Youth is pliant and elastic; if it receives impressions easily, they are as easily effaced: but maturity is rigid, and, admitting them slowly, retains them with a proportionate tenacity. CONSCIENCE. The rewarder of virtue, and avenger of crime. CATHERINE OF RUSSIA. Catherine I. of Russia was called the mother of her people; but Catherine II. might, with nearly equal justice, be named the _wife_. MOURNERS. They only truly mourn the dead, who endeavour so to live as to ensure a re-union with them in heaven. MEMORIES. Some persons are so tenacious of memory, that they forget nothing but the services they have received, and the errors they have committed. COURAGE AND VIRTUE. A man should never boast of his courage, nor a woman of her virtue, lest their doing so should be the cause of calling their possession of them into question. CUSTOM. Custom is a tyrant that holds us in chains, which we do not break, because so many others support them patiently. LIFE. Life, like the diamond in a mine, is sometimes valueless to its owner until it becomes estimated by another. YOUTHFUL LOVERS. Youthful lovers, like the painter Arellius, always paint the objects of their affection as goddesses. SPRING AND AUTUMN. Spring is the season of hope, and autumn is that of memory. TRUE AND FALSE FRIENDS. False friends will seek you in a happy home, But true friends only to a prison come. VIRTUE. The virtues of others often render us sensible of the want of them in ourselves, as the riches of our acquaintance make us more conscious of our poverty. MARRIAGE. How many in the married state we find Wedded in person, but divorced in mind! Unnatural union! fraught with as much dread As when the living chain’d were to the dead By stern Mezentius; yet less cruel he,— As many slaves of Hymen will agree,— For but one victim suffer’d from the chain, While wedlock gives the _two_ an equal pain. FÊTES. A fête is one of the many palliatives for that common malady _ennui_, and, like most palliatives, gives but a temporary relief, generally followed by a return of the disease. LEVELLERS. Men who cannot rise, are ever prone to pull down those who do, hoping to mount by their ruin. EXPERIENCE. Those are fortunate who borrow experience, instead of buying it. ADVERSITY.