SCINTILLATIONS.

Marlborough Express, Volume XVI, Issue 176, 30 July 1881, Page 2

SCINTILLATIONS.

"Be brief ; for it is with words as with sunbeams : the more they are condensed tha deeper they burn,"— Socthey. Social opinion is like a sharp knife. There are foolish people who regard it only with terror, and dare not touch or meddle with it ; there are more foolish people who, m rashness or defiance, seize it by the blade, and set cut or mangled for their pains ; and there are wise people who grasp it discreetly and boldly by the handle, and use it to carve out their own purposes. — Jamieson. The moment comes — It has already come — when thou must write Thi absolute total of thy life's rast sum. The constellations Btand victorious o'er thee, And placets shoot good foitune m fair junctions, And tell thee, " Now's the time !" — Schiller, Th"Be who quit their proper character to assume what does not belong to them, are for the greater part ignorant of both the character they leave and of the character they assume. — Burke. The most trifling actions that affect a man's credit are to be regarded. The sound of your hammer at five m the morning, or nine at night, heard by a creditor, makes him easy six months longer ; but if he seeß you at a billiardtable, or hears your voice at a tavern, he sends for his money the next day ; demands it before he can receive it m a lump. — Franklin. Ambition is the dropsy of the soul, Whose thirst we must not yield, but control. — Sedley. The habit of dissipating every serious thought by a succession of agreeable sensations is as fatal to happiness as to virtue ; for when amusement is uniformity substituted for objects of moral and mental interests, we lose all that elevates our enjoyment above the scale of childish pleasures.— Anna Maria Porter. Inquisitive people are the funnels of conversation ; they do not take m anything for their own use, but merely to pass it to another. — Steele. Convince the world that you're de»out and true, Be just m all you say, m all you do ; Whatever be your birth, you're sure to be A peer of the fust quality to me. —Juvenal. Equality is one of the most consummate scoundrels that ever crept from the brain of a political juggler , — a fellow who thrusts his hand into the pocket of honest industry or enterprising talent, and squanders their hard-earned profits on profligate idleness or indolent stupidity. — Langstaff. While every vice is hid by hypocrisy, every virtue is suspected to be hypocrisy. This excuses the bad from imitating virtue, the ungenerous from rewarding it ; and the suspicion is looked upon as wisdom, as if it was not as necessary a part of wisdom to know what to believe as what to reject. — Hon. Mrs Montagne. The way to avoid the imputation of impudence is, not to be ashamed of what we do, but never to do what we ought to be ashamed of. — Tullx Music can noble hints impart, Engender fury, kindle love ; With unsuspected eloquence can move, And manage all the man with secret art. Great men stand like solitary towers iv the city of God, and secret passages running beneath external nature, give their thoughts intercourse with higher intelligences, which strengthens and consols them, and of which the laborers on the surface do not even dream. — Longeellow.