to more
goodly proportion than those of Baucis and Philemon, poverty has tasted
the luxuries of competence, labor has lolled at ease in a perpetual
armchair of idleness, sickness has been bribed into banishment, life has
been invested with new charms, and death deprived of its former terrors.
Nor have the affections been less gratified than the wants, appetites,
and ambitions of mankind. By the conjurations of the same potent spell,
kindred have lavished anticipated benefits upon one another, and charity
upon all. Let it be termed a delusion,--a fool's Paradise is better than
the wise man's Tartarus; be it branded as an _ignis-fatuus_,--it was at
least a benevolent one, which, instead of beguiling its followers into
swamps, caverns, and pitfalls, allured them on with all the
blandishments of enchantment to a garden of Eden, an ever-blooming
Elysium of delight. True, the pleasures it bestowed were evanescent: but
which of our joys are permanent? and who so inexperienced as not to know
that anticipation is always of higher relish than reality, which strikes
a balance both in our sufferings and enjoyments? "The fear of ill
exceeds the ill we fear"; and fruition, in the same proportion,
invariably falls short of hope. "Men are but children of a larger
growth," who may amuse themselves for a long time in gazing at the
reflection of the moon in the water; but, if they jump in to grasp it,
they may grope forever, and only get the farther from their object. He
is the wisest who keeps feeding upon the future, and refrains as long as
possible from undeceiving himself by converting his pleasant
speculations into disagreeable certainties.

The true mental epicure always purchased his ticket early, and postponed
inquiry into its fate to the last possible moment, during the whole of
which intervening period he had an imaginary twenty thousand locked up
in his desk: and was not this well worth all the money? Who would
scruple to give twenty pounds interest for even the ideal enjoyment of
as many thousands during two or three months? "_Crede quod habes, et
habes_"; and the usufruct of such a capital is sorely not dear at such a
price. Some years ago, a gentleman, in passing along Cheapside, saw the
figures 1,069, of which number he was the sole proprietor, flaming on
the window of a lottery-office as a capital prize. Somewhat flurried by
this discovery, not less welcome than unexpected, he resolved to walk
round St. Paul's that he migh