Sick of the world, and all its joys,
My soul in pining sadness mourns;
Dark scenes of woe my mind employs,
The past and present in their turns.
Have you ever met with a saying of the great, and like wise good Mr. Locke, author of the famous
Essay on the Human Understanding
? He wrote a letter to a friend, directing it, "not to be delivered till after my decease;" it ended thus—"I know you loved me when living, and will preserve my memory now I am dead. All the use to be made of it is, that this life affords no solid satisfaction, but in the consciousness of having done well, and the hopes of another life. Adieu! I leave my best wishes with you. J. LOCKE."
Clarinda, may I reckon on your friendship for life? I think I may. Thou Almighty Preserver of men! thy friendship, which hitherto I have too much neglected, to secure it shall, all the future days and nights of my life, be my steady care! The idea of my Clarinda follows—
Hide it, my heart, within that close disguise,
Where, mix'd with God's, her lov'd idea lies.
But I fear that inconstancy, the consequent imperfection of human weakness. Shall I meet with a friendship that defies years of absence, and the chances and changes of fortune? Perhaps "such things are;"
one honest
man