“ One of the most prominent and growing evils of society, seems to me to be the love of scandal. This may in a great degree be attributed to the stagnation and absence of customary, active employment in our cities, during the recent war. The return of peace, among other advantages, may afford such employment for every one in their own concerns, as may force them to relinquish in part the gratuitous interest they have taken in those of others. In the mean time we may gradually acquire more generous habits, and attain to manly feelings by degrees ”

“ What idea can the unfortunate young people of the present day have of ancient polish and refinement? So extensive is the deterioration of society, so deleterious the consequences of abandoning established systems, that even the well-intentioned know not how to conduct themselves. ”

“ Since that period every thing has been new modelled, and our manners left to choke themselves with their own wild growth, without any pruning, till they have shot into the utmost exuberance of rudeness. Once in a while a vestige may be perceived of better times, some well-bred antique that shrinks from “modern degeneracy;” and when seen in society recals to mind the insulated Corinthian columns, that are still erect amid the desolation of Palmyra, or the deserted environs of the Forum. ”

“ The young colts, the yearlings, and the handsome, coquettish bay mare, whose mission it is to tease the old horse, are frisking about or bending their swan-like, short-shorn necks to nibble at the blades of grass. ”

“ It is surprising, that in a country where the spirit of improvement and enterprise is so strong, the establishment of mail and other coaches, should be so miserably wanting in every thing, for the comfort of the traveller, which is still more remarkable, because there being no post-horses on the roads, almost all our journeying is in these vehicles. Hitherto nothing seems to have been aimed at but speed, and the rapidity with which the mail is transported, equals that of the most improved countries in Europe. ”

“ The crumbling of ancient systems, the decomposition of civil society, the propagation of extravagant theories, the rashness of new experiments, and the destruction of visionary hopes, have produced many elaborate essays, and educed from human intellect, numerous consummate specimens of splendid eloquence. ”

“ If the majority are of opinion, that force can serve the purposes of religion, that men will be more constant and devout in their attendance on publick worship from being compelled, let these regulations be universally enforced, and doubtless some useful additions might be made from a celebrated code now obsolete. The King of Spain has restored the Inquisition, and it is not for us to say he has not done wisely. There is a restless spirit in man never to be contented. ”

“ The following curious English advertisement appeared in the Times and Morning Chronicle in June, 1813.
One who has lived, thus far, for others, would fain do, at length though late, a little for himself. A created being, more trespassed upon than the Advertiser, never, perhaps, had existence. ”

“ How decisive of success is a well chosen auxiliary? The perfection of advice frequently is—by whom to be advised.—No particular line of proffered utility is here chalked out. With the seeker after right ends, or the sufferer under wrongs, the presumption is left, whether the description of co-operator inferrible from this advertisement may be worth cultivating. It remains only to be added, that the Advertiser will meddle with nothing immoral or illegal and that, however legal or moral, he must be allowed to decline what is disagreeable.—To frank applications the frankest answers will be given ”

“ There have been circles of society, where it would have been considered impertinent, for a gentleman to sit cross-legged; but as I do not aim at impossibilities, I shall say nothing on this point: no gentleman, however, must allow himself to sit in the company of others in the following position. On the edge of the chair, one leg over the other, parallel to, and leaning on the back of the chair. ”

“ After wasting a rather lengthened career in the uses and abuses of other people, the Advertiser finds himself, at not a very early epoch, in a plight of fortune, which is, indeed, very susceptible of melioration. It is such melioration he now aims at. What has hitherto been given gratis, would in future be devoted to thrift; and the change is not impossible that a course of anterior knight-errantry might terminate in sordidness: for he can neither work cheap nor trust much—The man who has seen more of the world and its ways than the Advertiser OUGHT NOT to be a novice ”

“ When one sees an assembly in the present day, straggling groupes of young men with whiskered cheeks, and wild, uncurled, unpowdered, bewildered locks, and the innocent animated imitations of the Medicean Venus, with their thousand cork-screw ringlets and muslin robes roaming among them, it brings to the fancy a flock of merino lambs in a field of scrub oaks. ”

“ No gentleman at dinner or tea time is to take out a silk handkerchief, that has been in his pocket two or three days, and lay it over his knee; if in eating toast, he is not furnished with a napkin to wipe his fingers, he may make use of a fresh cambrick one, if he has it, but he had better adopt the feline mode of cleansing his paws, than the practice here prohibited. ”

“ In modern Europe, whose institutions are principally monarchical, titles of different degrees, chiefly hereditary, are the most common mode of rewarding brilliant or useful services, and one the main supports of this form of government. ”

“ For many years this society existed without the knowledge of the Turks, and, in the final event to their great dismay. The barbarity of the ruling power at length aroused the Greeks, and with the aid of the Russian, English, and French allied forces, a battle was fought in the Bay of Navarino, in which the Turkish fleet was destroyed with great loss of life, and the Turks were forced to abandon Greece. ”

“ A woman rushes in crying that a muzhik has fallen into the water; he sees again the hastening of the peasants, the fruitless efforts to rescue the man; he longs to jump into the pond, but does not. Then the net is drawn in with its shining carp, and, later, with something terribly still and white. ”

“ If a gentleman be requested to carve a turkey, or any other fowl, he is not to proceed as if it were a character, and cut it completely up: but take off a piece as it is wanted, and not keep a company waiting, and leave the whole bird piece-meal, when perhaps no one will taste it. ”

“ Is not delivering two sermons a week, a greater task, than most or even any clergyman can well perform, in addition to other parochial duties? Would not a single discourse, which, it may reasonably be inferred, would be composed with more care and ability, produce more good than is now usually done by two? Does not the multiplicity of sermons, in some measure, weaken their effect? ”

“ I wish to propose an undertaking to the publick, which I hope some of our learned societies or liberal individuals may be disposed to prosecute. This is to explore those ancient entrenchments that are found in the western states, more effectually than has yet been done. ”

“ The lovers of economy will not object to making use of this portion of the “cheap defence” of nations: and more generous and enlarged minds would gladly decree to a statesman, or hero, a surname, which would only be a glorious distinction to him, and not being hereditary as in monarchies, would not make his descendants burthensome to the publick. ”

“ From South America to India is a long step around the globe, but the conquest of Burmah by the English justly deserves mention in the story of the world's progress in this century, and while the battle of Prome, in the first Burmese war, did not at once give the country into the hands of the British, it was the point from which the dynasty of Alompra began to decline. ”

“ We grieve honestly over the deaths of the brave young ensign and of the guileless Velenchuk. We share his dread of seeing the face of the wounded, or standing on the spot marked by the death struggle. ”

“ There is now living in Gardiner, on Kennebeck River, a gentleman about 81 years old, whose vision exhibits the following curious phenomena.—Until he had passed his 79th year, his eyes had gradually undergone the change common to persons of an advanced age,—requiring the objects of vision to be carried more and more distant as life progressed. ”

“ It is therefore obviously unfair to compare the work of the young count, full of the romantic enthusiasm of his first military experience, with that of the melancholy mystic, whose theories of social and religious life have attracted so much attention. ”

“ The introduction and rapid extension of merino sheep, in this country, forms one of the most important features of our rural economy. I have heard the numbers of full-bred and half-bred now in the United States, very differently estimated. ”

“ It has been the policy of all nations to encourage their citizens, to the performance of great actions, by some species of honourable distinction. The nature of these has varied with the genius of their governments. ”

“ What I wish here to repress, is not censoriousness, but only that idle gossip and mischievous tattling, the natural occupation of ignoble minds in a state of idleness. The breed of censorious people are by far too useful to be destroyed ”

“ The sketch most resembling Tolstoi's later works, in style and subject, is "Polikusha," a powerful story of Russiam peasant life, the plot of which turns on the conscription of a young peasant and his release by a sad tragedy of the ghastly sort in which the author is fond of displaying his skill. But entirely unique and unlike anything from this pen is the last sketch "Kholstomir, the History of a Horse." Never did piebald gelding find a more faithful and sympathetic historian. It might be called a study in equine ethics. The piebald ife old. "There is an honorable old age ”

“ The presence among us thirty-five years ago, of the most accomplished noblemen of the Court of Versailles, in adding a slight polish to the simplicity and frankness of our habits, formed a most pleasing and perfect system of behaviour. ”

“ At the distance of 15 or 20 feet, he is unable to distinguish his most intimate acquaintances. Yet at the distance of 50 or 60 rods, he sees with tolerable accuracy, so as to tell a man from a woman, or a horse from an ox, as correctly as most persons. ”

“ Those who are still desirous of greater perfection, without regarding the propensities of human nature, would do well to recollect a celebrated Italian epitaph on a man who took physic in health: Stavo bene, ma per star meglior, sto qui. ”

“ Of Chinese warfare, comparatively little has been known by reason of the Celestial Kingdom's long centuries of exclusiveness. Mr. Knox classes the capture of the forts in the Peiao River and Fekin among important events in the history of nations, because by the succeeding treaty of Tien-Tsin the hitherto secluded region was practically opened to the rest of the world. ”

“ Nor can such topicks be exhausted, while philosophers possess the power of perception, combination and analysis, to develope, or the talent of speaking to convince, or the art of writing to demonstrate, the inevitable tendency of rash and innovating propositions, by which the simple are confounded, and the wise baffled. ”

“ It is impossible that the people who are able to construct such extensive works, should not have possessed a variety of tools, and utensils of various descriptions; and it is extremely probable that fragments at least of these might be found if a civilized people had any thing to do with them, coins might perhaps be discovered. ”

“ The attitude of Russia towards the Greeks naturally aroused the hostility of the Porte against that nation, and a series of battles, terminating in the siege of Silistria, brought about the treaty of Adrianople, in favor of the Russians. ”

“ In England, this is found to be a lucrative branch of the business; every town has a coach office, where parcels are booked, and are transmitted daily to all parts of the kingdom, for a trifling charge; every package is delivered immediately, and very often the persons, to whom they are addressed, receive them as early as they would a letter by the mail. ”

“ The hour would be more propitious to devotion, the closing of the day with religious exercises would be more natural and decorous, than the present arrangement, by which, in summer time particularly, the day is most unequally divided, and the services inconveniently crowded together. ”

“ His other faculties, except a slight deafness of long standing, are more than usually perfect, for his time of life. His muscular strength and activity are such as to enable him to walk 4 or 5 miles from home, and return the same day. ”

“ As the slightest innovation in these concerns, is apt to startle even the strongest minds, I hope that the following suggestions may be candidly appreciated, and shewn to be expedient or otherwise, after mature consideration. ”

“ The description of the horses to whom the hero relates his adventures, as they are standing in the field on a summer morning, is a bit of pastoral poetry worthy of Virgil or Izaak Walton. "Tis the time when the railbird, running from place to place among the thick reeds, passionately calls his mate ”