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all of happiness upon such fragile things, that I can scarcely fail of being disappointed.

Visiting my Relations.

To have too much forethought, is the part of a wretch; to have too little, is the part of a fool.

Cecil.

Looking back is more then we can sustain without going back. Ib.

"There is no cream like that which rises on spilled milk."

For myself I made an excuse for poor Anna, knowing she supports upon her head the Worry pole. I dare say people do not know generally what this infliction is, although they themselves probably bear one always about with them, sprouting out of their brains.

An Art Student in Munich.

A perfectly just and sound mind is a rare and invaluable gift. But it is still much more unusual to see such a mind unbiased in all its actings. God has given this soundness of mind to but few; and a very small number of those few escape the bias of some predilection, perhaps habitually operating; and none are, at all times, and perfectly free. I once saw this subject forcibly illustrated. A watchmaker told me that a gentleman had

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ON JUDGING JUSTLY.

put an exquisite watch into his hands, that went irregularly. It was as perfect a piece of work as was ever made. He took it to pieces and put it together again twenty times. No manner of defect was to be discovered, and yet the watch went intolerably. At last it struck him, that, possibly, the balance-wheel might have been near a magnet. On applying a needle to it, he found his suspicions true. Here was all the mischief. The steel work in the other parts of the watch had a perpetual influence on its motions; and the watch went as well as possible with a new wheel. If the soundest mind be magnetized by any predilection, it must act irregularly. Cecil.

I wish there were tables of pride and prejudice as of refraction and parallax that we might free ourselves from errors of position and atmosphere. Even then we must make, as the astronomer does, a personal equation.

Every fancy that we would substitute for a reality, is, if we saw aright, and saw the whole, not only false, but every way less beautiful and excellent than that which we sacrifice to it. Sterling.

Things are sullen and will be as they are, whatever we think them or wish them to be. Cudworth.

There is small chance of truth at the goal where there is not a childlike humility at the starting-post.

Coleridge.

VI.

TEMPTATIONS AND DUTIES.

ANTAGONIST TO SELF.

Is there in human nature no direct antagonist to Self? Undoubtedly there is. The first aid against it is gained from Domestic affection. To gross and barbarian natures, love for Woman, not uninspired by some perception of beauty or grace, is probably the first school of practical virtue; so too, do all the domestic relations tend to the same result the sacrifice of self to another. He who lives without any such ties, is shorn of a great aid towards the mortification of self; and unless he cultivates a peculiarly enlarged benevolence, falls morally below the average of his class and country.

Nevertheless the domestic affections rather multiply Self than annihilate selfishness, and often reproduce it in a less odious but more intense form. They are quite insufficient to the general demands of morality. But another and far more implacable antagonist to Self is found in Enthusiasm; which is generally a passionate love for some idea or abstract conception; and whatever form it may take, its impulse is capable of animating the man to

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ANTAGONISTS TO SELF.

any or every sacrifice of Self. But not to speak of separate enthusiasms, one universal enthusiasm belongs to man as man; namely, that which is called out by a sense of the Infinite; wherein we feel Self to be swallowed up. All the generous side of human nature is nurtured and expanded by the contemplation of the Infinite. Hence is it that a sense of the Sublime and Beautiful, though it be not yet Religion, supplies to Morals an important part of that which it is reserved for religion to give in full power and divine harmony. Hence the glorious effect of high poetry, and of all that excites pure and beautiful imagination, on the youthful mind. Therefore it is that to weep with Andromache, to shudder for Hector, to tremble at Achilles, to admire Alcestis, to rejoice with Admetus, constitute a better moral training than Paley's Philosophy or Aristotle's Ethics can give. Whatever throws the heart out of Self, and swallows it up into some noble or beautiful Idea, affords to the moralist precisely that which he wants, but cannot get within his own science. Enthusiasm is the Life to morality; and to excite a pure and reasonable Enthusiasm is, as will be seen, the great moral end of Religion. F. W. Newman.

Selfishness is the direct antagonist to the Sense of the Infinite; the former cramps us within our own miserable body, the latter spreads one abroad into the universe. Ib.

Oh that there were more love in the world, and then these things that we deplore could not be. Love, like the

ANTAGONISTS TO SELF.

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opening of the heavens to the Saints, shows for a moment even to the dullest man, the possibilities of the human race. He has faith, hope, and charity for another being, perhaps but a creation of his imagination; still, it is a great advance for a man to be profoundly loving, even in his imaginations. Helps.

There is no danger in sharp truth, if the sheath of love be thick enough.

When 'good sense seems'morose,' shall we blame it, or ourselves?

Those are, shall we say fortunate or full of love, who have no aversions of taste.

Round a circle of extravagantly admiring friends is sure to be a line of cold doubting enemies; as in Newton's circles a bright band is always followed by a dark interval.

"Reaction equals action. If I do this man injustice, men enough in the community will resent it." "Ah but, my friend, friction and the atmosphere and other causes too often reduce Reaction to

nothing."

Some poor peasants came weeping to Hedwige, Duchess of Poland, to complain that the king's servants had taken their cattle. She went immediately to her husband and obtained their restoration, after which she said, "Their cattle indeed are returned to them, but who can restore to them their tears."

The Life of St. Elizabeth of Hungary.