PROPER TIME TO BE STILL.

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homely phrase,) to make them handy. The body, likewise, needs exercise, to keep it in a healthy state. The various parts of its machinery have a great work to do, every day, in turning your food into blood, and sending it a great many thousand times, in a vast number of little streams, to every part of the body. But this machinery will not work, if the body is all the time inactive. It requires motion, to give it power. There is nothing, therefore, so bad for it as laziness. It is like a dead calm to a windmill, which stops all its machinery.

7. LEARN, AT PROPER TIMES, TO BE STILL. All nature needs repose. If the human system were always kept in the utmost activity, it would soon wear out. For this reason, God has given us periodical seasons of rest: a part of every day, and one whole day in seven. There are times, also, when it is not proper to be active; as, when you are at your devotions, or at family worship, or in the house of God. So, likewise, at school, or in company, or when you sit down with the family at home, as well as in many other cases, activity is out of place. Your body, therefore, will never be educated, till you have obtained such control over it, as to be able, at proper times, to be still. And I may say, it is a great accomplishment in a young person, to know just when to be still, and to have self-control enough to be still just at the proper time.

8. BE CAREFUL TO KEEP THE BODY IN ITS NATURAL POSITION. This is necessary, not only to preserve its beauty, but to prevent deformity. Sitting at school, or at any sedentary employment, is liable to produce some unnatural twist or bend of the body. The human form, in its natural position, is a model of beauty. But, when bad habits turn it out of shape, it offends the eye. Avoid a stooping posture, or an inclination

to either side. But sit and stand erect, with the small of the back curved in, the chest thrown forward, the shoulders back, and the head upright. A little attention to these things every day, while the body is growing, aud the bones and muscles are in a flexible state, will give your form a beauty and symmetry, which you can never acquire afterwards, if you neglect it at this time of life. And it will do more, a thousand times, to keep you in health, than all the doctor's pill-boxes.

SNAKE.

9. AVOID TIGHT-DRESSING AS YOU WOULD A BLACK You will perhaps smile at this. But if you know any thing of the black snake, you will recollect that it assaults not with deadly venom, but winds itself around its victim, stops the circulation of the blood, and, if it reaches high enough, makes a rope of itself, to strangle him. I need not tell you that the effects of tight-dressing are similar. Whatever part of the body, whether neck, chest, arms, limbs, or feet, is pinched with tight covering, is subject to the same strangling process produced by the black snake. It obstructs the free circulation of the blood, and produces a tendency to disease in the part so compressed. If you feel an unpleasant tightness in any part of your dress, remember the black snake.

10. DISCIPLINE THE MUSCLES OF THE FACE. You may think this is a queer direction; but I assure you it is given with all gravity. If you allow every temper of the heart to find a corresponding expression in the muscles of the face, you will be sure to spoil the fairest countenance. How would you feel, if you were to see an accomplished young person, with fine features, and a beautiful countenance; but on coming near, should discover little holes in the face, from which, every now and then, vipers and venomous serpents were thrusting out their heads and hissing at you?

Well, the evil tempers of the heart, such as pride, vanity, envy, and jealousy, are a nest of vipers; and, when indulged, they will spit out their venom through the countenance. How often do we see a proud, scornful, sour, morose, or jealous expression, that has fairly been worn into the features of the countenance! And what is this but the hissing of vipers that dwell within? Strive to acquire such self-control, as to keep a calm, serene expression upon your countenance; and you cannot tell how much it will add to your appearance.

11. BE TEMPERATE. To be strictly temperate is, to avoid all excess. Not only abstain from eating and drinking what is hurtful, but use moderation in all things; in eating and drinking, in running and walking, in play, in amusement.

I

CHAPTER XIII

ON USEFUL LABOUR.

HAVE seen boys who would make incredible exertion to accomplish any thing which they un

dertook for their own amusement; but who, when called upon to do any thing useful, would demur and complain, put on sour looks, and conjure up a multitude of objections, making the thing to be done like lifting a mountain. Whenever any work is to be done, "there is a lion in the way;" and the objections they make, and the difficulties they interpose, make you feel as if you would rather do it a dozen times yourself, than to ask them to lift a little finger. The real difficulty is in the boy's own mind. He has no idea of being useful; no thought of doing any thing but to seek his own pleasure; and he is mean enough to look on and see his father and mother toil and wear themselves out to bring him up in idleness. Play, play, play, from morning till night, is all his ambition. Now, I do not object to his playing; but what I would find fault with is, that he should wish to play all the time. I would not have him work all the time, for

"All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy;" neither would I have him play all the time, for

"All play and no work makes Jack a mere toy."

There is not a spark of manliness in such a boy; and he never will be a man, till he alters his notions.

There is another boy, who has more heart, a better disposition. When called to do any thing, he is always ready and willing. His heart dilates at the thought of helping his father or his mother; of being useful. He takes hold with alacrity. You would think the work he is set about would be despatched in a trice. But he is chicken-hearted. Instead of conquering his work, he suffers his work to conquer him. He works briskly for a few minutes, and then he begins to flag. Instead of working away, with steady perseverance, he stops every minute or two, and looks at his work, and wishes it were done. But wishing is not working; and his work does not get done in this way. The more he gazes at it, the more like a mountain it appears. At length he sits down to rest; and finally, after having suffered more from the dread of exertion than it would have cost him to do his work a dozen times, he gives it up, and goes to his father or mother, and in a desponding tone and with a sheepish look, he says, "1 can't do it!" He is a coward. He has suffered himself to be conquered by a wood-pile which he was told to saw, or by a few weeds in the garden that he was required to dig up. He will never make a man, till he gets courage enough to face his work with resolution, and to finish it with a manly perseverance. "I can't," never made a man.

Here is another boy, who has got the notion into his head that he is going to live without work. His father is rich; or he intends to be a professional man, or a merchant; and he thinks it of no use for him to learn to work. He feels above labour. He means to be a gentleman. But he is very much mistaken as to what constitutes a gentleman. He has altogether erroneous and false views of things. Whatever may be his situation in life, labour is necessary to exercise