its
proprietors, but could not maintain a property in themselves! Just so
the same creature of yesterday asserts his property in that ancient
globe, which he is destined to enjoy but an hour; and he asserts, that
all was made for him, though in another hour he leaves all and becomes
again, as to the planet which nurtured him, the nonentity of
yesterday.

Pride, the bane of man--I exclaimed, as I passed the gate--what are
its claims? Does it arise from fine clothing?--let it be remembered
that every part has been stolen from the lowest of Nature's
works--that the finest glitter is but a modification of the very
surface--and that the garments which this year deck beauty and rank, will
in the next be rotting on the dunghill! Does Pride feed on the records
of ancestry?--let it visit the family tomb, and examine the bones and
dust of that ancestry on which it founds its self-importance! Is Pride
derived from titles of distinction?--let it inquire who conferred
them--for what--and by what intrigues--and let it be considered, that
titles or names confer no inherent quality, and do not alter the
nature of any thing to which they are applied! Does an inexperienced
girl take a lesson of Pride from her looking-glass?--she may be cured
of her foible, by conceiving 10 to be added to the date of the year,
or by looking on those ten years older than herself! Is it an office
of power which serves as the basis of a lofty and insulting
Pride?--let him who fills it remember that he is but the puppet of
knaves, or fools; and at best but a mere _servant_ of the public! Does
wealth intoxicate the weakness of man?--let it never be forgotten that
the possession is distinct from the possessor, and that the most
contemptible of the human race have been the accumulators of wealth!
Does the name of wisdom, puff up any of its professors?--of such it
may truly be said, that their wisdom is foolishness--for none truly
wise ever felt, in the researches of man, any ground of arrogance,
while pursuits of philosophy serve only to teach humility!--But to
what purpose tend such observations? Every man is his own microcosm,
and his case, in his own view, is that of no other man! Pride will
always find food in self-love, which in spite of exhortations, it will
devour with ravenous appetite! If men were immortal, how intolerable
would be existence from the arrogance and perpetuity of Pride! While
this passion infects and misleads the governors of the world,