sciousness becomes more intense; and unless an opposite principle were simultaneously unfolded, it would painfully embarrass and weaken us by constantly directing the thoughts within. That opposite principle is Enthusiasm ; which fills the affections with thoughts wholly foreign to self, and lifts us above vulgar criticism. If this is wanting, even in statesmen, acuteness and experience make them over cautious, inactive, and wise too late. For the practical man, Impulse is as essential as guidance; there is serious instruction in the witty saying of a satirical poet, that we must not "fear the flames required to boil our kettle." ib.

A mother should give her children a superabundance of enthusiasm ; that after they have lost all they are sure to lose on mixing with the world, enough may still remain to prompt and support them through great actions. A cloak should be of three-pile, to keep its gloss in wear. Hare.

An excess of excitement and a deficiency of enthusiasm may easily characterize the same period. Enthusiasm is grave, inward, self-controlled; mere excitement, outward, fantastic, hysterical, and passing in a moment from tears to laughter. Sterling.

Can any man be strong by believing a lie?

Faith, to be strong, must be faith in something eternal, objective, true, which would exist just as much though we and all the world disbelieved it. The strength of belief

comes from that which is believed in; if you separate it from that, it becomes a mere self-opinion, a sensation of positiveness; and what sort of strength that will give, History tells us in many a sad page of human folly. It may give the fury of idiots; not the deliberate might of valiant men. Kingsley.

Faiths wear out in many cases, and the truth of things is the ultimate level, unaffected by mortal enthusiasm. Wilkinson.

To sigh after an unconscious life, what is it but to protest against the very power of thought? To think is not merely to have ideas, - to be the theatre across which images and emotions are marched; but to sit in the midst as master of one's conceptions; to detain them for audience, or dismiss them at a glance; to organize them into coherence and direct them to an end.

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Again, to sigh for an unconscious life, is to protest against conscience. For what is this faculty, but, as its name denotes, a knowledge with one's self of the worth and excellence of the several principles of action by which we are impelled.

And, once more, to pray for an unconscious life, is to desire an incapacity for Faith. For, what is Faith, but trust in an Infinite and Holy One, of whom we could have no conception, if our aspirations did not transcend our realities.

The peculiar faculty in man of overlooking himself, is

but the needful condition and natural preparation for another, that of directing himself. A thing that is entirely at the disposal of foreign forces, that is moved hither and thither by laws imposed upon it, would plainly be none the better for the gift of self-knowledge. If the planet, urged through an inflexible orbit by determinate mechanism, were made aware of its own history, no hair's breadth of guidance would the revelation give. If the tree could study its own physiology, its growth would be no nobler, and its fruit no fairer. If the animal could scrutinize its instincts, they would perform no new function, and afford no happier guidance. And if man can superintend his own mind, it is because he is not, like the planet, the tree, the brute, the mere theatre on which forces display themselves, but a fresh power in himself, able to originate action in the same sense in which God originates the universe.

We often hear the question raised What is the effect on human character of a high and complicated civilization? Are its vast accumulation of commodities, its rapid circulation of activity and thought, its minute division of employments, its close interlacing of interests, its facilities. for class-organization, to be looked upon with joy and gratulation, as so many triumphs of intelligence and refinement over ignorance and barbarism; or with grief and consternation, as the gathering of an uncontrollable and aimless power, destined, like the mad Hercules, to destroy the offspring of its strength?

The specific effect on human character produced by a high state of civilization, may be expressed in a single

phrase it developes the self-consciousness of man to an intense degree, or, to borrow the venerable language of Scripture, immeasurably increases their "knowledge of good and evil." This, indeed, arises necessarily from our living so closely in the presence of each other. A perfectly solitary being, who had a planet to himself, would remain, I suppose, forever incapable of knowing himself, and reflecting upon his thoughts and actions. He would continue, like other creatures, to have feelings and ideas, but would not make them his objects and bring them under his Will. This human peculiarity would remain latent in him, till he was introduced before the face of some kindred being, and saw his nature reflected in another mind. Looking into the eyes of a living companion, changing with laughter and with tears, flashing with anger, drooping with sleep, he finds the mirror of himself; the passions of his inner life are revealed to him; and he becomes a person instead of a living thing. In proportion as society collects more thickly around a man, this primitive change deepens and extends. He knows all about his appetites, and how to serve them; can name his feelings, feign them, stifle them; can manage his thoughts, fly from them, conceal them; can meditate his actions, link them into a system, protect them from interrupting impulse, and direct them to an end; can go through the length and breadth of life with mind grossly familiar with its wonders, or reverently studious of its wisdom; and look on Death with the eye of an undertaker, or through the tears of a saint. In an old and artificial community, the self

consciousness of individuals is shared by Society at large; it studies itself, talks of its past, is anxious about its future; becomes aware of its own mechanism, and tries to estimate its strength.

It is only in the Naturalist's scale, not in the Christian's, that man is elevated by the influences of artificial society. He becomes a well-marked specimen of his kind, broadly separated from other races upon earth; but how he ranks among spiritual beings, whether he approaches the confines of Heaven, or touches the verge of Hell, - is wholly undecided still. Superior knowledge of good and evil involves no change in the proportionate love of them. Mere cleverness derived from the heated and sensitive atmosphere around, implies no hardy spiritual life within, and ensures no moral thoughtfulness or wisdom.

Who then can be so blind as to deny the dangers amid which we live? We are wholly out of the reach of the narrow safety of simple and instinctive life. We stand in the presence of a gigantic amount of good and evil, yet we have not stronger spirits to bear the mightier strain. So far as our condition forms us, we are less complete men, and therefore of less massive stability, than were our forefathers. Martineau.

If we are not to return to some jejune fiction of a state of nature, that is to barbarous, savage, and ultimately to brutal existence, the consciousness of mankind must be more and more widely awakened. In the finer and loftier spirits this consciousness, organized and fixed in system