lly forgetful of
every thing besides, and all emulation in him absorbed in
pleasure.--Thus hurried, as the different propensities prevailed, from
one extreme to the other;--never in a medium, but always doing either
more or less than was required of him.

In like manner was his _avarice_ moderated by his _pity_;--an instance
of which was this;--One morning having won at chuck-farthing, or some
such game, all the money a poor boy was master of, and which he said
had been given him to buy his breakfast, Natura was so much melted at
his tears and complaints, that he generously returned to him the whole
of what he had lost.--Greatly is it to be wished, the same sentiments
of compassion would influence some of riper years, and make them scorn
to take the advantage chance sometimes affords of ruining their
fellow-creatures; but the misfortune is, that when we arrive at the
state of perfect manhood, the _worst_ passions are apt to get the
better of the more _noble_, as the prospect they present is more
alluring to the eye of sense: all men (as I said before) being born
with the same propensities, it is _virtue_ alone, or in other words, a
strict _morality_, which prevents them from actuating alike in
all.--But to return to the young Natura.

He was scarce ten years old when his mother died; but was not sensible
of the misfortune he sustained by the loss of her, though, as it
afterwards proved, was the greatest could have happened to him: the
remembrance of the tenderness with which she had used him, joined to
the sight of all the family in tears, made him at first indeed utter
some bitter lamentations; but the thoughts of a new suit of mourning,
a dress he had never yet been in, soon dissipated his grief, and the
sight of himself before the great glass, in a habit so altogether
strange, and therefore pleasing to him, took off all anguish for the
sad occasion.--So early do we begin to be sensible of a satisfaction
in any thing that we imagine is an advantage to our persons, or will
make us be taken notice of.--How it grows up with us, and how
difficult it is to be eradicated, I appeal even to those of the most
sour and cynical disposition.

Mr. Dryden admirably describes this propensity in human nature in
these lines:

Men are but children of a larger growth,
Our appetites as prone to change as theirs,
And full as craving too, and full as vain.

A fondness for trifles is certainly no less conspicuous in age than
y