bles that we have but might be reasoned away. The short man can not
add a cubit to his stature; but he may think, after all, that many great
heroes have been short, and that it is the mind, not the form, that
makes the man. Napoleon the Great, who had high-heeled boots, and was,
to be sure, hardly a giant in stature, once looked at a picture of
Alexander, by David. "Ah!" said he, taking snuff, with a pleased air,
"Alexander was shorter than I." The hero last mentioned is he who cried
because he had no more worlds to conquer, and who never thought of
conquering himself. But if Alexander were disappointed about another
world, his courtiers were much more so because they were not Alexanders.
But the world would not have cared for a surplus of them; one was
enough. Conquerers are very pleasant fellows, no doubt, and are
disappointed and sulky because they can not gain more battles; but we
poor frogs in the world are quite satisfied with one King Stork.

If we look at a disappointment as a lesson, we soon take the sting out
of it. A spider will teach us that. He is watching for a fly, and away
the nimble fellow flies. The spider upon this runs round his net to see
whether there be any holes, and to mend them. When doing so, he comes
upon an old body of one of his victims, and he commences again on it,
with a pious ejaculation of "Better luck next time." So one of the
greatest and wisest missionaries whom we have ever had, tried, when a
boy, to climb a tree. He fell down, and broke his leg. Seriously lamed,
he went on crutches for six months, and at the end of that time quietly
set about climbing the tree again, and succeeded. He had, in truth, a
reserve fund of good-humor and sound sense, saw where he failed, and
conquered it. His disappointment was worth twenty dozen successes to
him, and to the world too. It is a good rule, also, never to make too
sure of any thing, and never to put too high a price on it. Every thing
is worth doing well; every thing, presuming you like it, is worth
having. The girl you fall in love with may be silly and ill-favored; but
what of that? she is your love. "'Tis a poor fancy of mine own to like
that which none other man will have," says the fool Touchstone; but he
speaks like a wise man. He is wiser than the melancholy Jacques in the
same play, who calls all people fools, and mopes about preaching wise
saws. If our young men were as wise, there would not be half the
ill-assorted marriages in th