cipal Design, and to be
industrious in making the Earth gay and delightful, while she is
carrying on her great Work, and intent upon her own Preservation. The
Husbandman after the same manner is employed in laying out the whole
Country into a kind of Garden or Landskip, and making every thing smile
about him, whilst in reality he thinks of nothing but of the Harvest,
and Encrease which is to arise from it.

We may further observe how Providence has taken care to keep up this
Chearfulness in the Mind of Man, by having formed it after such a
manner, as to make it capable of conceiving Delight from several Objects
which seem to have very little use in them; as from the Wildness of
Rocks and Desarts, and the like grotesque Parts of Nature. Those who are
versed in Philosophy may still carry this Consideration higher, by
observing that if Matter had appeared to us endowed only with those real
Qualities which it actually possesses, it would have made but a very
joyless and uncomfortable Figure; and why has Providence given it a
Power of producing in us such imaginary Qualities, as Tastes and
Colours, Sounds and Smells, Heat and Cold, but that Man, while he is
conversant in the lower Stations of Nature, might have his Mind cheared
and delighted with agreeable Sensations? In short, the whole Universe is
a kind of Theatre filled with Objects that either raise in us Pleasure,
Amusement, or Admiration.

The Reader's own Thoughts will suggest to him the Vicissitude of Day and
Night, the Change of Seasons, with all that Variety of Scenes which
diversify the Face of Nature, and fill the Mind with a perpetual
Succession of beautiful and pleasing Images.

I shall not here mention the several Entertainments of Art, with the
Pleasures of Friendship, Books, Conversation, and other accidental
Diversions of Life, because I would only take notice of such Incitements
to a Chearful Temper, as offer themselves to Persons of all Ranks and
Conditions, and which may sufficiently shew us that Providence did not
design this World should be filled with Murmurs and Repinings, or that
the Heart of Man should be involved in Gloom and Melancholy.

I the more inculcate this Chearfulness of Temper, as it is a Virtue in
which our Countrymen are observed to be more deficient than any other
Nation. Melancholy is a kind of Demon that haunts our Island, and often
conveys her self to us in an Easterly Wind. A celebrated French
Novelist, in opposition to those