A Book for the Young | Page 3

best of every thing, we only dwell on the annoyance, regardless of many extenuations that may attend it.
As one of the means to happiness, I would beg of you, my fair young Brides, not to fix too high a standard by which to measure either the perfections of your beloved partners or your own hopes of being happy. Bear in mind that those to whom you are united are subject to the same infirmities as yourself. Look well to what are your requirements as wives, and then prayerfully and steadily act up to them, and if your hopes are not built too high, you may, by acting rightly and rationally, find a well spring of peace and enjoyment that must increase. Think what very proud feelings will be yours, to find you are appreciated and esteemed for the good qualities of the heart and endowments of the mind, and to hear after months of trial, the wife pronounced dearer than the bride.
Look around at the many who have entered the pale of matrimony before you, equally buoyant with hope; with the same loving hearts and the same bright prospects as you had,--and yet the stern realities of life have sobered down that romance of feeling with which they started; yet they are perhaps more happy, though it is a quiet happiness, founded on esteem. Oh, you know not the extent to which the conduct I have urged you to pursue, may affect your well-being, and that of him to whom you are united.
And now with the same greeting I commenced with, will I take my leave--a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you all, and may each succeeding return find you progressing in all that can give you peace and happiness, not only here but hereafter!

THE DYING HORSE.
Heaven! what enormous strength does death possess! How muscular the giant's arm must be To grasp that strong boned horse, and, spite of all His furious efforts, fix him to the earth! Yet, hold, he rises!--no--the struggle's vain; His strength avails him not. Beneath the gripe Of the remorseless monster, stretched at length He lies with neck extended; head hard pressed Upon the very turf where late he fed. His writhing fibres speak his inward pain! His smoking nostrils speak his inward fire! Oh! how he glares! and hark! methinks I hear His bubbling blood, which seems to burst the veins. Amazement! Horror! What a desperate plunge, See! where his ironed hoof has dashed a sod With the velocity of lightning. Ah!-- He rises,--triumphs;--yes, the victory's his! No--the wrestler Death again has thrown him And--oh! with what a murdering dreadful fall! Soft!--he is quiet. Yet whence came that groan, Was't from his chest, or from the throat of death Exulting in his conquest! I know not, But if 'twas his, it surely was his last; For see, he scarcely stirs! Soft! Does he breathe? Ah no! he breathes no more. 'Tis very strange!
How still he's now! how fiery hot--how cold How terrible! How lifeless! all within A few brief moments!--My reason staggers! Philosophy, thy poor enlightened dotard, Who canst for every thing assign a cause, Here take thy stand beside me, and explain This hidden mystery. Bring with thee The head strong Atheist; who laughs at heaven And impiously ascribes events to chance, To help to solve this wonderful enigma! First, tell me, ye proud haughty reasoners, Where the vast strength this creature late possessed Has fled to? how the bright sparkling fire, Which flashed but now from those dim rayless eyes Has been extinguished? Oh--he's dead you say. I know it well:--but how, and by what means? Was it the arm of chance that struck him down, In height of vigor, and in pride of strength, To stiffen in the blast? Come, come, tell me: Nay shake not thus the head's that are enriched With eighty years of wisdom, gleaned from books, From nights of study, and the magazines Of knowledge, which your predecessors left. What! not a word!--I ask you, once again, How comes it that the wond'rous essence, Which gave such vigour to these strong nerved limbs Has leaped from its enclosure, and compelled This noble workmanship of nature, thus To sink Into a cold inactive clod? Nay sneak not off thus cowardly--poor fools Ye are as destitute of information As is the lifeless subject of my thoughts!
The _subject of my thoughts_? Yes--there he lies As free from life, as if he ne'er had lived. Where are his friends and where his old acquaintance Who borrowed from his strength, when in the yoke, With weary pace the steep ascent they climbed? Where are the gay companions of his prime, Who with him ambled o'er the flowery turf, And proudly snorting, passed the way worn hack, With haughty brow; and,