Penny Magazine

No. 001 - THE PENNY MAGAZINE - Mar. 31, 1832

Power of Steam.—It is on the rivers, and the boatman may repose on his oars; it is in highways, and begins to exert itself along the courses of land-conveyance; it is at the bottom of mines, a thousand feet below the earth's surface; it is in the mill, and in the workshops of the trades. It rows, it pumps, it excavates, it carries, it draws, it lifts, it hammers, it spins, it weaves, it prints.—From Webster's Lectures.

A Popular Error.—It is not at all an uncommon thing for even well-informed people to consider one event the cause of another, because the one has immediately preceded the other in the order of time. A curious instance of this error occurred in the last century. The fish, on which many of the inhabitants of Norway depended for subsistence, suddenly vanished from their coasts; the practice of inoculation for the small-pox had just then been introduced, and was instantly fixed upon as the cause of the calamity; and as the people considered the risk of that disorder a trifle in comparison with starvation, nothing could exceed their righteous indignation against all who undertook to prevent their taking the small-pox.

Instruction and Amusement are more blended than the world in general is apt to imagine. Uninstructive amusement may be afforded for a moment by a passing jest or a ludicrous anecdote, by which no knowledge is conveyed to the mind of the hearer or the reader, but the man who would amuse others for an hour, either by his writing or his conversation, must tell his hearers or his readers something that they do not know, or suggest to them some new reflexion upon the knowledge they have previously acquired. The more the knowledge bears upon their pursuits, upon their occupations, or upon their interests, the more attractive it will be, and the more entitled to be called useful.

The Secret of great Workers.—M. Dumont, in his "Recollections of Mirabeau,' the leading orator of the French Revolution, thus describes the persevering industry of our illustrious countryman, Sir Samuel Romilly:—"Romilly, always tranquil and orderly, has an incessant activity. He never loses a minute: he applies all his mind to what he is about. Like the hand of 3 watches, he never stops, although his equal movements in the same way almost escape observation."

Devotion of a Great Mind to its Duties.—Milton, the poet of Paradise Lost, who, during an active life in the most troublesome times, was unceasing in the cultivation of his understanding, thus describes his own habits:—" Those morning haunts are where they should be, at home, not sleeping or concocting the surfeits of an irregular feast, but up and stirring; in winter, often ere the sound of any bell awake men to labour or devotion; in summer as oft with the bird that first rouses, or not much tardier, to read good authors, or cause them to be read, till the attention be weary, or memory have its full draught; then with useful and generous labours preserving the body's health and hardiness, to render lightsome, clear, and not lumpish obedience to the mind, to the cause of religion and our country's liberty."

An era is fast approaching, when no writer will be read by the great majority, save and except those who can effect that for bales of manuscript, that the hydrostatic screw performs for bales of cotton, by condensing that matter into a period that before occupied a page.—Colton.

Two painters undertook a portrait of Hannibal; one of them painted a full likeness of him, and gave him two eyes, whereas disease had deprived him of one. The other painted him in profile, but with his blind side from the spectators. He severely reprimanded the first, but handsomely rewarded the second.

The petty sovereign of an insignificant tribe in North America every morning stalks out of his hovel, bids the sun good morrow, and points out to him with his finger the course he is to take for the day.

When the air-balloon was first discovered, someone flippantly asked Dr. Franklin what was the use of it? The doctor answered this question by asking another: "What is the use of a newborn infant ? It may become a man."

The Chinese affect to despise European ingenuity, but they cannot mend a common watch; when it is out of order, they say it is dead, and barter it away for a living one.

A friend called on Michael Angelo, who was finishing a statue. Some time afterwards he called again; the sculptor was still at his work. His friend, looking at the figure, exclaimed, You have been idle since I saw you last. By no means, replied the sculptor, I have retouched this part, and polished that; I have softened this feature, and brought out this muscle, I have given more expression to this lip, and more energy to this limb. Well, well, said his friend, but all these are trifles. It may be so, replied Angelo, but recollect that trifles make perfection, and that perfection is no trifle.

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