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on its distance from that luminary. From the same principle we may infer that the light of Saturn and Herschel may be equal to that of our Earth, although the one is ten times, and the other twenty times, further from the Sun than we are.

The planet Venus is the next in order to Mercury. Her orbit is also within the orbit of the Earth, but without the orbit of Mercury; consequently she is never seen in opposition to the Sun. The diameter of Venus is 7,700 miles; very near as great as the diameter of the Earth, though she appears so small to the eye of the observer. Her distance from the Sun is 68,000,000 of miles from the Earth, when nearest, 27,000,000. Her annual revolution is performed in 224 days, 16 hours, 49 minutes, at the rate of 80,000 miles an hour; and her diurnal rotation is performed in 23 hours, 15 minutes, 40 seconds.

EXAMPLES FROM HISTORY.

FILIAL LOVE.

THE ancient Romans, as well as some other people, gave parents the absolute right of life and death over their children; and the Chinese, at present, are remarkable for the reverence they exact from children to their parents. Their punishment of parricide, if such a thing ever happens, is the most exemplary and severe the criminal in this case is cut into ten thousand pieces, which are afterwards burned; his houses and lands are destroyed, and even the houses that stand near them; to remain as monuments of so detested a crime; or, rather, that all remembrance of so abominable a villainy may be effaced from the earth!

Let their commands be ever sacred in your ears, and implicitly obeyed, where they do not contradict the commands of God: pretend not to be wiser than they who have had so much more experience than yourselves; and despise them not, if happily you should be so blest as to have gained a degree of knowledge or of fortune superior to them. Let your carriage towards

them be always respectful, reverent, and submissive; let your words be always affectionate and humble; and especially beware of pert and ill-seeming replies; of angry, discontented, and peevish looks. Never imagine, if they thwart your wills, or oppose your inclinations, that this arises from any thing but love to you: solicitous as they have ever been for your welfare, always consider the same tender solicitude as exerting itself, even in cases most opposite to your desires; and let the remembrance of what they have done and suffered for you ever preserve you from acts of disobedience, and from paining those good hearts which have already felt so much for you, their children.

Doubtless you have all too much ingenuousness of temper, to think of repaying the fears and bleeding anxieties they have experienced for your welfare by deeds of unkindness, which will pierce them to the soul; which will perhaps break the strings of a heart of which you, and you only, have long had the sole possession! No, my young friends, so far from this, you will think it the greatest happiness of your lives to follow your blessed Saviour's example, and to show the most tender concern for your parents; particularly if, like his, your's should happen to be a widowed parent; a mother deprived of her chief happiness and stay, by the loss of a husband; for which nothing can compensate but the dutiful and affectionate behaviour of her children; who are bound, in that case, to manifest double kindness, and to alleviate, by all the tenderness and affection imaginable, the many difficulties and sorrows of widowhood.

EXAMPLES.

A beautiful illustration of this virtue will be found in the scriptural story of Naomi and Ruth, in the first chapter of Ruth, which is particularly recommended to the young reader's attention.

CYRUS, King of Persia, having conquered Crœsus, King of Lydia, in battle, the latter fled into Sardis; but Cyrus following, took the city by storm; and a soldier running after Croesus with a sword, young

Croesus, his son, who had been born dumb, and had so continued to that hour, from the mere impulse of natural affection, seeing his father in such imminent danger, suddenly cried out, "O man, kill not Croesus;" and continued to enjoy the faculty of his speech all the rest of his life.

MILTIADES, a famous Athenian commander, died in prison, where he had been cast for debt. His son

Cimon, to redeem his father's body for burial, voluntarily submitted himself a prisoner in his room, where he was kept in chains till the debt was paid.

OLYMPIAS, the mother of Alexander the Great, was very morose and severe towards him: yet when Antipater, Alexander's deputy in Europe, wrote letters of great complaint against her to Alexander, the latter sent the following answer: "Knowest thou not, that one little tear of my mother's will blot out a thousand of thy letters of complaint?"

As some Christian captives at Algiers, who had been ransomed, were going to be discharged, the cruizers brought in a Swedish vessel, among the crew of which was the father of one of those ransomed captives. The son made himself known to the old man; but their mutual unhappiness at meeting in such a place may well be conceived. The young man, however, considering that the slavery his father was about to undergo would inevitably put an end to his life, requested that he might be released, and himself detained in his room; which was immediately granted. But when the story was told to the governor, he was so affected with it, that he caused the son likewise to be discharged, as the reward of his filial and exemplary tenderness.

BOLESLAUS the Fourth, King of Poland, had a picture of his father, which he carried about his neck, set in a plate of gold; and when he was going to say or do any thing of importance, he took this pleasing monitor in his hand, and kissing it, used to say, My dear father, may I do nothing remissly, or unworthy of thy name!

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Among the incredible number of persons who were proscribed under the second triumvirate of Rome, were

the celebrated orator Cicero, and his brother Quintus. When the news of the proscription was brought to them, they endeavoured to make their escape to Brutus in Macedon. They travelled together for some time, mutually condoling their bad fortune: but as their departure had been very precipitate, and they were not furnished with money, and other necessaries for the voyage, it was agreed that Cicero should make what haste he could to the sea-side to secure their passage, and that Quintus should return home to make more ample provision. But, as in most houses there are as many informers as domestics, his return was immediately made known, and the house in consequence filled with soldiers and assassins. Quintus concealed himself so effectually that the soldiers could not find him. Enraged at their disappointment, they put his son to the torture, in order to make him discover the place of his father's concealment: but filial affection was proof in this young Roman against the most exquisite torments. An involuntary sigh, and sometimes a deep groan, was all that could be extorted from the generous youth. His agonies were increased; but, with amazing fortitude, he still persisted in his resolution not to betray his father. Quintus was not far off; and it may better be imagined than it can be expressed, how the heart of a father must have been affected with the sighs and groans of a son expiring in torture to save his life. He could bear it no longer: but, quitting the place of his concealment, he presented himself to the assassins, beseeching them with a flood of tears to put him to death, and dismiss the innocent child, whose generous behaviour the triumvirs themselves, if informed of the fact, would judge worthy of the highest approbation and reward. The inhuman monsters, however, unmoved by the tears of the father or the son, answered that they both must die; the father because he was proscribed, and the son because he had concealed his father. Upon this a new contest of tenderness arose, who should die first; which, however, the assassins soon decided, by beheading them both at the same time.

VOL. I.-5.

The Emperor of China on certain days of the year pays a visit to his mother, who is seated on a throne to receive him; and four times on his feet, and as often on his knees, he makes her a profound obeisance, bowing his head even to the ground. The same custom is also observed through the greatest part of the empire; and if it appears that any one is negligent or deficient in his duty to his parents, he is liable to a complaint before the magistrates, who punish such offenders with much severity. This, however, is seldom the case; no people, in general, expressing more filial respect and duty than they.

Sir Thomas Moore seems to have emulated this beautiful example; for, being Lord Chancellor of England at the same time that his father was a Judge of the King's Bench, he would always, on his entering Westminster Hall, go first to the King's Bench, and ask his father's blessing, before he went to sit in the Court of Chancery, as if to secure success in the great decisions of his high and important office.

During an eruption of Mount Etna, many years since, the danger it occasioned to the inhabitants of the adjacent country became very imminent, and the flames flying about, they were obliged to retire to a greater distance. Amidst the hurry and confusion of such a scene (every one flying and carrying away whatever they deemed most precious) two sons, the one named Anapias, the other Amphinomus, in the height of their solicitude for the preservation of their wealth and goods, recollected their father and mother, who, being both very old, were unable to save themselves by flight. Filial tenderness set aside every other consideration; and, "Where (cried the generous youths) shall we find a more precious treasure than those who begat and gave us being?" This said, the one took up his father on his shoulders, the other his mother, and so made their way through the surrounding smoke and flames. The fact struck all beholders with the highest admiration; and they and their posterity ever after called the path they took in their retreat, "The Field of the Pious," in memory of this pleasing accident.

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