The Doctor, Andc. ... (V. 4) Book

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: THE DOCTOR, CHAPTER CVI. THE AUTHOR APOSTROPHIZES SOME OF HIS FAIR READERS ; LOOKS FARTHER THAN THEY ARE LIKELY TO DO, AND GIVES THEM A JUST THOUGH MELANCHOLY EXHORTATION TO BE CHEERFUJ. WHILE THEY MAY. Hark how the birds do sing, And woods do ring! All creatures have their joy, and Man hath his : Yet, if we rightly measure, Man's joy and pleasure Rather hereafter, than in present is. Hbrbkrt- Bkrtha, Arabella, Sarah, Mary, Caroline, Dorothea, Elizabeth, Kate, Susan,?how many answer to these names, each thinking that perad- VOL. IV. B venture she may be the individual especially addressed? Alcun' 8 che risponde a chi nol chiama ; you are looking with impatience for Deborah's wedding day, and are ready to inveigh against me for not immediately proceeding to that part of my story. Well has Sir William Davenant said, Slow seems their speed whose thoughts before them run ; hut H ;s true in one sense as applied to you, and in another as applied to myself. To you my progress appears slow because you are eager to arrive at what, rightly considering it the most important point upon the whole journey of life, you may perhaps expect to prove the most interesting in this volume. Your thoughts have sped forward to that point and no farther. Mine travel beyond it, and this, were there no other motive, would retard me now. You are thinking of the bride and bridegroom, and the bridesmaid, and the breakfast at the vicarage, and the wedding dinner at the Petrarch. Grange, and the Doncaster bells which rung that day to the Doctor's ears the happiest peal that ever saluted them, from St. George's tower. My thoughts are of a different complexion; for where now are the joys and the sorrows of that day, and where are all those by whom they were partaken ! ...Read More