reafons to believe, that the deficiencies of the penfion fund are, by no means, the laft that will be made good by parliament.

Your petitioner begs leave to obferve, That a fmall penfion is difgraceful and opprobrious, as it intimates a fhameful neceffity on one part, and a degrading fort of charity on the other; but that a great one implies dignity and affluence on one fide, on the other regard and efteem; which, doubtless, your majefty must entertain. in the higheft degree, for thofe great perfonages, whofe refpectable names ftand upon your eleemofynary list. Your petitioner, therefore, humbly perfuades himself, upon this principle, that less than three thousand pounds a year will not be propofed to him: if made up gold, the more agreeable, if for life, the more marketable.

Your petitioner perfuades him felf, that your majefty will not fufpect this his humble application to proceed from any mean interefted motive, of which he has always had the utmoft abhorrence. No, Sir, he confeffes his own weakness; honour alone is his object; honour is his paffion; honour is dearer to him than life. To honour he has always facrificed all other confiderations; and upon this generous principle, fingly, he now folicits that honour, which, in the most fhining times, diftinguifhed the greatest men of Greece, who were fed at the expence of the public.

Upon this honour, fo facred to him as a peer, fo tender to him as a man, he moft folemnly affures your majefty, that, in cafe you fhall be pleased to grant him this his humble request, he will gratefully and honourably fupport, and pro

mote with zeal and vigour, the worst measure that the worst minifter can ever fuggeft to your majefty; but, on the other hand, fhould he be fingled out, marked, and branded by a refufal, he thinks himself obliged in honour to declare, that he will, to the utmost of his power, oppose the best and wifeft meafures that your majesty yourself can ever dictate.

And your majesty's petitioner fhall ever pray.

Effay on Friendship, written by the

late Dr. Oliver Goldsmith.

(Never published in his works.)

HERE are few subjects which

have been more written upon and lefs understood, than that of friendship; to follow the dictates of fome, this virtue, instead of being the affuager of pain, becomes the fource of every inconvenience. Such fpeculatifts, by expecting too much from friendship, diffolve the connection, and by drawing the bands too clofely, at length break them. Almost all our romance and novel writers are of this kind; they perfuade us to friendships, which we find impoffible to fuftain to the laft; fo that this fweetener of life, under proper regulations, is, by their means, rendered inacceffible or uneafy. It is certain, the best method to cultivate this virtue is by letting it, in fome measure, make itself; a fimilitude of minds or studies, and even fometimes a diverfity of purfuits, will produce all the pleafures that arife from it. The current of tendernets widens, as it proceeds; and two men imperceptibly find their hearts warm with N 4

good

good-nature for each other, when they were at firft only in pursuit of mirth or relaxation.

Friendship is like a debt of honour; the moment it is talked of, it lofes its real name, and affumes the more ungrateful form of obligation. From hence we find, that thofe who regularly undertake to cultivate friendship find ingratitude generally repays their endeavours. That circle of beings, which dependance gathers round us, is almost ever unfriendly; they fecretly wifh the term of their connexions more nearly equal; and, where they even have the moft virtue, are prepared to referve all their affections for their patron, only in the hour of his decline. Increasing the obligations which are laid upon fuch minds only increafes their bur. then; they feel themselves unable to repay the immenfity of their debt, and their bankrupt hearts are taught a latent refentment at the hand that is ftretched out with offers of fervice and relief.

Plautinus was a man who thought that every good was to be bought from riches; and as he was poffeffed of great wealth, and had a mind naturally formed for virtue, he refolved to gather a circle of the best men round him. Among the number of his dependants was Mufidorus, with a mind just as fond of virtue, yet not lefs proud than his patron. His circumftances, however, were fuch as forced him to stoop to the good offices of his fuperior, and he faw himself daily among a number of others loaded with benefits and proteftations of friendship. Thefe, in the ufual courfe of the world, he thought it prudent to accept; but, while he gave his eftcem, he could not give

his heart. A want of affection breaks out in the moft trifling inftances, and Plautinus had skill enough to ubferve the minuteft ac tions of the man he wished to make his friend. In these he ever found his aim disappointed; for Mufidorus claimed an exchange of hearts, which Plautinus, folicited by a variety of claims, could never think of bestowing.

It may be easily fuppofed, that the referve of our poor proud man was foon conftrued into ingratitude; and fuch indeed in the common acceptation of the world it was. Wherever Mufidorus appeared, he was remarked as the ungrateful man; he had accepted favours, it was faid, and still had the infolence to pretend to independance. The event, however, juftified his conduct. Plautinus, by mifplaced liberality, at length became poor, and it was then that Mufidorus first thought of making a friend of him. He flew to the man of fallen fortune, with an offer of all he had; wrought under his direction with affiduity; and by uniting their talents, both were at length placed in that state of life from which one of them had formerly fallen.

To this ftory, taken from modern life, I fhall add one more, taken from a Greek writer of antiquity: Two Jewish foldiers, in the time of Vefpafian, had made many campaigns together, and a participation of dangers, at length bred an union of hearts. They were remarked throughout thewhole army, as the two friendly brothers; they felt and fought for each other. Their friendship might have continued, without interruption, till death, had not the good fortune of the one alarmed the pride of the

other,

other, which was in his promotion to be a Centurion under the famous John, who headed a particular party of the Jewish malcontents.

From this moment their former love was converted into the most inveterate enmity. They attached themselves to oppofite factions, and fought each other's lives in the conflict of adverfe party. In this manner they continued for more than two years, vowing mutual revenge, and animated with an unconquer able spirit of averfion. At length, however, that party of the Jews, to which the mean foldier belong. ed, joining with the Romans, it became victorious, and drove John with all his adherents, into the Temple. History has given us more than one picture of the dreadful conflagration of that fuperb edifice. The Roman foldiers were gathered round it; the whole Temple was in flames, and thoufands were seen amidst them, within its facred circuit. It was in this fituation of things, that the now fuccefsful foldier faw his former friend, upon the battlements of the highest tower, looking round with horror, and just ready to he confumed with flames. All his former tenderness now returned; he faw the man of his bofom just going to perish; and, unable to withstand the impulfe, he ran fpreading his arms, and crying out to his friend, to leap down from the top, and find fafety with him. The Centurion from above heard and obeyed, and, cafting himself from the top of the tower into his fellow foldier's arms, both fell a facrifice on the fpot; one being crushed to death by the weight of his companion, and the other dashed to pieces by the greatnefs of his fall.'

N. B. Not very long fince, the minifter's ftipend of that church. which hath five chapels belonging to it, was five pounds per annum, a goofe-grafs, or the right of commoning his goofe; a whittle gait, or the valuable privilege of using his knife for a week at a time at any table in the parish; and lastly, a hardened fark, or a fhirt of coarse linen whereas the rectory of Winwick, a fmall village in Lancafhire, is the richest living in England. The rector is lord of the manor, and has a glebe of 13001. annual rent; the whole living is worth 2300l. per annum.

In Ruthwell church-yard, Scot land, is an infcription in memory of Mr. Gawin Young, ordained minifter there in 1617, and Jean Stewart, his spouse, and his family.

Far from our own, amids our own we ly;

Of our dear bairns thirty and one us by.

Anagram.

Gavinur junius.

Unius agni ufui Jean Steuart a true faint

a true faint I live it, fo I die it, tho men jaw no, my God did fee it.

This Gawin Young maintained his poft, and lived a tranquil life through all the changes, from 1638 to 1660, and died in peace after enjoying his cure fifty-four years.

In the church yard of St. Michael, Dumfries, are feveral monuments in form of pyramids, very ornamental; and on fome grave ftones are infcriptions in memory of the martyrs of the country, or the poor victims to the violence of the apoftate archbishop Sharp, or the bigotry of James II. before and after his acceffion. Powers were given to an inhuman fet of mif. creants to deftroy on fufpicion of difaffection, or even for declining to give anfwers declarative of their political principles. Many poor peafants were thot instantly to death on moors, on the fhores, or wherefoever their enemies met with them. Perhaps enthufiafm might poffefs the fufferers, but an infernal spirit had poffeffion of their perfecutors. The memory of thofe flagitious deeds is preferved on many of the wild moors, by infcribed graveftones, much to the fame effect as the following in St. Michael's church yard.

On John Grierfon, who fuffered
Jan. 2, 1667.

Underneath this ftone doth lie
Duft facrificed to tyranny:
Yet precious in Immanuel's fight,
Since martyr'd for his kingly right;
When he condemns thefe hellifh drud-

Another, on James Kirke, shot on the fands of Dumfries.

By bloody Bruce and wretched Wright
I loft my life in great despight.
Shot dead without due time to try
And fit me for eternity.
A witnefs of prelatic rage,
As ever was in any age.

In the high church-yard of Glafgow is an epitaph on a jolly phyfician, whofe practice should be recommended to all fuch harbingers of death, who by their terrific faces fcare the poor patients prematurely into the regions of eternity. Stay, paffenger, and view this stone, For under it lies fuch a one, Who cured many while he liv'd; So gracious he no man griev'd: Yea when his phifick's force oft failed, His pleafant purpose then prevailed; For of his God he got the grace To live in mirth, and die in peace: Heaven has his foul, his corps this stone;

Sigh, paffenger, and then be gone.

Doctor Peter Law, 1612.

Though there is scarcely a veftige remaining of the monaftery founded at Paisley in 1160, yet there is an infcription ftill extant on the N. W. corner of the garden wall, which is of cut ftone, and appears to have been built by George Shaw, the abbot, anno 1484.

They call it the abbot George of Shaw,
About my abby gart make this waw
An hundred four hundredth zear
Eighty four the date but weir.
Pray for his falvátion

That laid this noble foundation.

In the church-yard at Falkirk, on a plain ftone, is the following epitaph on John de Graham, ftiled the right hand of the gallant Wallace, killed at the battle of Falkirk in 1298.

Here