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emerge from their smoky atmosphere, and respire a purer air in the country, where their hearts may be rejoiced with a pure and innocent pleasure, and their souls rise up to heaven in aspirations of praise and gratitude to the Author of every blessing.

MAY XVII.

The Tulip.

THE tulip is one of the finest formed and most beautiful of flowers; the fineness of its shape, and the brilliancy of its colours, make it the queen of the garden. And if we consider that each year millions of them blow, all differing in form and beauty, our admiration increases, and we are compelled to acknow. ledge that so much beauty and elegance cannot be the effect of blind chance, but must have some great First Cause which has produced them in its wisdom and beneficence, the existence of which is sufficiently proved by the tulip in full flower.

Though tulips are now produced from roots, there was a time when they did not exist; and whence was derived the first bulb, and that primitive arrangement, of which all subsequent revolutions are only the development, but from some intelligent cause which we call the Creator? As much power and wisdom are dis. played in the structure of a single tulip from which ten others shall proceed, as in the creation of ten at once. Whenever we see a bed of tulips, then, let us not rest satisfied with admiring their beauty; let us also admire in them that wisdom which has formed them with such perfection.

Though the beauties of the tulip are thus so eminently conspicuous, they lose some of their value when we consider they are only to please the sight, for not

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being odoriferous they cannot gratify the smell; and when we contrast them with the pink, which to beauty of form adds the most exquisite perfume, we forget immediately the richness of the tulip. And this is the case with those vain people, who endowed with personal charms set them off with every additional ornament their vanity can suggest; whilst they neglect, and suffer to remain uncultivated, the powers of the under. standing and the virtues of the heart, which alone can render them acceptable to their Maker, and amiable to their fellow-creatures. The beauty of the tulip fades, and the pride of person is laid low: but the beauties of the mind remain to cheer, to delight, and to instruct, when the graces of form are no more; and the virtues of the heart will flourish, when the elegance of shape and the vigour of body are decayed.

The simple annals of plants furnish us with this useful observation, that the more beautiful a flower is the sooner it fades. We shall soon see no more of the tulip than a dry and dead stalk; its beauty and life only last a few short weeks, when its charms are destroyed, its leaves wither, its colours fade, and all that remains of what so lately struck us with its beauty is a sapless stem. Thus we learn from the tulip the little dependance that is to be placed on external advantages; we witness the frailty of beauty, and the short duration of life. For like the flower of the field man groweth up and flourisheth, and then speedily withereth away; his days are few and full of troubles. And may we so live, that when the awful period arrives, the good and the virtuous may regret our loss, and the afflicted and fatherless mourn for our dissolution.

MAY XVIII.

Reflections on Grass.

THOUGH the flowers which the care and industry of man cultivates in the gardens are extremely beautiful, we should know little of the vegetable kingdom if we confined our attention to the contemplation of flowerbeds. Every field is equally the wonderful scene of the works of God, and equally claims our attention. Can any thing be more astonishing than the great quantity of grass which grows in one meadow? To be convinced of the prodigious number of blades of grass, we need only attempt to reckon them as they are growing in any given space, and we shall soon be satisfied of their superior fertility over all plants and herbs. All this is for the subsistence of various species of animals, of which fields and meadows may very properly be considered as the granaries.

Another great advantage to be considered in grass, is the little care it requires in its cultivation; and that it will grow and perpetuate itself independent of the labours of man. Since the Almighty Word of God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, whose seed is in itself, our fields have been uninterruptedly fertile, and we have known no defi. ciency of grass. Its colour is also the most grateful; for who could have borne the dazzling lustre of white, or the brilliant glare of red? If the universal colour had been more dark or obscure, how gloomy and dis. mal would have been the face of nature! But the ever-bountiful Creator has neither injured our sight with colours which our eyes could not support, nor pained it by obscure gloom; on the contrary, he has clothed the fields in colours that strengthen the sight, and please by their diversity: for such is the differ. ence of shade, that scarcely two blades of grass can

Contemplation of the Heavens.

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be found of exactly the same shade of green. By this arrangement of the vegetable kingdom, God has not provided less for our pleasure than for our advantage, the proofs of which every-where present themselves to our observation; and may we never pass them with indifference or disregard, but may our reason ever be employed in tracing out the perfection of wisdom, and the consummation of goodness, in all the works of nature!

MAY XIX.

Sentiments excited by the Contemplation of the Hea

vens.

WHAT Being can have formed the superb vault of heaven? Who has given motion to those immense globes of light, whose continuance is perpetual, and velocity inexpressible? Who has commanded the vast masses of inert manner to assume so many and various forms? Whence are derived the connection, harmony, and beauty, of the whole; and who has determined their proportions, and set limits to their number? Who has prescribed to the planets laws which, during the lapse of ages, remained undiscovered till the sublime genius of a Newton unfolded them? Who has defined the vast circles in which the various stars roll in endless spheres? And who first commanded them to move, and continue their course in uninterrupted progression? All these questions lead us to thee, our adorable Creator! Self-existing, infinite Being! to thy intelligence and supernal power all these heavenly bodies owe their existence, their laws, arrangement, force, and influence!

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What sublime ideas the contemplation of these grand objects raises in our souls! If the space where

so many millions of worlds are revolving cannot be measured by our understanding; if we are lost in as tonishment at the magnitude of the spheres! if the edifice of the universe, which the Almighty has formed, be so immense that all our ideas are confounded in its contemplation; what must Thou be, O God, and what understanding can comprehend thee? If the heavens and all their hosts are so majestically grand and beautiful that the eye is never satiated with their splendour, nor the mind satisfied with the contemplation of their wonders, what must Thou be, O God, of whose glory these are but faint shadows and feeble images? What must be the infinity of Thy powers and the extent of Thy wisdom, when Thou seest at one glance all the immense space of Heaven, with its revolving worlds; and when Thou penetratest into the nature and pro perties of every existing being! Thou who hast formed these admirable plans, who hast calculated every thing, and weighed all in Thy balance; who hast established the laws of the universe, and proposed to Thyself the most sublime ends; in the contemplation of Thee I am lost in sublimity, and prostrate myself before the throne of Thy glory, unable to behold Thy reful. gence!

MAY XX.

Fecundity of Plants.

THE magnificence of the terrestrial part of creation is never more conspicuous than when observed in the astonishing fertility of plants. A single plant produces millions of others. One tobacco-plant produces forty thousand three hundred and twenty grains of seed; and if from this we calculate the produce of four years, we shall find that there may be produced two

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