LIFE.
Love, thou sportive, fickle boy,
Source of anguish, child of joy;
Ever wounding, ever smiling,
Soothing still, and still beguiling;
What are all thy boasted treasures?
Tender sorrows, transient pleasures;
Anxious hopes, and jealous fears,
Laughing hours, and mourning years.
What is FRIENDSHIP’s soothing name?
But a shadowy, vap’rish flame;
Fancy’s balm, for ev’ry wound,
Ever sought, but rarely found.
What is BEAUTY? but a flow’r,
Blooming, fading, in an hour;
Deck’d with brightest tints at morn,
At twilight, with’ring on a thorn;
Like the gentle ROSE of spring;
Chill’d by ev’ry Zephyr’s wing;
Ah! how soon its colour flies,
Blushes, trembles, falls, and DIES.
What is YOUTH? in smiling sorrow,
Blithe to-day, and sad to-morrow:
Never fix’d, for ever ranging,
Laughing, weeping, doating, changing;
Wild, capricious, giddy, vain,
Cloy’d with pleasure, nurs’d with pain;
Ev’ry moment LIFE’s decaying,
Bliss expires, while TIME’s delaying;
Age steals on with wintry face,
Ev’ry rapt’rous HOPE to chase;
Like a wither’d sapless tree
Bow’d to chilling FATE’s decree;
Stripp’d of all its foliage gay,
Drooping at the close of day.
What of tedious LIFE remains?
Keen regrets, and cureless pains;
Till DEATH appears a welcome FRIEND,
And bid the scene of SORROW end.
NEW-YORK: Printed by JOHN TIEBOUT, No. 358, Pearl-Street, for THOMAS BURLING, Jun. & Co. Subscriptions for this Magazine (at 6s. per quarter) are taken in at the Printing-Office, and at the Circulating Library of Mr. J. FELLOWS, No. 60, Wall-Street.
For the New-York Weekly Magazine.
It has often been made a question on my mind, Whether the multiplicity of books in circulation are an advantage or disadvantage to the morals of youth?—That every book ought to be investigated, and that with an impartial eye before we condemn it, is a fact incontestible. None but the prejudiced, the weak and the ignorant, will ever attempt to persuade youth from the pursuit of wisdom. A man possessed of the least spark of knowledge, would blush to advise others from the investigation of truth. That book has never yet been printed, which, when examined by the eye of reason and candor, did not contain something by which we may be profited. Yet, how numerous are they who will discard the writings of an author, merely because they have heard it was an improper book. How forcible is such reasonings! What will be the opinion of the rational part of the creation concerning such persons, if they argue with such inconsistency? Will they not justly conclude that a weak head, and unprincipled heart, guides their opinion? And while they continue thus to argue, they ought to reflect, if capable of reflection, that by condemning them without investigating one single principle whereby they may substantiate their charge, they expose themselves to censure and contempt. Thus we behold books too often branded with detestation, and consigned to oblivion, by those pests of society. For such they truly are, in my opinion, who have the audacity to persuade youth from a search after knowledge. Consider, O youth, that while you are obeying the dictates of these all-knowing men, you are sacrificing your own opinion at the shrine of ignorance. It is ignorance, united with impudence and conceit, that prompts them to trespass on your judgment. If they were duly to consider from what source their knowledge arises—if they would give themselves more time to reflect, and that with candor, they would find that all their profound search and erudition is nothing more than a “sounding brass or tinkling symbol.” And that as long as they suffer themselves to be led by the wrong principles which some of our ancestors imbibed, they will be considered as a mere BLANK in society.
I will readily admit, that there are books which, by a constant application to them, will corrupt and lead astray the minds of youth, whose principles are not fully established. Yet, are they to be prohibited from a perusal of those books? No!—But guard them well against the danger, and then let them examine such authors with attention and candor. Let their youthful minds bestow on them their just sentence. By being thus accustomed to judge for themselves, they will be able with clearness and precision to detect impostors, if any of that description should attempt to impose on their understandings. That they will have to combat with such characters at some period of their lives, is beyond a doubt, then being unprepared to answer them, will they not expose THEIR folly in obeying the dictates of men who were guided by self-conceited, superstitious, and bigotted principles. They are self-conceited, because THEIR knowledge is deemed by them to be superior to the rest of mankind; superstitious, because they worship as their gods a select number of books by which their rule of life is formed, and from which they dare not deviate, least they should by transgression seal their ruin; bigotted, because they are callous to the voice of reason, and determined to adhere to their own principles, however unfounded.—Such are the men to whose care the instruction of youth has been too often committed; and who, instead of expanding and cultivating their juvenile minds with useful knowledge, by a thorough investigation of every book, have bred them up in superstitious ignorance, preparing them for the reception of every vice, which finally proves their ruin.
ZULINDUS.
May 5, 1797
This article is listed in the Index under the name of the author, Zulindus.