“I say there is nothing, as I am a pig, Like sleeping, stretch’d out at ease; Let the world go round with its whirligig, And cares just as it may please.” The other the contrary chanced to tell The same little lamb, to take heed; “Look, innocent! here, to live right well, Sleep very little indeed. “Summer or winter, early to rise With the stars the practice seek; For sleeping the senses stupefies, And leaves you languid and weak.” Confused, the poor lamb the counsels compares, And cannot perceive in his mind, That contrary each advising declares, But how he himself is inclined. * * * * * And thus we find authors the practice make, To hold, as infallibly true, The rules they fancy themselves to take, And in their own writings pursue. THE FLINT AND THE STEEL. Cruelly bent, it chanced the Flint Ill-treated the Steel one day; And wounding, gave it many a dint, To draw its sparks away. When laid aside, this angry cried To that, “What would your value be Without my help?” the Flint replied, “As much as yours, sir, but for me.” * * * * * This lesson I write, my friends to incite; Their talents, however great, That they must study with them unite, To duly cultivate. The Flint gives light with the help of the Steel, And study alone will talent reveal; For neither suffice if found apart, Whatever the talent or the art. III. JUAN MELENDEZ VALDES. For a hundred years after the time of Calderon de la Barca, who died in 1687, there appeared in Spain no writer of sufficient merit to be classed among those eminent characters, who had done so much honour to Spanish literature in the seventeenth century. Verses were published in sufficient abundance, which found readers and even admirers, merely from the necessity the public felt of having something to read and to admire, as of the fashion of the day. But they were written with a perversion of taste and a deficiency of talent, which was truly astonishing, in the successors of such authors, as had immediately preceded them.