fall, no comets rush out, like young colts from their stables,
flinging their tails into the faces of the more sober and pacific
brotherhood of lights. But, denied the satisfaction of chuckling
at such sights as these, his satanic majesty chuckles not the less
at the human vanity which looks for them. Nay, he himself is very
likely to suggest this vanity. It is one of his forms of temptation
--one of his manoeuvres; and we take leave, by way of warning, to
hint to those worthy people, who judge of to-morrow's providence
by the corns of their great toe, or their periodical lumbago, or
the shooting of their warts, or the pricking of their palms, that
it is in truth the devil which is at the bottom of all this, and
that the Deity has nothing to do in the business. It is the devil
instilling his vanities into the human heart, in that form which
he thinks least likely to prove offensive, or rouse suspicion. The
devil is most active in your affairs, Mrs. Thompson, the moment
you imagine that there must be a revolution on your account in the
universal laws of nature. At such a moment your best policy will be
to have blood let, take physic, and go with all diligence to your
prayers.

There was no sort of warning on the part of the natural to the
moral world, on the day when Alfred Stevens set forth with the
worthy John Cross, to visit the flock of the latter. There was
not a lovelier morning in the whole calendar. The sun was alone
in heaven, without a cloud; and on earth, the people in and about
Charlemont, having been to church only the day before, necessarily
made their appearance everywhere with petticoats and pantaloons
tolerably clean and unrumpled. Cabbages had not yet been
frost-bitten. Autumn had dressed up her children in the garments
of beauty, preparatory to their funeral. There was a good crop of