But supposing
public worship were duly attended by all persons, as, according to what
has now become a fiction of the law, it is designed to be, how are the
remaining portions of the day to be disposed of by those who have no
domestic circle to which they can repair--no opportunities for that
refreshment both of body and mind, which the Sabbath, when wisely and
properly observed, affords? Or who, if belonging to or placed in
religious families, are not yet at years of such discretion as suffices
to repress their natural activity and the instinctive desire of
recreation? Rigorous gamelaws do not more certainly encourage poaching,
than the puritanical observance of the Sabbath leads to
Sabbath-breaking.--_Quarterly Review._
* * * * *
BURNS.
This extraordinary man, before he produced any of the pieces on which
his fame is built, had educated himself abundantly; and when he died,
at the age of thirty-seven, knew more of books, as well as of men, than
fifty out of a hundred in any of the learned professions in any country
of the world are ever likely to do.--_Ibid._
* * * * *
THE ETTRICK SHEPHERD.
When the Ettrick Shepherd was first heard of, he had indeed but just
learned to write, by copying the letters of a printed ballad, as he
lay watching his flock on the mountains; but thirty years or more have
passed since then, and his acquirements are now such, that the Royal
Society of Literature, in patronizing him, might be justly said to
honour a laborious and successful student, as well as a masculine and
fertile genius.
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