The New-York Weekly Magazine, or Miscellaneous Repository Part 158

Adieu, dear maid! and may each hour Heav'n's choicest gifts upon you show'r!

May happiness shine in each day, And truth and virtue light your way!

While I will never cease to think of thee, Though thou, perhaps, wilt ne'er remember me.

CYNTHIO.

ODE TO SPRING.

Hail, gentle Spring! whose genial pow'r Calls to new life each fragrant flow'r, In richest tints array'd: Whose balmy breath revives each scene, The shady grove, the daisied green In verdant beauty clad.

At thy approach the feather'd trains Renew their long neglected strains; Sweet music floats around; Whist list'ning Echo's busy tongue Repeats the burden of each song, In faint imperfect sound.

Thy presence prompts the lab'ring swain To give, with equal hand, the grain To the kind fost'ring soil: Mild suns autumnal shall mature The golden crop, in happy hour To recompense his toil.

The mute sojourners of the brook Had long their wonted paths forsook, Cramp'd by stern Winter's reign; But, rouz'd by thy revising beam, Again they gambol in the stream, And skim the gla.s.sy plain.

Ah! short-liv'd joys! The angler keen Shall soon to sorrow change the scene, With the deceptive fly; The speckled rovers seize the bait, And swallow unsuspected fate; They flounce, they gasp, they die.

Thy healing hand destroys disease; Thy breath brings health in every breeze; Before thee agues fly: Thou giv'st each heart with joy to glow, All blood in brisker streams to flow; Health laughs in every eye.

What tribute, then, shall mortals bring, To offer to the genial Spring?

What trophies shall we raise?

With grateful sons, at least, let's try To waft her praises to the sky, In loud accordant lays.

SONG.--By +Maria Falconer+.

Ye roses bow your lovely heads, Nor boast your damask hue; For see, yon spotless lily spreads Her charms to rival you.

So in the beauteous female breast Does Envy's pa.s.sion dwell; Each blooming maid, of charms possest, Endeavours to excel.

Ah silly nymphs, behold your doom, In yonder fading flower; For what is Beauty's brightest bloom?

The triumph of an hour!

_NEW-YORK: +Printed by JOHN TIEBOUT, No. 358, Pearl-Street, for THOMAS BURLING, Jun. & Co.+ +Subscriptions+ for this +Magazine+ (at 6s. per quarter) are taken in at the Printing-Office, and at the Circulating Library of Mr. J. FELLOWS, No. 60, Wall-Street._

THE NEW-YORK WEEKLY MAGAZINE; or, Miscellaneous Repository.

+Vol. II.+] +Wednesday, April 19, 1797.+ [+No. 94.+

CHEARFULNESS.

"Come, Chearfulness, triumphant fair, Shine thro' the painful cloud of care: O sweet of language, mild of mien; O virtue's friend, and pleasure's queen!

And, while thy gracious gifts I feel, My song shall all thy praise reveal."

Dr. AKENSIDE.

It is the indispensable duty, not to say privilege, of every rational being on the face of the earth, to cultivate and improve a serene and chearful disposition, independent of that levity and versatility which many possess from an erroneous way of thinking. "Chearfulness," says Mr.

Addison, in the Spectator--a work of very considerable merit for its natural sweetness, ease, and delicacy--"is the best promoter of health.

Repinings and secret murmurings of heart give imperceptible strokes to those delicate fibres of which the vital parts are composed, and wear out the machine insensibly; not to mention those violent ferments which they stir up in the blood, and those irregular, disturbed motions, which they raise in the animal spirits. The pleasures of friendship, books, conversation, and other accidental diversions of life, offer themselves as incitements to a chearful temper, to persons of all ranks and conditions; and which may sufficiently shew us, that Providence did not design this world should be filled with murmurs and repinings, or that the heart of man should be involved in gloom and melancholy."

There are many persons who indulge a fixed melancholy, from religious motives. Many of the lower orders of society contract a gloomy, forbidding aspect, by feeding their minds with the ranting effusions of puritanical enthusiasts; whose doctrines, for the most part, are particularly calculated to cloud all their bright intellects. They discourage the good, and intimidate the penitent. They oftener disserve, than benefit, the cause of christianity. It is an observation of the learned and pious Dr. Watts, that religion never was designed to make our pleasures less. Innocent recreations (and innocent they must be, or not at all) calculated to promote chearfulness, are absolutely necessary to soften the cares of life. Superst.i.tion and fanaticism are highly incompatible with the generous feelings of a devotional taste and habit which are in themselves very desirable; but a habit of melancholy is altogether improper, and wholly repugnant to these divine precepts, which ought to influence all to the adoption of amiable principles, and a chearful disposition. "Piety and goodness," says Dr. Blair, "ought never to be marked with that dejection which sometimes takes rise from superst.i.tion, but which is the proper portion only of guilt. At the same time, the chearfulness belonging to virtue, is to be carefully distinguished from that light and giddy temper which characterises folly, and is so often found among the dissipated and vicious part of mankind. Their gaiety is owing to a total want of reflection; and brings with it the usual consequences of an unthinking habit, shame, remorse, and heaviness of heart, in the end. The chearfulness of a well regulated mind, springs from a good conscience and the favour of Heaven, and is bounded by temperance and reason. It makes a man happy in himself, and promotes the happiness of all around him. It is the clear and calm sunshine of a mind illuminated by piety and virtue. It crowns all other good dispositions, and comprehends the general effect which they ought to produce on the heart."

Indeed, true piety is an invaluable treasure; and happy are they who esteem its salutary tendency. It meleorates the morals and disposition, and promotes present and future felicity. It adds dignity, pleasure, and security, to any age. To old age, in particular, it is the most becoming grace, the most substantial support, and the sweetest comfort. It is the only proper and adequate relief of decaying man. Let the old and the young, therefore, who wish to be happy, and preserve so great an acquisition, cultivate it with peculiar care and increasing ardour, as the source of all tranquility and chearfulness; and let it be remembered, that in order to retain it successfully, the whole tenour of life must be guided and attended by the very admirable requisites of temperance, innocence, and simplicity.

A chearful temper irradiates the progress of life, and dispels the evils of sublunary nature. All, indeed, cannot possess so desirable a blessing, without some interruptions, inseparable from the evils of life, to damp its energy and excellence. Afflictions are so diversified, that it were superfluous to enumerate even the most prominent and lamentable: but in these, and all other misfortunes, there is a remedy pointed out for the acceptance of mankind, which, if properly administered, does not fail to alleviate the unavoidable casualties and afflictions necessarily attendant on frail nature. Not a few are rendered wretched and despondent by their own immediate vices, after having exhausted their vile pursuits and prost.i.tuted their advancement to a comfortable and peaceful life by practices which religion forbids and wisdom reprobates. We should endeavour to turn our enjoyments to a current altogether serene and pure. Such rational and manly conduct would render us respectable: man would admire a life so exemplary, and G.o.d himself would approve it.

I was pleased a few evenings since, on reading the answer of an Italian Bishop, who possessed all the virtues which adorn and embellish human life. He struggled through great difficulties without repining; and met with much opposition in the discharge of his episcopal function, without ever betraying the smallest impatience. An intimate friend, who highly admired these virtues which he thought it impossible to imitate, one day asked the prelate if he could communicate the _secret_ of being always easy?--"Yes," replied the old man, "I can teach you _my_ secret, and with great facility: it consists in nothing more than making a right use of my _eyes_."

My friend begged him to explain himself. "Most willingly," returned the Bishop--"In whatever state I am, I first of all look up to heaven, and I remember that my princ.i.p.al business here, is to get there: I then look down upon the earth, and call to mind how small a s.p.a.ce I shall occupy in it when I come to be interred: I then look abroad into the world, and observe what mult.i.tudes there are, who in many respects are more unhappy than myself. Thus I learn where true happiness and innate chearfulness are placed, where all my cares must end, and hew very little reason I have to repine, or to complain."

From what has been said, we may learn to be chearful; at least, calm and contented; and gratefully enjoy, in moderation, the blessings which Providence has bestowed on us. It is puerile and absurd, to indulge melancholy. Be it, therefore, the endeavour of us all to cherish with the greatest care an ingenuous and mild disposition; and, above all, religion, piety, and virtue. Let it be our constant rule and practice to cultivate self-command; to cultivate humility; to cultivate the milder affections; submit to our reason and our conscience; be christians, and be happy.

T. C.

OBSERVATION.

There can be no pleasure in any enjoyments which the heart cannot approve, and which tends to sink, in our estimation the object of our love: obstruct the idea of perfection and our enthusiasm vanishes: take our esteem and love is at an end.

+ADDRESS of the TRANSLATOR+ +of+ +The VICTIM of MAGICAL DELUSION+, &c.

To His Thinking Readers.

Before the Translator takes leave of the Reader, who will not withhold a tear of tender pity from the Hero of the preceding history, when informed that the mournful tale of his deviations and hapless fate is not the offspring of imaginary fiction, but founded on historical facts, recorded in Abbe Vertot's excellent history of the Revolution in Portugal; he deems it his duty as a man, and as a Christian, to put his young friends, who will peruse his translation, in a way to avoid the snares of superst.i.tion, the dire effects of which are the theme of the preceding history. A careful attention to the four following principles, will be the surest means of steering clear of the dangerous rocks and quicksands of superst.i.tion, on which the happiness of so many mortals has been wrecked; the Translator, therefore, begs his readers who value their peace of mind, never to forget

_That Order is the Supreme Law of Nature_. The motion of the celestial bodies, the ecliptical course of our globe, the regular change of day and night, and of the different seasons, and every object we behold in Nature's boundless realms, enforce the truth of that principle on the mind of the attentive observer. We no where behold effects without a sufficient cause, no where causes without proportionate effects; no where vacancies nor irregular leaps in the series and concatenation of things; no where beings that are insulated and unallied to the whole; no where supernatural effects nor _immediate_ interpolations of the G.o.dhead, where the regular powers of Nature are sufficient to effect the great views of the Creator. On the contrary, we behold every where the most indissoluble union, and the exactest proportion between cause and effect, every where the most admirable connection between all the smaller and the lesser parts of the whole, and between all the mutations and changes that take place therein: we behold every where fixed, immutable laws, after which all the works of G.o.d, the sun and the smallest grain of sand, the worm and man, the king of creation, move and act, every where great ends and means that are proportionate to them.

Who can examine the world, without perceiving the most perfect order whereby it is ruled? And what reasonable man would conclude from what he _does not know, nor can comprehend_ of the contrary of those things which he _can_ see and examine? How was it possible that man could successfully carry on his occupations and labours without this unalterable order of things? How could he know the will of his Creator, and how execute it? how conclude with the least security from what is past, of what will be? how compute the success of his undertakings, meditations and exertions? What a dreadful scene of confusion would a world exhibit, wherein the series and the connections of things were constantly interrupted through miracles, or the influence of superior beings. Order is, and ever will be, the supreme law of Nature; respect, therefore, this law, take it for your guide on your pilgrimage, and you will avoid the deviations of superst.i.tion.