fwing of his wicked purfuits, till a remarkable judgment of heaven took him out of the world. As he was riding out one day with fome of his companions, his horse threw him off, and before they could give him any affiftance, kicked out his bowels, and he had only just time to say "I am damned;" and then expired. T CONJUGAL INFIDELITY. HRICE happy, indeed, may those be pronounced whom the conjugal link closely unites. Harmony and friendship render their domestic habitation an elyfium, where joy, unalloyed with care, is mutual. Even the misfortunes and evils, accidental to mankind are alleviated by participation in this feat of matrimonial felicity. Their offspring are the pledges of connubial blifs, and bring to the parents' memory the pleasing imagination of scenes of transport and hopes of future joy. And shall any individual trample upon thefe holy rites, and with impious audacity violate the most facred and divine laws, by attempting to feduce the affections of either party? Shall fuch a character escape with impunity? The one who attempts to feduce, the other who is weak enough to be feduced, are both to blame. Weak muft he be, who voluntarily exchanges conjugal felicity, ratified and enjoyed by divine command, for illicit pleasure with a woman, whom, in his rational rational reflecting moments, he must deteft. In the mean time his amiable and unfortunate wife pines away in wretched folitude. Her cup of pleasure has been fuddenly dashed to the ground. The conjugal and holy rites have been violated. Her offspring is a fad memento of her former happiness, and brings to her recollection the features of her once beloved, and equally fond hufband. The too wretched and inconfiderate man must remember that fuch things were, and those most dear to him. Once it was in thy power to enjoy happiness, but the time is gone by. No more fhall that peace of mind, arising from a quiet confcience, armed with integrity, return to thy poffeffion. Thou haft indulged in a lawless paffion too long to be happy. Had an early repentance incited thee to the practice of virtue, happiness was within thy reach. But the hour is past-and at the point of death the excruciating thought of having brought misery to thyself, and the recollection that far different might have been the hours of approaching diffolution, and how wretched thou haft left thy once beloved and innocent partner and children, muft opprefs thee with the utmost horror; at that moment death, although much to be dreaded, will be welcome. "Afraid to die, yet more afraid to live." Such Such is the depravity of the age, fo vitiated is the mind, that the opinion of the Koman poetof his countrymen, may be applied with propriety to the present time. Etas parentum, pejor avis, tulit At least, if daily inftances of nuptial infidelity, and thofe of the moft heinous kind are to be enrolled among the catalogue of vices, and fuch they certainly are of the most iniquitous tendency; divorcements are cafualties which fo frequently happen in thefe days, that we expect to find them in a public print as regularly as the account of marriages and deaths. It is painful to reflect upon this univerfal species of immorality; who, then, fet the example? thofe very perfons, who, from their rank and fortune alone, have influence among the more fubordinate clafs of people. Look among the exalted fiations in life, and the lover of virtue will fhrink with abhorrence from the scene. Nobility, princely pride, what are ye, without virtue! It is reputation, which is not to be bought with wealth, in as much as it is fuperior to it, it is felicity originating from an internal fource, which is not to be obtained but from upright morals and integrity, which enhance thefe thefe gifts of fortune. Princes, indeed, are unhappy, who do not hear the truth; it is not fo in this country; the public will speak out-neither are they deterred through fervile fear, nor blinded by the dazzling splendour of fituation; and they speak the truth in an open manner, which commands attention and refpect. Let the man, be he ever fo exalted, regard the anger and cenfure of the people. He who will disgrace himself, and is a public character, is the more imprudent, as being the more liable to obfervation and detection, than the man who moves in the middle fpheres of life; although the laws may not reach him, popular cenfure will ;-he cannot escape this, as little as he can the reflections of an upbraiding and diseased mind. "Therein the patient must minister unto himself." THE GIPSY. A MORAL TALE. UMBERLESS are the complaints against deceit; but were we not fometimes deceived, we should find ourselves, perhaps, in very unhappy fituations. By By happening to spend a few weeks together, one fummer, at the houfe of a lady in the country, with whom they were both intimately acquainted, Mifs Beverton and Miss Martin, became fo fond of each others company, that a violent friendship commenced between them. These two young ladies, being fummoned about the fame time, by their refpective parents, from Middleton-hall, who lived many miles from that place, and in different counties, feparated with no fmall reluctance, but, with their concluding adieus, mutually promised to keep up a most friendly correspondence with their pens. Few female friends were more firmly attached to each other than Emily Beverton and Lucy Martin; their attachment indeed was rather remarkable, as their fouls were not quite congenial. They were both very good-natured, and were, in general, pleased with the fame pursuits: they both prefered a country life to a town one; but here was the principal line of discrimination : Emily, though he was a warm admirer of the beauties of nature, and enjoyed " each rural fight, each rural found," with a degree of enthusiasm, had |