insomuch, that if Athens confided in his wisdom, and implicity followed his counsels, our condition were hopeless. No bribe can tempt him: like another Aristides, he is impenetrable to such overtures: patriotism alone inspires and actuates him.' Such was the honourable testimony, borne by an enemy, to the commanding talents and public virtue of this celebrated orator."

"How strikingly is St. Paul's definition," said Mrs. Spencer, "of that light and frivolous propensity of the Athenians, which led them to pass the day only to hear and tell some new thing,' illustrated by Plutarch's relation of the illiterate citizen, who who voted Aristides to the punishment of the ostracism. When that great man questioned his ac-. cuser, whether Aristides had ever injured him, he replied: Far from it: that he did not even know him; only he was quite tired of hearing him every where called 'the just.' Besides that spirit of envy which is remarkably displayed in his speech, to have heard this excellent person calumniated must have been a refreshing novelty, and have enabled him to tell a new thing."

Mr. Wilmot smiled and said: "The delicate and refined females of our favoured country,

should feel peculiar thankfulness in comparing their happy lot with the degraded state of women in the politest ages of Greece. Condemned to ignorance, labour, and obscurity-excluded from rational intercourse, debarred from every species of intellectual improvement or innocent enjoyment, they never seem to have been the objects of respect or esteem. In the conjugal relation, they were the servile agents, not the endeared companions of their husbands. Their depressed state was, in some measure, confirmed by illiberal legal institutions, and their native genius was systematically restrained from rising above one degraded level. Such was the lot of the virtuous part of the sex. I forbear to oppose to this gloomy picture, the profligate renown to which the bold pretensions of daring vice elevated mercenary beauty; nor should I glance at this impure topic, but to remind my young cousins, that immodesty in dress, contempt of the sober duties of domestic life, a boundless appetite for pleasure, and a misapplied devotion to the arts, were among the steps which led to this systematic profession of shameless profligacy, and to the establishment of those countenanced corruptions, which raised the more celebrated but infamous Athenian women to that bad emi

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nence. But, Ann, you are engaged with a fine historical subject."

"The death of Pericles, the Athenian general," said Mrs. Spencer. "Will you kindly relate to them the particulars of it?"

"Certainly," replied Mr. Wilmot. "When Pericles was at the point of death, his surviving friends and the principal citizens, sitting round his bed, discoursed together concerning his extraordinary virtue, and the great authority he had enjoyed. They enumerated his various exploits, and the number of his victories; for, whilst he was commander, he had erected no less than nine trophies to the honour of Athens. These things they talked of, supposing that he attended not to what they said, but that his senses were gone. He took notice, however, of every word they had spoken, and thereupon delivered himself as follows: 'I am surprised, that, while you dwell upon and extol those acts of mine, though fortune had her share in them, and many other generals have performed the like, you take no notice of the greatest and most honourable part of my character; that no Athenian, through my means, ever put on mourning.""

"Since you are talking of benefactors to their country," said Mrs. Spencer, "allow me to re

late a few particulars of Herodes Atticus, an Athenian citizen, whose munificent gifts would have been been worthy of the greatest king.

"The family of Herod was lineally descended from Cimon and Miltiades, Theseus and Cecrops, Ægeus and Jupiter; but the posterity of so many gods and heroes was fallen into the most abject state. His grandfather had suffered by the hands of justice; and Julius Atticus, his father, must have ended his life in poverty and contempt, had he not discovered an immense treasure, buried under an old house, the last remains of his patrimony.

"According to the rigour of the law, the emperor might have asserted his claim; and the prudent Atticus prevented, by a frank confession, the officiousness of informers. But the equitable Nerva, who then filled the throne, refused to accept any part of it, and commanded him to use, without scruple, the present of fortune. The cautious Athenian still insisted that the treasure was too considerable for a citizen, and that he knew not how to use it. 'Abuse it, then,' said the monarch, with a good-natured peevishness, for it is your own.'

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Many will be of opinion, that Atticus literally obeyed the emperor's last instructions,

since he expended the greatest part of his fortune, which was much increased by an advantageous marriage, in the public service. He had obtained for his son Herod the prefecture of Asia; and the young magistrate, observing that the town of Troas was but indifferently supplied with water, obtained from the munificence of Hadrian three hundred myriads of drachms, (about one hundred thousand pounds of our money.) But in the execution of the work, the charge amounted to more than double the estimate; and the officers of the revenue began to murmur, till the generous Atticus silenced their complaints, by requesting that he might be permitted to take upon himself the whole additional expence.

"The ablest preceptors of Greece and Asia had been invited, by liberal rewards, to direct the education of young Herod. Their pupil soon became a celebrated orator, according to the useless rhetoric of that age; which, confining itself to schools, disdained to visit either the forum or the senate. He was honoured with the consulship at Rome; but the greatest part of his life was spent in a philosophical retirement, at Athens and the adjacent villas; perpetually surrounded by sophists, who acknowledged, without reluctance, the superiority