s great delight
is, to sit with his feet upon the fender, at a club all day, telling
what a famous rider, shooter, and drinker, he was long ago; but nobody
cares to hear such old stories; therefore he is called a 'proser,' and
every person avoids him. It is no wonder a man talks about himself, if
he has never read or thought about any one else. But at length his
precious time has all been wasted, and his last hour comes, during which
he can have nothing to look back upon but a life of folly and guilt. He
sees no one around who loves him, or will weep over his grave; and when
he looks forward, it is towards an eternal world which he has never
prepared to enter, and of which he knows nothing."

"What a terrible picture, grandmama!" said Frank, rather gravely. "I
hope there are not many people like that, or it would be very sad to
meet with them. Now pray let us have a pleasanter description of the
sort of persons you would like Harry and me to become."

"The first foundation of all is, as you already know, Frank, to pray
that you may be put in the right course and kept in it, for of ourselves
we are so sinful and weak that we can do no good thing. Then feeling a
full trust in the Divine assistance, you must begin and end every day
with studying your Bible, not merely reading it, but carefully
endeavouring to understand and obey what it contains. Our leisure should
be bestowed on reading of wiser and better people than ourselves, which
will keep us humble while it instructs our understandings, and thus we
shall be fitted to associate with persons whose society is even better
than books. Christians who are enlightened and sanctified in the
knowledge of all good things, will show us an example of carefully using
our time, which is the most valuable of all earthly possessions. If we
waste our money, we may perhaps get more--if we lose our health, it may
be restored--but time squandered on folly, must hereafter be answered
for, and can never be regained. Whatever be your station in life, waste
none of your thoughts upon fancying how much better you might have acted
in some other person's place, but see what duties belong to that station
in which you live, and do what that requires with activity and
diligence. When we are called to give an account of our stewardship, let
us not have to confess at the last that we wasted our one talent,
because we wished to have been trusted with ten; but let us prepare to
render up what was gi