nothing.

Ex

If you do as much now, you will do more by-and-by. Light gains make heavy purses. Despise not small profits. pect not, desire not to be made rich in a day. Accumulate by degrees, sixpence at a time—and it will do you more good, and make you happier than an estate in California. Mark all our rich men, and, with but few exceptions, you will find they all accumulated property by little and little. If you despise small gains you will always be poor. The purchase of house property through well-managed building societies has made thousands of persons independent and happy. There are men who, supposing providence to have an implacable spite against them, bemoan, in the poverty of a wretched old age, the misfortunes of their lives. Luck for ever ran against them, and for others. One, with a good profession, lost his luck in the river, where he idled away his time at fishing, when he should have been at his office. Another, with a good trade, perpetually burnt up his luck by his hot temper, which provoked all his employers to leave him. Another, who might have had a lucrative business, lost his luck by amazing diligence at everything but his business. Another, who steadily followed his trade, as steadily followed his bottle. Another, who was honest and constant to his work, erred by perpetual misjudgments-he lacked discretion. Hundreds lose their luck by endorsing bills, by sanguine speculations, by trusting fraudulent men, and by dishonest gains.

Let every man avoid all sorts of gambling as he would poison. A poor man or boy should not allow himself even to toss up for a halfpenny, for this is often the beginning of a habit of gambling; and this ruinous crime comes on by slow degrees. Whilst a man is minding his work he is playing the best game, and he is sure to win. A gambler never makes good use of his money even if he should win, A man never has what can really be called good luck who has a bad wife. We never knew an early-rising, hard-working, economical, honest man, with a good wife, who had bad luck; or, at least, we never heard such a man complain of bad luck.

A man who had become very rich from very small beginnings, when asked how he obtained his riches, replied, "My father

taught me never to play till my work was finished, and never to spend money till I had earned it. If I had but half-an-hour's work to do in a day, I must do that the first thing, and in half-anhour. And after this I was allowed to play; and I could then play with much more pleasure than if I had the thought of an unfinished task before my mind. I early formed the habit of doing everything in its time, and it soon became perfectly easy to do so. It is to this habit I owe my prosperity."

Kingsley says:-"It is a painful fact, but there is no denying it, the mass are the tools of circumstances; thistle-down on the breeze, straw on the river, their course is shaped for them by the currents and eddies of the stream of life. But only in proportion as they are things, not men and women. Man was meant to be not the slave, but the master of circumstances; and in proportion as he recovers his humanity, in every sense of that great obsolete word-in proportion as he gets back the spirit of manliness, which is self-sacrifice, affection, loyalty to an idea beyond himself, a God above himself—so far will he rise above circumstances, and wield them at his will."

Lord Lytton said, in his inaugural address as Lord Rector of Glasgow University :-"Never affect to be other than you are. Never be ashamed to say, 'I do not know.' Men will then believe you when you say, 'I do know.' Never be ashamed to say, whether as applied to time or money, 'I cannot afford it' —‘I cannot afford to waste an hour in the idleness to which you invite me'—'I cannot afford the guinea you ask me to throw away.' Once establish yourself and your mode of life as what they really are, and your foot is on solid ground, whether for the gradual step onward or for the sudden spring over a precipice. From these maxims let me deduce another. Learn to say 'No' with decision; 'Yes' with caution. 'No' with decision whenever

it meets a temptation; 'Yes' with caution whenever it implies a promise. A promise once given is a bond inviolable. A man is already of consequence in the world when it is known that we can implicitly rely on him. I have frequently seen in life such a person preferred to a long list of applicants for some important

charge; he has been lifted at once into station and fortune merely because he has this reputation, that when he says he knows a thing, he knows it; and when he says he will do a thing, he will do it."

As a gladiator trained the body, so must we train the mind to self-sacrifice-" to endure all things," to meet and overcome difficulty and danger. We must take the rough and thorny roads as well as the smooth and pleasant; and a portion at least of our daily duty must be hard and disagreeable; for the mind cannot be kept strong and healthy in perpetual sunshine only, and the most dangerous of all states is that of constantly recurring pleasure, ease, and prosperity. Most persons will find difficulties and hardships enough without seeking them; let them not repine, but take them as a part of that educational discipline necessary to fit the mind to arrive at its highest good.

Learn from the earliest days to ensure your principles against the peril of ridicule. You can no more exercise your reason if you live in the constant dread of laughter, than you can enjoy your life if you are in the constant terror of death. If you think it right to differ from the times, and to make a point of morals, do it; however rustic, however antiquated, however pedantic it may appear, do it—not for insolence, but seriously and grandly, as a man who wore a soul of his own in his bosom, and did not wait till it was breathed into him by the breath of fashion.

J. A. Froude says:-"You who believe that you have hold of newer and wider truths show it, as you may and must show it, unless you are misled by your own dreams, in leading wider, simpler, and nobler lives. Assert your own freedom if you will but assert it modestly and quietly, respecting others as you wish to be respected yourselves. Only, and especially, I would say this-be honest with yourselves, whatever the temptation; say nothing to others that you do not think, and play no tricks with your own mind. Of all the evil spirits abroad at this hour in the world, humbug is the most dangerous :

"This above all-To your own selves be true,

And it will follow, as the night the day,

You cannot then be false to any man.'

Keep in good credit. A Dutch proverb says,—“ Let says,-"Let my house be burned, let my anchor fail, let my ship be lost, and yet I can redeem myself; but if I lose my credit, I lose everything."

Use not to-day that to-morrow may want, neither leave that to hazard which foresight may provide for or care prevent.

Be careful as to lending money, or being bound with others. Avoid all lawsuits. Lord Bacon says, "I wish every man knew as much law as would enable him to keep himself out of it." Keep your books posted, and look well to the accounts of your customers.

Look over your books regularly, and if you find an error, trace it out.

Buy low, sell fair, and take care of profits.

Use every hour to advantage, and study to make even leisure hours useful.

Years are the sum of hours. Vain is it at wide intervals to say, “I'll save this year," if at each narrow interval you do not "I'll save this hour."

say,

If your means suit not your ends, pursue those ends which suit your means.

A penny a day saved, instead of spent, will amount to thirty shillings and fivepence in a year.

Thirty shillings saved and put to interest at 5 per cent. will produce one shilling and sixpence a year.

Money will double itself, at 5 per cent., in fourteen years.

Nothing is ever well and frugally done in a small household if the master and mistress are ignorant of the mode in which it should be done.

The current coin of life is plain, sound sense. We drive a more substantial trade with that than with aught else.

The eccentric, but brilliant John Randolph once rose up suddenly in his seat in the House of Representatives, and screamed out at the top of his voice, "Mr. Speaker! Mr. Speaker! I have discovered the philosopher's stone. It is-Pay as you go Sir James Graham thus writes :my opinion that the great object of political economy is not the

:

"I must take leave to express

accumulation of wealth, but the distribution of it—the application of capital to industry, on the principles which science and experience have proved to be most conducive to the happiness of the greatest numbers."

Do not be deceived by false economy in your purchases. A "cheap" shirt is a day and night mare, laden with the sighs of heart-broken seamstresses; a "cheap" coat disfigures God's image; "cheap" boots give corns; "cheap" education is dear at any price and so are "cheap" law and "cheap" medicine.

We recommend those who adopt a very favourite watchword of democrats and revolutionists-"There's a good time coming" -to connect it with more practical and beneficial things than universal suffrage and an equal share in the government of the country. "There's a good time coming" when apprentices and shop-boys will lay aside gold chains and cigars; when mechanics will work six days in the week, instead of getting drunk every Monday and Tuesday; when decent men and women can walk through our streets and along our roads without being shocked by profane, horrible, and filthy language; when churches will be better attended than gin palaces; when servant-girls will dress more like their mothers than their mistresses-when mechanics and labourers will perform offices of civility and courtesy without asking for or desiring "something to drink"; when men can enjoy a holiday without drunkenness and ribaldry; when a publichouse is not a public nuisance; and when those who can buy what they want on a Saturday or Monday will not force those who serve in our shops to serve seven days in the week.

ON LETTER-WRITING.

How many people write a good letter? Putting business on one side, which, perhaps, needs a special talent, how many of the ordinary letters of friend to friend are but so much waste? The time and space taken up with apologies for bad writing, excuses for not having written before, etc., would enable one to convey