Never was the bitterness of soul which reproach occasions, more admirably delineated. Observe, however, how very different a thing this is from an accurate appreciation of the vice and its motives. The account given by Cassius of the reproaches of Brutus is dramatically true. If any one will put himself in the situation of Cassius, then will he mistake and exaggerate as Cassius did. Brutus did not hate him, nor note his faults for the purpose of casting them in his teeth; but Cassius, in the bitterness of his heart, feels that his friend has done so, and the great dramatist makes him express himself accordingly. And this is worthy of being observed, not merely for the notion which it affords us of the dramatical propriety in which Shakespeare was above all men felicitous, but that we may see how great is the pain which reproach inflicts, over and above what the mere reason, or the naked facts of the case would warrant. We do not feel merely that certain faults of ours have been in an unkind and unfeeling manner brought before our notice, but our hearts are torn with the suspicion that the watchfulness of hatred is upon us, and that our errors are carefully noted for the sake of the malicious pleasure of casting them in our teeth. It is not, however, to great occasions of quarrel or bitterness, now and then occurring, that I would call attention, but to the perni cious habit of finding fault in a fault-finding manner. This is a continual trickling into the cup of bitterness which makes our very life distasteful; and yet no more than a knowledge of the existence of the habit, and an earnest wish to be loved and respected, rather than hated and shunned, are sufficient to put an end to it. It is not necessary that faults and omissions be borne without observation. There is such a thing as earnest and affectionate remonstrance; but beware of the spiteful, triumphant reproach, and do not suppose, that because it seems so hateful when your attention is first called to it, that you are innocent of such an offence. There are, perhaps, but few who are wholly so, and there are very many whose most ordinary mode of communication is in that odious form. To such persons a re-form is most essential. VERBAL CAVILLERS. THERE is a class of people who acquire a mean reputation for cleverness in this-that they assume that all persons should "speak by the card," and they affect to discover errors, which are in truth not errors, but only that the person represented to be erroneous has not written or spoken for minute questioners and cavillers, but for the common sense of mankind. It hap pened lately that the Duke of Wellington, in the discussion of some important matter in Parliament, referred to the great experience he had had in negotiations upon the subject, and thence assumed (as the world will think he very fairly might) that the opinion he offered was deserving of consideration and weight. To this a word-snapper in one of the newspapers answers, that the facts stated by the Duke touching his experience only proved that he ought to have been able to give a sound opinion upon the subject, and did not necessarily lead to the inference intended by the Duke, namely, that he was able to give a sounder opinion than most others. Having made this profoundly logical discovery, our word-catcher goes on to show how many people ought to know things who do not know them, as though that had anything to do with the probability of the Duke of Wellington's experience having informed his judgment. This ridiculous questioning and cavilling is only mentioned as an instance of that paltry cleverness which is in fact a vice, but yet is one upon which many persons pride themselves. It is true that the proposition that experience adds to knowledge is not logically universal, but it is sufficiently general to be fairly assumed as truth in ordinary speech. Certainly it is far more reasonable to do this than to do what the critic above alluded to has done, namely, to argue from the fact that some stupid or silly persons do not improve their judgment by experience, to the conclusion that the Duke of Wellington has no right to assume that his judgment is improved by experience. This, however, is the sum and substance of the wordcatcher's argument. By the same species of ingenuity, a moralist who argued upon the assumption that man was a rational and an accountable being, might be controverted by the assertion that all men were not rational-that there were many houses in the land which were confessedly asylums for the irrational or insane, and, therefore, that an argument founded upon the assumption of the rationality of man was unsound. It is certainly of great importance that every one, whether in public speaking or private conversation, should endeavour to be as accurate as it is possible to be, without stiffness or verbal tediousness. But one would not have a statement made in the manner of what lawyers call a" declaration," or a complaint put forward with the minute verbal particularity of an indictment; and yet, unless this were done, it is certain that word-catchers will find abundant matter for the display of that sort of cleverness upon which they pride themselves. It is but right that such critics, at all events, when they assail persons of great character with such puny weapons, should be regarded with contempt. "We must speak by the card," says Hamlet, " or equivocation will undo us;" but when he says this he is alluding to a foolish gravedigger, who was anxious to display his skill in equivocation. In general we have a right to expect that men will express themselves correctly, but not that they will "speak by the card." CRUELTY TO ANIMALS. THE poet Wordsworth tells a beautiful story of a stag hunted in the olden time for a long day, until at last, after all the dogs were tired, the master of the chase still remained in pursuit, and the stag, making three tremendous bounds adown a mountain's side, drops stone dead by a spring that bubbled up at the bottom. The knight who thus perseveringly hunted the poor creature to death, built a pleasure-house upon the spot in commemoration of his triumph :— "Ere thrice the moon into her port had steer'd A cup of stone received the living well; Three pillars of rude stone Sir Walter rear'd, And built a house of pleasure in the dell. "And near the fountain flowers of stature tall With trailing plants and trees were intertwined, Which soon composed a little sylvan hall, A leafy shelter from the sun and wind. "And thither, when the summer days were long, |