* * * * *

THE CHOICE OF HERCULES.

When Hercules was in that part of his youth in which it was natural for him to consider what course of life he ought to pursue, he one day retired into a desert, where the silence and solitude of the place very much favoured his meditations.  As he was musing on his present condition, and very much perplexed in himself on the state of life he should choose, he saw two women, of a larger stature than ordinary, approaching towards him.  One of them had a very noble air, and graceful deportment; her beauty was natural and easy, her person clean and unspotted, her eyes cast towards the ground with an agreeable reserve, her motion and behaviour full of modesty, and her raiment as white as snow.  The other had a great deal of health and floridness in her countenance, which she had helped with an artificial white and red; and she endeavoured to appear more graceful than ordinary in her mien, by a mixture of affectation in all her gestures.  She had a wonderful confidence and assurance in her looks, and all the variety of colours in her dress, that she thought were the most proper to shew her complexion to advantage.  She cast her eyes upon herself, then turned them on those that were present, to see how they liked her, and often looked on the figure she made in her own shadow.  Upon her nearer approach to Hercules, she stepped before the other lady, who came forward with a regular, composed carriage, and running up to him, accosted him after the following manner:—­

“My dear Hercules!” says she, “I find you are very much divided in your thoughts upon the way of life that you ought to choose; be my friend, and follow me; I will lead you into the possession of pleasure, and out of the reach of pain, and remove you from all the noise and disquietude of business.  The affairs of either war or peace shall have no power to disturb you.  Your whole employment shall be to make your life easy, and to entertain every sense with its proper gratifications.  Sumptuous tables, beds of roses, clouds of perfume, concerts of music, crowds of beauties, are all in readiness to receive you.  Come along with me into this region of delights, this world of pleasure, and bid farewell for ever to care, to pain, to business.”  Hercules, hearing the lady talk after this manner, desired to know her name, to which she answered—­“My friends, and those who are well acquainted with me, call me Happiness; but my enemies, and those who would injure my reputation, have given me the name of Pleasure.”