through Italy, once through Spain and Portugal, Russia, Sweden, Denmark, and part of Turkey-occupying a period of about twelve years. Without the few bright spots in the world's arid waste of selfishness, that occasionally irradiate the gloomy lot of the oppressed and poor, what a dreary life of deprivation and sorrow would be their portion. Man is necessarily a selfish being to a certain extent, but the social principle is no less an attribute of his nature; and the divine injunction requiring him to love his neighbour as himself, was doubtless imposed for the preservation of the weak and dependent, as well as being the palladium of all the virtues of our social economy. As a class, the poor are, indeed, often prodigal of their gifts, while the affluent are no less penurious; the former may almost be said to rob themselves, while the latter defraud society of the common inheritance of mankind. To choose between the two conditions, indeed, were not difficult; the "golden mean"-neither poverty nor riches-should be the aim of all; yet, in the words of the prince of poets,

"Poor and content is rich, and rich enough:

But riches endless is as poor as winter

To him that ever fears he shall be poor."

The author of "Notes on Life" judiciously sums up the question in the following paragraph.

"The philosophy which affects to teach us a contempt of money, does not run very deep; for, indeed, it ought to be still more clear to the philosopher than it is to ordinary men, that