tecture, sculpture, painting, and vases of exquisite perfection attest an appreciation of beauty in form; but our masters in these things were strangers to the useful arts, as to the comforts and virtues of home. Abounding in what to us are luxuries, they had not what to

Vice and bar

us are necessaries. Without knowledge there can be no sure Progress. barism are the inseparable companions of ignorance. Nor is it too much to say, that, except in rare instances, the highest virtue is attained only through intelligence. This is natural; for to do right we must first understand what is right. But the people of Greece and Rome, even in the brilliant days of Pericles and Augustus, could not arrive at this knowledge. The sublime teachings of Plato and Socrates -calculated in many respects to promote the best interests of the race

were limited in influence to a small company of listeners, or to the few who could obtain a copy of the costly manuscripts in which they were preserved. Thus the knowledge and virtue acquired by individuals were not diffused in their own age or secured to posterity.

Now, at last, through an agency all unknown to Antiquity, knowledge of every kind has become general and permanent. It can no longer be confined to a select circle. It cannot be crushed by tyranny, or lost by neglect. It is immortal as the soul from which it proceeds. This alone renders all relapse into barbarism impossible, while it affords an unquestionable distinction between ancient and modern times. The Press, watchful with more than the hundred eyes of Argus, strong with more than the hundred arms of Briareus, not only guards all the conquests of civilization, but leads the way to future triumphs. Through its untiring energies, the meditation of the closet, or the utterance of the human voice, which else would die away within the precincts of a narrow room, is prolonged to the most distant nations and times, with winged words circling the globe. We admire the genius of Demosthenes, Sophocles, Plato, and Phidias ; but the printing-press is a higher gift to man than the eloquence, the drama, the philosophy, and the art of Greece.

THE LOVE OF GLORY.

THE Love of Glory is a motive of human conduct. But the same Heavenly Father who endowed us with the love of approbation has placed in us other sentiments of a higher order, more kindred to his

own divine nature. These are Justice and Benevolence, both of which, however imperfectly developed or ill-directed, are elements of every human soul. The desire of Justice, filling us with the love of Duty, is the sentiment which fits us to receive and comprehend the sublime injunction of doing unto others as we would have them do to us. In the predominance of this sentiment, enlightened by intelligence, injustice becomes impossible. The desire of Benevolence goes farther. It leads all who are under its influence to those acts of kindness, disinterestedness, humanity, love to neighbor, which constitute the crown of Christian character. Such sentiments are celestial, godlike in their office.

In determining proper motives of conduct, it is easy to perceive that the higher are more commendable than the lower, and that even an act of Justice and Benevolence loses something of its charm when known to be inspired by the selfish desire of human applause. It was the gay poet of antiquity who said that concealed virtue differed little from sepulchered sluggishness :

But this is a heathen sentiment, alien to reason and to truth.

It is hoped that men will be honest, but from a higher motive than because honesty is the best policy. It is hoped that they will be humane, but for a nobler cause than the fame of humanity.

The love of approbation may properly animate the young, whose minds have not yet ascended to the appreciation of that virtue which is its own exceeding great reward. It may justly strengthen those of maturer age who are not moved by the simple appeals of duty, unless the smiles of mankind attend them. It were churlish not to offer homage to those acts by which happiness is promoted, even though inspired by a sentiment of personal ambition, or by considerations of policy. But such motives must always detract from the perfect beauty even of good works. The Man of Ross, who was said to

"Do good by stealth, and blush to find it Fame,"

was a character of real life, and the example of his virtue may still be prized, like the diamond, for its surpassing rarity. It cannot be disguised, however, that much is gained where the desire of praise acts in conjunction with the higher sentiments. If ambition be our lure, it will be well for mankind if it unite with Justice and Benevolence.

It may be demanded if we should be indifferent to the approbation of men. Certainly not. It is a proper source of gratification, and is one of the just rewards on earth. It may be enjoyed when virtuously won, though it were better if not proposed as the object of desire. The great English magistrate, Lord Mansfield, while confessing a wish for popularity, added, in words which cannot be too often quoted, "But it is that popularity which follows, not that which is run after; it is that popularity which, sooner or later, never fails to do justice to the pursuit of noble ends by noble means." And the historian of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, who was no stranger to the Love of Glory, has given expression to the satisfaction which he derived from the approbation of those whose opinions were valuable. "If I listened to the music of praise," says Gibbon in his Autobiography, "I was more seriously satisfied with the approbation of my judges. The candor of Dr. Robertson embraced his disciple. A letter from Mr. Hume overpaid the labor of ten years." It would be difficult to declare the self-gratulation of the successful author in language more sententious or expressive.

While recognizing praise as an incidental reward, though not a commendable motive, we cannot disregard the evil which ensues when the desire for it predominates over the character, and fills the soul, as is too often the case, with a blind emulation chiefly solicitous for personal success. The world, which should be a happy scene of constant exertion and harmonious co-operation, becomes a field of rivalry, competition, and hostile struggle. It is true that God has not given to all the same excellences of mind and heart; but he naturally requires more of the strong than of the many less blessed. The little we can do will not be cast vainly into his treasury; nor need the weak and humble be filled with any idle emulation of others. Let each act earnestly, according to the measure of his powers, -rejoicing always in the prosperity of his neighbor; and though we may seem to accomplish little, yet we shall do much, if we be true to the convictions of the soul, and give the example of unselfish devotion to duty. This of itself is success; and this is within the ambition of all. Life is no Ulyssean bow, to be bent only by a single strong arm. There is none so weak as not to use it.

In the growth of the individual the intellect advances before the moral powers; for it is necessary to know what is right before we can practice it; and this same order of progress is observed in the

Human Family. Moral excellence is the bright, consummate flower of all progress. It is often the peculiar product of age. And it is then, among other triumphs of virtue, that Duty assumes her commanding place, while personal ambition is abased. Burke, in that marvelous passage of elegiac beauty where he mourns his only son, says, Indeed, my Lord, I greatly deceive myself, if, in this hard season, I would give a peck of refuse wheat for all that is called Fame and Honor in the world." And Channing, with a sentiment most unlike the ancient Roman orator, declares that he sees "nothing worth living for but the divine virtue which endures and surrenders all things for truth, duty, and mankind." Such an insensibility to worldly objects, and such an elevation of spirit, may not be expected at once from all men, - certainly not without something of the trials of Burke or the soul of Channing. But it is within the power of all to strive after that virtue which it may be difficult to reach; and just in proportion as duty becomes the guide and the aim of life shall we learn to close the soul against the allurements of praise and the asperities of censure, while we find satisfactions and compensations such as man cannot give or take away. The world, with ignorant or intolerant judgment, may condemn; the countenance of companion may be averted; the heart of friend may grow cold; but the consciousness of duty done will be sweeter than the applause of the world, than the countenance of companion, or the heart of friend.

THE age of chivalry has gone. An age of humanity has come. The horse, whose importance, more than human, gave the name to that early period of gallantry and war, now yields his foremost place to man. In serving him, in promoting his elevation, in contributing to his welfare, in doing him good, there are fields of bloodless triumph, nobler far than any in which the bravest knights ever conquered. Here are spaces of labor wide as the world, lofty as heaven.

Let me say, then, in the language once bestowed upon the youthful knights, scholars, jurists, artists, philanthropists, heroes of a Christian age, companions of a celestial knighthood, "Go forth. Be brave, loyal, and successful!" And may it be our office to light a fresh beaconfire sacred to truth! Let the flame spread from hill to hill, from island to island, from continent to continent, till the long lineage of fires shall illumine all the nations of the earth, animating them to the holy contests of knowledge, justice, beauty, love.

DICKENS.

1812-1870.

CHARLES DICKENS, the most popular novelist of his time, was born at Portsmouth, England, in 1812, and died June 9, 1870. His childhood was spent in poverty and menial toil, and how, amid such unfavorable surroundings, he acquired an education sufficient for his work in life will always remain a subject of wonder. His father was at one time a reporter of Parliamentary debates, and Charles adopted the same calling. He became attached to the Morning Chronicle, and in its columns first appeared Sketches by Boz, afterwards published in book form, 1836–37. These Sketches had a very cordial reception, and their success induced a publisher to engage Dickens and Seymour the artist to prepare an illustrated narrative of the adventures of a party of Cockney sportsmen. The result of this contract was The Pickwick Papers, which at once became the most popular book of the day, and still ranks among the first favorites of all classes of readers. It was followed at short intervals by Nicholas Nickleby, Oliver Twist, The Old Curiosity Shop, and Barnaby Rudge. In 1842 Dickens visited America, where he had a very cordial reception. With ingratitude for which he has never been fully forgiven, he repaid the sincere kindness of his American entertainers by writing a record of his tour, called American Notes, in which he ridiculed the people and institutions of the United States with unsparing hand. In Martin Chuzzlewit, published in 1844, he returned to the attack with great keenness and vigor of satire. In 1845 he established the Daily News in London, but conducted it only for a short time, returning to the more congenial work of novel-writing. In 1853 he began to give public readings from his own books, and was no less successful as a reader than he had been as a writer. In 1868 he visited America for the second time, and gave readings in the principal cities to immense and delighted audiences. The profits of his tour are said to have been over $200,000. During the last year of his life he was engaged on a novel, The Mystery of Edwin Drood, which he left unfinished. His death was very sudden, and the announcement of it caused universal grief throughout the English-speaking world. His books are too familiar to the reading public to demand enumeration here. Of them all, The Pickwick Papers, Nicholas Nickleby, and David Copperfield are generally esteemed the best; the latter is specially interesting as being largely autobiographical. His later novels, Great Expectations and Our Mutual Friend, were less popular than their predecessors. Among English novelists Dickens stands alone; he occupies a field that none other has cultivated, and may justly be esteemed the creator of a new school of fiction. He was a man of strong sympathies, quick to feel and plead for the poor and oppressed, and in his books he has done yeoman service in the work of social and legal reform. His most conspicuous characteristic is humor, natural, rich, and seemingly inexhaustible, and in this quality lies the chief charm of his writings. Yet many pages in Dombey and Son exhibit a not less thorough mastery of pathos. The secret of his success seems to have consisted in his intuitive apprehension of the popular needs and tastes; no other novelist has ever lived who was so thoroughly en rapport with the heart of the people he wrote for them and to them, and they acknowledged his efforts with unbounded good-will and admiration. Brilliant, genial, and uniformly entertaining though they are, Dickens's books have little moral depth or weight: they please, warm, soften, but they are, in effect, material. The extracts, each of which represents fairly his humor, pathos, and descriptive power, are from The Pickwick Papers, Dombey and Son, and American Notes.

MR. PICKWICK'S EXTRAORDINARY DILEMMA.

MR. PICKWICK's apartments in Goswell Street, although on a limited scale, were not only of a very neat and comfortable description, but peculiarly adapted for the residence of a man of his genius and observation.