This, and many other instances that might be produced, will show you how much of the beauty of the poet's art must be lost to you, without some notion of these allegorical personages. Boys, in their school learning, have this kind of knowledge impressed on their minds by a variety of books: but women, who do not go through the same course of instruction, are very apt to forget what little they read or hear on the subject: I advise you, therefore, never to lose an opportunity of enquiring into the meaning of any thing you meet with in poetry, or in painting, alluding to the history of any of the heathen deities, and of obtaining from some friend an explanation of its connection with true history, or of its allegorical reference to morality or to physics. Natural Philosophy, in the largest sense of the expression, is too wide a field for you to undertake; but the study of nature, as far as may suit your powers and opportunities, you will find a most sublime entertainment: the objects of this study are all the stupendous works of the Almighty Hand, that lie within the reach of our observation. In the works of man perfection is aimed at, but it can only be found in those of the Creator. The contemplation of perfection must produce delight, and every natural object around you would offer this delight, if it could attract your attention. If you survey the earth, every leaf that trembles in the breeze, every blade of grass beneath your feet, is a wonder as absolutely beyond the reach of human art to imitate as the construction of the universe. Endless pleasures, to those who have a taste for them, might be derived from the endless variety to be found in the composition of this globe and its inhabitants. The fossil--the vegetable--and the animal world--gradually rising in the scale of excellence--the innumerable species of each, still preserving their specific differences from age to age, yet of which no two individuals are ever perfectly alike--afford such a range for observation and enquiry, as might engross the whole term of our short life, if followed minutely. Besides all the animal creation obvious to our unassisted senses, the eye, aided by philosophical inventions, sees myriads of creatures, which by the ignorant are not known to have existence: it sees all nature teem with life; every fluid--each part of every vegetable and animal--swarm with its peculiar inhabitants--invisible to the naked eye, but as perfect in all their parts, and enjoying life as indisputably, as the elephant or the whale.