THE AUTHOR VENTURES TO SPEAK A WORD ON CHRISTIAN CHEERFULNESS:—QUOTES BEN SIRACH,—SOLOMON,—BISHOP HACKET,—WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR,—BISHOP REYNOLDS,—MILTON,—&C. --_Ἀλλὰ σὺ ταῦτα μαθὼν, βιότου ποτί τέρμα ψυχῇ τῶν ἀγαθῶν τλῆθι χαριζόμενος._ SIMONIDES. In the thirtieth chapter of the Book called Ecclesiasticus, and at the twenty-fifth verse, are these words “A cheerful and a good heart will have a care of his meat and diet.” This is not the text to a sermon, but the beginning of a Chapter. There is no reason why a Chapter as well as a sermon, should not be thus impressively introduced: and if this Chapter should neither be so long as a sermon, nor so dull as those discourses which perchance and (I fear) per-likelihood, it may be thy fortune to hear, O Reader, at thy parish church, or in phrase nonconformist, to sit under at the conventicle, it will be well for thee: for having began to read it, I dare say thou wilt peruse it orally, or ocularly to the end. A cheerful and a good heart, the Doctor had; aye as cheerful and good a one as ever man was blest with. He held with Bishop Hacket, that melancholy was of all humours the fittest to make a bath for the Devil, and that cheerfulness and innocent pleasure preserve the mind from rust, and the body from putrifying with dulness and distempers; wherefore that Bishop of good and merry memory would sometimes say, he did not like to look upon a sour man at dinner, and if his guests were pleased within, would bid them hang out the white flag in their countenance. _Udite, udite amici, un cor giocondo E Rey del Mondo._ And if the poet says true (which I will be sworn he does) our Doctor might be more truly King of the World, than Kehama after he had performed his sacrifice. His cheerfulness he would not have exchanged for all the bank-bills which ever bore the signature of Abraham Newland, or his successor Henry Hase; he thanked his Maker for it; and that it had been kept from corruption and made so far good as (with all Christian humility) to be self approved; he thanked his heavenly Father also for the free grace vouchsafed him, and his earthly one for having trained him in the way that he should go. Cheerful and grateful takers the Gods love And such as wait their pleasures with full hopes; The doubtful and distrustful man Heaven frowns at.[1] [Footnote 1: BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER.] Being thus cheerful and good, he had that care of his meat and diet which the son of Sirach commends in the text, and notices as an indication of cheerfulness and goodness.