plain ?" The husbandman replied, "The earth which thou hast made will yield me no food, unless I till and sow it ;m and no increase, except it be watered by thy rain.

10. "While I guided my plought in obedience to thy law, thy rain came, and it fell not only on the earth, but on me; it penetrated through the clothes which I had been obliged to make for myself, because thou hadst left me naked; it cooled my skin, which thou hadst rendered delicate and sensible; it disordered all the functions of my organized frame, and now rheumatic fever parches my blood, and agonizes every muscle. O Jupiter, thou art not a kind father to thy children."

11. Jupiter heard the complaint, and graciously replied, "My physical and organic laws were established for thy advantage and enjoyment, and thou hast grievously infringed them; the pain thou sufferest is intended to reclaim thee to thy duty, and I have constituted thy duty the higheste joy of thy existence; but say, what dost thou desire ?"

12. The husbandman answered, "What, O Jupiter, signify the purposes of thy laws to me, when thou hast denied me faculties to discover and obey them? Frail and fallible as I am, they cause me only pain; deliver me from their effects, and I ask no other boon!"

13. " Thy prayer is granted," said Jupiter; "I restore thee to perfect health, and, for thy gratification, I suspend the laws that have offended thee. Henceforth,w water shall not wet thee or thine, thy skin shall feel cold no more, and thy muscles shall never ache. Art thou now contented ?"

14. "Most gracious Jupiter," said the husbandman, “ my soul is melted with deepest gratitude, and I now adore thee as supremely good." While he spoke he found himself in a field behind his team, healthful and vigorous, jocund and gay, and again blessed Jupiter for his merciful dispensation.

15. The season was spring, when yet the chill blast of the north, the bright blaze of a powerful sun, and rain, interchange in quick and varying succession. He drove his plough along, the rain descended, but it wet not him; the sharp winds blew, but they chilled no fibre in his frame; the flood of heat next poured upon his brow, but no sweat started from its pores; the physicaly and organic laws were suspended as to him.

16. Rejoicing in his freedom from annoyance and pain, he returned gladly home to meet his smiling family, after the labors of the day. It had been his custom in the evening to

put off the garments in which during day he had toiled, to clothe himself in linen fresh from the fold, to sup on milk prepared by his wife, with savory fruits and spices; and to press his children to his bosom with all the fervor of a parent's love; and he used to feel a thrill of pleasure' pervading every nerve, as they acknowledged and returned the affectionate embrace. 17. He looked to find the linen clean, cool, delicately dressed, and lying in its accustomed place, but it was not there. He called to his wife to fetch it, half chiding her for neglect. With wonder and dismay depicted in every feature, she narrated a strange adventure. With the morning sun she had risen to accomplish her wonted duty, but, although the water wettedb every thread that clothed other individuals, it moistened not a fibrew of his.

18. She boiled it on a powerful fire, and applied every means that affection, enlightened by intellect, could devise, but the result was still the same;m water glided over his clothes, and would not wet them. "The physical law," said the husbandman within himself, "is suspended as to me; henceforth water wettethb not me and mine." He said no more, but placed himself at table, and smiled over his lovely family. He lifted his youngest child upon his knee, a girl just opening in her bloom, pressed her to his bosom, and kissed her ruddy cheek.

19. But he started when he experienced no sensation. He saw her with his eyes,2 and heard her speak, but had no feeling of her presence. His knee was as stone;m his bosom as marble; and his lips as steel; no sensation penetrated through his skin. He placed her on the floor, looked wistfully on her form, graceful, vivacious, and instinct with love; and, as if determined to enjoy the well remembered pleasure now withheld, he clasped her to his bosom with an embrace so ardent that she screamed with pain.

20. Still he was all adamant;m no sensation reached his soul. He sent her away, heaved a deep sigh, and again the thought entered his very soul, that "the organic law is suspended as to me." Recollecting well the sweet gratifications of his evening meal, he seized a bowl, and delicately began to sip, exciting every papilla of the tongue to catch the grateful flavor.

21. But no flavor reached his mind; the liquid glided over his gustatory organs like quicksilver over the smooth surface

of a mirror without impression, and without leaving a trace behind. He started now in horror, and his spirit sank within him, when he thought that henceforth he should live without sensation. He rushed into the fields and called aloud on Jupiter. "O Jupiter, I am the most miserable of men ;m I am a being without sensation. Why hast thou made me thus ?"

22. Jupiter heard his cry, and answered, "I have suspended the physical and organic laws, to which thou ascribedst thy fever and thy pain; henceforth no pang shall cause thy nerves to shrink, or thy muscles to quiver; why, then, art thou thus unhappy, and why discontented with thy new condition?" 23. "O Jupiter," replied the husbandman, "but thou hast taken away from me sensation ;m I no longer feel the grateful breath of morn fanning my cheek as I drive my team afield; the rose diffuses its fragrance for me in vain; the ruddy grape, the luscious fig, the cooling orange, and the fresh fountain, to me are now savorless as adamant or air; my children are as stones; O, Jupiter, I am utterly wretched, I am a man without sensation!"

24. Unhappy mortal," replied the god, "how can I afford thee satisfaction? When I gave thee nerves to feel, and muscles to execute the purposes of thy mind, and bestowed on thee water to refresh thy palate, and made thy whole frame one great inlet of enjoyment, thou wert not content. I made thy nerves liable to pain, to warn thee when thou departedst from my laws. The rain that was sent, fell to fructify and refresh the earth, and not to injure thee.

25. "I saw thee while the showers descended, stay abroad, regardless of its influence on thy corporeal frame. The northern blast received from me its piercing cold, to warn thee of its effects; and yet I saw thee, wet and shivering, stand in its course, regardless of its power. In the voice of the storm I spake to thy understanding, but thou didst not comprehend. The fever that parched thy blood was sent to arrest thee in thy departures from my organic laws. If I restore to thee my institutions, thou mayest again forget my ways, and in misery impeach my justice."

26. "O most gracious Jupiter," cried the husbandman, now I see thy power and wisdom, and my own folly and presumption. I accept thy laws and gratefully acknowledge, that, even in the chastisements they inflict, they are beneficent. Restore to me the enjoyments of sensation; permit me once

more to reap the advantages that flow from the just uses of my nerves and muscles, and I bow with resignation to the punishment of misapplying them."

27. Jupiter granted his request. His fever and pains returned; but by medicine were relieved. He slowly recovered health and strength, and never after embraced his children, or enjoyed a meal, but he poured forth a deeper offering of gratitude than he had ever done before. He was now instructed concerning the source of his enjoyment, he studied the laws of his nature and obeyed them; and when he suffered for occasional deviations, he hastened back to the right path, and never again underwent so severe a punishment as the first.

SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED.

1. JUST as the husbandman had resumed his wonted labors, a new voice was heard calling loudly to Jupiter for relief. It proceeded from a young heirk writhingy in agony, who cried, "O Jupiter, my father committed debaucheries," for which my bones are pierced with liquid fire; gout teareth my flesh asunder;-thou art not just to punish me for his transgressions; deliver me, O Jupiter, or renounce thy character for benevolence and justice."

2. "Thou complainest of my laws of hereditary descent," said Jupiter. "Hast thou derived from thy father any other quality besides gout?" "O Jupiter," said the sufferer, "I have derived nerves that feel sweet pleasure when the gout ceaseth its gnawing; muscles that execute the purposes of my will; senses that are inlets of joy; and faculties" that survey and rejoice in thy fair creation: but why didst thou permit gout to descend from him who sinned, to me?"

3. "Short sighted mortal," said Jupiter, "thy father was afflicted because he infringed my institutions; by my organic law, thou hast received a frame constituted as was that of thy father, when thy life commenced; the delicate sensibility of his nerves transmitted the same susceptibility to thine; the vigor of his muscles has been transferred into thine; and by the same law, the liability to pain that existed in his bones from debauchery, constituted an inseparable element of thine. If this law afflict thee, speak the word, and I shall suspend it as to thee."

4. "Bountiful Jupiter!" said the sufferer, "but tell me first if thou suspend thy law, shall I lose all that I inherited by it from my father,―nerves, muscle, senses, faculties, and all that constitute my delight, when the gout afflicteth me not ?" "Assuredly thou shalt," said Jupiter, "but thou shalt have no organic pain."

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5. "Forbear, most bounteous deity," replied the sufferer. "I gratefully accept the gift of thy organic laws, with all their chastisements annexed. But say, O Jupiter, if this pain was inflicted on my father for transgressing thy law, may it not be lessened or removed, if I obey?"

6. "The very object of my law," said Jupiter,f" is that it should. Hadst thou proceeded as thy father did, thy whole frame would have become one great centre of disease. The pain was transmitted to thee to guard thee by a powerful monitor from pursuing his sinful ways, that thou mightest escape this greater misery. Adopt a course in accordance with my institutions, thy pain shall abate, and thy children shall be free from its effects."

7. The heir expressed profound resignation to the will of Jupiter, blessed him for his organic law, and entered upon a life of new and strict obedience. His pain through time diminished, and his enjoyments increased. Ever after he was grateful for the law.

8. A feeble voice next reached the vault of heaven. It was that of an infant, sick and in pain. "What is thy distress, poor child," said Jupiter, "and of what dost thou complain ?" Half drowned in sobs, the feeble voice replied, "I suffer under thy organic law. A father's sickness and a mother's disordered frame, have been transmitted and combined in me. I am all over exhaustion1 and pain."

9. "Hast thou received no other gift," said Jupiter, "but sickness and disease, no pleasure to thy nerves, thy muscles, or thy mental powers?" "All are so feeble," replied the child, "that I exist not to enjoy, but to suffer." "Poor infant," said

Jupiter, "my organic law will soon deliver thee, and I shall take thee to myself." The organic law instantly operated, the body of the child lay a lifeless mass, but suffered no more; its spirit dwelt with Jupiter.

10. The next prayer was addressed by a merchant struggling on the Mediterranean waves, and nigh sinking in their foam. "What evil dost thou charge against me," said Jupiter," and what dost thou require ?”