Mr. Thaxter return'd from Exeter Court, (where he went last Tuesday) and dined with us. Mrs. Shaw was out, all the afternoon and evening. This morning I finish'd the 2d. book of Horace's Odes, and had one, which pleased me, as much, or more than any I have met with yet. It is the 16th. All those that Compose, this book are very fine, and I remember I have heard my 376father who is very fond of the author, speak, in a peculiar manner of it.

Eliza, spent the day here. Received some books from Braintree. Studied Watts's logic, in the afternoon, and have now got upon the subject of Syllogisms, which I do not as yet perfectly understand, but believe I shall with another reading. This method of Syllogism, is not the most perfect kind of rhetoric. Anything may be proved by it according to the rules: though nothing can be proved in fact but what the adversary chooses to grant.

It snow'd hard, all day. Wrote a letter in the Evening to my Mamma.1

Christmas day.1 Among the Roman Catholics and the followers of the Church of England it is a great and Important day, but it is not observed in this Country, nor any where I believe by the dissenters. We had a couple of doctrinal Sermons to day. One from Isaiah XLIV. 23. Sing, o ye heavens; for the Lord hath done it: shout, ye lower parts of the Earth; break forth into singing, ye mountains o forest and every tree therein; for the Lord hath redeemed Jacob, and glorified himself in Israel. The other from John XIII. 8. Jesus answered him, If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me.

The weather has been very pleasant. Eliza is unwell and was not at meeting. In the Evening I read to the Ladies, the 2d. book of the Conquest of Canäan; it is not inferior to the first, but the hero has nothing to do in it, and it consists all in relation, as the 2d. and 3d. Books of the Æneid. The hymn to the Sun, is beautiful. Mina's account of the Creation, and the subsequent history, is as concise, and comprehensive, as any thing of the kind I have read: the observation she makes concerning the Sun,

is admirable, but the author must have supposed that the Educa-377tion of young Ladies, at the time he writes of, was much more excellent, than is given them in this age of the world. It is probable, that the reading of history has since been replaced by that of novels and plays, which were not invented then; young Ladies now, would be much more expert at giving an account of some high flown Romance, than of any history, even that of their own Country.