having for their radii the two other sides. The knowledge of this enables you to construct a basin of water as large as two other basins together.

The circle can be doubled exactly, though it cannot be exactly squared.

understands it no more than his pupi Here Malezieux, in his Elements of Geometry, bursts into an extacy. He says positively, that there are incompatible truths. Would it not have been more simple to have said, that these lines have but one common point, on each side of which they separate.

I can always divide a number in thought; but does it thence follow that the number is infinite? Newton, in his integral, and in his differential calculation, does not use this great word; and Clairaut takes good care not to teach in his Elements of Geometry, that a hoop may be passed between a ball and the table on which it lies. A careful distinction should be made between useful and curious geometry.

When accustomed thus to feel the advantages of geometrical truths, the pupil reads in some elements of this science, that if a straight line, called a tangent, be drawn touching a circle in one point, another straight line can never be made to pass between this circle and this line. This is evident enough, and was scarcely worth the trouble of saying. But it is added, that an infinite number of curve lines may be made to pass through this point of contact. This surprises him; and it would surprise older persons: he is tempted to believe that matter is pe- To the useful we owe the proportional netrable. The books tell him that this compasses, invented by Galileo, the meais not matter, that these are lines without surement of triangles, that of solids, and breadth. But if they are without breadth, the circulation of moving forces. Most these metaphysical straight lines will pass other problems may enlighten and one upon another for ever without touch-strengthen the intellect; very few of them ing anything. If they have breadth no curve can pass. The child no longer knows where he is; he finds himself transported into a new world, which has nothing in common with our own.

will be of sensible utility to mankind. Square curves as long as you like—and while displaying extreme sagacity only resemble an arithmetician who examines the properties of his numbers, instead of calculating the amount of his own pro

How shall he believe, that what is manifestly impossible in nature, is true?perty. I well conceive, he will say to a master of the transcendental geometry, that all your circles will meet in C. But this is all you can demonstrate to me. You can never demonstrate that these circular lines pass at this point between the first circle and the tangent.

A secant A G may be shorter than another secant A G H:-granted; but it does not thence follow that your curve lines can pass between two lines which touch. They can pass, the master will reply, because the secant G H as distinguished from the secants A G, and A G II may be an "infiniment-petit" of the second order.

When Archimedes found the specific weight of bodies, he rendered a service to mankind: what service will you render by finding three numbers, so as that the difference of the squares of two of them, added to the cube of the three, will still be a square, and that the sum of the three differences added to the same cube, shall make another square? "Nugæ difficiles."

GLORY-GLORIOUS.

SECTION I.

GLORY is reputation joined with esteem, and is complete when admiration superadded. It always supposes that which is brilliant in action, in virtue, or in talent, and the surmounting of great

I do not understand what "an infini-is ment-petit" is, says the child; and the master is obliged to acknowledge that he

The saints and angels have sometimes been called the glorious, as dwelling in the abode of glory.

difficulties. Cæsar, Alexander, had glory. in glory; but this is the case in no reli The same can hardly be said of Socrates. gion but ours. It is not allowable to say He claims esteem, reverence, pity, indig-that Bacchus, or Hercules, was received nation against his enemies; but the term into glory, when speaking of their apoglory applied to him would be improper; theosis. his memory is venerable rather than glorious. Attila had much brilliancy, but he has no glory; for history, which may be mistaken, attributes to him no virtues : Gloriously is always taken in the good Charles XII. still has glory; for his sense; he reigned gloriously; he extrivalour, his disinterestedness, his liberal-cated himself gloriously from great danger ity, were extreme. Success is sufficient or embarrassment. for reputation, but not for glory. The glory of Henry IV. is every day increas-good, sometimes in the bad sense, acing; for time has brought to light all his cording to the nature of the object in virtues, which were incomparably greater question. He glories in a disgrace which than his defects. is the fruit of his talents and the effect of envy. We say of the martyrs, that they

To glory in, is sometimes taken in the

Glory is also the portion of inventors in the fine arts; imitators have only ap-glorified God-that is, that their conplause. It is granted too to great talents, stancy made the God whom they attested but in sublime arts only. We may well revered by men. say, the glory of Virgil, or of Cicero, but not of Martial, nor of Aulus Gellius.

Men have dared to say, the glory of God: God created the world for his glory; not that the Supreme Being can have glory; but that men, having no expressions suitable to him, use for him those by which they are themselves most flattered.

SECTION II.

That Cicero should love glory, after having stifled Catiline's conspiracy, may be pardoned him.

That the King of Prussia, Frederic the Great, should have the same feelings after Rosbach and Lissa, and after being the legislator, the historian, the poet, and the philosopher of his country- that he should be passionately fond of glory, and at the same time, have self-command enough to be modestly so—he will, on that account, be the more glorified.

That the Empress Catherine II. should

Vain glory is that petty ambition which is contented with appearances, which is exhibited in pompous display, and never elevates itself to greater things. Sovereigns, having real glory, have been known to be nevertheless fond of vain glory-seeking too eagerly after praise, and being too much attached to the trap-have beeu forced by the brutal insolence pings of ostentation. of a Turkish sultan to display all her False glory often verges towards va-genius; that from the far north she nity; but it often leads to excesses, while vain glory is more confined to splendid littlenesses. A prince who should look for honour in revenge, would seek a false glory rather than a vain one.

should have sent four squadrons which spread terror in the Dardanelles and in Asia Minor; and that, in 1770, she took four provinces from those Turks who made Europe tremble;-she will not be reproached with enjoying her glory, but will be admired for speaking of her successes with that air of indifference and wit-superiority, which shows that they were merited.

To give glory, signifies to acknowledge, to bear witness. Give glory to truth, means acknowledging truth-Give glory to the God whom you serve Bear ness to the God whom you serve.

Glory is taken for heaven-He dwells

In short, glory befits geniuses of this

sort, though belonging to the very mean race of mortals.

glory? Can he receive it from you? Can he enjoy it? How long, ye two-legged animals without feathers, will you make God after your own image? What! because you are vain, because you love glory, you would have God love it also? If there were several Gods, perhaps each one would seek to gain the good opinion of his fellows. That might be glory to God. Such a God, if infinite greatness may be compared with extreme lowli

But if, at the extremity of the west, a townsman of a place called Paris thinks he has glory in being harangued by a teacher of the university, who says to him, "Monseigneur, the glory you have acquired in the exercise of your office, your illustrious labours with which the universe resounds," &c., then I ask if there are mouths enow in that universe to celebrate, with their hisses, the gloryness, would be like King Alexander or of our citizen, and the eloquence of the pedant who attends to bray out this harangue at monseigneur's hotel?

We are such fools, that we have made God glorious like ourselves.

That worthy chief of the dervises, Benal-betif, said to his brethren one day :"My brethren, it is good that you should frequently use that sacred formula of our koran- In the name of the most merciful God;' because God uses mercy, and you learn to do so too, by often repeating the words that recommend virtue, without which there would be few men left upon the earth. But, my brethren, beware of imitating those rash ones who boast, on every occasion, of labouring for the glory of God.

"If a young simpleton maintains a thesis on the categories, an ignoramus in furs presiding, he is sure to write in large characters, at the head of his thesis, Ek alha abron doxa.'-' Ad majorem Dei gloriam.'-To the greater glory of God. If a good Mussulman has had his house whitewashed, he cuts this foolish inscription in the door. A saka carries water for the greater glory of God. It is an impious usage piously used. What would you say of a little chiaoux, who, while emptying our sultan's close-stool, should exclaim,-To the greater glory of our invincible monarch? There is certainly a greater distance between God and the sultan than between the sultan and the little chiaoux.

"Ye miserable earth-worms, called men, what have you resembling the glory of the Supreme Being? Can he love

Iscander, who would enter the lists with none but kings. But you, poor creatures! what glory can you give to God? Cease to profane the sacred name. An emperor, named Octavius Augustus, forbade his being praised in the schools of Rome, lest his name should be brought into contempt. You can neither bring the name of the Supreme Being into contempt, nor into honour. Humble yourselves in the dust; adore, and be silent." {

Thus spake Ben-al-betif; and the dervises cried out," Glory to God! Benal-betif has said well."

SECTION III.

Conversation with a Chinese. In 1723, there was in Holland a Chi nese: this Chinese was a man of letters and a merchant; which two professions ought not to be incompatible, but which have become so amongst us, thanks to the extreme regard which is paid to money, and the little consideration which mankind have ever shown, and will ever show, for merit.

This Chinese, who spoke a little Dutch, was once in a bookseller's shop with some men of learning. He asked for a book, and Bossuet's Universal History, badly translated, was proposed to him. "Ah!" said he, "how fortunate! I shall now see what is said of our great empire-of our nation, which has existed as a national body for more than fifty thousand years

of that succession of emperors who have governed us for so many ages; I shall now see what is thought of the re

ligion of the men of letters, of that simple worship which we render to the Supreme Being. How pleasing to see what is said in Europe of our arts, many of which are more ancient amongst us than any Euro-bited a province about a two-hundredth pean kingdom. I guess the author will have made many mistakes in the history of the war which we had twenty-two thousand five hundred and fifty-two years ago, with the warlike nations of Tonquin and Japan; and of that solemn embassy which the mighty Emperor of the Moguls sent to ask laws from us, in the year of the world 500,000,000,000,079,123, 450,000." "Alas!" said one of the learned men to him, "you are not even mentioned in that book; you are too inconsiderable; it is almost all about the first nation in the world-the only nation, the great Jewish people!"

European; "he also treats of that celebrated people, the Greeks."-" Who are these Greeks?" asked the man of letters. "Ah!" continued the other," they inha

part as large as China, but which has been famous throughout the world.”"I have never heard speak of these people neither in Mogul, nor in Japan, nor in Great Tartary," said the Chinese, with (an ingenuous look.

"Oh ignorant, barbarous man!" politely exclaimed our scholar. “Know you not, then, the Theban Epaminondas; nor the harbour of Piræus; nor the name of the two horses of Achilles; nor that of Silenus's ass? Have you not heard of Jupiter, nor of Diogenes, nor of Lais, nor of Cybele, nor-"

I am much afraid," replied the man of letters, "that you know nothing at all of the ever memorable adventure of the celebrated Xixofou Concochigramki, nor of the mysteries of the great Fi Psi Hi Hi. But pray, what are the other unknown things of which this universal history treats?" The scholar then spoke for a quarter of an hour on the Roman commonwealth: but when he came to

"The Jewish people !" exclaimed the Chinese. "Are they, then, masters of at least three quarters of the earth?""They flatter themselves that they shall one day be so," was the answer; "until which time they have the honour of being our old-clothes-men, and, now and then, clippers of our coin.". "You jest," said the Chinese; "had these people ever a vast empire?""They had as their own for some years," said I, “a small country; but it is not by the extent of their states that a people are to be judged; as it is not by his riches that we are to esti-warm, "do you not at least know the

mate a man."

"But is no other people spoken of in this book?" asked the man of letters. Undoubtedly," returned a learned man who stood next me, and who constantly replied, "there is a deal said in it of a small country sixty leagues broad, called Eygpt, where it is asserted that there was a lake a hundred and fifty leagues round, cut by the hands of men."-"Zounds!" said the Chinese; "a lake a hundred and fifty leagues round in a country only sixty broad! That is fine, indeed!"-"Every body was wise in that country," added the doctor. "Oh! what fine times they must have been," said the Chinese. "But is that all ?"—"No," replied the

Julius Caesar, the Chinese interrupted him, saying, “ As for him, I think I know him: was he not a Turk !”

"What!" said the scholar, somewhat

difference between Pagans, Christians, and Mussulmen? Do you not know Constantine, and the history of the popes?" "We have indistinctly heard," answered the Asiatic, "of one Mahomet."

"It is impossible," returned the other, "that you should not, at least, be acquainted with Luther, Zuinglius, Bellarmin, Ecolampades." "I shall never remember those names," said the Chinese. He then went away to sell a considerable parcel of tea and fine grogram, with which he bought two fine girls and a ship-boy, whom he took back to his own country, adoring Tien, and commending himself to Confucius.

For myself, who was present at this

The worship of the goat was established THF honours of every kind which an- in Egypt, and in the lands of a part of tiquity paid to goats, would be very Palestine. Enchantments were believed astonishing, if anything could astonish to be operated by means of goats, and those who have grown a little familiar other monsters, which were always reprewith the world, ancient and modern.sented with a goat's head. The Egyptians and the Jews, often designated the kings and the chiefs of the people by the word goat. We find in Zachariah,

It is not likely that the Egyptian shoën or shotim-i. e. priests, immolated goats and worshipped them at the same time. We know that they had their goatwho was attached to Martinet, mounted Hazazel, which they adorned and crowned with flowers, and threw down headlong, as an expiation for the people; and that

on his back, and was carried in an instant through the air to a place called the Nut of Benevento.