ve be a
culpable affectation, then certainly to insinuate an idea of their
skill, where they are actually ignorant, is a most unworthy artifice.

BUT of all the qualifications for conversation, humility, if not the
most brilliant, is the safest, the most amiable, and the most feminine.
The affectation of introducing subjects, with which others are
unacquainted, and of displaying talents superior to the rest of the
company, is as dangerous as it is foolish.

There are many, who never can forgive another for being more agreeable
and more accomplished than themselves, and who can pardon any offence
rather than an eclipsing merit. Had the nightingale in the fable
conquered his vanity, and resisted the temptation of shewing a fine
voice, he might have escaped the talons of the hawk. The melody of his
singing was the cause of his destruction; his merit brought him into
danger, and his vanity cost him his life.

[5] Lord Bacon.

ON
ENVY.

Envy came next, Envy with squinting eyes,
Sick of a strange disease, his neighbour's health;
Best then he lives when any better dies,
Is never poor but in another's wealth:
On best mens harms and griefs he feeds his fill,
Else his own maw doth eat with spiteful will,
Ill must the temper be, where diet is so ill.

FLETCHER'S PURPLE ISLAND.

"ENVY, (says Lord Bacon) has no holidays." There cannot perhaps be a
more lively and striking description of the miserable state of mind
those endure, who are tormented with this vice. A spirit of emulation
has been supposed to be the source of the greatest improvements; and
there is no doubt but the warmest rivalship will produce the most
excellent effects; but it is to be feared, that a perpetual state of
contest will injure the temper so essentially, that the mischief will
hardly be counterbalanced by any other advantages. Those, whose progress
is the most rapid, will be apt to despise their less successful
competitors, who, in return, will feel the bitterest resentment against
their more fortunate rivals. Among persons of real goodness, this
jealousy and contempt can never be equally felt, because every
advancement in piety will be attended with a proportionable increase of
humility, which will lead them to contemplate their own improvements
with modesty, and to view with charity the miscarriages of others.

WHEN an envious man is melancholy, one may ask him, in the words of
Bion, what evil has