TIMOTHY TITCOMB'S WORKS. 1.-LETTERS TO YOUNG PEOPLE; SINGLE AND MARRIED. (26th Edition.) One vol. 12mo. $1 00; gilt edges, $1 50. II.—BITTER-SWEET; A POEM. (15th Edition.) One vol. 12mo. $0 75; gilt edges, $1 25. III.-GOLD-FOIL; HAMMERED FROM POPULAR PROVERBS. (15th Edition.) One vol. 12mo. $1 00; gilt edges, $1 50. IV.-MISS GILBERT'S CAREER; AN AMERICAN STORY. (13th Edition.) One vol. 12mo. $1 25. V.-LESSONS IN LIFE. A SERIES OF FAMILIAR ESSAYS. One vol. 12mo. $1 00; gilt edges, $1 50. Copies sent by mail, post-paid, on receipt of price. A SERIES OF FAMILIAR ESSAYS. BY TIMOTHY TITCOMB, AUTHOR OF LETTERS TO THE YOUNG," "GOLD-FOIL," ETC. NEW YORK: CHARLES SCRIBNER, 124 GRAND STREET. ENTERED, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1861, BY CHARLES SCRIBNER, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of New York. JOHN F. TROW, PRINTER, STEREOTYPER, AND ELECTROTYPER, 48 & 50 Greene Street, New York. PREFACE. THE quick and cordial reception which greeted the author's "Letters to the Young," and his more recent series of essays entitled "Gold Foil," and the constant and substantial friendship which has been maintained by the public toward those productions, must stand as his apology for this third venture in a kindred field of effort. It should be -and probably is-unnecessary for the author to say that in this book, as in its predecessors, he has aimed to be neither brilliant nor profound. He has endeavored, simply, to treat in a familiar and attractive way a few of the more prominent questions which concern the life of every thoughtful man and woman. Indeed, he can hardly pretend to |