{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_21045/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_21045","id":"gutenberg_21045","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/21045","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Category: Teaching & Education","Education"],"text":"Produced by Sigal Alon, Marcia, Fox in the Stars and the\nOnline Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net\n\n\n\n\n\n\nEDUCATION AND THE HIGHER LIFE\n\n\nBY BISHOP SPALDING.\n\nEDUCATION AND THE HIGHER LIFE. 12mo. $1.00.\n\nTHINGS OF THE MIND. 12mo. $1.00.\n\nMEANS AND ENDS OF EDUCATION. 12mo. $1.00.\n\nTHOUGHTS AND THEORIES OF LIFE AND EDUCATION. 12mo. $1.00.\n\nOPPORTUNITY AND OTHER ESSAYS AND ADDRESSES. 12mo. $1.00.\n\nSONGS: CHIEFLY FROM THE GERMAN. 16mo, gilt top. $1.25.\n\nA. C. McCLURG & CO.\n\nCHICAGO.\n\n\n\nEDUCATION\nAND\nTHE HIGHER LIFE\n\nBY\n\nJ. L. Spalding\n\nBishop of Peoria\n\n\n    The business of education is not, as I think, to perfect the learner\n    in any of the sciences, but to give his mind that freedom and\n    disposition, and those habits, which may enable him to attain every\n    part of knowledge himself.--LOCKE\n\n\nSIXTH EDITION\n\nCHICAGO\n\nA. C. McCLURG & CO.\n\n1900\n\n_Copyright_,\n\nBY A. C. MCCLURG AND CO.,\n\nA. D. 1890.\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS.\n\n\n      CHAPTER                                  PAGE\n\n   I. IDEALS                                          7\n\n  II. EXERCISE OF MIND                               30\n\n III. THE LOVE OF EXCELLENCE                         51\n\n  IV. CULTURE AND THE SPIRIT OF THE AGE              73\n\n   V. SELF-CULTURE                                   92\n\n  VI. GROWTH AND DUTY                               117\n\n VII. RIGHT HUMAN LIFE                              144\n\nVIII. UNIVERSITY EDUCATION                          172\n\n\n\n\nEDUCATION\nAND\nTHE HIGHER LIFE.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I.\n\nIDEALS.\n\n\n                                A noble aim,\n    Faithfully kept, is as a noble deed.\n\nWORDSWORTH.\n\n\nTo few men does life bring a brighter day than that which places the\ncrown upon their scholastic labors, and bids them go forth from the\nhalls of the Alma Mater to the great world's battlefield. There is a\nfreshness in these early triumphs which, like the bloom and fragrance of\nthe flower, is quickly lost, never to be found again even by those for\nwhom Fortune reserves her most choice gifts. Fame, though hymned by\nmyriad tongues, is not so sweet as the delight we drink from the\ntear-dimmed eyes of our mothers and sisters, in the sacred hours when we\ncan yet claim as our own the love of higher things, the faith and hope\nwhich make this mortal life immortal, and fill a moment with a wealth of\nmemories which lasts through years. The highest joy is serious, and in\nthe midst of supreme delight there comes to the soul a stillness which\npermits it to rise to the serene sphere where truth is most gladly heard\nand most easily perceived; and in such exaltation, the young see that\nlife is not what they take it to be. They think it long; it is short.\nThey think it happy; it is full of cares and sorrows. This two-fold\nillusion widens the horizon of life and tinges it with gold. It gives to\nyouth its charm and makes of it a blessed time to which we ever turn\nregretful eyes. But I am wrong to call illusion that which in truth is\nbut an omen of the divine possibilities of man's nature. To the young,\nlife is not mean or short, because the blessed freedom of youth may make\nit noble and immortal. The young stand upon the threshold of the world.\nOf the many careers which are open to human activity, they will choose\none; and their fortunes will be various, even though their merits should\nbe equal. But if position, fame, and wealth are often denied to the most\npersistent efforts and the best ability, it is consoling to know they\nare not the highest; and as they are not the end of life, they should\nnot be made its aim. An aim, nevertheless, we must have, if we hope to\nlive to good purpose. All men, in fact, whether or not they know it,\nhave an ideal, base or lofty, which molds character and shapes destiny.\nWhether it be pleasure or gain or renown or knowledge, or several of\nthese, or something else, we all associate life with some end, or ends,\nthe attainment of which seems to us most desirable.\n\nThis ideal, that which in our inmost souls we love and desire, which we\nlay to heart and live by, is at once the truest expression of our nature\nand the most potent agency in developing its powers. Now, in youth we\nform the ideals which we labor to body forth in our lives. What in these\ngrowing days we yearn for with all our being, is heaped upon us in old\nage. All important, therefore, is the choice of an ideal; for this more\nthan rules or precepts will determine what we are to become. The love of\nthe best is twin-born with the soul. What is the best? What is the\nworthiest life-aim? It must be something which is within the reach of\nevery one, as Nature's best gifts--air and sunshine and water--belong to\nall. What only the few can attain, cannot be life's real end or the\nhighest good. The best is not far removed from any one of us, but is\nalike near to the poor and the rich, to the learned and the ignorant, to\nthe shepherd and the king, and only the best can give to the soul\nrepose and contentment. What then is the true life-ideal? Recalling to\nmind the thoughts and theories of many men, I can find nothing better\nthan this, \"Seek ye first the kingdom of God.\" \"Love not pleasure,\" says\nCarlyle, \"love God. This is the everlasting Yea, wherein all\ncontradiction is solved; wherein whoso walks and works, it is well with\nhim.\"\n\nTo the high and aspiring heart of youth, fame, honor, glory, appeal with\nsuch irresistible power, and appear clad in forms so beautiful, that at\na time of life when all of us are unreal in our sentiments and crude in\nour opinions, they are often mistaken for the best. But fame is good\nonly in so far as it gives power for good. For the rest, it is nominal.\nThey who have deserved it care not for it. A great soul is above all\npraise and dispraise of men, which are ever given ignorantly and without\nfine discernment. The popular breath, even when winnowed by the winds of\ncenturies, is hardly pure.\n\nAnd then fame cannot be the good of which I speak, for only a very few\ncan even hope for it. To nearly all, the gifts which make it possible\nare denied; and to others, the opportunities. Many, indeed, love and win\nnotoriety, but such as they need not detain us here. A lower race of\nyouth, in whom the blood is warmer than the soul, think pleasure life's\nbest gift, and are content to let occasion die, while they revel in the\nelysium of the senses. But to make pleasure an end is to thwart one's\npurpose, for joy is good only when it comes unbidden. The pleasure we\nseek begins already to pall. It is good, indeed, if it come as\nrefreshment to the weary, solace to the heavy-hearted, and rest to the\ncareworn; but if sought for its own sake, it is \"the honey of poison\nflowers and all the measureless ill.\" Only the young, or the depraved,\ncan believe that to live for pleasure is not to be foreordained to\nmisery. Whoso loves God or freedom or growth of mind or strength of\nheart, feels that pleasure is his foe.\n\n\n    \"A king of feasts and flowers, and wine and revel,\n    And love and mirth, was never King of glory.\"\n\n\nOf money, as the end or ideal of life, it should not be necessary to\nspeak. As a fine contempt for life, a willingness to throw it away in\ndefence of any just cause or noble opinion, is one of the privileges of\nyouth, so the generous heart of the young holds cheap the material\ncomforts which money procures. To be young is to be free, to be able to\nlive anywhere on land or sea, in the midst of deserts or among strange\npeople; is to be able to fit the mind and body to all circumstance, and\nto rise almost above Nature's iron law. He who is impelled by this high\nand heavenly spirit will dream of flying and not of hobbling through\nlife on golden crutches. Let the feeble and the old put their trust in\nmoney; but where there is strength and youth, the soul should be our\nguide.\n\nAnd yet the very law and movement of our whole social life seem to point\nto riches as the chief good.\n\n\n    \"What is that which I should turn to, lighting upon days like these?\n    Every door is barred with gold, and opens but to golden keys.\"\n\n\nMoney is the god in whom we put our trust, to whom instinctively we pay\nhomage. We believe that the rich are fortunate, are happy, that the best\nof life has been given to them. We have faith in the power of money, in\nits sovereign efficacy to save us not only from beggary, from sneers and\ninsults, but we believe that it can transform us, and take away the\npoverty of mind, the narrowness of heart, the dullness of imagination,\nwhich make us weak, hard, and common. Even our hatred of the rich is but\nanother form of the worship of money. The poor think they are wretched,\nbecause they think money the chief good; and if they are right, then is\nit a holy work to strive to overthrow society as it is now constituted.\nBuckle and Strauss find fault with the Christian religion because it\ndoes not inculcate the love of money. But in this, faith and reason are\nin harmony. Wealth is not the best, and to make it the end of life is\nidolatry, and as Saint Paul declares, the root of evil. Man is more than\nmoney, as the workman is more than his tools. The soul craves quite\nother nourishment than that which the whole material universe can\nsupply. Man's chief good lies in the infinite world of thought and\nrighteousness. Fame and wealth and pleasure are good when they are born\nof high thinking and right living, when they lead to purer faith and\nlove; but if they are sought as ends and loved for themselves, they\nblight and corrupt. The value of culture is great, and the ideal it\npresents points in the right direction in bidding us build up the being\nwhich we are. But since man is not the highest, he may not rest in\nhimself, and culture therefore is a means rather than an end. If we make\nit the chief aim of life, it degenerates into a principle of exclusion,\ndestroys sympathy, and terminates in a sort of self-worship.\n\nWhat remains, then, but the ideal which I have proposed?--\"Seek ye first\nthe Kingdom of God.\" Unless the light of Heaven fall along our way,\nthick darkness gathers about us, and in the end, whatever our success\nmay have been, we fail, and are without God and without hope. So long\nas any seriousness is left, religion is man's first and deepest concern;\nto be indifferent is to be dull or depraved, and doubt is disease.\nDifficulties assuredly there are, underlying not only faith, but all\nsystems of knowledge. How am I certain that I know anything? is a\nquestion, debated in all past time, debatable in all future time; but we\nare none the less certain that we know. The mind is governed by laws\nwhich neither science nor philosophy can change, and while theories and\nsystems rise and pass away, the eternal problems present themselves ever\nanew clothed in the eternal mystery. But little discernment is needed to\nenable us to perceive how poor and symbolic are the thoughts of the\nmultitude. Half in pity, half in contempt, we rise to higher regions\nonly to discover that wherever we may be there also are the laws and the\nlimitations of our being; and that in whatsoever sanctuaries we may take\nrefuge, we are still of the crowd. We cannot grasp the Infinite;\nlanguage cannot express even what we know of the Divine Being, and hence\nthere remains a background of darkness, where it is possible to adore,\nor to mock. But religion dispels more mystery than it involves. With it,\nthere is twilight in the world; without it, night. We are in the world\nto act, not to doubt. Leaving quibbles to those who can find no better\nuse for life, the wise, with firm faith in God and man, strive to make\nthemselves worthy to do brave and righteous work. Distrust is the last\nwisdom a great heart learns; and noble natures feel that the generous\nview is, in the end, the true view. For them life means good; they find\nstrength and joy in this wholesome and cheerful faith, and if they are\nin error, it can never be known, for if death end all, with it knowledge\nceases. Perceiving this, they strive to gain spiritual insight, they\nlook to God; toward him they turn the current of their thought and love;\nthe unseen world of truth and beauty becomes their home; and while\nmatter flows on and breaks and remakes itself to break again, they dwell\nin the presence of the Eternal, and become co-workers with the Infinite\nPower which makes goodness good, and justice right. They love knowledge,\nbecause God knows all things; they love beauty, because he is its\nsource; they love the soul, because it brings man into conscious\ncommunion with him and his universe. If their ideal is poetical, they\ncatch in the finer spirit of truth which the poet breathes, the\nfragrance of the breath of God; if it is scientific, they discover in\nthe laws of Nature the harmony of his attributes; if it is political and\nsocial, they trace the principles of justice and liberty to him; if it\nis philanthropic, they understand that love which is the basis, aim,\nand end of life is also God.\n\nThe root of their being is in him, and the illusory world of the senses\ncannot dim their vision of the real world which is eternal. By\nself-analysis the mind is sublimated until it becomes a shadow in a\nshadowy universe; and the criticism of the reason drives us to doubt and\ninaction, from which we are redeemed by our necessary faith in our own\nfreedom, in our power to act, and in the duty of acting in obedience to\nhigher law. Knowledge comes of doing. Never to act is never to know. The\nworld of which we are conscious is the world against which we throw\nourselves by the power of the will; hence life is chiefly conduct, and\nits ideal is not merely religious, but moral. The duty of obedience to\nour better self determines the purpose and end of action, for the better\nself is under the impulse of God. Whether we look without or within, we\nfind things are as they should not be; and there awakens the desire,\nnay, the demand that they be made other and better. The actual is a\nmockery unless it may be looked upon as the means of a higher state. If\nall things come forth only to perish and again come forth as they were\nbefore; if life is a monster which destroys itself that it may again be\nborn, again to destroy itself,--were it not better that the tragedy\nshould cease? For many centuries men have been struggling for richer and\nhappier life; and yet when we behold the sins, the miseries, the wrongs,\nthe sorrows, of which the world is full, we are tempted to think that\nprogress means failure. The multitude are still condemned to toil from\nyouth to age to provide the food by which life is kept in the body;\nimmortal spirits are still driven by hard necessity to fix their\nthoughts upon matter from which they with much labor dig forth what\nnourishes the animal. Like the savage, we still tremble before the\npitiless might of Nature. Floods, hurricanes, earthquakes, untimely\nfrosts, destroy in a moment what with long and painful effort has been\nprovided. Pestilence still stalks through the earth to slay and make\ndesolate. Each day a hundred thousand human beings die; and how many of\nthese perish as the victims of sins of ignorance, of selfishness, of\nsensuality.\n\nTo-day, as of old, it would seem man's worst enemy is man. What hordes\nstill wander through Asia and Africa, seeking opportunity for murder and\nrapine; what multitudes are still hunted like beasts, caught and sold\ninto slavery. In Europe millions of men stand, arms in hand, waiting for\nthe slaughter. They still believe, because they were born on different\nsides of a river and speak different languages, that they are natural\nenemies, made to destroy one another. And in our own country, what other\nsufferings and wrongs,--greed, sensuality, injustice, deceit,--make us\nenemies one of another! There is a general struggle in which each one\nstrives to get the most, heedless of the misery of others. We trade upon\nthe weaknesses, the vices, and the follies of our fellow-men; and every\nattempt at reform is met by an army of upholders of abuse. When we\nconsider the murders, the suicides, the divorces, the adulteries, the\nprostitutions, the brawls, the drunkenness, the dishonesties, the\npolitical and official corruptions, of which our life is full, it is\ndifficult to have complacent thoughts of ourselves. Consider, too, our\nprisons, our insane asylums, our poor-houses; the multitudes of old men\nand women, who having worn out strength and health in toil which barely\ngave them food and raiment, are thrust aside, no longer now fit to be\nbought and sold; the countless young people, who have, as we say, been\neducated, but who have not been taught the principles and habits which\nlead to honorable living; the thousands in our great cities who are\ndriven into surroundings which pervert and undermine character. And\nworse still, the good, instead of uniting to labor for a better state\nof things, misunderstand and thwart one another. They divide into\nparties, are jealous and contentious, and waste their time and exhaust\ntheir strength in foolish and futile controversies. They are not anxious\nthat good be done, nor asking nor caring by whom; but they seek credit\nfor themselves, and while they seem to be laboring for the general\nwelfare, are striving rather to satisfy their own selfish vanity.\n\nBut the knowledge of all this does not discourage him who, guided by the\nlight of true ideals, labors to make reason and the will of God prevail.\nIf things are bad he knows they have been worse. Never before have the\nfaith and culture which make us human, which make us strong and wise,\nbeen the possession of so large a portion of the race. Religion and\ncivilization have diffused themselves, from little centres--from Athens\nand Jerusalem and Rome--until people after people, whole continents,\nhave been brought under their influence. And in our day this diffusion\nis so rapid that it spreads farther in a decade than formerly in\ncenturies. For ages, mountains and rivers and oceans were barriers\nbehind which tribes and nations entrenched themselves against the human\nfoe. But we have tunneled the mountains; we have bridged the rivers; we\nhave tamed the oceans. We hitch steam and electricity to our wagons,\nand in a few days make the circuit of the globe. All lands, all seas,\nare open to us. The race is getting acquainted with itself. We make a\ncomparative study of all literatures, of all religions, of all\nphilosophies, of all political systems. We find some soul of goodness in\nwhatever struggles and yearnings have tried man's heart. As the products\nof every clime are carried everywhere, like gifts from other worlds, so\nthe highest science and the purest religion are communicated and taught\nthroughout the earth: and as a result, national prejudices and\nantagonisms are beginning to disappear; wars are becoming less frequent\nand less cruel; established wrongs are yielding to the pressure of\nopinion; privileged classes are losing their hold upon the imagination;\nand opportunity offers itself to ever-increasing numbers.\n\nNow, in all this, what do we perceive but the purpose of God, urging\nmankind to wider and nobler life? History is his many-chambered school.\nHere he has taught this lesson, and there another, still leading his\nchildren out of the darkness of sin and ignorance toward the light of\nrighteousness and love, until his kingdom come, until his will be done\non earth as it is in heaven. To believe in God and in this divine\neducation, and to make co-operation with his providential guidance of\nthe race a life-aim is to have an ideal which is not only the highest,\nbut which also blends all other true ideals into harmony. And the lovers\nof culture should be the first to perceive that intellectual good is\nempty, illusory, unless there be added to it the good of the heart, the\ngood of conscience. To live for the cultivation of one's mind, is, after\nall, to live for one's self, and therefore out of harmony with the\neternal law which makes it impossible for us to find ourselves except in\nwhat is not ourselves. \"It is the capital fault of all cultivated men,\"\nsays Goethe, \"that they devote their whole energies to the carrying out\nof a mere idea, and seldom or never to the realization of practical\ngood.\" Whatever may be said in praise of culture, of its power to make\nits possessor at home in the world of the best thought, the purest\nsentiment, the highest achievements of the race; of the freedom, the\nmildness, the reasonableness of the temper it begets; of its aim at\ncompleteness and perfection,--it is nevertheless true, that if it be\nsought apart from faith in God and devotion to man, its tendency is to\nproduce an artificial and unsympathetic character. The primal impulse of\nour nature is to action; and unless we can make our thought a kind of\ndeed, it seems to be vain and unreal; and unless the harmonious\ndevelopment of all the endowments which make the beauty and dignity of\nhuman life, give us new strength and will to work with God for the good\nof men, sadness and a sense of failure fall upon us. To have a\ncultivated mind, to be able to see things on many sides, to have wide\nsympathy and the power of generous appreciation,--is most desirable, and\nwithout something of all this, not only is our life narrow and\nuninteresting, but our energy is turned in wrong directions, and our\nvery religion is in danger of losing its catholicity.\n\nCulture, then, is necessary. We need it as a corrective of the tendency\nto seek the good of life in what is external, as a means of helping us\nto overcome our vulgar self-complacency, our satisfaction with low aims\nand cheap accomplishments, our belief in the sovereign potency of\nmachines and measures. We need it to make our lives less unlovely, less\nhard, less material; to help us to understand the idolatry of the\nworship of steam and electricity, the utter insufficiency of the ideals\nof industrialism. But if culture is to become a mighty transforming\ninfluence it must be wedded to religious faith, without which, while it\nwidens the intellectual view, it weakens the will to act. To take us out\nof ourselves and to urge us on to labor with God that we may leave the\nworld better because we have lived, religion alone has power. It gives\nnew vigor to the cultivated mind; it takes away the exclusive and\nfastidious temper which a purely intellectual habit tends to produce; it\nenlarges sympathy; it teaches reverence; it nourishes faith, inspires\nhope, exalts the imagination, and keeps alive the fire of love. To lead\na noble, a beautiful, and a useful life, we should accept and follow the\nideals both of religion and of culture. In the midst of the\ntransformations of many kinds which are taking place in the civilized\nworld, neither the uneducated nor the irreligious mind can be of help.\nLarge and tolerant views are necessary; but not less so is the\nenthusiasm, the earnestness, the charity of Christian faith. They who\nare to be leaders in the great movements upon which we have entered,\nmust both know and believe. They must understand the age, must\nsympathize with whatever is true and beneficent in its aspirations, must\nhail with thankfulness whatever help science, and art, and culture can\nbring; but they must also know and feel that man is of the race of God,\nand that his real and true life is in the unseen, infinite, and eternal\nworld of thought and love, with which the actual world of the senses\nmust be brought into ever-increasing harmony. Liberty and equality are\ngood, wealth is good, and with them we can do much, but not all that\nneeds to be done. The spirit of Christ is not merely the spirit of\nliberty and equality; it is more essentially the spirit of love, of\nsympathy, of goodness; and this spirit must breathe upon our social life\nuntil it becomes as different from what it is as is fragrant spring from\ncheerless winter. Sympathy must become universal; not merely as a\nsentiment prompting to deeds of helpfulness and mercy, but as the\ninforming principle of society until it attains such perfectness that\nwhatever is loss or gain for one, shall be felt as loss or gain for all.\nThe narrow, exclusive self must lose itself in wider aims, in generous\ndeeds, in the comprehensive love of God and man. The good must no longer\nthwart one another; the weak must be protected; the wicked must be\nsurrounded by influences which make for righteousness; and the forces of\nNature itself must more and more be brought under man's control.\nPestilence and famine must no longer bring death and desolation; men\nmust no longer drink impure water and adulterated liquors, no longer\nmust they breathe the poisonous air of badly constructed houses;\ndwellings which are now made warm in winter, must be made cool in\nsummer; miasmatic swamps must be drained; saloons, which stand like\npainted harlots to lure men to sin and death, must be closed. Women\nmust have the same rights and privileges as men; children must no longer\nbe made the victims of mammon and offered in sacrifice in his temple,\nthe factory; ignorance, which is the most fruitful cause of misery, must\ngive place to knowledge; war must be condemned as public murder, and our\npresent system of industrial competition must be considered worse than\nwar; the social organization, which makes the few rich, and dooms the\nmany to the slavery of poorly paid toil, must cease to exist; and if the\npolitical state is responsible for this cruelty, it must find a remedy,\nor be overthrown; society must be made to rest upon justice and love,\nwithout which it is but organized wrong. These principles must so\nthoroughly pervade our public life that it can no more be the interest\nof any one to wrong his fellow, to grow rich at the cost of the poverty\nand misery of another. Life must be prolonged both by removing many of\nthe physical causes of death, and by making men more rational and\nreligious, more willing and able to deny themselves those indulgences\nwhich are but a kind of slow suicide.\n\nNever before have questions so vast, so complex, so pregnant with\nmeaning, so fraught with the promise of good, presented themselves; and\nit can hardly be vanity or conceit which prompts us to believe that in\nthis mighty movement toward a social life in harmony with our idea of\nGod and with the aspirations of the soul, America is the divinely\nappointed leader. But if this faith is not to be a mere delusion, it\nmust become for the best among us the impulse to strong and persevering\neffort. Not by millionaires and not by politicians shall this salvation\nbe wrought; but by men who to pure religion add the best intellectual\nculture. The American youth must learn patience; he must acquire that\nserene confidence in the power of labor, which makes workers willing to\nwait. He must not, like a foolish child, rush forward to pluck the fruit\nbefore it is ripe, lest this be his epitaph: The promise of his early\nlife was great, his performance insignificant.\n\nDo not our young men lack noble ambition? Are they not satisfied with\nlow aims? To be a legislator; to be a governor; to be talked about; to\nlive in a marble house,--seems to them a thing to be desired. Unhappy\nyouths from whom the power and goodness of life are hidden, who,\nstanding in the presence of the unseen, infinite world of truth and\nbeauty, can only dream some aldermanic nightmare. They thrust themselves\ninto the noisy crowd, and are thrown into contact with disenchanting\nexperience at a time of life when the mind and heart should draw\nnourishment and wisdom from communion with God and with great thoughts.\nAmid the universal clatter of tongues, and in the overflowing ceaseless\nstream of newspaper gossip, the soul is bewildered and stifled. In a\nblatant land, the young should learn to be silent. The noblest minds are\nfashioned in secrecy, through long travail like,--\n\n\n    \"Wines that, Heaven knows where,\n    Have sucked the fire of some forgotten sun\n    And kept it thro' a hundred years of gloom\n    Yet glowing in a heart of ruby.\"\n\n\nIs it not worth the labor and expectation of a life-time to be able to\ndo, even once, the right thing excellently well? The eager passion for\ndisplay, the desire to speak and act in the eyes of the world, is\nboyish. Will is concentration, and a great purpose works in secrecy. Oh,\nthe goodness and the seriousness of life, the illimitable reach of\nachievement, which it opens to the young who have a great heart and\nnoble aims! With them is God's almighty power and love, and his very\npresence is hidden from them by a film only. From this little islet they\nlook out upon infinite worlds; heaven bends over them, and earth bears\nthem up as though it would have them fly. How is it possible to remain\ninferior when we believe in God and know that this age is the right\nmoment for all high and holy work? The yearning for guidance has never\nbeen so great. We have reached heights where the brain swims, and\nthoughts are confused, and it is held to be questionable whether we are\nto turn backward or to move onward to the land of promise; whether we\nare to be overwhelmed by the material world which we have so\nmarvelously transformed, or with the aid of the secrets we have\nlearned, are to rise Godward to a purer and fairer life of knowledge,\njustice, and love.\n\nIs the material progress of the nineteenth century a cradle or a grave?\nAre we to continue to dig and delve and peer into matter until God and\nthe soul fade from our view and we become like the things we work in? To\nput such questions to the multitude were idle. There is here no affair\nof votes and majorities. Human nature has not changed, and now, as in\nthe past, crowds follow leaders. What the best minds and the most\nenergetic characters believe and teach and put in practice, the millions\nwill come to accept. The doubt is whether the leaders will be\nworthy,--the real permanent leaders, for the noisy apparent leaders can\nnever be so. And here we touch the core of the problem which Americans\nhave to solve. No other people has such numbers who are ready to thrust\nthemselves forward as leaders, no other has so few who are really able\nto lead. In mitigation of this fact, it may be said with truth, that\nnowhere else is it so difficult to lead; for nowhere else does force\nrule so little. Every one has opinions; the whole nation is awakened;\nthousands are able to discuss any subject with plausibility; and to be\nsimply keen-witted and versatile is to be of the crowd. We need men\nwhose intellectual view embraces the history of the race, who are\nfamiliar with all literature, who have studied all social movements, who\nare acquainted with the development of philosophic thought, who are not\nblinded by physical miracles and industrial wonders, but know how to\nappreciate all truth, all beauty, all goodness. And to this wide culture\nthey must join the earnestness, the confidence, the charity, and the\npurity of motive which Christian faith inspires. We need scholars who\nare saints, and saints who are scholars. We need men of genius who live\nfor God and their country; men of action who seek for light in the\ncompany of those who know; men of religion who understand that God\nreveals himself in science, and works in Nature as in the soul of man,\nfor the good of those who love him. Let us know the right moment, and\nlet us know that it comes for those alone who are prepared.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II.\n\nEXERCISE OF MIND.\n\n\n     O heavens! how awful is the might of souls\n     And what they do within themselves while yet\n     The yoke of earth is new to them, the world\n     Nothing but a wild field where they were sown.\n\n     WORDSWORTH.\n\n\n\nLearning is acquaintance with what others have felt, thought, and done;\nknowledge is the result of what we ourselves have felt, thought, and\ndone. Hence a man knows best what he has taught himself; what personal\ncontact with God, with man, and with Nature has made his own. The\nimportant thing, then, is not so much to know the thoughts and loves of\nothers, as to be able ourselves to think truly, and to love nobly. The\naim should be to rouse, strengthen, and illumine the mind rather than to\nstore it with learning; and the great educational problem has been, and\nis, how to give to the soul purity of intention, to the conscience\nsteadfastness, and to the mind force, pliability, and openness to light;\nor in other words, how to bring philosophy and religion to the aid of\nthe will so that the better self shall prevail and each generation\nintroduce its successor to a higher plane of life.\n\nTo this end the efforts of all teachers have, with more or less\nconsciousness, tended; and in this direction too, along winding ways and\nwith periods of arrest or partial return, the race of man has for ages\nbeen moving; and he who aspires to gain a place in the van of the mighty\narmy on its heavenward march,--\n\n\n    \"And draw new furrows 'neath the healthy morn\n    And plant the great Hereafter in this Now,\"--\n\n\nmay be rash, but his spirit is not ignoble. To him it may not be given\n\"to fan and winnow from the coming step of Time the chaff of custom;\"\nbut if he persevere he may confidently hope that his thought and love\nshall at length rise to fairer and more enduring worlds. He weds himself\nto things of light, seeks aids to true life within, learns to live with\nthe noble dead, and with the great souls of the present who have uttered\nthe truth whereby they live, in a way more intimate and higher than that\ngranted to those who are with them day by day; for minds are not\nseparated by time and space, but by quality of thought. But to be able\nto love this life, and with all one's heart to seek this close communion\nwith God, with noble souls, and with Nature is not easy, and it may be\nthat it is impossible for those who are not drawn to it by irresistible\ninstincts. For the intellect, at least, attractions are proportional to\ndestiny; and the art of intellectual life is not most surely learned by\nthose whom circumstances favor, but by those whom will impels onward to\nexercise of mind; whom neither daily wants, nor animal appetites, nor\nhope of gain, nor low ambition, nor sneers of worldlings, nor prayers of\nfriends, nor aught else can turn from the pursuit of wisdom; who, with\nceaseless labor and with patient thought, eat their way in silence, like\ncaterpillars, to the light, become their own companions, walk uplifted\nby their own thoughts, and by slow and imperceptible processes are\ntransformed and grow to be the embodiment of the truth and beauty which\nthey see and love.\n\nThe overmastering love of mental exercise, of the good of the intellect,\nis probably never found in formal and prosaic minds; or if so, its first\nawakening is in the early years when to think is to feel, when the soul,\nfresh from God, comes trailing clouds of glory, and the sun and moon and\nstars, and the hills and flowing waters seem but made to crown with joy\nhearts that love. It is in these dewy dawns that the image of beauty is\nimprinted on the soul and the sense of mystery awakens. We move about\nand become a part of all we see, grow akin to stones and leaves and\nbirds, and to all young and happy things. We lose ourselves in life\nwhich is poured round us like an unending sea; are natural, healthful,\nalive to all we see and touch; have no misgivings, but walk as though\nthe eternal God held us by the hand. These are the fair spring days when\nwe suck honey that shall nourish us in the winters of which we do not\ndream; when sunsets interfuse themselves with all our being until we are\ndyed in the many-tinted glory; when the miracle of the changing year is\nthe soul's fair seed-time; when lying in the grass, the head resting in\nclasped hands, while soft white clouds float lazily through azure skies,\nand the birds warble, and the waters murmur, and the flowers breathe\nfragrance, we feel a kind of unconscious consciousness of a universal\nlife in Nature. The very rocks seem to be listening to what the leaves\nwhisper; and through the silent eternities we almost see the dead\nbecoming the living, the living the dead, until both grow to be one, and\nwhatever is, is life.\n\nHe who has never had these visions; has never heard these airy voices;\nhas never seemed about to catch a glimpse of the inner heart of being,\npulsing beneath the veil of visible things; has never felt that he\nhimself is a spirit looking blindly on a universe, which if his eyes\ncould but see and his ears hear, would be revealed as the very heaven of\nthe infinite God,--must forever lack something of the freshness, of the\neager delight, with which a poetic mind contemplates the world and\nfollows whither the divine intimations point. This early intercourse\nwith Nature nourishes the soul, deepens the intellect, exalts the\nimagination, and fills the memory with fair and noble forms and images\nwhich abide with us, and as years pass on, gain in softness and purity\nwhat they may lose in distinctness of outline and color. This is the\nsource of intellectual wealth, of tranquil moods, of patience in the\nmidst of opposition, of confidence in the fruitfulness of labor and the\ntransforming power of time. Here is given the material which must be\nmolded into form; the rude blocks which must be cut and dressed and\nfitted together until they become a spiritual temple wherein the soul\nmay rest at one with God and Nature, and with its own thought and love.\nTo run, to jump, to ride, to swim, to skate, to sit in the shade of\ntrees by flowing water, to watch reapers at their work, to look on\norchards blossoming, to dream in the silence that lies amid the hills,\nto feel the solemn loneliness of deep woods, to follow cattle as they\ncrop the sweet-scented clover,--to learn to know, as one knows a\nmother's face, every change that comes over the heavens from the dewy\nfreshness of early dawn to the restful calm of evening, from the\noverpowering mystery of the starlit sky to the tender human look with\nwhich the moon smiles upon the earth,--all this is education of a higher\nand altogether more real kind than it is possible to receive within the\nwalls of a school; and lacking this, nothing shall have power to develop\nthe faculties of the soul in symmetry and completeness. Hence a\nphilosopher has said there are ten thousand chances to one that genius,\ntalent, and virtue shall issue from a farmhouse rather than from a\npalace. The daily intercourse with Nature in childhood and youth\nintertwines with noble and enduring objects the passions which form the\nmind and heart of man, whereas those who are shut out from such\ncommunion are necessarily thrown into contact with what is mean and\nvulgar; and since our early years, whatever our surroundings may have\nbeen, seem to us sweet and fair because life itself is then a\nclear-flowing fountain, they cannot help blending the memory of that\ninnocent and happy time with thoughts of base and mechanical objects,\nor, it may be, of low and ignoble associates.\n\nHe is fortunate who, during the first ten years of his life, escapes the\nconfinement and repression of school, and lives at home in the country\namid the fields and the woods, day by day growing familiar with the look\non Nature's face, with all her moods, with every common object, with\nliving things in the air and the water and on the earth; who sees the\ncorn sprout, and watches it grow week after week until the yellow\nharvest waves in the sunlight; who looks with unawed eye on rising\nthunder-clouds and shouts with glee amid the lightning's play; who\nlearns to know that whatever he looks upon is thereby humanized, and to\nfeel that he is part of all he sees and loves. He will carry with him to\nthe study of the intellectual and spiritual world of men's thoughts shut\nup in books, a strength of mind, a depth and freshness of heart which\nonly those can own who have drunk at Nature's deep flowing fountain, and\ncome up to life's training-course wet with her dews and with the\nfragrance of her flowers on their breath. In the eyes of the old Greeks,\nwho first made education a science, the scholar was an idler,--one who\nhad leisure to look about him, to stroll amid the olive groves, to let\nhis eye rest upon the purple hills or the blue sea studded with green\nisles, to listen to the brooks and the nightingales, to read the lesson\nthe fair earth teaches more than that imprinted on parchment; and the\nschool must still preserve something of this freedom from constraint,\nmust encourage the play of body and of mind, the delight natural to the\nyoung in the exercise of strength of whatever kind, and thus as far as\npossible lighten the labor and drudgery of elementary studies with\nthoughts of liberty, of beauty, and of excellence. Let the boy feel how\ngood it is to be alive though life meant only the narrow world and the\nmere surfaces of things with which alone it is possible for him to be\nacquainted; and then when we ask him to believe that in high thinking\nand in noble acting he will find a life infinitely more worthy, his\neager soul will be inflamed with a desire for knowledge and virtue, and\nbearing in his heart the strength and wealth of imagination gained from\nhis early experience, his thoughts will turn to great and good men. Dim\nvisions of mighty conquerors, of poets at whose song the woods and waves\ngrow calm, of orators whose words with storm-like force, whatever way\nthey take, sweep with them the wills of men,--will rise before his mind.\nHis young fancy will endow them with preternatural qualities; and he\nwill yearn to draw near, to mingle with them and to catch the secret of\ntheir divine power. The germ of the godlike within his bosom bursts and\nsprings. What they were, why may not he also become? What bars are\nthrown athwart his path, what obstacles hem his way, which, whoever in\nany age has excelled, has not had to break down and surmount? Here the\nwise teacher comes to cheer him, to tell him his faith is not wrong, his\nhope not without promise of attainment if he but trust himself, and bend\nhis whole mind to the task; that whatever goal within the scope of human\npower, the will sets to itself, it may reach.\n\nIn order to develop, strengthen, and confirm this high mood, this noble\ntemper, let him by all means be made acquainted with the language and\ngenius of Greece. Here he will be introduced to a world of thought and\nsentiment almost as fresh, as fair and many-sided as Nature\nherself,--the fragrant blossoming in myriad hues and forms of the life\nand mind of the most richly endowed portion of the human race. Not only\nare the Greeks the most highly-gifted of all people, but in this\nclassical age they have also this special charm and power,--that the\nkeenest intellectual faculties are in them united with the feelings,\nhopes, and fancies of a noble and great-hearted youth. Even Socrates and\nPlato talk like high-souled boys who can see the world only in the light\nof ideals, for whom what the mind beholds and the heart loves is alone\nreal. How healthfully they look on life, with what delight they breathe\nthe air! What fine contempt have they not of death, thinking no fortune\nso good as that which comes to the hero who dies in a worthy cause!\nThere is Athens, already the world's university; but no books, no\nlibraries, no lecture-halls, only great teachers who walk about followed\nby a crowd of youths eager to drink in their words. Here is the\nAcropolis, with its snow-white temples and propylaeum, fair and chaste as\nthough they had been built in heaven and gently lowered to this Attic\nmound by the hands of angels. There in the Parthenon are the sculptures\nof Phidias, and yonder in the temple of the Dioscuri, the paintings of\nPolygnotus,--ideal beauty bodied forth to lure the souls of men to\nunseen and eternal worlds. If they turn to the east, the isles of the\nAEgean look up to them like virgins who welcome happy lovers; to the\nwest, Mount Pentelicus, from whose heart the architectural glory of the\ncity has been carved, bids them think what patience will enable man's\ngenius to accomplish; and to the north, Hymettus, fragrant with the\nbreath of a thousand herbs and musical with the hum of bees, stoops with\ngentle undulations to their feet. They live in the air; their temples\nare open to the sunlight; their theatres are uncovered to the heavens;\nand whithersoever they move, they are surrounded by what is fair, noble,\nand inspiring. This free and happy life in the company of great\nteachers becomes the stimulus to the keenest exercise of mind. They are\nas eager to see things in a true light as they are quick to sympathize\nwith whatever is heroic or beautiful; and all their talk is of truth and\njustice, the good, the fair, the excellent, of philosophy, religion,\npoetry, and art, and of whatever else seems favorable to human life and\nto the development of ideal manhood. Of the merely useful they have the\nscorn of young and inexperienced minds; and Hippocrates proclaims\nhimself ready to give Protagoras, not only whatever he himself\npossesses, but also the property of his friends, if he will but teach\nhim wisdom. Superior knowledge was to them of all things the most\nadmirable and the most to be desired. What noble thoughts have they not\nconcerning education? \"An intelligent man,\" says Plato, \"will prize\nthose studies which result in his soul getting soberness, righteousness,\nand wisdom, and will less value the others.\" The culture of the mind is\nmade a kind of religion, in the spreading of which the personal\ninfluence of the teacher is not less active than the truths he sets\nforth. Bonds of affection bind the disciple to the master whose words\nhave for him the sacredness of wisdom and the charm of genius, power to\nconfirm the will, and warmth and color whereby the imagination is\nraised.\n\nThis secret of making knowledge attractive, of clothing truth in chaste\nand beautiful language, of associating it with whatever is fair and\nnoble in Nature, and of relating it to life and conduct, which is part\nof the genius of Greece, still lives in her literature; and to read the\nwords of her poets, orators, and philosophers is to feel the presence of\na high and active spirit, is to breathe in an intellectual atmosphere of\nlight and liberty, is of itself enlargement and cultivation of mind.\nHence, in the realms of thought, the Greeks are the civilizers and\nemancipators of the world; and whoever thinks, is to some extent their\ndebtor. The music of their eloquence and poetry can never grow silent;\nthe forms of beauty their genius has created can never perish, and never\ncease to win the admiration and love of noble minds and gentle hearts,\nor to be the inspiration, generation after generation, to high thoughts\nand heroic moods. So long as glory, beauty, freedom, light, and gladness\nshall seem good and fair, so long will the finer spirits of the world\nfeel the attraction and the charm of Greece, and know the sweet surprise\nwhich thrilled the heart of Keats when first he read Homer:--\n\n\n    \"Then felt I like some watcher of the skies\n    When a new planet swims into his ken,\n    Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes\n    He stared at the Pacific, and all his men\n    Looked at each other with a wild surmise,\n    Silent, upon a peak in Darien.\"\n\n\nIn a less degree, Roman literature, which is the offspring of Greek\nculture, has value as an intellectual stimulus and discipline. Here also\nthe youthful mind is brought into the presence of a great and noble\npeople, who, if they have less genius and a duller sense of beauty than\nthe Greeks, excel them in steadiness of purpose, in dignity of\ncharacter, in reverence for law and religion, and above all in the art\nof governing.\n\nThe educational value of the classics does not lie so much in the Greek\nand Latin languages as in the type of mind, the sense of proportion and\nbeauty, the heroic temper, the philosophic mood, the keen relish for\nhigh enterprise, and the joyful love of life which they make known to\nus. The world to which they introduce us is so remote that the\npre-occupations and vulgarities of the present, by which we all are\nhemmed and warped, fall away from us; and it is at the same time so real\nand of such absorbing interest that we are caught up in spirit and\ncarried to the Attic Plain and the hills of Latium. They are useful, not\nbecause they teach us anything that may not be learned and learned more\naccurately from modern books, but because they move the mind, fire the\nheart, ennoble and refine the imagination in a way which nothing else\nhas power to do. They are sources of inspiration; they first roused the\nmodern mind to activity; and the potency of their influence can never\ncease to be felt by those whose aptitudes lead them to the love of\nintellectual perfection, who delight in the free play of the mind, who\nare attracted by what is symmetrical, who have the instinct for beauty,\nwho swim in a current of ideas as naturally as birds fly in the air.\nThey appeal to the mind as a whole, stimulate all its faculties, awaken\na many-sided sympathy both with Nature and with the world of men. They\nwiden our view of life, bring forth in us the consciousness of our\nkinship with the human race, and of the application to ourselves,\nhowever common and uninspiring our surroundings may be, of the best\nthoughts and noblest deeds which have ever sprung from the brain and\nheart of man. They help to make one, again to quote Plato, \"A lover, not\nof a part of wisdom, but of the whole; who has a taste for every sort of\nknowledge, and is curious to learn and is never satisfied; who has\nmagnificence of mind, and is a spectator of all time and all existence;\nwho is harmoniously constituted, of a well-proportioned and gracious\nmind, whose own nature will move spontaneously toward the true being of\neverything; who has a good memory, and is quick to learn, noble,\ngracious, the friend of truth, justice, courage, temperance.\" The ideal\npresented is that of complete harmonious culture, the aim of which is\nnot to make an artisan, a physician, a merchant, a lawyer, but a man\nalive in all his faculties, touching the world at many points, for whom\nall knowledge is desirable, all beauty lovable, and for whom fine\nbearing and noble acting are indispensable.\n\nIt is needless to point out in what, or why, the Greeks failed, since\nhere there is question only of intellectual life, and in this they did\nnot fail. Nor is there any thought, in what has here been said, of\ndepreciating the worth of the study of science, without a certain\nknowledge of which no one, in this age, can in any true sense, be called\neducated. Whoever, indeed, learns a language properly, acquires\nscientific knowledge; and the Greeks are not only the masters in poetry\nand eloquence, they are also the guides to the right use of reason and\nto scientific method, and the teachers of mathematics, logic, and\nphysics. He who pursues culture, in the Greek spirit, who desires to see\nthings as they are, to know the best that has been thought and done by\nmen, will fear nothing so much as the exclusion of any truth, and he\nwill be anxious to acquaint himself not only with the method, but as\nfar as possible with the facts, of physical science. Still he perceives\nthat however great the value of natural knowledge may be, it is, as an\ninstrument of culture, inferior to literature. We are educated by what\ncalls forth in us love and admiration, by what creates the exalted mood\nand the steadfast purpose. In bowing with reverence to what is above us,\nwe are uplifted. When we are moved, we are more alive; we are stronger,\ntenderer, nobler. Now to look upon Nature with the detective eye of the\nman of science is to be cold and unsympathetic; to learn by methodic\nexperiment is to gain knowledge, which, since it is only remotely or\nindirectly related to life, is but little interesting. Such knowledge is\na fragment, and a fragment extremely difficult to fit into the temple\nbuilt by thought and love, by hope and imagination; and hence when we\nhave learned a great deal about chemical elements, geologic epochs,\ncorrelation of forces, and sidereal spaces, we are rather astonished\nthan enlightened. We are brought into the presence of a world which is\nnot that of the senses, nor yet that which faith, hope, and love\nforebode; and the bearing it may have upon human life is of more\ninterest to us than the facts made known. We are, indeed, curious to\nknow whatever may, with any certainty, be told us of atoms and\nbiogenesis; but our real concern is to learn what significance such\ntruth may have in its relation to questions of God and the soul.\n\nThere is doubtless a disciplinary value in the study of physical\nscience. It trains the mind to habits of patient attention, of careful\nobservation, teaches the danger of hasty generalization, and diminishes\nintellectual conceit; but these results may also be obtained by other\nmeans. The aim of education is not simply to develop this or the other\nfaculty, however indispensable, nor yet to make one thoroughly\nconversant with a particular order of facts, but the aim is to bring\nabout a conscious participation in the life of the race, to evoke all\nthe powers of man, so that his whole being shall be quickened and made\nresponsive to the touch of things seen and unseen; and the study of\nscience is less adapted to the attainment of this end than the study of\nhuman letters. The scientific temper draws to specialties; and\nspecialists are narrow, are incomplete. They, each in his own line, do\ngood work, and are the chief agents for the increase of natural\nknowledge, and are, we may grant, leaders in every kind of improvement;\nbut like the operatives who provide our comforts and luxuries, they are\nthemselves warped and crippled by what they do. The habit of looking at\na single order of facts, coldly and always from the same point of view,\ntakes from the mind flexibility, weakens the imagination, and puts\nfetters on the soul; and hence though it is important that there be\nspecialists, the kind of education by which they are formed, while it is\nsuited to make a geologist, a chemist, a mathematician, or a botanist,\nis not suited to call forth the free and harmonious play of all man's\npowers. We do not live on facts alone, much less on facts of a single\nkind. Religion and poetry, love, hope, and imagination are as essential\nto our well-being as science. Human life is knowledge, is faith, is\nconduct, is beauty, is manners; it unfolds itself in many directions and\nshoots its roots into infinitude; and for the general purposes of\neducation, science is learned to best advantage when it is embodied in\nliterature, and its methods and results, rather than the details of its\nwork, are presented to us. Whatever it is able to do, to improve the\nmind, to widen the range of thought, to give true notions of the\nworkings of Nature,--it will do for whoever learns accurately its\ngeneral conceptions and results; and these cannot remain unknown to him\nwhose aim is culture, for such an one is, as Plato says, \"A lover not of\na part of wisdom, but of the whole, and has a taste for every sort of\nknowledge, and is curious to learn, and is never satisfied; and though\nhe will not know medicine like a physician, or the heavens like an\nastronomer, or the vegetable kingdom like a botanist, his mind will play\nover all these realms with freedom, and he will know how to relate the\nprinciples and facts of all the sciences to our sense for beauty, for\nconduct, for life and religion in a way which a mere specialist can\nnever find.\" And his view will not only be wider and less impeded, it\nwill also be deeper than that of the man of science; for he who sees but\none order of things sees only their surfaces, just as he who sees but\none thing sees nothing at all.\n\nIt would be a mistake to imagine that the ideal here commended, means\nsuperficial accomplishments, an excessive love of style and the\nornaments of poetry and eloquence, or preoccupation in favor of aught\nexternal or frivolous. It is the very opposite of dilettantism, and if\nit mean anything, means thoroughness, and a thoroughness which can come\nonly of untiring labor carried on through many years; for time and\nintercourse with men and varied experience are indispensable elements.\nIt is like the ideal of religion which makes the saint think himself a\nsinner; it is as exacting as the miser's thought which makes millions\nseem to be beggary; like the artist's vision, like the poet's dream, it\nallures and yet forbids hope of attainment. The seeker after wisdom\nmust have a high purpose, a strong soul, and the purest love of truth.\nHe cannot live in the senses alone, nor in the mind, nor in the heart\nalone, but the spiritual being, which is himself, yearns for whatever is\ngood, whatever is true, whatever is fair, and so he finds himself akin\nto the infinite God and to all that he has made. When his thought is\ncarried out to atoms weaving the garment which is our body, and molding\nthe world we see and touch; when he beholds motion lighting, warming,\nthrilling the universe,--he is filled with intellectual joy, but at the\nsame time he perceives that all this is but a phase of truth; that God\nand the boundless facts are infinitely more than drilled atomics\nmarshaled rank on rank until they form the countless hosts of the\nheavens. When the men of science have labeled the elements, and put\ntickets upon all natural compounds, and with complacency declare that\nthis is the whole truth, he looks on the flowers around him and the\nblooming children, on the stars above his head, on the sun slow wheeling\ndown the western horizon, on the moon climbing some eastern hill, and\nhis inmost soul is glad because he feels the thrill of the infinite,\nliving Spirit, and forebodes to what fair countries we are bound.\n\nAnd when they proclaim the wonders science has wrought,--increase of\nphysical enjoyment and social comfort; the yoking of lightning and steam\nto make them work for man; the providing of more abundant food; the\nbuilding of more wholesome dwellings; the lengthening of life; temporal\nbenefits of every kind,--he joins with those who utter praise, but knows\nthat infinitely more than all this goes to the making of man's life. So\nhe turns his mind in many directions, and while he looks on the truth in\nscience, does not grow blind to the truth in religion; while he knows\nthe value of what is practically useful, understands also the priceless\nworth of what is noble and beautiful, and his acquaintance with many\nkinds of thought, with many shades of opinion confirms him, as Joubert\nsays, in the acceptance of the best.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III.\n\nTHE LOVE OF EXCELLENCE.\n\n\n     Why is this glorious creature to be found One only in ten thousand?\n     what one is, Why may not millions be? what bars are thrown By\n     Nature in the way of such a hope?\n\n     WORDSWORTH.\n\n\n\nHe teaches to good purpose who inspires the love of excellence, and who\nsends his pupils forth from the school's narrow walls with such desire\nfor self-improvement that the whole world becomes to them a\nGod-appointed university. And why shall not every youth hope to enter\nthe narrow circle of those for whom to live, is to think, who behold\n\"the bright countenance of truth in the quiet and still air of\ndelightful studies.\" An enlightened mind is like a fair and pleasant\nfriend who comes to cheer us in every hour of loneliness and gloom; it\nis like noble birth which admits to all best company; it is like wealth\nwhich surrounds us with whatever is rarest and most precious; it is like\nvirtue which lives in an atmosphere of light and serenity, and is itself\nenough for itself. Whatever our labors, our cares, our disappointments,\na free and open mind, by holding us in communion with the highest and\nthe fairest, will fill the soul with strength and joy. The artist, day\nby day, year in and year out, hangs over his work, and finds enough\ndelight in the beauty he creates; and shall not the friend of the soul\nbe glad in striving ceaselessly to make his knowledge and his love less\nunlike the knowledge and the love of God? Seldom is opportunity of\nvictory offered to great captains, the orator rarely finds fit theme and\naudience, hardly shall the hero meet with occasions worthy of the\nsacrifice of life; but he who labors to shape his mind to the heavenly\nforms of truth and beauty beholds them ever present and appealing. Life\nwithout thought and love is worthless; and to the best men and women\nbelong only those who cultivate with earnestness and perseverance their\nspiritual faculties, who strive daily to know more, to love more, to be\nmore beautiful. They are the chosen ones, and all others, even though\nthey sit on thrones, are but the crowd.\n\nWithout a free and open mind there is no high and glad human life. You\nmay as well point to the savage drowsing in his tent, or to cattle\nknee-deep in clover, and bid me think them high, as to ask me to admire\nwhere I can behold neither intelligence nor love. All that we possess is\nqualified by what we are. Gold makes not the miser rich, nor its lack a\ntrue man poor; and he who has gained insight into the fair truth that he\nis a part of all he sees and loves, is richer than kings, and lives like\na god in his universe. Possibilities for us are measured by the kind of\nwork in which we put our hearts. If a man's thoughts are wholly busy\nwith carpentering do not expect him to become anything else than a\ncarpenter; but if his aim is to build up his own being, to make his mind\nluminous, his heart tender and pure, his will steadfast, who but God\nshall fix a limit beyond which he may not hope to go. Education, indeed,\ncannot confer organic power; but it alone gives us the faculty to\nperceive how infinitely wonderful and fair are man's endowments, how\nboundless his inheritance, how full of deathless hope is that to which\nhe may aspire. Religion, philosophy, poetry, science,--all bring us into\nthe presence of an ideal of ceaseless growth toward an all-perfect\nInfinite, dimly discerned and unapproachable, but which fascinates the\nsoul and haunts the imagination with its deep mystery, until what we\nlong for becomes more real than all that we possess, and yearning is our\nhighest happiness. Ah! who would throw a veil over the vision on which\nyoung eyes rest when young hearts feel that ideal things alone are real?\nWho would rob them of this divine principle of progress which makes\ngrowth the best of life?\n\n\n                        \"Many are our joys\n    In youth; but oh, what happiness to live\n    When every hour brings palpable access\n    Of knowledge, when all knowledge is delight!\"\n\n\nIn all ages, we know those made wise by experience, which teaches us to\nexpect little, whether of ourselves or others, have made the thoughts\nand hopes of youth a jest, even as men have made religion a jest, having\nnothing to offer us in compensation for its loss, but witticisms and\ndespair. This is the fatal fault of life, that when we have obtained\nwhat is good,--as wealth, position, wife, and friends,--we lose all hope\nof the best, and with our mockery discourage those who have ideal aims;\nwho, remembering how the soul felt in life's dawn, retain a sense of\nGod's presence in the world, to whom with growing faculties they aspire,\nfeeling that whatsoever point they reach, they still have something to\npursue. This is the principle of the diviner mind in all high and heroic\nnatures; this is the spring-head of deeds that make laws, of \"thoughts\nthat enrich the blood of the world;\" this is the power which gives to\nresolve the force of destiny, and clothes the soul with the heavenliest\nstrength and beauty when it stands single and alone, of men abandoned\nand almost of God.\n\nThere is little danger that too many shall ever hearken to the\ninvitation from the fair worlds to which all souls belong, and where\nalone they can be luminous and free. For centuries, now, what\ninnumerable voices have pleaded with men to make themselves worthy of\nheaven; while they have moved on heedless of the heaven that lies about\nus here, placing their hopes and aims in material and perishable\nelements, athirst neither for truth, nor beauty, nor aught that is\ndivinely good! They sleep, they wake, they eat, they drink; they tread\nthe beaten path with ceaseless iteration, and so they die. If one come\nappealing for culture of intellect, not because they who know, are\nstronger than the ignorant and make them their servants, but because an\nopen, free, and flexible mind is good and fair, better than birth,\nposition, and wealth, they turn away as though he trifled with their\ncommon-sense. Life, they say, is not for knowledge, but knowledge for\nlife; and they neither truly know, nor live. And if here and there some\nnobler soul stand forth, he degrades himself to an aspirant to fame,\nforgetting truth and love.\n\n\n    Enough there are on earth who reap and sow,\n    Enough who give their lives to common gain,\n    Enough who toil with spade and axe and plane,\n    Enough who sail the seas where rude winds blow;\n    Enough who make their life unmeaning show,\n    Enough who plead in courts, who physic pain;\n    Enough who follow in the lover's train,\n    And taste of wedded hearts the bliss and woe.\n\n    A few at least may love the poet's song,\n    May walk with him, their visionary guide,\n    Far from the crowd, nor do the world a wrong;\n    Or on his wings through deep blue skies may glide\n    And float, by light transfused, like clouds along\n    Above the earth and over oceans wide.\n\n\nWith unresting, wearing thought and labor we are striving to make earth\nmore habitable. We drag forth from its inner parts whatever treasures\nare hidden there; with steam's mighty force we mold brute matter into\nevery fair and serviceable form; we build great cities, we spread the\nfabric of our trade; the engine's iron heart goes throbbing through\ntunneled mountains and over storm-swept seas to bear us and our wealth\nto all regions of the globe; we talk to one another from city to city,\nand from continent to continent along ocean's oozy depths the lightning\nflashes our words, spreading beneath our eyes each morning the whole\nworld's gossip,--but in the midst of this miraculous transformation, we\nourselves remain small, hard, and narrow, without great thoughts or\ngreat loves or immortal hopes. We are a crowd where the highest and the\nbest lose individuality, and are swept along as though democracy were a\ntyranny of the average man under which superiority of whatever kind is\ncriminal. Our population increases, our cities grow, our roads are\nlengthened, our machinery is made more perfect, the number of our\nschools is multiplied, our newspapers are read in ever-widening circles,\nthe spirit of humanity and of freedom breathes through our life; but the\nindividual remains common-place and uninteresting. He lacks\nintelligence, has no perception of what is excellent, no faith in\nideals, no reverence for genius, no belief in any highest sort of man\nwho has not shown his worth in winning wealth, position, or notoriety.\nWe have a thousand poets and no poetry, a thousand orators and no\neloquence, a thousand philosophers and no philosophy. Every city points\nto its successful men who have millions, but are themselves poor and\nunintelligent; to its writers who, having sold their talent to\nnewspapers and magazines, sink to the level of those they address,\ndealing only with what is of momentary interest, or if the question be\ndeep, they move on the surface, lest the many-eyed crowd lose sight of\nthem. The preacher gets an audience and pay on condition that he stoop\nto the gossip which centres around new theories, startling events, and\nmechanical schemes for the improvement of the country. If to get money\nbe the end of writing and preaching, then must we seek to please the\nmultitude who are willing to pay those who entertain and amuse them.\nWill not our friends, even, conceive a mean opinion of our ability, if\nwe fail to gain public recognition?\n\nSo we make ourselves \"motleys to the view, and sell cheap what is most\ndear.\" We must, perforce, show the endowment which can be brought to\nperfection only if it be permitted to grow in secrecy and solitude. The\nworst foe of excellence is the desire to appear; for when once we have\nmade men talk of us, we seem to be doing nothing if they are silent, and\nthus the love of notoriety becomes the bane of true work and right\nliving. To be one of a crowd is not to be at all; and if we are resolved\nto put our thoughts and acts to the test of reason, and to live for what\nis permanently true and great, we must consent, like the best of all\nages, to be lonely in the world. All life, except the life of thought\nand love, is dull and superficial. The young love for a while, and are\nhappy; a few think; and for the rest existence is but the treadmill of\nmonotonous sensation. There are but few, who, through work and\nknowledge, through faith and hope and love, seek to escape from the\nnarrowness and misery of life to the summits of thought where the soul\nbreathes a purer air, and whence is seen the fairer world the multitude\nforebodes. There are but few whose life is\n\n\n    \"Effort and expectation and desire,\n    And something evermore about to be;\"\n\n\nbut few who understand how much the destiny of Man hangs upon single\npersons; but few who feel that what they love and teach, millions must\nknow and love.\n\n\n    \"A people is but the attempt of many\n    To rise to the completer life of one;\n    And those who live as models for the mass\n    Are singly of more value than them all.\"\n\n\nOnly the noblest souls awaken within us divine aspirations. They are the\nmusic, the poetry, which warms and illumines whole generations; they are\nthe few who, born with rich endowments, by ceaseless labor develop their\npowers until they become capable of work which, were it not for them,\ncould not be done at all. History is the biography of aristocrats, of\nthe chosen ones with whom all improvement originates, who found States,\nestablish civilizations, create literatures, and teach wisdom. They work\nnot for themselves; for in spite of human selfishness and the personal\naims of the ambitious, the poet, the scholar, and the statesman bless\nthe world. They lead us through happy isles; they clothe our thoughts\nand hopes with beauty and with strength; they dissipate the general\ngloom; they widen the sphere of life; they bring the multitude beneath\nthe sway of law.\n\nNow, here in America, once for all, whatever the thoughtless may\nimagine, we have lost faith in the worth of artificial distinctions.\nIndeed plausible arguments may be found to prove that the kind of man\ndemocracy tends to form, has no reverence for distinctions of whatever\nkind, and is without ideals, and that as he is envious of men made by\nmoney, so he looks with the contempt of unenlightened common-sense upon\nthose whom character and intellect raise above him. This is not truth.\nThe higher you lift the mass, the more will they acknowledge and\nappreciate worth, the clearer will they see that what makes man human,\nbeautiful, and beneficent is conduct and intelligence; and so increasing\nenlightenment will turn thought and admiration from position and wealth,\nfrom the pomp and show of life to what makes a man's self, his\ncharacter, his mind, his manners even,--for the source of manners lies\nwithin us. In a society like ours, the chosen ones, the best, the models\nof life, and the leaders of thought will be distinguished from the crowd\nnot by accident or circumstance, but by inner strength and beauty, by\nfiner knowledge, by purer love, by a deeper faith in God, by a more\nsteadfast trust that it must, and shall be, well with a world which God\nmakes and rules, and which to the fairest mind is fairest, and to the\nholiest soul most sacred.\n\nHere and now, if ever anywhere at any time, there is need of men, there\nis appeal to what is godlike in man, calling upon us to rise above our\nprosperities, our politics, our mechanical aims and implements, and to\nturn the courage, energy, and practical sense which have wrought with\nmiraculous power in developing the material resources of America, to the\ncultivation of our spiritual faculties. We alone of the great modern\nnations are without classical writers of our own, without a national\nliterature. The thought and love of this people, its philosophy, poetry,\nand art lies yet in the bud; and our tens of thousands of books, even\nthe better sort, must perish to enrich the soil that nourishes a life of\nheavenly promise. Hitherto we have been sad imitators of the English,\nbut not the best the English have done will satisfy America. Their\nlanguage indeed will remain ours, and their men of genius, above all\ntheir poets, will enrich our minds with great thoughts nobly expressed.\nBut a literature is a national growth; it is the expression of a\npeople's life and character, the more or less perfect utterance of what\nit loves, aims at, believes in, hopes for; it has the qualities and the\ndefects of the national spirit; it bears the marks of the thousand\ninfluences that help to make that spirit what it is,--and English\nliterature cannot be American literature, for the simple reason that\nAmericans are not Englishmen, any more than they are Germans or\nFrenchmen. We must be ourselves in our thinking and writing, as in our\nliving, or be insignificant, for it is a man's life that gives meaning\nto his thought; and to write as a disciple is to write in an inferior\nway, since the mind at its best is illumined by truth itself and not\ntaught by the words of another. It is not to be believed that this\ngreat, intelligent, yearning American world will content itself with the\ntrick and mannerism of foreign accent and style, or that those who build\non any other than the broad foundation of our own national life shall be\naccepted as teachers and guides. There is, of course, no method known to\nman by which a great author may be formed; no science which teaches how\na literature may be created. The men who have written what the world\nwill not permit to die have written generally without any clear\nknowledge of the worth of their work, just as great discoverers and\ninventors seem to stumble on what they seek; nevertheless one may hope\nby right endeavor to make himself capable of uttering true thoughts so\nthat they shall become intelligible and attractive to others; he may\neducate himself to know and love the best that has been spoken and\nwritten by men of genius, and so become a power to lift the aims and\nenlarge the views of his fellow-men. If many strive in this way to\nunfold their gifts and to cultivate their faculties, their influence\nwill finally pervade the life and thought of thousands, and it may be of\nthe whole people.\n\nI do not at all forget Aristotle's saying that \"life is practice and not\ntheory;\" that men are born to do and suffer, and not to dream and weave\nsystems; that conduct and not culture is the basis of character and the\nsource of strength; that a knowledge of Nature is of vastly more\nimportance to our material comfort and progress than philosophy, poetry,\nand art. This is not to be called in question; but in this country and\nage it seems hardly necessary that it be emphasized, for what is the\nwhole world insisting upon but the necessity of scientific instruction,\nthe importance of practical education, the cultivation of the\nmoney-getting faculty and habit, and the futility of philosophy, poetry,\nand art? Who is there that denies the worth of what is useful? Where is\nthere one who does not approve and encourage whatever brings increase of\nwealth? Are we not all ready to applaud projects which give promise of\nproviding more abundant food, better clothing, and more healthful\nsurrounding for the poor? Does not our national genius seem to lie\naltogether in the line of what is practically useful? Is it not our\nboast and our great achievement that we have in a single century made\nthe wilderness of a vast continent habitable, have so ploughed and\ndrained and planted and built that it can now easily maintain hundreds\nof millions in gluttonous plenty? Is not our whole social and political\norganization of a kind which fits us to deal with questions and affairs\nthat concern our temporal and material welfare? What innumerable\nindividuals among us are congressmen, legislators, supervisors, bank and\nschool directors, presidents of boards and companies, committee-men,\ncouncilmen, heads of lodges and societies, lawyers, professors,\nteachers, editors, colonels, generals, judges, party-leaders, so that\nthe sovereign people seems to have life and being only in its titled\nrepresentatives! What does this universal reign of title and office mean\nbut the practical education which responsibility gives? If from the\nmidst of this paradise of utility, materialism, and business, a voice is\nraised to plead for culture, for intelligence, for beauty, for\nphilosophy, poetry, and art, why need any one take alarm? While human\nnature remains what it is, can there be danger that the many will be\ndrawn away from what appeals to the senses, to what the soul loves and\nyearns for? If the Almighty God does not win the multitude to the love\nof righteousness and wisdom, how shall the words of man prevail?\n\nIt is a mistake to oppose use to beauty, the serviceable to the\nexcellent, since they belong together. Beauty is the blossom that makes\nthe fruit-tree fair and fragrant. Life means more than meat and drink,\nhouse and clothing. To live is also to admire, to love, to lose one's\nself in the contemplation of the splendor with which Nature is clothed.\nHuman life is the marriage of souls with things of light. Its basis,\naim, and end is love, and love makes its object beautiful. Man may not\neven consent to eat, except with decency and grace; he must have light\nand flowers and the rippling music of kindly speech, that as far as\npossible he may forget that his act is merely animal and useful. He will\nlose sight of the fact that clothing is intended for protection and\ncomfort, rather than not dress to make himself beautiful. To speak\nmerely to be understood, and not to speak also with ease and elegance,\nis not to be a gentleman. How easily words find the way to the heart\nwhen uttered in melodious cadence by the lips of the fair and young.\nHome is the centre and seat of whatever is most useful to us; and yet to\nthink of home is to think of spring-time and flowers, of the songs of\nbirds and flowing waters, of the voices of children, of floating clouds\nand sunsets that linger as though heaven were loath to bid adieu to\nearth. The warmth, the color, and the light of their boyish days still\nglow in the hearts and imagination of noble men, and redeem the busy\ntrafficking world of their daily life from utter vulgarity. What hues\nhas not God painted on the air, the water, the fruit, and the grain that\nare the very substance and nutriment of our bodies? Beauty is nobly\nuseful. It illumines the mind, raises the imagination, and warms the\nheart. It is not an added quality, but grows from the inner nature of\nthings; it is the thought of God working outward. Only from drunken eyes\ncan you with paint and tinsel hide inward deformity. The beauty of hills\nand waves, of flowers and clouds, of children at play, of reapers at\nwork, of heroes in battle, of poets inspired, of saints rapt in\nadoration,--rises from central depths of being, and is concealed from\nfrivolous minds. Even in the presence of death, the hallowing spirit of\nbeauty is felt. The full-ripe fruit that gently falls in the quiet air\nof long summer days, the yellow sheaves glinting in the rays of\nautumn's sun, the leaf which the kiss of the hoar frost has made\nblood-red and loosened from the parent stem,--are images of death but\nthey suggest only calm and pleasant thoughts. The Bedouin, who, sitting\namid the ruins of Ephesus, thinks but of his goats and pigs, heedless of\nDiana's temple, Alexander's glory, and the words of Saint Paul, is the\ntype of those who place the useful above the excellent and the fair; and\nas men who in their boards of trade buy and sell cattle and corn, dream\nnot of green fields and of grain turning to gold in the sun of June, so\nwe all, in the business and worry of life, lose sight of beauty which\nmakes the heart glad and keeps it young.\n\nThe mind of man is the earthly home of beauty, and if any real thing\nwere fair as the tender thought of imaginative youth, heaven were not\nfar. All we love is but our thought of what only thought makes known and\nmakes beautiful, and for what we know love's thought may be the essence\nof all things.\n\n\n    Fairer than waters where soft moonlight lies,\n    Than flowers that slumber on the breast of Spring,\n    Than leafy trees in June when glad birds sing,\n    Than a cool summer dawn, than sunset skies;\n\n    Than love, gleaming through Beauty's deep blue eyes,\n    Than laughing child, than orchards blossoming;\n    Than girls whose voices make the woodland ring,\n    Than ruby lips that utter sweet replies,--\n\n    Fairer than these, than all that may be seen,\n    Is the poetic mind, which sheds the light\n    Of heaven on earthly things, as Night's young Queen\n    Forth-looking from some jagged mountain height\n    Clothes the whole earth with her soft silvery sheen\n    And makes the beauty whereof eyes have sight.\n\n\nNature is neither sad nor joyful. We but see in her the reflection of\nour own minds. Gay scenes depress the melancholy, and gloomy prospects\nhave not the power to rob the happy of their contentment. The spring may\nfill us with fresh and fragrant thoughts, or may but remind us of all\nthe hopes and joys we have lost; and autumn will speak to one of decay\nand death, to another of sleep and rest, after toil, to prepare for a\nnew and brighter awakening. All the glory of dawn and sunset is but\netheric waves thrilling the vapory air and impinging on the optic nerve;\nbut behind it all is the magician who sees and knows, who thinks and\nloves. \"It is the mind that makes the body rich.\" Thoughts take shape\nand coloring from souls through which they pass; and a free and open\nmind looks upon the world in the mood in which a fair woman beholds\nherself in a mirror. The world is his as much as the face is hers. If we\ncould live in the fairest spot of earth, and in the company of those who\nare dear, the source of our happiness would still be our own thought and\nlove; and if they are great and noble, we cannot be miserable however\nmeanly surrounded. What is reality but a state of soul, finite in man,\ninfinite in God? Theory underlies fact, and to the divine mind all\nthings are godlike and beautiful. The chemical elements are as sweet and\npure in the buried corpse as in the blooming body of youth; and it is\ndefective intellect, the warp of ignorance and sin, which hides from\nhuman eyes the perfect beauty of the world.\n\n\n            \"Earth's crammed with heaven,\n    And every common bush afire with God;\n    But only he who sees, takes off his shoes.\"\n\n\nWhat we all need is not so much greater knowledge, as a luminous and\nsymmetrical mind which, whatsoever way it turn, shall reflect the things\nthat are, not in isolation and abstraction, but in the living unity and\nharmony wherein they have their being.\n\nThe worth of religion is infinite, the value of conduct is paramount;\nbut he who lacks intellectual culture, whatever else he may be, is\nnarrow, awkward, unintelligent. The mirror of his soul is dim, the\nmotions of his spirit are sluggish, and the divine image which is\nhimself is blurred.\n\nBut let no one imagine that this life of the soul in the mind is easy;\nfor it is only less difficult than the life of the soul in God. To\nlearn many things; to master this or that science; to have skill in law\nor medicine; to acquaint one's self with the facts of history, with the\nopinions of philosophers or the teachings of theologians,--is\ncomparatively not a difficult task; and there are hundreds who are\nlearned, who are skillful, who are able, who have acuteness and depth and\ninformation, for one who has an open, free, and flexible mind,--which is\nalive and active in many directions, touching the world of God and\nNature at many points, and beholding truth and beauty from many sides;\nwhich is serious, sober, and reasonable, but also fresh, gentle, and\nsympathetic; which enters with equal ease into the philosopher's\nthought, the poet's vision, and the ecstasy of the saint; which excludes\nno truth, is indifferent to no beauty, refuses homage to no goodness.\nThe ideal of culture indeed, like that of religion, like that of art,\nlies beyond our reach, since the truth and beauty which lure us on, and\nflee the farther the longer we pursue, are nothing less than the eternal\nand infinite God.\n\nAnd culture, if it is not to end in mere frivolity and gloss, must be\npursued, like religion and art, with earnestness and reverence. If the\nspirit in which we work is not deep and holy, we may become accomplished\nbut we shall not gain wisdom, power, and love. The beginner seeks to\nconvert his belief into knowledge; but the trained thinker knows that\nknowledge ends in belief, since beyond our little islets of intellectual\nvision, lies the boundless, fathomless expanse of unknown worlds where\nfaith and hope alone can be our guides. Once individual man was\ninsignificant; but now the earth itself is become so,--a mere dot in\ninfinite space, where, for a moment, men wriggle like animalcules in a\ndrop of water. And if at times a flash of light suddenly gleam athwart\nthe mind, and it seem as though we were about to get a glimpse into the\ninner heart of being, the brightness quickly dies, and only the surfaces\nof things remain visible. Oh, the unimaginable length of ages when on\nthe earth there was no living thing! then life's ugly, slimy beginnings;\nthen the conscious soul's fitful dream stretching forth to endless time\nand space; then the final sleep in abysmal night with its one star of\nhope twinkling before the all-hidden throne of God, in the shadow of\nwhose too great light faith kneels and waits!\n\nWhy shall he whose mind is free, symmetrical, and open, be tempted to\nvain glory, to frivolous boasting? Shall not life be more solemn and\nsacred to him than to another? Shall he indulge scorn for any being whom\nGod has made, for any thought which has strengthened and consoled the\nhuman heart? Shall he not perceive, more clearly than others, that the\nunseen Power by whom all things are, is akin to thought and love, and\nthat they alone bring help to man who make him feel that faith and hope\nmean good, and are fountains of larger and more enduring life? The\nhighest mind, like the purest heart, is a witness of the soul and of\nGod.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV.\n\nCULTURE AND THE SPIRIT OF THE AGE.\n\n\n     But try, I urge,--the trying shall suffice: The aim, if reached or\n     not, makes great the life.\n\n     BROWNING.\n\n\n\nThe mass of mankind, if we pass the whole race in review, are sunk in\ngross ignorance; and even in civilized nations, where education is free,\nthe multitude have but a rude acquaintance with the elements of\nknowledge. Their ability to read and write hardly serves intellectual\nand moral ends; and such learning as they possess seems only to weaken\ntheir power to admire and love what is best in life and thought.\n\nIf we turn to the more cultivated, whose numbers even in the most\nenlightened countries are not great, we find but here and there an\nindividual who has anything better than a sort of mechanical cleverness.\nStudents, it has been said, on leaving college, quickly divide into two\nclasses,--those who have learned nothing, and those who have forgotten\neverything. In the professions, the lawyer tends to become an advocate,\nthe physician an empiric, the theologian a dogmatist; and these are but\ninstances of a general falling away from ideals. The student of physical\nscience is subdued to what he works in; the man of letters loses depth\nand earnestness; and the teacher, whose business it is to rouse and\nillumine souls, shrivels until he becomes merely a repeater of facts and\ndoctrines in which there is no life, no power to exalt the imagination\nor to give tone to the intellect. The teacher cannot create talent, and\nhis best work lies in stimulating and directing energy and impulse; but\nthis he seldom strives to do or to make himself capable of doing; and\nhence pupils very generally leave school as men quit a prison, with a\nsense of emancipation, and with a desire to forget both the place and\nthe kind of life there encouraged. A talent is like seed-corn,--it bears\nwithin itself the power to break the confining walls and to spring\nupward to light, if only it be sown in proper soil, where the rain and\nthe sunshine fall; but this is a truth which those who make education a\nbusiness are slow to accept. They repress; they overawe; they are\ndictatorial; they prescribe rules and methods for minds which can gain\nstrength and wisdom only by following the bent given by their\nendowments,--and thus the young, who are most easily discouraged in\nthings which concern their highest gifts, lose heart, turn away from\nideals, and abandon the pursuit of excellence. The nobler the mind, the\ngreater the danger of its being wrongly dealt with. We seldom find a man\nwhose thinking has helped to form opinion and to create literature, who,\nif he care to say what he feels, will not declare that his scholastic\ntraining was bad. Milton, Gray, Dryden, Wordsworth, Byron, Cowley,\nAddison, Gibbon, Locke, Shelley, and Cowper had no love for the schools\nto which they were sent; Swift and Goldsmith received no college honors;\nand Pope, Thomson, Burns, and Shakespeare had little or nothing to do\nwith institutions of learning. A man educates himself; and the best work\nteachers can do, is to inspire the love of mental exercise and a living\nfaith in the power of labor to develop faculty, and to open worlds of\nuse and delight which are infinite, and which each individual must\nrediscover for himself. It is the educator's business to cherish the\naspirations of the young, to inspire them with confidence in themselves,\nand to make them feel and understand that no labor can be too great or\ntoo long, if its result be cultivation and enlightenment of mind. For\nthem ideals are real; their life is as yet wrapped in the bud; and to\nencourage them to believe that if they are but true to themselves, the\nflower and the fruit will be fair and health-bringing, is to open for\nthem the fountain of hope and noble endeavor.\n\nWhat men have done, men can still do. Nay, shall we not rather believe\nthat the best is yet to be done? The peoples whom we call ancient were\nbut rude beginners. We are the true ancients, the inheritors of all the\nwisdom and all the heroism of the past. We stand in a wider world, and\nmove forward with more conscious purpose along more open ways. Of the\npast we see but the summits, illumined by the rays of genius and glory.\nCould we look upon the plains where the multitudes lie in darkness,\nwearing the triple chain of servitude, ignorance, and want, we should\nunderstand how fair and beneficent our own age is. Enthusiasm for the\npast cannot inspire the best intellectual work. The heart turns to the\npast; but the mind looks to the future, and is forever untwisting the\ncords which bind us to the things that pleased a childlike fancy. To\ngrow is to outgrow; and whatever of the past survives, survives, as the\nvery word implies, because it is still living and applicable here and\nnow. Let not the young believe that the age of the heroic and godlike is\ngone. Good and the means of good are not harder to reconcile to-day than\nthey were a hundred or a thousand years ago, and they who have a heart\nmay now, as the best have done in the past, wring even from despair the\ncourage on which victory loves to smile. If we are weak and inferior the\nfault lies in ourselves, not in the age. We are the age; and if we but\nwill and work, opportunities are offered us to become and to perform\nwhatever may crown and glorify a human soul. The time for doing best\nthings, like eternity, is ever present. Let but the man stand forth, and\nhe will find and do his work.\n\nWe are too near our own age to discern its true glory, which shall best\nappear from the vantage-ground of another century; but surely we can\nfeel that it throbs with life, with immortal yearnings, with\never-growing desire to give to all men higher thoughts and purer loves.\nSociety, the State, the Church, the individual, are striving with\nconscious purpose to make life moral and intelligent. We have become\nmore humane than men have ever been, and accept more fully the duty and\nthe task of extending the domain of justice, of goodness, and of truth.\nThe aim of our civilization is not merely to instruct the ignorant, but\nto make ignorance impossible; not merely to feed the hungry, but to do\naway with famine; not merely to visit the captive, but to make captivity\nthe means of his regeneration. Already the chains of the slave have\nbeen broken, and the earth has become the home of God's free children.\nDisease has been tracked to its secret hiding-places, and barriers have\nbeen built against pestilence and contagion. War has become less\nfrequent and less barbarous; persecution for opinion and belief has\nbecome rare; man's inhumanity to woman, which is the deepest stain upon\nthe history of the race, has yielded to the influence of religion and\nknowledge; and with ever-increasing force the truth is borne in upon\nthose who think and observe, that the fate of the rich and high-placed\ncannot be separated from that of the poor and lowly. While we earnestly\nstrive to control and repress every kind of moral evil, we feel that\nsociety itself is responsible for sin and crime, and that social and\npolitical conditions and constitutions must change, until the weak and\nthe heavy-laden are protected from the heartlessness of the strong and\nfortunate. Not only must those who labor with their hands have larger\nopportunities than hitherto have ever been given them, but in the whole\nsocial life of man there must be more justice, more love, more\ntenderness, more of the spirit of Christ, than hitherto has ever been\nfound there.\n\nWhat marvelous, intellectual work are we not doing? What admirable\nexpression of the highest truth do we not find in the best writers of\nour age! It is not all pure gold; but whether we take a religious, a\nmoral, or an intellectual point of view, we may not affirm of the\nliterature of any age or country that it is perfect. When man clothes in\nwords what he thinks and loves, what he knows and believes, his work\nbears the marks of his defects not less than those of his qualities.\nNay, if we turn to the Bible itself, how much do we not find there which\nwe either fail to comprehend or are unable to apply! Has not the mind of\nChristendom been trained and illumined by the literatures of Greece and\nRome, which in moral purity, in elevation of sentiment, in breadth and\ndepth of thought, in the knowledge of the laws of Nature, in scientific\naccuracy, in sympathy and tenderness, are altogether inferior to the\nbest writings of our own day? It is a mistake to suppose that this is a\nmaterial age in which the love of religion, of poetry, of art, of\nexcellence of whatever kind, is dead. The love of what is best has never\nat any time been alive save in the hearts of the chosen few; and in such\nsouls it burns now with as sweet and steady a glow as when Plato spoke,\nand the blessed Saviour uttered words of divine wisdom. Here and now, in\nand around us, there is the heavenly presence of budding life, of\nwidening vision, of \"new thoughts urgent as the growth of wings.\" Let\nus turn the white forehead of hope to the fair time, and deem no labor\ngreat by which we shall become less unfit to do the work of God and man.\n\n\n    \"Nay, never falter; no great deed is done\n    By falterers who ask for certainty.\n    No good is certain but the steadfast mind,\n    The undivided will to seek the good:\n    'T is that compels the elements and wrings\n    A human music from the indifferent air.\n    The greatest gift the hero leaves his race\n    Is to have been a hero. Say we fail!\n    We feed the high tradition of the world\n    And leave our spirit in our children's breasts.\"\n\n\nBut to enter upon such a course of life with well-founded hope of\nsuccess, we must be reverent and devout. The thrill of awe is, as Goethe\nsays, the best thing humanity has. We must understand and feel that the\nvisible is but the shadow of the invisible, that the soul has its roots\nin God, whose kingdom is within us. We must perceive that what we know,\nbelieve, admire, love, and yearn for makes our real life; that we are\nworth what we _are_, and not what we possess and use. We must be lovers\nof perfection, as the divine Saviour bids us become,--\"Be ye perfect,\neven as your Father in heaven is perfect.\" We must be conscious of the\nimmortal spirit which is ourself, and walk in the company of God and of\njust men made perfect, striving after light and purity and strength,\nwhich are of the soul. We must love the inward, the true, and the\neternal rather than the outward and transitory. We must believe that in\nvery truth we are akin to God, that God is in us, and we in him, and\nconsequently that it is our first duty to follow after perfection,\ncompleteness of life, in thought, in love, and in conduct. As it is good\nto know, so is it good to be strong, to be patient, to be humble, to be\nhelpful; so is it good to do right, though the deed should be our only\nreward.\n\nBut we are beset by all manner of temptations to turn aside from a high\nand noble way of living. The line of least resistance for us is the\ncommon highway of money-getters and place-winners; and the moment a man\ngives evidence of ability, the whole world urges him to put it to\nimmediate use. Our public opinion identifies the good with the useful,\nall else is visionary and unreal. The average man controls us not only\nin politics, but in religion, in art, and in literature. To turn away\nfrom material good in order to gain spiritual and intellectual benefit\nis held to be evidence of a feeble or perverted understanding. If a man\nis eloquent, let him become a lawyer, a politician, or a preacher; if he\nhave a talent for science, let him become a physician, a practical\nchemist, or a civil engineer; if he have skill in writing, let him\nbecome a journalist or a contributor to magazines. No one asks himself,\nWhat shall I do to gain wisdom, strength, virtue, completeness of life;\nbut the universal question is, How shall I make a living, get money,\nposition, notoriety? In our hearts we should rather have the riches of a\nRothschild than the mind of Plato, the imagination of Shakespeare, or\nthe soul of Saint Theresa. We believe the best is outside of us, that\nthe aids to the most desirable kind of life are to be found in material\nand mechanical things. We talk with pride of our numbers, our\ninstitutions, our machines; we love the display and noise of life, are\neager to mingle in crowds, to live in great cities, and to listen to\nexaggerated and declamatory speech. The soberness of wisdom, the\nhumility of religion, the plainness of worth, are unattractive and\nunrecognized. We rush after material things, like hunters after game;\nand in the excitement of the chase our pulse grows quick, and our vision\nconfused. We have lost the art of patient work and expectation. We are\nno more capable of living in our work, of making it the means of our\ngrowth and happiness. What we do, must be quickly done, must have\nimmediate results. Our success in solving the political and social\nproblems has spoiled us. When we hear of a man who has been prosperous\nfor years, whom no misfortune has sobered and softened, we expect him to\nbe narrow and supercilious; and in the same way, a prosperous people are\nexposed to the danger of becoming self-complacent and superficial. We\nexaggerate the importance of our own achievements and think that which\nwe have accomplished is the best; whereas the wise hold what they have\ndone in slight esteem, and think only of becoming themselves nobler and\nwiser. Instead of boasting of our civilization, because we have\nindustrial and commercial prosperity, wealth and liberty, churches,\nschools, and newspapers, we ought to ask ourselves whether civilization\ndoes not imply something more and higher than this,--what kind of soul\nlives and loves and thinks in this environment? Instead of trying to\npersuade ourselves that we are the greatest and most enlightened people,\nwould it not be worth while to ask ourselves, in a dispassionate temper,\nwhether our best men and women are the most intellectual, the most\ninteresting, and the most Christian men and women to be found in the\nworld? Do they not lack repose, distinction, a sense for complete and\nharmonious living? Must we not still look to Europe for our best\nreligious and philosophic thought, our best poetry, painting, music,\nand architecture? \"Let the passion for America,\" says Emerson, \"cast out\nthe passion for Europe.\" This is desirable, but numbers and wealth will\nnot bring it about. While the best is said and done in Europe, the\nbetter sort of Americans will look thither,--just as Europe looks to us\nfor corn and cotton, or mechanical appliances. We have done much, and\nmuch that it was well to do. We have, as Matthew Arnold says, solved the\npolitical and social problems better than any other people, though we\nourselves perceive that the solution is by no means final. The\nconditions of our life are favorable to the many. It is easier for a man\nto assert himself here, than it is or has ever been elsewhere. A little\nsense, a little energy, is all that any one needs to make himself\nindependent and comfortable; and because success of this kind is so easy\nit threatens to absorb our whole life. They alone seem to be living\nworthily who are doing practical work, who are developing the natural\nwealth of the country, starting new enterprises and inventing new\nmachines. The political problems which interest us are financial;\nschools are maintained and fostered because they protect and strengthen\nour institutions; religious beliefs are tolerated and encouraged because\nthey are aids to morality,--and morality means sobriety, honesty,\nindustry, which lead to thrift. Then there is an idea that religion is a\nconservative power, useful as a bulwark against the assaults of\nanti-social fanatics. Philosophy, poetry, and art are not considered\nseriously, because they are not seen to bear any clear relation to our\ninstitutions and temporal well-being. Opinion rules the wide world over;\nand in the face of this strong public opinion which lays stress chiefly\nupon external things,--the environment, the machinery of life,--and not\nupon spiritual and intellectual qualities, it is not easy to love\nknowledge and virtue for themselves, for the strength and beauty they\ngive to the soul, for their power to build up the being which is a man's\nvery self. It is rare that men have faith in what but few believe in;\nthey are gregarious, and need the encouragement that comes of having\naims and hopes of which the millions approve.\n\nThe predominance of the average man, of which our public opinion is the\nresult, puts other obstacles in the way of culture. It makes us\nself-complacent, easily satisfied with what we perform. A representative\nman will become a lawyer, a soldier, a merchant, a legislator, an\nauthor, in turns, as occasion offers, and he has no doubt of his\nsufficiency; because average work is all that is expected of any one. To\nbe able to do anything fairly well seems to us a more desirable\naccomplishment than to be able to do some one thing better than anybody\nelse. But this is a view which only those may take who live in an\nimperfectly developed society. As men become more cultivated, they more\nand more want only the best; and the noblest natures feel the desire to\ndo their best, not with their actual power, but with the skill which\nforty or fifty years of discipline and effort might give them. They are\nlaborious; they are patient; they persevere in one direction; they\nbelieve that if they but continue to observe, to think, to read, to\ncompare, and to express in plain words what they know, their power of\nseeing and of uttering will continue to grow. The charm of increasing\nfaculty in an infinite world sways and controls them. They never know\nenough; they are never able to say well enough what they know; and so\nthey grow old still learning many things. They work in a spirit wholly\ndifferent from that of the common man, who if he get through with what\nhe has in hand is satisfied. They have an artist's sense of perfection;\nand like Virgil would burn the works which if they once escape their own\nhands, the world will never permit to perish.\n\nIt is hard to resist when many invite to utterance; and with us whoever\nhas ability is urged to put himself forward, and consequently to\ndissipate in crude performances energies which if employed in\nself-culture might make of him a philosopher, a poet, or a man of\nscience. As it is easier to act than to think, the multitude of course\nwill be only talkers, writers, and performers; but a great and civilized\npeople must have at least a few men who take rank with the profound\nthinkers and finished scholars of the world. No lover of America can\nhelp thinking it undesirable that any one should be able to say of us\nwith truth, what Locke has said, \"The Americans are not all born with\nworse understandings than the Europeans, though we see none of them have\nsuch reaches in the arts and sciences.\" It is our aim to create the\nhighest civilization; but the highest civilization is favorable to the\nhighest life, which implies and requires more than the possession of\nmaterial things. Conduct is necessary, knowledge is necessary, beauty is\nnecessary, manners are necessary, and a civilized people must develop\nlife in all these directions, and as far as such a thing is possible,\nharmoniously. Whoever excels in conduct, or in knowledge, or in a sense\nfor the beautiful, or in manners, helps to raise the standard of\nliving,--helps to give worth, dignity, charm, and refinement to life. It\nis hard to take interest in a people who have no profound thinkers, no\ngreat artists, no accomplished scholars, for only such men can lift a\npeople above the provincial spirit, and bring them into conscious\nrelationship with former ages and the wide world. The rule of the people\nlooks to something higher than opportunity for every man to have food\nand a home; to something more than putting a church, a school, and a\nnewspaper at every man's door. Saints and heroes, philosophers and\npoets, are a people's glory. They give us nobler loves, higher thoughts,\ndiviner aims. They show us how like a god man may become; and political\nand social institutions which make saints and heroes, philosophers and\npoets, impossible, can have but inferior value. And there is some\nradical wrong where the noblest manhood and womanhood are not\nappreciated and reverenced. Not to recognize genuine worth is the mark\nof a superficial and vulgar character. The servile spirit has no\nconception of the heroic nature; and they who measure life by material\nstandards, do not perceive the infinite which is in man and which makes\nhim godlike. A few only in any age or nation love the best, follow after\nideal aims; but when these few are wanting, all life becomes\ncommon-place, and the millions pass from the cradle to the grave and\nleave no lasting impression upon the world.\n\nThe practical turn of mind which finds expression in our commercial and\nindustrial achievements, makes itself felt also in our intellectual\nactivity, and those among us who have knowledge and power of utterance\nare expected, almost required, to throw themselves into the breakers of\ncontroversy, to discuss the hundred political, social, religious,\nfinancial, sanitary, and educational problems which are ever waiting to\nbe solved. Let them enter the lists, let them take sides, let them\nstrive to see clear in an atmosphere of smoke and fog; and not to do\nthis is, in the estimation of the many, to be a dreamer, a dilettante, a\nthinker to no purpose. But this is precisely what those who seek to\ncultivate themselves, who seek to learn and communicate the best that is\nknown, ought not to do. They should live in a serene air, in a world of\ntranquility and peace, where the soul is not troubled by contention,\nwhere the view is not perturbed by passion. They should have leisure,\nwhich is the original meaning of school and scholar; for the mind, like\nthe soul, is refreshed and strengthened by quiet meditation. Its\nimprovement is slow, is imperceptible often; its training is the result\nof delicate methods which require patience and perseverance, faith in\nideals, and a constant looking to the all-perfect Infinite; and to throw\nit into the noise and confusion of the busy excited world of practical\naffairs is to stunt and warp its growth. We do not hitch a race-horse to\nthe plough, nor should we ask the best intellects to do the common work\nof which every man is capable. They render the best service, when living\nin communion with the highest and most cultivated minds of the past and\npresent, they learn and teach the way of looking and thinking, of\nbehaving and doing, which has been followed by the greatest and noblest\nof the race. Political and social questions are forever changing; views\nwhich commend themselves to-day will in a few years seem absurd;\nmeasures which are thought to be of vital importance will grow to be\ninapplicable. To talk and write about such things is well,--may help to\nprevent stagnation and corruption in public life; but they exercise\naltogether a higher office, who live in the presence of what is\npermanently true and good and beautiful, who believe in ideal aims and\nends and prevent the masses from losing sight of what constitutes man's\nreal worth. They do what they alone can do, whereas the practical and\nthe useful may be any one's work. They may not, of course, isolate\nthemselves; on the contrary they must live closer than other men not\nonly to God and Nature, but also to the past and present history of\ntheir country and of mankind. They study the movements of the age, but\nthey study them in a philosophic and not in a partisan spirit. They seek\nto know, not what is popular, but what is right and good; and they often\nsee clearly where the view of others is uncertain and confused.\nEncouragements and rewards are not necessary for them, for they are\ndrawn to the knowledge and love of the best by irresistible attractions,\nand the more they learn and love the more beneficent and joy-giving does\ntheir life become. Their aims and ends are in harmony with the highest\nreason and the highest faith. The world they live in abides; and if they\nare neglected or forgotten now, they can wait, for truth and goodness\nand beauty can never lose their power or their charm.\n\n\n    \"The worthiest poets have remained uncrowned\n    Till death has bleached their foreheads to the bone.\"\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V.\n\nSELF-CULTURE.\n\n\n                  There is\n    One great society alone on earth\n    The noble Living and the noble Dead.\n\n    WORDSWORTH.\n\n\n\nThe passion for truth and for the culture which makes its possession\npossible is not rightly felt by the heart of boy or of youth; it is the\nman's passion, and its power over him is most irresistibly asserted when\noutward restraint has been removed, when escaping from the control of\nparents and teachers he is left to himself to shape his course and seek\nhis own ends. When his companions have finished their studies he feels\nthat his own are now properly only about to begin; when they are\ndreaming of liberty and pleasure, of wealth and success, of the world\nand its honors, his mind is haunted by the mystery of God and Nature, by\nvisions of dimly discerned truth and beauty which he must follow\nwhithersoever they lead; and already he perceives that wisdom comes to\nthose alone who toil and cease not from labor, who suffer and are\npatient. Hitherto he has learned the lessons given him by teachers\nappointed by others; henceforth he is himself to choose his instructors.\nAs once, half-unconscious, he played in the smile or frown of Nature,\nand drank knowledge with delight, so now in the world of man's thought,\nhope, and love, he is, with deliberate purpose, to seek what is good for\nthe nourishment of his soul. Happy is he, for nearly all men toil and\nsuffer that they may live; but he is also to have time to labor, to make\nlife intelligent and fair. He must know not only what the blind atoms\nare doing, but what saints, sages, and heroes have loved, thought, and\ndone. He will still keep close to Nature who, though she utters myriad\nsounds, never speaks a human word; but he will also lend his ear to the\nvoice of wisdom which lies asleep in books, and to sympathetic minds\nwhispers from other worlds whatever high or holy truth has consecrated\nthe life of man. His guiding thought must be how to make the work by\nwhich he maintains himself in the world subserve moral and intellectual\nends; for his aim is not merely or chiefly to have goods, but to be wise\nand good, and therefore to build up within himself the power of conduct\nand the power of intelligence which makes man human, and distinguishes\nhim from whatever else on earth has life.\n\nIt is our indolence and frivolity that make routine duties, however\ndistracting or importunate, incompatible with the serious application\nwhich the work of self-culture demands; but we are by nature indolent\nand frivolous, and only education can make us earnest and laborious.\nNone but a cultivated mind can understand that if the whole human race\ncould be turned loose, to eat and drink and play like thoughtless\nchildren, life would become meaningless; that a paradise in which work\nshould not be necessary would become wearisome. The progress of the race\nis the result of effort, physical, religious, moral, and intellectual;\nand the advance of individuals is proportional to their exertion. Nature\nherself pushes the young to bodily exercise; but though activity is for\nthem a kind of necessity, only the discipline of habit will lead them to\nprefer labor to idleness; and they will not even use their senses\nproperly unless they are taught to look and to listen,--just as they are\ntaught to walk and to ride. The habit of manual labor, as it is directly\nrelated to the animal existence to which man is prone, and supplies the\nphysical wants whose urgency is most keenly felt, is acquired with least\ndifficulty, and it prepares the way for moral and intellectual life; but\nit especially favors the life which has regard to temporal ends and\nconduces to comfort and well-being. They whose instrument is the brain\nrarely aim at anything higher than wealth and position; and if they\nbecome rich and prominent, they remain narrow and uninteresting. They\ntalk of progress, of new inventions and discoveries, and they neglect to\nimprove themselves; they boast of the greatness of their country, while\ntheir real world is one of vulgar thought and desire; they take interest\nin what seems to concern the general welfare, but fail to make\nthemselves centres of light and love. What is worse they have the\nconceit of wisdom,--they lack reverence; they are impatient, and must\nhave at once what they seek. But the better among us see the\ninsufficiency of the popular aims, and begin to yearn for something\nother than a life of politics, newspapers, and financial enterprise.\nThey desire to know and love the best that is known, and they are\nwilling to be poor and obscure, if they may but gain entrance into this\nhigher world. \"I shall ever consider myself,\" says Descartes, \"more\nobliged to those who leave me to my leisure, than I should to any who\nmight offer me the most honorable employments.\" This is the thought of\nevery true student and lover of wisdom; for he feels that whatever a\nman's occupation may be, his business is to improve his mind and to form\nhis character. He desires not to be known and appreciated, but to know\nand appreciate; not to _have_ more, but to _be_ more; not to have\nfriends, but to be the friend of man,--which he is when he is the lover\nof truth. He turns from vulgar pleasures as he turns from pain, because\nboth pleasure and pain in fastening the soul to the body deprive it of\nfreedom and hinder the play of the mind.\n\n\n    He loves the best with single heart\n    And without thought what gifts it bring.\n\n\nUnless one have deep faith in the good of culture he will easily become\ndiscouraged in the work which is here urged upon him. He must be drawn\nto the love of intellectual excellence by an attraction such as a poet\nfeels in the presence of beauty; he must believe in it as a miser\nbelieves in gold; he must seek it as a lover seeks the beloved. Our\nwants determine our pleasures, and they who have no intellectual\ncravings feel not the need of exercise of mind. They are born and remain\ninferior. They are content with the world which seems to be real,\nforgetting the higher one, which alone is real; they are not urged to\nthe intellectual life by irresistible instincts. They are discouraged by\ndifficulties, thwarted by obstacles which lie in the path of all who\nstrive to move forward and to gain higher planes. It is not possible to\nadvance except along the road of toil, of struggle, and of suffering.\nWe cannot emerge even from childish ignorance and weakness without\nexperiencing a sense of loss. Mental work in the beginning and for a\nlong time is weariness, is little better than drudgery. We labor, and\nthere seems to be no gain; we study and there seems to be no increase of\nknowledge or power; and if we persevere, we are led by faith and hope,\nnot by any clear perception of the result of persistent application.\nGenius itself is not exempt from this law. Poets and artists work with\nan intensity unknown to others, and are distinguished by their faith in\nthe power of labor. The consummate musician must practice for hours, day\nby day, year in and year out. The brain is the most delicate and the\nfinest of instruments, and it is vain to imagine that anything else than\nceaseless, patient effort will enable us to use it with perfect skill;\nindeed, it is only after long study that we become capable of\nunderstanding what the perfection of the intellect is, that we become\ncapable of discerning what is excellent, beautiful, and true in style\nand thought.\n\nDiscouragement and weariness will, again and again, suggest doubts\nconcerning the wisdom of this ceaseless effort to improve one's self.\nWhy persist in the pursuit of what can never be completely attained?\nWhy toil to gain what the mass of men neither admire nor love? Why wear\nout life in a course of action which leads neither to wealth nor honors?\nWhy turn away from pleasures which lie near us to follow after ideal\nthings? These are questions which force themselves upon us; and it\nrequires faith and courage not to be shaken by this sophistry. Visions\nof ideal life float before young eyes, and if to be attracted by what is\nhigh and fair were enough, it were not difficult to be saint, sage, or\nhero; but when we perceive that the way to the best is the road of toil\nand drudgery, that we must labor long and accomplish little, wander far\nand doubt our progress, must suffer much and feel misgivings whether it\nis not in vain,--then only the noblest and the bravest still push\nforward in obedience to inward law. The ideal of culture appeals to them\nwith irresistible force. They consent to lack wealth, and the approval\nof friends and the world's applause; they are willing to turn away when\nfair hands hold out the cup of pleasure, when bright eyes and smiling\nlips woo to indulgence. If, you ask, How long? They answer, Until we\ndie! They are lovers of wisdom and do not trust to hope of temporal\nreward. Their aim is light and purity of mind and heart; these they\nwould not barter for comfort and position. As saints, while doing the\ncommon work of men, walk uplifted to worlds invisible, so they, amid the\nnoise and distractions of life still hear the appealing voice of truth;\nand as parted lovers dream only of the hour when they shall meet again,\nso these chosen spirits, in the midst of whatever cares and labors, turn\nto the time when thought shall people their solitude as with the\npresence of angels. They hear heavenly voices asking, Why stay ye on the\nearth, unless to grow? Vanity, frivolity, and fickleness die within\nthem; and they grow to be humble and courageous, disinterested and\nlaborious, strong and persevering. The cultivation of their higher\nnature becomes the law of their life; and the sense of duty, \"stern\ndaughter of the voice of God,\" which of all motives that sway the heart,\nbest stands the test of reason, becomes their guide and support. Thus\nculture, which looks to the Infinite and All-wise as to its ideal, rests\nupon the basis of morality and religion.\n\nTo think is difficult, and they who wish to grow in power of thought\nmust hoard their strength. Excess, of whatever kind, is a waste of\nintellectual force. The weakness of men of genius has impoverished the\nworld. Sensual indulgence diminishes spiritual insight; it perverts\nreason, and deadens love; it enfeebles the physical man, and weakens the\norgans of sense, which are the avenues of the soul. The higher self is\ndeveloped harmoniously only when it springs from a healthful body. It is\nthe lack of moral balance which makes genius akin to madness. Nothing is\nso sane as reason, and great minds fall from truth only when they fail\nin the strength which comes of righteous conduct.\n\nLet the lover of wisdom then strive to live in a healthy body that his\nsenses may report truly of the universe in which he dwells. But this is\nnot easy; for mental labor exhausts, and if the vital forces are still\nfurther diminished by dissipation, disease and premature decay of the\nintellectual faculties will be the result. The ideal of culture embraces\nthe whole man, physical, moral, religious, and intellectual; and the\nloss of health or morality or faith cannot but impede the harmonious\ndevelopment of the mind itself. Passion is the foe of reason, and may\neasily become strong enough to extinguish its light. He who wishes to\neducate himself must learn to resist the desires of his lower nature,\nwhich if indulged deaden sensibility, weaken the will, take from the\nimagination its freshness, and from the heart the power of loving. The\ntask he has set himself is arduous, and he cannot have too much energy,\ntoo much warmth of soul, too much capacity for labor. Let him not waste,\nlike a mere animal, the strength which was given him that he might\nlearn to know and love infinite truth and beauty. The dwelling with\none's self and with thoughts of what is true and high, which is an\nessential condition of mental growth, is impossible when the sanctuary\nof the soul is filled with unclean images. Intellectual honesty, the\ndisinterested love of truth, without which no progress can be made, will\nhardly be found in those who are the slaves of unworthy passions. The\nmore religious a man is, the more does he believe in the worth and\nsacredness of truth, and the more willing does he become to throw all\nhis energies with persevering diligence into the work of\nself-improvement. They who fail to see in the universe an all-wise,\nall-holy, and all-powerful Being, from whom are all things and to whom\nall things turn, easily come to doubt whether it holds anything of true\nworth. History teaches this, and it requires little reflection to\nperceive that it must be so. Of the Solitary, Wordsworth says,--\n\n\n                      \"But in despite\n    Of all this outside bravery, within\n    He neither felt encouragement nor hope;\n    For moral dignity and strength of mind\n    Were wanting, and simplicity of life\n    And reverence for himself; and, last and best,\n    Confiding thoughts, through love and fear of Him\n    Before whose sight the troubles of this world\n    Are vain.\"\n\n\nThe corrupt and the ignorant easily learn to feel contempt, but the\nscholar is reverent. He moves in the midst of infinite worlds, and knows\nthat the least is part of the whole.\n\nNow, how shall he who is resolved to educate himself set about his work?\nWhat advice shall be given him? What rules shall be made for him that he\nmay not waste time and energy? He who yearns for the cultivation of mind\nwhich makes wisdom possible must work his way to the light. All\nintellectual men strive to educate themselves, but each one strives in a\ndifferent way. They all aim at insight rather than information, at the\nperfect use of their faculties rather than learning. The power to see\nthings as they are, is what they want; and therefore they look, observe,\nexamine, compare, analyze, meditate, read, and write. And they keep\ndoing this day by day; and the longer they work, the more attractive\ntheir work grows to be. Descartes, who is a typical lover of the\nintellectual life, looked upon himself simply as a thinking being, and\ngave all his thought to the cultivation of his higher faculties in the\nhope that he might finally discover some truth which would bring\nblessings to men. He had no thought of literary fame, published little,\nand sedulously avoided whatever might bring him into notoriety. \"Those,\"\nhe says, \"who wish to know how to speak of everything and to acquire a\nreputation for learning, will succeed most easily if they content\nthemselves with the semblance of truth, which may readily be found.\" The\nlove of truth is the mark of the real student. What is, is; it is man's\nbusiness to know it. He is the foe of pretense; sham for him means\nshame. He will have sound knowledge; he will do his work well; whether\nmen shall applaud or reward him for it, is a foreign consideration. He\nobeys an inward law, and the praise of those who cannot understand him\nsounds to him like mockery. True thought, like right conduct, is its own\nreward. To see truth and to love it is enough,--is more than to have the\nworship of the world. The important thing is to be a man, to have a\nserious purpose, to be in earnest, to yearn for what is good and holy;\nand without this the culture of the intellect will not avail.\n\nWe must build upon the broad foundation of man's life, and not upon any\nspecial faculty. The merely literary man is often the most pitiful of\nmen,--able, it may be, to do little else than complain that his merits\nare not recognized. Let it not be imagined then that the lover of\nwisdom, the follower of intellectual good, should propose to himself a\nliterary career. He may of course be or become a man of letters, but\nthis is incidental to his life-purpose, which is to develop within\nhimself the power of knowing and loving. He will learn to think rightly\nand to act well, first of all; for he knows that a man's writing cannot\nbe worth more than he himself is worth. He is a seeker after truth and\nperfection; and understanding at the price of what countless labors\nthese may be hoped for, he is slow to imagine that words of his may be\nof help to others.\n\nObservation, reading, and writing are the chief means by which thought\nis stimulated, the mind developed, and the intellect cultivated. The\nhabit of looking and the habit of thinking are closely related. A man\nthinks as he sees; and for a mind like Shakespeare's, for instance,\nobservation is almost the only thing that is necessary for its\ndevelopment. The boundless world breaks in upon him with creative force.\nHis sympathy is universal, and therefore so is his interest. He sees the\nlike in the unlike, the differences in things which are similar. Every\nlittle bird and every little flower are known to him. He contemplates\nFalstaff and Poor Tom with as much interest as though they were Hamlet\nand King Lear. In all original minds the power of observation is great.\nIt is the chief source of our earliest knowledge, of that which touches\nus most nearly and most deeply colors the imagination. When the boy is\nwandering through fields, sitting in the shade of trees, or lying on the\nbanks of murmuring streams, he is not only learning more delightful\nthings than books will ever teach him, but he is also acquiring the\nhabit of attention, of looking at what he sees, which nowhere else can\nbe gotten in so natural and pleasant a way. Hence the best minds have\neither been born in the country or have passed there some of their early\nyears. Unless we have first learned to look with the eye, we shall never\nlearn to look with the mind. They who walk unmoved beneath the starlit\nheavens, or by the ever-moving ocean, or amid the silent mountains; who\ndo not find, like Wordsworth, that the meanest flower that blows gives\nthoughts which often lie too deep for tears, will not derive great help\nfrom the world of books. But in the world of books the intellectual must\nalso make themselves at home and live, must thence draw nourishment,\nlight, wisdom, strength, for there as nowhere else the mind of man has\nstamped its image; and there the thoughts of the master spirits still\nbreathe, still glow with truth and beauty. The best books are powers\n\n\n    \"Forever to be hallowed; only less,\n    For what we are and what we may become,\n    Than Nature's self, which is the breath of God,\n    Or his pure Word, by miracle revealed.\"\n\n\nBut it is as difficult to know books as to know men. There are but few\nmen who can be of intellectual service to us; and there are but few\nbooks which stimulate and nourish the mind. The best books are, as\nMilton says, \"the precious life-blood of a master spirit;\" and it is\nabsurd to suppose that they will reveal their secret to every chance\ncomer, to every heedless reader. As it takes a hero to know a hero, so\nonly an awakened mind can love and understand the great thinkers. The\nreading of the ignorant is chiefly a mechanical proceeding; and, indeed,\nfor men in general reading is little better than waste of time. Their\nreading, like their conversation, leaves them what they were, or worse.\nThe mass of printed matter has no greater value from an intellectual\npoint of view at least than the wide ever-flowing stream of talk; and\nfor the multitude it is all the same whether they gossip and complain,\nor read and nod. However much they read, they remain unintelligent; what\nknowledge they gain is fragmentary, unreal; they learn merely enough to\ntalk about what they do not understand. We may of course read for\nentertainment, as we may talk for entertainment; but this is merely a\nrecreation of the mind, which is good only because it rests and prepares\nus for work. The wise read books to be enlightened, uplifted, and\ninspired. Their reading is a labor in which every faculty of the mind\nis awake and active. They are attentive; they weigh, compare, judge.\nThey re-create within their own minds the images produced by the author;\nthey seek to enter into his inmost thought; they admire each well-turned\nphrase, each happy epithet; they walk with him, and make themselves at\nhome in the wonderland which his genius has called into being; past\ncenturies rise before them, and they almost forget that they did not\nhear Plato discourse in the Academy, or stroll with Horace along the\nSacred Way. As they are brought thus intimately into the company of the\nnoblest minds, they think as they thought, feel as they felt, and so are\nenlightened and inspired. They drink the spirit of the mighty dead, and\ngradually come to live in a higher and richer world. The best in life\nand literature is seen to be such only by those who have made themselves\nworthy of the heavenly vision; and once we have learned to love the few\nreal books of the world, or rather what in these few is eternally true\nand beautiful, we breathe the atmosphere of the intellectual life. What\nis frivolous, or false, or vulgar can no longer please us; having seen\nand loved what is high we may not sink to the lower.\n\nKnowledge may be useful, and yet have little power to nourish, train,\nand enlarge the mind, and it is its disciplinary and educational value\nwhich we are here considering. Medicine for a physician, law for an\nattorney, theology for a clergyman, is the most useful knowledge; but\nthey are not therefore the best means of intellectual culture. Natural\nscience, though it is most useful, ministering as it does in a thousand\nways and with ever-increasing efficacy to our wants and comforts, has\nbut an inferior educational power. Acquaintance with the uniform\nco-existences and sequences of phenomena is not a mental tonic. Such\nknowledge not only leaves us unmoved,--it has a tendency even to fetter\nthe free play of the mind and to chill the imagination. It unweaves the\nrainbow, and leaves us the dead chemical elements. The information we\nhave gained is practical, but it does not exalt the soul or render us\nmore keenly alive to the divine beauty which rests on Nature's face. It\ndoes not enable us, as does the knowledge of literature and history, to\nparticipate in the conscious life of the race. It makes no appeal to our\nnobler human instincts. There is no book on natural science, nor can\nthere ever be one, which may take a place among the few immortal works\nwhich men never cease to read and love. Physical science has its own\ndomain, and its study will continue to enrich the world, to make\nspecialists of a hundred kinds; but it never can take the place of\nliterature and history as a means of culture; and as an educational\nforce its value is greatest when it is studied not experimentally, but\nas literature,--though of course, every cultivated man should be\nfamiliar with the inductive method, and should receive consequently a\ncertain scientific training.\n\nHistory, in bringing us into the presence of the greatest men and in\nshowing us their mightiest achievements, rouses our whole being. It sets\nthe mind aglow, awakens enthusiasm, and fires the imagination. It makes\nus feel how blessed a thing it is \"to scorn delights and live laborious\ndays;\" how divine to perish in bringing truth and holiness to men. We\ncommingle with the makers of the world; we hear them speak and see them\nact; we catch the spirit of their lofty purpose, their high courage,\ntheir noble eloquence. When we drink deeply of the wisdom which history\nteaches, we come to understand that truth and justice, heroism and\nreligion, which are the virtues of the greatest men, may be ours as\neasily as theirs; that opportunity for true men is ever present, and\nthat the task set for each one of us is as sacred and important as any\nwhich has ever been entrusted to the human mind and will. Our thought\nis widened, our hearts are strengthened, and we come to feel that it\nshall be well for others that we too have lived. When we have learned to\nbe at home with lofty and generous natures, the heroic mood becomes\nnatural to us.\n\nThere are of course but few histories which have this tonic effect upon\nthe mind and the will, but with these the lover of culture should make\nhimself familiar. Each one must find the book he needs; and though he\nshould find no help in a volume which time and the consent of the\nlearned have consecrated, let him not be discouraged, but continue to\nseek and to read until he meet with the author who fills his soul with\njoy and opens to his wondering eyes visions of new worlds. To love any\ngreat book so that we read it--or at least those portions of it which\nespecially appeal to us--many times, and always with new pleasure (as a\nmother never wearies of looking upon her child), until the thought and\nstyle of the author become almost our own, is to learn the secret of\nself-education; for he who understands and loves one great book is sure\nto find his way to the love and knowledge of other works of genius. He\nwill not read chiefly to gain information, but he will read for\nexaltation of spirit, for enlightenment, for strength of soul, for the\nhelp which springs from contact with generous and awakened minds. He\nwill mark his favorite passages and refer to them often, as one loves to\nrevisit places where he has been happy; and these very pencil-marks will\nbecome dear to him as tokens of truth revealed, of wisdom gained, of joy\nbestowed. The best reading is that which most profoundly stimulates\nthought, which brings our own minds into active, conscious communion\nwith the mind of the author; and hence the best poetry is the most\nefficacious and the most delightful aid to mental improvement.\n\nPoetry is, as Aristotle says, the most philosophic of all writing. It is\nalso the writing which is most instinct with passion, with life. It\nsprings from intense thought and feeling, and bears within itself the\npower to call forth thought and feeling. It is thought transfused with\nthe glow of emotion, and consequently thought made beautiful,\nattractive, contagious. It is, to quote Wordsworth, \"the breath and\nfiner spirit of all knowledge; it is the impassioned expression which is\nin the countenance of all science.\" The poet has more enthusiasm and\ntenderness than other men, a more sensitive soul, a more comprehensive\nmind. His wider sympathy gives him greater insight; and his power to see\nabsent things as though they were present enables him to bring the\ndistant and the past before our eyes, to make them live again in a new\nand immortal world; he stimulates the whole mind and appeals to every\nfaculty of the soul. The greatest philosophers are, like Plato, poets\ntoo; and unless the historian is also a poet, there is no inspiration,\nno life in what he writes. It is as superficial and vulgar to sneer at\npoetry as to sneer at religion; and they alone are mockers who have eyes\nbut for some counterfeit. To be able to read a true poet is not a gift\nof Nature; it is a faculty to be acquired. He creates, as Wordsworth\nsays, the taste by which he is appreciated. To imagine we may read him\nas we read a frivolous novel is absurd; it may well happen we shall see\nno truth or beauty in him until patient study has made it plain. It\noften takes the world a hundred years or more to recognize a great poet;\nand a knowledge of his worth can be had by the student only at the price\nof patient labor. Wordsworth will attract scarcely any one at the first\nglance; the great number of readers will soon weary of him and throw him\naside; but those who learn to understand him find in his writings\ntreasures above all price. There are but a few great poems in the\nliteratures of the different nations, but he who wishes to have a\ncultivated mind must, at the cost of whatever time and labor, make\nhimself familiar with them; for there alone are found the best thoughts\nclothed in fittest words; there alone are rightly portrayed the noblest\ncharacters; there alone is the world of men and things transfigured by\nthe imagination and illumined by the pure light of the mind. True poets\nhelp us to see, they teach us to admire, they lift our thoughts, they\nappeal to our higher nature; they give us nobler loves, more exalted\naims, more spiritual purposes; they make us feel that to live for money\nor place is to lead a narrow and a slavish life; and to men around whom\nthe fetters of material and hardening cares are growing, they cry and\nbid them--\n\n\n                                     \"Look abroad\n    And see to what fair countries they are bound.\"\n\n\nBut even the greatest poets have weaknesses, and are great only by\ncomparison. There is not one who however he may enchant and strengthen,\ndoes not also disappoint us. The perfect poet the future will bring; and\nto his coming we shall look with more eager expectation than if we\nforesaw man dowered with wings. The elevation we forebode is of the\nsoul, not of the body. Progress we have already made. It is no longer\npossible for a true poet to sing of sensual delights; the man he creates\nis now no more the slave \"of low ambition or distempered love.\" His\ntheme is rather--\n\n\n    \"No other than the heart of man\n    As found among the best of those who live,\n    Not unexalted by religious faith,\n    Nor uninformed by books, good books, though few,\n    In Nature's presence.\"\n\n\nWriting is as great an aid to the cultivation of the mind as reading. It\nis indeed indispensable, and the accuracy of thought and expression of\nwhich Bacon speaks, is but one of its good results. \"By writing,\" says\nSaint Augustine, \"I have learned many things which nothing else had\ntaught me.\" There is, of course, no question here of writing for\npublication. To do this no one should be urged. The farther we are from\nall thought of readers, the nearer are we to truth; and once an author\nhas published, a sort of madness comes over him, and he seems to be\ndoing nothing unless he continue to publish. The truly intellectual man\nleads an interior life; he dwells habitually in the presence of God, of\nNature, and of his own soul; he swims in a current of ideas, looks out\nupon a world of truth and beauty; he would rather gain some new vision\nof the eternal reality than to have a mountain of gold or the suffrages\nof a whole people. The great hindrance is lack of the power of\nprolonged attention, of sustained thought; and this the habit of\nserious writing gives. But the habit itself is difficult to acquire. At\nfirst in attempting to write we are discouraged to find how crude, how\nunreal, how little within our control our knowledge is; and it will\noften happen that we shall simply hold the pen in idleness, either\nbecause we find nothing to write, or because the proper way to express\nwhat we think eludes our efforts. When this happens day after day, the\ntemptation will come to abandon our purpose, and to seek easier and less\neffective means of developing mental strength, or else we shall write\ncarelessly and without thought, which is even a greater evil than not to\nwrite at all. In the writing of which I am thinking there is no question\nof style, of what critics and readers will say; all that is asked is\nthat we apply our minds to things as they appear to us, and put in plain\nwords what we see. Thus our style will become the expression of our\nthought and life. It will be the outgrowth of a natural method, and\nconsequently will have genuine worth. What is written in this way should\nbe preserved, not that others may see it, but that we ourselves by\ncomparing our earlier with our later essays may be encouraged by the\nevidence of improvement. It is not necessary to make choice of a\nsubject,--whatever interests us is a fit theme; and if nothing should\nhappen specially to interest us, by writing we shall gain interest in\nmany things.\n\nThe method here proposed requires serious application, perseverance,\ndiligence: it is difficult; but they who have the courage to continue to\nwrite, undeterred by difficulties, will gain more than they hope for.\nThey will grow in strength, in accuracy, in pliancy, in openness of\nmind; they will become capable of profound and just views, and will\ngradually rise to worlds of truth and beauty of which the common man\ndoes not dream. And it will frequently happen that there will be\npermanent value in what is written not to please the crowd or to flatter\na capricious public opinion, or to win gold or applause, but simply in\nthe presence of God and one's own soul to bear witness to truth. As the\npainter takes pallet and brush, the musician his instrument, each to\nperfect himself in his art, so he who desires to learn how to think\nshould take the pen, and day by day write something of the truth and\nlove, the hope and faith, which make him a living man.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI.\n\nGROWTH AND DUTY.\n\n\n     Why stay we on the earth unless to grow?\n\n     BROWNING.\n\n\n\nWhat life is in itself we do not know, any more than we know what matter\nis in itself; but we know something of the properties of matter, and we\nalso have some knowledge of the laws of life. Here it is sufficient to\ncall attention to the law of growth, through which the living receive\nthe power of self-development,--of bringing their endowments into act,\nof building up the being which they are. Whatever living thing is strong\nor beautiful has been made so by growth, since life begins in darkness\nand impotence. To grow is to be fresh and joyous. Hence the spring is\nthe glad time; for the earth itself then seems to renew its youth, and\nenter on a fairer life. The growing grass, the budding leaves, the\nsprouting corn, coming as with unheard shout from regions of the dead,\nfill us with happy thoughts, because in them we behold the vigor of\nlife, bringing promise of higher things.\n\nNature herself seems to rejoice in this vital energy; for the insects\nhum, the birds sing, the lambs skip, and the very brooks give forth a\nmerry sound. Growth leads us through Wonderland. It touches the germs\nlying in darkness, and the myriad forms of life spring to view; the\nmists are lifted from the valleys, and flowers bloom and shed fragrance\nthrough the air. Only the growing--those who each moment are becoming\nsomething more than they were--feel the worth and joyousness of life.\nUpon the youth nothing palls, for he is himself day by day rising into\nhigher and wider worlds. To grow is to have faith, hope, courage.\n\nThe boy who has become able to do what a while ago was impossible to\nhim, easily believes that nothing is impossible; and as his powers\nunfold, his self-confidence is nourished; he exults in the consciousness\nof increasing strength, and cannot in any way be made to understand the\ndoubts and faint-heartedness of men who have ceased to grow. Each hour\nhe puts off some impotence, and why shall he not have faith in his\ndestiny, and feel that he shall yet grow to be poet, orator, hero, or\nwhat you will that is great and noble? And as he delights in life, we\ntake delight in him.\n\nIn the same way a young race of people possesses a magic charm. Homer's\nheroes are barbarians; but they are inspiring, because they belong to a\ngrowing race, and we see in them the budding promise of the day when\nAlexander's sword shall conquer the world; when Plato shall teach the\nphilosophy which all men who think must know; and when Pericles shall\nbid the arts blossom in a perfection which is the despair of succeeding\ngenerations. And so in the Middle Ages there is barbarism enough, with\nits lawlessness and ignorance; but there is also faith, courage,\nstrength, which tell of youth, and point to a time of mature faculty and\nhigh achievement. There is the rich purple dawn which shall grow into\nthe full day of our modern life.\n\nHere in this New World we are the new people, in whose growth what\nhighest hopes, what heavenly promises lie! All the nations which are\nmoving forward, are moving in directions in which we have gone before\nthem,--to larger political and religious liberty; to wider and more\ngeneral education; to the destroying of privilege and the\ndisestablishment of churches; to the recognition of the equal rights not\nonly of all men, but of all men and women.\n\nWe also lead the way in the revolution which has been set in motion by\nthe application of science to mechanical purposes, one of the results\nof which is seen in the industrial and commercial miracles of the\npresent century. It is our vigorous growth which makes us the most\ninteresting and attractive of the modern peoples. For whether men love\nus, or whether they hate us, they find it impossible to ignore us,\nunless they wish to argue themselves unknown; and the millions who yearn\nfor freedom and opportunity turn first of all to us.\n\nBut observant minds, however much they may love America, however great\ntheir faith in popular government may be, cannot contemplate our actual\ncondition without a sense of disquietude; for there are aspects of our\nsocial evolution which sadden and depress even the most patriotic and\nloyal hearts. It would seem, for instance, that with us, while the\nmultitude are made comfortable and keen-witted, the individual remains\ncommon-place and weak; so that on all sides people are beginning to ask\nthemselves what is the good of all this money and machinery if the race\nof godlike men is to die out, or indeed if the result is not to be some\nnobler and better sort of man than the one with whom we have all along\nbeen familiar. Is not the yearning for divine men inborn? In the heroic\nages such men were worshiped as gods, and one of the calamities of\ntimes of degeneracy is the dying out of faith in the worth of true\nmanhood caused by the disappearance of superior men. Such men alone are\nmemorable, and give to history its inspiring and educating power. The\nruins of Athens and Rome, the cathedrals and castles of Europe, uplift\nand strengthen the heart, because they bid us reflect what thoughts and\nhopes were theirs who thus could build.\n\nHow quickly kings and peasants, millionaires and paupers, become a\ncommon, undistinguished crowd! But the hero, the poet, the saint, defy\nthe ages and remain luminous and separate like stars. They--\n\n\n    \"Waged contention with their time's decay,\n    And of the past are all that cannot pass away.\"\n\n\nThe soul, which makes man immortal, has alone the power to make him\nbeneficent and beautiful.\n\nBut in this highest kind of man, in whom soul--that is, faith, hope,\nlove, courage, intellect--is supreme, we Americans, who are on the crest\nof the topmost waves of the stream of tendency, are not rich. We have\nour popular heroes; but so has every petty people, every tribe its\nheroes. The dithyrambic prose in which it is the fashion to celebrate\nour conspicuous men has a hollow sound, very like cant. A marvelous\ndevelopment of wealth and numbers has taken place in America; but what\nAmerican--poet, philosopher, scientist, warrior, ruler, saint--is there\nwho can take his place with the foremost men of all this world? The\nAmerican people seem still to be somewhat in the position of our new\nmillionaires: their fortune is above them, overshadows, and oppresses\nthem. They live in fine houses, and have common thoughts; they have\ncostly libraries, and cheap culture; and their rich clothing poorly\nhides their coarse breeding. Nor does the tendency seem to be toward a\nnobler type of manhood.\n\nThe leaders of the Revolution, the framers of the Federal Constitution,\nthe men who contended for State-rights, and still more those who led in\nthe great struggle for human rights were of stronger and nobler mold\nthan the politicians who now crowd the halls of Congress. The promise of\na literature which a generation ago budded forth in New England was, it\nappears, delusive. What a sad book is not that recently issued from the\npress on the poets of America! It is the chapter on snakes in Ireland\nwhich we have all read,--there are none. And are not our literary men\nwhom it is possible to admire and love either dead or old enough to die?\n\nAll this, however, need not be cause for discouragement, if in the\ngenerations which are springing up around us, and which are soon to\nenter upon the scene of active life, we could discover the boundless\nconfidence, the high courage, the noble sentiments, which make the\nfaults of youth more attractive than the formal virtues of a maturer\nage. But youth seems about to disappear from our life, to leave only\nchildren and men. For a true youth the age of chivalry has not passed,\nnor has the age of faith, nor the age of poetry, nor the age of aught\nthat is godlike and ideal. To our young men, however, high thoughts and\nheroic sentiments are what they are to a railroad president or a bank\ncashier,--mere nonsense. Life for them is wholly prosaic and without\nillusions. They transform ideas into interests, faith into a\nspeculation, and love into a financial transaction. They have no vague\nyearnings for what cannot be; hardly have they any passions. They are\ncold and calculating. They deny themselves, and do not believe in\nself-denial; they are active, and do not love labor; they are energetic,\nand have no enthusiasm; they approach life with the hard, mechanical\nthoughts with which a scientist studies matter. Their one idea is\nsuccess, and success for them is money. Money means power, it means\nleisure, it means self-indulgence, it means display; it means, in a\nword, the thousand comforts and luxuries which, in their opinion,\nconstitute the good of life.\n\nIn aristocratic societies the young have had a passion for distinction.\nThey have held it to be an excellent thing to belong to a noble family,\nto occupy an elevated position, to wear the glittering badges of birth\nand of office. In ages of religious faith they have been smitten with\nthe love of divine ideals; they have yearned for God, and given all the\nstrength of their hearts to make his will prevail. But to our youth\ndistinction of birth is fictitious, and God is problematic; and so they\nare left face to face with material aims and ends; and of such aims and\nends money is the universal equivalent.\n\nNow, it could not ever occur to me to think of denying that the basis of\nhuman life, individual and social, is material. Matter is part of our\nnature; we are bedded in it, and by it are nourished. It is the\ninstrument we must use even when we think and love, when we hope and\npray. Upon this foundation our spiritual being is built; upon this\nfoundation our social welfare rests.\n\nConcern for material interests is one of the chief causes of human\nprogress; since nothing else so stimulates to effort, and effort is the\nlaw of growth. The savage who has no conception of money, but is\nsatisfied with what Nature provides, remains forever a savage. Habits\nof industry, of order, of punctuality, of economy and thrift, are, to a\ngreat extent, the result of our money-getting propensities. Our material\nwants are more urgent, more irresistible; they press more constantly\nupon us than any other; and those whom they fail to rouse to exertion\nare, as a rule, hopelessly given over to indolence and sloth. In the\nstimulus of these lower needs, then, is found the impulse which drives\nmen to labor; and without labor welfare is not possible.\n\n\n    The poor must work, if they would drink and eat;\n      The weak must work, if they in strength would grow;\n      The ignorant must work, if they would know;\n    The sad must work, if they sweet joy would meet.\n\n    The strong must work, if they would shun defeat;\n      The rich must work, if they would flee from woe;\n      The proud must work, if they would upward go;\n    The brave must work, if they would not retreat.\n\n    So for all men the law of work is plain;\n      It gives them food, strength, knowledge, vict'ry, peace;\n    It makes joy possible, and lessens pain;\n      From passion's lawless power it wins release,\n    Confirms the heart, and widens reason's reign,\n      Makes men like God, whose work can never cease.\n\n\nWhatever enables man to overcome his inborn love of ease is, in so far,\nthe source of good. Now, money represents what more than anything else\nhas this stimulating power. It is the equivalent of what we eat and\ndrink, of the homes we live in, of the comforts with which we surround\nourselves, of the independence which makes us free to go here or there,\nto do this or that,--to spend the winter where orange blossoms perfume\nthe soft air, and the summer where ocean breezes quicken the pulse of\nlife. It unlocks for us the treasury of the world, opens to our gaze\nwhatever is sublime or beautiful; introduces us to the master-minds who\nlive in their works; it leads us where orators declaim, and singers\nthrill the soul with ecstasy. Nay, more, with it we build churches,\nendow schools, and provide hospitals and asylums for the weak and\nhelpless. It is, indeed, like a god of this nether world, holding\ndominion over many spheres of life and receiving the heart-worship of\nmillions.\n\nYet, if we make money and its equivalents a life-purpose--the aim and\nend of our earthly hopes--our service becomes idolatry, and a blight\nfalls upon the nobler self. Money is the equivalent of what is\nvenal,--of all that may be bought or sold; but the best, the godlike,\nthe distinctively human, cannot be bought or sold. A rich man can buy a\nwife, but not a woman's love; he can buy books, but not an appreciative\nmind; he can buy a pew, but not a pure conscience; he can buy men's\nvotes and flattery, but not their respect. The money-world is visible,\nmaterial, mechanical, external; the world of the soul, of the better\nself, is invisible, spiritual, vital. God's kingdom is within. What we\nhave is not what we are; and the all-important thing is to be, and not\nto have. Our possessions belong to us only in a mechanical way. The\npoet's soul owns the stars and the moonlit heavens, the mountains and\nrivers, the flowers and the birds, more truly than a millionaire owns\nhis bonds. What I know is mine, and what I love is mine; and as my\nknowledge widens and my love deepens, my life is enlarged and\nintensified. But, since all human knowledge is imperfect and narrow, the\nsoul stretches forth the tendrils of faith and hope. Looking upon\nshadows, we believe in realities; possessing what is vain and empty, we\ntrust to the future to bring what is full and complete.\n\nAll noble literature and life has its origin in regions where the mind\nsees but darkly; where faith is more potent than knowledge; where hope\nis larger than possession, and love mightier than sensation. The soul is\ndwarfed whenever it clings to what is palpable and plain, fixed and\nbounded. Its home is in worlds which cannot be measured and weighed. It\nhas infinite hopes, and longings, and fears; lives in the conflux of\nimmensities; bathes on shores where waves of boundless yearning break.\nBorne on the wings of time, it still feels that only what is eternal is\nreal,--that what death can destroy is even now but a shadow. To it all\noutward things are formal, and what is less than God is hardly aught. In\nthis mysterious, super-sensible world all true ideals originate, and such\nideals are to human life as rain and sunshine to the corn by which it is\nnourished.\n\nWhat hope for the future is there, then, when the young have no\nenthusiasm, no heavenly illusions, no divine aspirations, no faith that\nman may become godlike, more than poets have ever imagined, or\nphilosophers dreamed?--when money, and what money buys, is the highest\nthey know, and therefore the highest they are able to love?--when even\nthe ambitious among them set out with the deliberate purpose of becoming\nthe beggars of men's votes; of winning an office the chief worth of\nwhich, in their eyes, lies in its emoluments?--when even the glorious\nand far-sounding voice of fame for them means only the gabble and cackle\nof notoriety?\n\nThe only example which I can call to mind of an historic people whose\nideals are altogether material and mechanical, is that of China. Are we,\nthen, destined to become a sort of Chinese Empire, with three hundred\nmillions of human beings, and not a divine man or woman?\n\nIs what Carlyle says is hitherto our sole achievement--the bringing into\nexistence of an almost incredible number of bores--is this to be the\nfinal outcome of our national life? Is the commonest man the only type\nwhich in a democratic society will in the end survive? Does universal\nequality mean universal inferiority? Are republican institutions fatal\nto noble personality? Are the people as little friendly to men of moral\nand intellectual superiority as they are to men of great wealth! Is\ntheir dislike of the millionaires but a symptom of their aversion to\nall who in any way are distinguished from the crowd? And is this the\nexplanation of the blight which falls upon the imagination and the\nhearts of the young?\n\nAh! surely, we who have faith in human nature, who believe in freedom\nand in popular government, can never doubt what answer must be given to\nall these questions. A society which inevitably represses what is\nhighest in the best sort of men is an evil society. A civilization which\ndestroys faith in genius, in heroism, in sanctity, is the forerunner of\nbarbarism. Individuality is man's noblest triumph over fate, his most\nheavenly assertion of the freedom of the soul; and a world in which\nindividuality is made impossible is a slavish world. There man dwindles,\nbecomes one of a multitude, the impersonal product of a general law;\nand all his godlike strength and beauty are lost. Is not one true poet\nmore precious than a whole generation of millionaires; one philosopher\nof more worth than ten thousand members of Congress; one man who sees\nand loves God dearer than an army of able editors?\n\nThe greater our control of Nature becomes, the more its treasures are\nexplored and utilized, the greater the need of strong personality to\ncounteract the fatal force of matter. Just as men in tropical countries\nare overwhelmed and dwarfed by Nature's rich profusion, so in this age,\nin which industry and science have produced resources far beyond the\npower of unassisted Nature, only strong characters, marked\nindividualities, can resist the influence of wealth and machinery, which\ntend to make man of less importance than that which he eats and\nwears,--to make him subordinate to the tools he uses.\n\nFrom many sides personality, which is the fountain-head of worth,\ngenius, and power, is menaced. The spirit of the time would deny that\nGod is a Person, and holds man's personality in slight esteem, as not\nrooted in the soul, but in aggregated atoms. The whole social network,\nin whose meshes we are all caught, cripples and paralyzes individuality.\nWe must belong to a party, to a society, to a ring, to a clique, and\ndeliver up our living thought to these soulless entities. Or, if we\nremain aloof from such affiliation, we must have no honest conviction,\nno fixed principles, but fit our words to business and professional\ninterests, and conform to the exigencies of the prevailing whim. The\nminister is hired to preach not what he believes, but what the people\nwish to hear; the congressman is elected to vote not in the light of his\nown mind, but in obedience to the dictates of those who send him; the\nnewspaper circulates not because it is filled with words of truth and\nwisdom, but because it panders to the pruriency and prejudice of its\npatrons; and a book is popular in inverse ratio to its individuality and\nworth. Our National Library is filled with books which have copyright,\nbut no other right, human or divine, to exist at all; and when one of us\ndoes succeed in asserting his personality, he usually only makes himself\nodd and ridiculous. He rushes into polygamous Mormonism, or buffoon\nrevivalism, or shallow-minded atheism; nay, he will even become an\nanarchist, because a few men have too much money and too little soul.\nWhat we need is neither the absence of individuality nor a morbid\nindividuality, but high and strong personalities.\n\nIf our country is to be great and forever memorable, something quite\nother than wealth and numbers will make it so. Were there but question\nof countless millions of dollars and people, then indeed the victory\nwould already have been gained. If we are to serve the highest interests\nof mankind, and to mark an advance in human history, we must do more\nthan establish universal suffrage, and teach every child to read and\nwrite. As true criticism deals only with men of genius or of the best\ntalent, and takes no serious notice of mechanical writers and\nbook-makers, so true history loses sight of nations whose only\ndistinction lies in their riches and populousness.\n\nThe noblest and most gifted men and women are alone supremely\ninteresting and abidingly memorable. We have already reached a point\nwhere we perceive the unreality of the importance which the chronicles\nhave sought to give to mere kings and captains. If the king was a hero,\nwe love him; but if he was a sot or a coward, his jeweled crown and\npurple robes leave him as unconsidered by us as the beggar in his rags.\nWhatever influence, favorable or unfavorable, democracy may exert to\nmake easy or difficult the advent of the noblest kind of man, an age in\nwhich the people think and rule will strip from all sham greatness its\ntrappings and tinsel. The parade hero and windy orator will be gazed at\nand applauded, but they are all the while transparent and contemptible.\nThe scientific spirit, too, which now prevails, is the foe of all\npretense; it looks at things in their naked reality, is concerned to get\na view of the fact as it is, without a care whether it be a beautiful or\nan ugly, a sweet or a bitter truth. The fact is what it is, and nothing\ncan be gained by believing it to be what it is not.\n\nThis is a most wise and human way of looking at things, if men will only\nnot forget that the mind sees farther than the eye, that the heart feels\ndeeper than the hand; and that where knowledge fails, faith is left;\nwhere possession is denied, hope remains. The young must enter upon\ntheir life-work with the conviction that only what is real is true,\ngood, and beautiful; and that the unreal is altogether futile and vain.\n\nNow, the most real thing for every man, if he is a man, is his own soul.\nHis thought, his love, his faith, his hope, are but his soul thinking,\nloving, believing, hoping. His joy and misery are but his soul glad or\nsad. Hence, so far as we are able to see or argue, the essence of\nreality is spiritual; and since the soul is conscious that it is not the\nsupreme reality, but is dependent, illumined by a truth higher than\nitself, nourished by a love larger than its own, it has a dim vision of\nthe Infinite Being as essentially real and essentially spiritual. A\nliving faith in this infinite spiritual reality is the fountain-head not\nonly of religion, but of noble life. All wavering here is a symptom of\npsychic paralysis. When the infinite reality becomes questionable, then\nall things become material and vile. The world becomes a world of sight\nand sound, of taste and touch. The soul is poured through the senses and\ndissipated; the current of life stagnates, and grows fetid in sloughs\nand marshes. Minds for whom God is the Unknowable have no faith in\nknowledge at all, except as the equivalent of weight and measure, of\ntaste and touch and smell.\n\nNow, if all that may be known and desired is reduced to this material\nexpression, how dull and beggarly does not life become,--mere atomic\nintegration and disintegration, the poor human pneumatic-machine purring\nalong the dusty road of matter, bound and helpless and soulless as a\nclanking engine! No high life, in individuals or nations, is to be hoped\nfor, unless it is enrooted in the infinite spiritual reality,--in God.\nIt is forever indubitable that the highest is not material, and no\nargument is therefore needed to show that when spiritual ideals lose\ntheir power of attraction, life sinks to lower beds.\n\nSight is the noblest sense, and the starlit sky is the most sublime\nobject we can behold. But what do we in reality see there? Only a kind\nof large tent, dimly lighted with gas jets. This is the noblest thing\nthe noblest sense reveals. But let the soul appear, and the tent flies\ninto invisible shreds; the heavens break open from abyss to abyss, still\nwidening into limitless expanse, until imagination reels. The gas jets\ngrow into suns, blazing since innumerable ages with unendurable light,\nand binding whole planetary systems into harmony and life. So infinitely\ndoes the soul transcend the senses! The world it lives in is boundless,\neternal, sublime. This is its home; this the sphere in which it grows,\nand awakens to consciousness of kinship with God. This is the\nfathomless, shoreless abyss of being wherein it is plunged, from which\nit draws its life, its yearning for the absolute, its undying hope, its\nlove of the best, its craving for immortality, its instinct for eternal\nthings. To condemn it to work merely for money, for position, for\napplause, for pleasure, is to degrade it to the condition of a slave. It\nis as though we should take some supreme poet or hero and bid him break\nstones or grind corn,--he who has the faculty to give to truth its\ndivinest form, and to lift the hearts of nations to the love of heavenly\nthings.\n\nWhatever our lot on earth may be--whether we toil with the hand, with\nthe brain, or with the heart--we may not bind the soul to any slavish\nservice. Let us do our work like men,--till the soil, build homes,\nrefine brute matter, be learned in law, in medicine, in theology; but\nlet us never chain our souls to what they work in. No earthly work can\nlay claim to the whole life of man; for every man is born for God, for\nthe Universe, and may not narrow his mind. We must have some practical\nthing to do in the world,--some way of living which will place us in\nharmony with the requirements and needs of earthly life; and what this\ndaily business of ours shall be, each one, in view of his endowments and\nsurroundings, must decide for himself.\n\nIt is well to bear in mind that every kind of life has its advantages,\nexcept an immoral life. Whatever we make of ourselves, then,--whether\nfarmers, mechanics, lawyers, doctors, or priests,--let us above all\nthings first have a care that we are men; and if we are to be men, our\nspecial business work must form only a part of our life-work. The\naim--at least in this way alone can I look at human life--is not to make\nrich and successful bankers, merchants, farmers, lawyers, and doctors,\nbut to make noble and enlightened men. Hence the final thought in all\nwork is that we work not to have more, but to be more; not for higher\nplace, but for greater worth; not for fame, but for knowledge. In a\nword, the final thought is that we labor to upbuild the being which we\nare, and not merely to build round our real self with marble and gold\nand precious stones. This is but the Christian teaching which has\ntransformed the world; which declares that it is the business of slaves\neven, of beggars and outcasts, to work first of all for God and the\nsoul. The end is infinite, the aim must be the highest. Not to know\nthis, not to hear the heavenly invitation, is to be shut out from\ncommunion with the best; is to be cut off from the source of growth; is\nto be given over to modes of thought which fatally lead to mediocrity\nand vulgarity of life.\n\n\n    To live for common ends is to be common.\n    The highest faith makes still the highest man;\n    For we grow like the things our souls believe,\n    And rise or sink as we aim high or low.\n    No mirror shows such likeness of the face\n    As faith we live by of the heart and mind.\n    We are in very truth that which we love;\n    And love, like noblest deeds, is born of faith.\n    The lover and the hero reason not,\n    But they believe in what they love and do.\n    All else is accident,--this is the soul\n    Of life, and lifts the whole man to itself,\n    Like a key-note, which, running through all sounds,\n    Upbears them all in perfect harmony.\n\n\nWe cannot set a limit to the knowledge and love of man, because they\nspring from God, and move forever toward him who is without limit. That\nwe have been made capable of this ceaseless approach to an infinite\nideal is the radical fact in our nature. Through this we are human;\nthrough this we are immortal; through this we are lifted above matter,\nlook through the rippling stream of time on the calm ocean of eternity,\nand beyond the utmost bounds of space, see simple being,--life and\nthought and love, deathless, imageless, absolute. This ideal creates the\nlaw of duty, for it makes the distinction between right and wrong. Hence\nthe first duty of man is to make himself like God, through knowledge\never-widening, through love ever-deepening, through life ever-growing.\n\nSo only can we serve God, so only can we love him. To be content with\nignorance is infidelity to his infinite truth. To rest in a lesser love\nis to deny the boundless charity which holds the heavens together and\nmakes them beautiful, which to every creature gives its fellow, which\nfor the young bird makes the nest, for the child the mother's breast,\nand in the heart of man sows the seed of faith and hope and heavenly\npity.\n\nCeaseless growth toward God,--this is the ideal, this is the law of\nhuman life, proposed and sanctioned alike by Religion, Philosophy, and\nPoetry. _Dulcissima vita sentire in dies se fieri meliorem._\n\n\n    Upward to move along a Godward way,\n      Where love and knowledge still increase,\n    And clouds and darkness yield to growing day,\n      Is more than wealth or fame or peace.\n\n    No other blessing shall I ever ask.\n      This is the best that life can give;\n    This only is the soul's immortal task\n      For which 't is worth the pain to live.\n\n\nIt is man's chief blessedness that there lie in his nature infinite\npossibilities of growth. The growth of animals comes quickly to an end,\nand when they cease to grow they cease to be joyful; but man, whose\nbodily development even is slow, is capable of rising to wider knowledge\nand purer love through unending ages. Hence even when he is old,--if he\nhas lived for what is great and exalted,--his mind is clear, his heart\nis tender, and his soul is glad. Only those races are noble, only those\nindividuals are worthy, who yield without reserve to the power of this\nimpulse to ceaseless progress. Behold how the race from which we have\nsprung--the Aryan--breaks forth into ever new developments of strength\nand beauty in Greece, in Italy, in France, in England, in Germany, in\nAmerica; creating literature, philosophy, science, art; receiving\nChristian truth, and through its aid rising to diviner heights of\nwisdom, power, freedom, love, and knowledge.\n\nAnd so there are individuals--and they are born to teach and to\nrule--for whom to live is to grow; who, forgetting what they have been,\nand what they are, think ever only of becoming more and more. Their\neducation is never finished; their development is never complete; their\nwork is never done. From victories won they look to other battlefields;\nfrom every height of knowledge they peer into the widening nescience;\nfrom all achievements and possessions they turn away toward the\nunapproachable Infinite, to whom they are drawn. Walking in the shadow\nof the too great light of God, they are illumined, and they are\ndarkened. This makes Newton think his knowledge ignorance; this makes\nSaint Paul think his heroic virtue naught. Oh, blessed men, who make us\nfeel that we are of the race of God; who measure and weigh the heavens;\nwho love with boundless love; who toil and are patient; who teach us\nthat workers can wait! They are in love with life; they yearn for fuller\nlife. Life is good, and the highest life is God; and wherever man grows\nin knowledge, wisdom, and strength, in faith, hope, and love, he walks\nin the way of heaven.\n\nTo you, young gentlemen, who are about to quit these halls, to continue\namid other surroundings the work of education which here has but begun,\nwhat words shall I more directly speak? If hitherto you have wrought to\nany purpose, you will go forth into the world filled with resolute will\nand noble enthusiasm to labor even unto the end in building up the being\nwhich is yourself, that you may unceasingly approach the type of perfect\nmanhood. This deep-glowing fervor of enthusiasm for what is highest and\nbest is worth more to you, and to any man, than all that may be learned\nin colleges. If ambition is akin to pride, and therefore to folly, it is\nnone the less a mighty spur to noble action; and where it is not found\nin youth, budding and blossoming like the leaves and flowers in spring,\nwhat promise is there of the ripe fruit which nourishes life? The love\nof excellence bears us up on the swift wing and plumes of high desire,--\n\n\n    Without which whosoe'er consumes his days,\n    Leaveth such vestige of himself on earth\n    As smoke in air or foam upon the wave.\n\n\nDo not place before your eyes the standard of vulgar success. Do not\nsay, I will study, labor, exercise myself, that I may become able to get\nwealth or office, for to this kind of work the necessities of life and\nthe tendency of the age will drive you; whereas, if you hope to be true\nand high, it is your business to hold yourselves above the spirit of the\nage. It is our worst misfortune that we have no ideals. Our very\nreligion, it would seem, is not able to give us a living faith in the\nreality of ideals; for we are no longer wholly convinced that souls live\nin the atmosphere of God as truly as lungs breathe the air of earth. We\nfind it difficult even to think of striving for what is eternal,\nall-holy, and perfect, so unreal, so delusive do such thoughts seem.\n\nWho will understand that to be is better than to have, and that in truth\na man is worth only what he is? Who will believe that the kingdom of\nthis world, not less than the kingdom of Heaven, lies within? Who, even\nin thinking of the worth of a pious and righteous life, is not swayed by\nsome sort of honesty-best-policy principle? We love knowledge because we\nthink it is power; and virtue, because we are told as a rule it\nsucceeds. Ah! do you love knowledge for itself?--for it is good, it is\ngodlike to know. Do you love virtue for its own sake?--for it is\neternally and absolutely right to be virtuous. Instead of giving your\nthoughts and desires to wealth and position, learn to know how little of\nsuch things a true and wise man needs; for the secret of a happy life\ndoes not lie in the means and opportunities of indulging our weaknesses,\nbut in knowing how to be content with what is reasonable, that time and\nstrength may remain for the cultivation of our nobler nature. Ask God to\ninspire you with some great thought, some abiding love of what is\nexcellent, which may fill you with gladness and courage, and in the\nmidst of the labors, the trials, and the disappointments of life, keep\nyou still strong and serene.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII.\n\nRIGHT HUMAN LIFE.\n\n\n    What do we gather hence but firmer faith\n    That every gift of noble origin\n    Is breathed upon by Hope's perpetual breath;\n    That virtue and the faculties within\n    Are vital, and that riches are akin\n    To fear, to change, to cowardice, and death?\n\n    WORDSWORTH.\n\n\n\nWhat is so delightful as spring weather? To it, whatever mystery life\ncan make plain, it reveals. There is universal utterance. Water leaps\nfrom its winding sheet of snow; the streams spring out to wander till\nthey find their source; the corn sprouts to receive the sun's warm kiss;\nthe buds unfold, the blossoms send forth fragrance, the heavens weep for\njoy; the birds sing, the children shout, and the fuller pulse of life\ngives, even to the old, fresh thoughts and young desires. Now, what is\nall this but a symbol of the soul, which feels the urgency of God\ncalling upon it to make itself alive in him and in his universe of truth\nand beauty?\n\nBut the season of growth is also the time of blight. A hundred germs\nperish for one that ripens into wholesome fruit; a hundred young lives\nsuffer physical or moral ruin for one that develops into some likeness\nof true manhood. And upon what slight causes success or failure seems to\ndepend!\n\nAs a mere word, a glance, will bring the blood to a maiden's cheek, so\nmay it sow the germ of moral death in the heart of youth. How helpless\nand ignorant the young are in their seeming strength and smartness: how\nself-sufficient in their unwisdom, how little amenable to reason, how\nslow to perceive true ideals. What patient, persevering effort is\nrequired to form character, and what a little thing will poison life in\nits source! How easy it is to see and understand what is coarse and\nevil, how difficult to appreciate what is pure and excellent. How\nquickly a boy learns to find pleasure in what is animal or brutal; but\nwhat infinite pains must be taken before he is won to the love of truth\nand goodness. Caricature delights him, and he has no eyes for the chaste\nbeauty of perfect art. The story of an outlaw fills him with enthusiasm,\nand the heroic struggles of godlike souls are for him meaningless. He\ngazes with envious awe upon some vulgar rich man, and finds a\nphilosopher, or a saint, only queer. He studies because he has been sent\nto school, where ignorance will expose him to ridicule and humiliation,\nand possibly too, because he is told that knowledge will help him to win\nmoney and influence. However great his proficiency, he is in truth but a\nbarbarian, without wisdom, without reverence, without gentleness. He has\nbeen brought only in a vague way into communion with the conscious life\nof the race; he has no true conception of the dignity of souls, no sense\nof the beauty of modest and unselfish action. He mistakes rudeness for\nstrength, boastfulness for ability, disrespect for independence,\nprofanity for manliness, brutality for courage.\n\nAnd to add to his misfortune, he is blind to his own weakness and\nignorance. A sneer or a jest is his reply to the voice of wisdom, as\nwith a light heart he walks in the road to ruin; and thus it happens\nthat for one who becomes a true and noble man, a hundred go astray or\nsink into an unintelligent and vulgar kind of life. This fact is\nconcealed from the eyes of the young, from the eyes of the multitude,\nindeed. As we hide the dead in the earth that we may quickly forget our\nloss, so society buries from sight and thought those who fail. Their\nnumber is so great that the oblivion which soon overwhelms them is\nneedful to save even the brave from discouragement. Of a hundred college\nboys the lives of twenty-five will be ruined by dissipation, by sensual\nindulgence; twenty-five others will be wrecked by unhappy marriages,\nfoolish financial schemes, dishonesty and indolence; of the remaining\nfifty, forty, let us say, will manage to get on without loss of\nrespectability, while the ten (who are still left) will win a sort of\nnotoriety by getting rich or by getting elected to office. Of the\nhundred will one become a saint, a philosopher, a poet, a statesman, or\neven a man of superior ability in natural knowledge or literature? And\nif this estimate is rightly made they all fail; and the emergence of a\nhigh and noble mind is so improbable that it may almost be looked upon,\nlike the birth of a genius, as an accident, so impossible is it, with\nour limited view, to bring such cases within the domain of law. These\nhundred college boys have been taken from a thousand youths. The nine\nhundred have remained outside the doors which open into the halls of\nculture, away from the special influences which thought and ingenuity\nhave created to develop and perfect man's endowments. As they are less\nfavored, we demand less of them, and are content to have them reinforce\nthe unenlightened army of laborers and money-getters. But when we come\namong those to whom leisure and opportunity are given that they may\nlearn to think truly and to act nobly, and find that they fail in this,\nas nearly all of them do fail, we are disappointed and saddened. The\nthoughtless imagine that those who provide food and shelter do the most\nimportant work; but such work is the most important only where there is\nno intellectual, moral, or religious life. That is most necessary which\nnourishes the highest faculty, and wherever civilization exists,\nenlightened minds and great characters are indispensable. The animal and\nthe savage, without much difficulty, find what satisfies appetite; but\nGod appoints that only living souls shall provide what keeps souls\nalive. Now this soul-life, which manifests itself in thought, in\nconduct, in hope, faith, and love, makes us human and lifts us above\nevery other kind of earthly existence. It is our distinctive attribute,\nthe godlike side of our being, which, under penalty of sinking to lower\nworlds, we must bring out and cultivate. The plant is alive. By its own\nenergy it springs from darkness, it grows, it waves its green leaves\nbeneath the blue heavens; but it is blind, deaf and dumb, senseless,\ndead to the world of sight and sound, of taste and smell. The animal too\nis alive, and in a higher way: for all the glories of Nature are painted\nupon its eye; all sounds strike upon its ear; it moves about and has all\nthe sensations of physical pleasure of which man is capable; but it is\nwithout thought, without sense of right and wrong, without imagination,\nwithout hope and faith. It is plain then that human life, in its highest\nsense, is life of the soul,--a life of thought and love, of faith and\nhope, of imagination and desire; and men are high or low as they partake\nmore or less of this true life. By this standard, and by no other,\nreason requires that we form an estimate of human worth. To be a king,\nto have money, to live in splendor, to meet with approval from few or\nmany,--is accidental, is something which may happen to an ignorant, a\nheartless, a depraved, a vulgar man. The most vicious and brutal of men\nhave, again and again, held the most exalted positions, and as a rule\ncringing and lying, trickery and robbery, or speculation and gambling,\nhave been and are the means by which great fortunes are acquired.\nPosition, then, and money are distinguishable from worth; and they may\nbe and often are found where the life of thought and love, of faith and\nhope, of imagination and desire, is almost wholly wanting. Now, it is\nthis life--the only true human life--which education should bring forth\nand strengthen; and the failure to lead this life, of those who pass\nthrough our institutions of learning, is a subject of deep concern for\nall who observe and reflect; for among them we look for the leaders who\nshall cause wisdom and goodness to prevail over ignorance and appetite.\nIf those who receive the best nurture and care remain on the low plains\nof a hardly more than animal existence, what hope is there that the\nmultitude shall rise to nobler ways of living?\n\nThere is question here of the most vital interests; and if we discover\nthe causes of the evil, a remedy may be found. These causes of failure\nlie partly in our environment and partly within ourselves. In the home,\nin which we receive the first and the most enduring impressions, true\nviews and noble aims are frequently wanting; and thus false and low\nestimates of life are formed at a time when what we learn sinks into the\nvery substance of the mind, and colors and shapes all our future seeing\nand loving. This primal experience accompanies us, and hangs about us\nlike a mist to shut out the view of fairer worlds. Enthusiasm for\nintellectual and moral excellence is never roused, because our young\nsouls were not made magnetic by the words and deeds of those whom we\nlooked up to as gods. Fortunate is he who bears with him into the\nlife-struggle pure memories of a happy home. When I think of the bees I\nhave seen coming back to the hive, honey-laden, in the golden light of\nsetting suns, when I was a boy at home, a feeling comes over me as\nthough I had lived in paradise and been driven forth into a bleak\nworld. When one is young, and one's father and mother are full of health\nand joy; when the roses are blooming and the brooks are laughing to\nthemselves from simple gladness, and the floating clouds and the silent\nstars seem to have human thoughts,--what more could we ask of God but to\nknow that all this is eternal, and is from him?\n\nIn such a mood, how easy it is to turn the childlike soul to the world\nof spiritual and immortal things. With what efficacy then a mother's\nsoft voice teaches us that we were born upon this earth for no other\npurpose than to know truth, to love goodness, to do right, that so,\nhaving made ourselves godlike, we may forever be with God. And if these\nhigh lessons blend in our thought with memories which make home a type\nof heaven, how shall they not through life be a spur to noble endeavor\nto accomplish the task thus set us? When great-hearted, high-souled boys\ngo forth to college from homes of intelligence and love, then is there\nwell-founded hope that they shall grow to be wise and helpful men, who\nknow and teach truth, who see and create beauty, who do and make others\ndo what becomes a man. Of hardly less importance is the neighborhood in\nwhich our early years are passed, and next to the companionship of the\nhome fireside, a boy's best neighbor is Nature. Well for him shall it\nbe, if, like colts and calves, and all happy young things, he is\npermitted to breath the wholesome air of woods and fields, to drink from\nflowing streams, to lie in the shade of trees on the green sward, or to\nstand alone beneath the silent starlit heavens until the thought and\nfeeling of the infinite and eternal sink deep into his soul, and make it\nimpossible that he should ever look upon the universe of time and space,\nor the universe of duty's law within his breast, in a shallow or\nirreverent spirit. Little shall be said to him, and little shall he\nspeak, and to the unobservant he shall seem dull; but he is Nature's\nnursling, and she paints her colors on his brain and infuses her\nstrength into his heart. She hardens him and teaches him patience; she\nshows him real things, fills him with the love of truth, and makes him\nunderstand that sham is shame.\n\nHis progress may be slow; but he will persevere, he will have faith in\nthe power of labor and of time, and when in after years we shall look\nabout for a man with some Diogenes' lantern, there are a thousand\nchances to one that when we find him we shall find him country-born, not\ncity-bred. Too soon is the town-boy made self-conscious; he is\nprecocious; all the tricks and devices of civilization are known to\nhim; all artifices and contrivances he sees in shop-windows; the street,\nthe theatre, the newspaper are the rivals of the home, and they quickly\nteach him irreverence and disobedience. He loses innocence, experience\nof evil gives him flippant views. He becomes wise in his own conceit;\nhaving eyes only for the surfaces of things, he easily persuades himself\nthat he knows all. Of such a youth how shall any college make an\nenlightened, a noble, and a reverent man? But the home and the\nneighborhood are not our whole environment. As we are immersed in an\natmospheric ocean, so do we swim in the current of our national life. To\npraise this life is easy. We all see and feel how vigorous it is, how\nconfident, how eager. Here is a world of busy men and women, active in\nmany directions. They found States, they build cities, they create\nwealth, they discuss all problems, they try all experiments, they hurry\non to new tasks, and think they have done nothing while aught remains to\ndo.\n\nThey live in the midst of the excitement of ever-recurring elections, of\nspeculation, of financial schemes and commercial enterprises. It is an\nunrestful, feverish, practical life, in which all the strong natures are\nthinking of doing something, of gaining something,--a life in the\nmarket-place, where high thought and noble conduct are all but\nimpossible, where the effort to make one's self a man, instead of\nstriving to get so many thousands of money, would seem ridiculous. It is\na life of inventions and manufactures, of getting and spending, in which\nwe bring forth and consume in a single century what it has taken Nature\nmany thousand years to hoard. Our aim is to have more rather than to be\nmore; our ideal is that of material progress; our praise is given to\nthose who invent and discover the means of augmenting wealth. Liberty is\nopportunity to get rich; education is the development of the\nmoney-getting faculty. Our national life may, of course, be looked at\nfrom many sides, but the general drift of opinion and effort is in the\ndirection here pointed out. Nine tenths of our thought and energy are\ngiven to material interests, and these interests represent nine tenths\nof our achievements. This may be true of men in general, it may be true\nalso that material progress is a condition of moral and intellectual\ngrowth; but none the less is it true that right human life is a life of\nthought and love, of hope and faith, of imagination and desire.\nConsequently in a well-ordered society, the chief aim--nine tenths of\nall effort, let us say--will have for its object the creation of\nenlightened and loving men and women, whom faith and hope shall make\nstrong, whom imagination shall refresh, and the desire of perfection\nshall keep active. The aims which the ideals of democracy suggest are\nnot wholly or chiefly material. We strive, indeed, to create a social\ncondition in which comfort and plenty shall be within the reach of all;\nbut the better among us understand that this is but an inferior part of\nour work, and they take no delight whatever in our great fortunes and\ngreat cities. If democracy is the best government, it follows that it is\nthe kind of government which is most favorable to virtue, intelligence,\nand religion. It is faint praise to say that in America there is more\nenterprise, more wealth, than elsewhere. What we should strive to make\nourselves able to say, is, that there is here a more truly human life,\nmore public and private honesty, purity, sympathy, and helpfulness; more\nlove of knowledge, more perfect openness to light, greater desire to\nlearn, and greater willingness to accept truth than is to be found\nelsewhere. It should be our endeavor to create a world of which it may\nbe said, there life is more pleasant, beauty more highly prized,\ngoodness held in greater reverence, the sense of honor finer, the\nrecognition of talent and worth completer than elsewhere.\n\nWealth and population should be considered merely as means, which, if we\nourselves do not sink beneath our fortune, we shall use to help us to\ndevelop on a vast scale, a nobler, freer, and fairer life than hitherto\nhas ever existed. We Americans have a great capacity for seeing things\nas they are. A thousand shams and glittering vanities have gone down\nbefore our straight-looking eyes; and because such things fail to\nimpress us, we seem to be irreverent. We must look more steadfastly,\ndeeper still, until we clearly perceive and understand that to live for\nmoney is to lead a false and vulgar life, to rest with complacency in\nmere numbers is to have a superficial and unreal mind. To form a right\njudgment of a people, as of individuals, we must consider what they are;\nnot what they have, except in so far as their possessions are the result\nof work which at once forms and reveals character. And we must know that\nwork is good only in as much as it helps to make life human,--that is,\nintelligent, moral and religious. And what we have the right to demand\nof those to whom we give a higher education is, that they shall body\nforth these principles in their lives and become leaders in the task of\nspreading them among the multitude. We demand, first of all, that they\nbecome men whose hearts are pure and loving, whose minds are open and\nenlightened, whose motives are benevolent and generous, whose purposes\nare high and religious; and if they are such men, it shall matter\nlittle to what special pursuits they turn, for whatever their\noccupation, honor, truth, and intelligence shall go with them, bearing,\nlike mercy, a blessing for those who give and a blessing for those who\nreceive. The spirit in which they work shall be more than what they do,\nas they themselves shall be more than what they accomplish.\n\nA right spirit transforms the whole man, and the first and highest aim\nof the educator should be to impart a new heart, a new purpose, which\nshall bring into play forces that may oppose and overcome those faults\nof the young of which I have spoken, and which, if not corrected, lead\nto failure.\n\nAnd here we come to the causes of ill success which lie within\nourselves. We have our individual qualities and defects, and we have\nalso the qualities and defects of the people whence we are sprung, and\nof the time-spirit into which we are born. It is the aim of education,\nas it is the aim of religion, to lift us above the spirit of the age;\nbut in attempting to do this, they who lose sight of what is true and\nbeneficent in that spirit, commit a serious blunder. A national spirit,\ntoo, is a narrow, and often a harsh and selfish spirit; but when culture\nand religion strive to make us citizens of the world and universally\nbenevolent, a care must be had that we retain what is strong and noble\nin the character we inherit from our ancestors.\n\nThe lover of intellectual excellence, however, is little inclined to\ndwell with complacency either upon his own qualities, or upon the\ngreatness of his country or his age. The untaught optimism which leads\nthe crowd to exaggerate the worth of whatever they in any way identify\nwith themselves, he looks upon with suspicion, if not with aversion.\nSelf-complacency is pleasant; but truth alone is good, and they who\nthink least are best content with themselves and with their world. He\nwho seeks to improve his mind, neither boasts of his age and country,\nnor rails at them; but tries to understand them as he tries to know\nhimself. The important knowledge here is of obstacles and defects; for\nwhen these are removed, to advance is easy. The first lesson which we\nmust learn is that in the work of mental culture, time and patience are\nnecessary elements. The young, who are eager and restless, find it\ndifficult to work with patience and perseverance, especially when the\nreward of labor is remote, and in the excitement and hurry of American\nlife, such work often seems to be impossible. But by this kind of work\nalone can true culture be acquired. It is this Buffoon means when he\ncalls genius a great capacity for taking pains. When Albert Duerer said,\n\"Sir, it cannot be better done;\" he simply meant that he had bestowed\ninfinite pains upon his work. Now, they who are in a hurry cannot take\npains; and they who work for money will take pains only in so far as it\nis profitable to do so. We must live in our work and love it for its own\nsake. To do work we love makes us happy, makes us free, and according to\nits kind educates us; and whatever its kind, it will at least teach us\nthe sovereign virtue of patience, and give us something of the spirit of\nthe old masters who in dingy shops ceased not from labor, and kept their\ncheerful serenity to the end, though the outcome was only the most\nperfect fiddle, or a deathless head. But they themselves had the souls\nof artists, and were honest men, who in their work found joy and\nfreedom, and therefore what they did remains as a source of delight and\ninspiration. If we find it impossible to put our hearts into our work\nand consequently impossible to take infinite pains with it, then this is\nwork for which we were not born. The impatient cannot love the labor by\nwhich the mind is cultivated, because impatience implies a sense of\nrestraint, a lack of freedom. They are restless, easily grow weary or\ndespondent, find fault with themselves and their task, and either throw\noff the yoke or bear it in a spirit of disappointment and bitterness.\nAs they fail to make themselves strong and serene, their work bears the\nmarks of haste and feebleness, for work reveals character; it is the\nlikeness of the doer, as style shows the man. Then the young are blinded\nby the glitter and glare of life, by the splendors of position and\nwealth; they are drawn to what is external; they would be here and\nthere; they love the unchartered liberty of chance desires, and are\neasily brought to look upon the task of self-improvement as a slavish\nwork. They would have done with study that they may be free, may enter\ninto what they suppose to be a fair and rich heritage. They cannot\nunderstand that so long as they are narrow, sensual, and unenlightened,\nthe possession of a world could not make them high or happy. They do not\nknow that to have liberty, without the power of using it for worthy\nends, is a curse not a blessing. They imagine that experience of the\nworld's ways and wickedness will make them wise, whereas it will make\nthem depraved.\n\nHow can they realize that the good of life consists in being, and not in\nhaving? that we are worth what our knowledge, love, admiration, hope,\nfaith, and desire make us worth? They will not perceive that happiness\nand unhappiness are conditions of soul, and consequently that the wise,\nthe loving, and the strong, whatever their outward fortune, are happy,\nwhile the ignorant, the heartless, and the weak are miserable. To know\nourselves, we should seek to discover the kind of life our influence\ntends to create. Consider the kind of world college boys make for\nthemselves, the things they admire, the companions they find pleasant,\nthe subjects in which they take interest, the books that delight\nthem,--and one great cause of the failure of education will be made\nplain; for though they are sent to school to be taught by professors,\ntheir influence upon one another is paramount. Instead of helping one\nanother to see that their real business is to educate themselves, they\npersuade one another that life is given for common ends and vulgar\npleasures. Hence they look with envy upon their companions who are the\nsons of rich men, as they have not lived long enough to learn that the\nfate of four fifths of the sons of rich men in this country, is moral\nand physical ruin. If such is the public opinion of the world in which\nthey live; and if even strong men are feeble in the presence of public\nopinion,--how shall we find fault with them for not being attracted by\nthe ideals of intellectual and moral excellence. For the trained mind\neven to think is difficult, and for them independent thought is almost\nimpossible. They do not know the little less than creative power of\nright education, or that as we are changed by action, we are\ntransformed by thought. What patient labor may do to exalt and refine\nthe mental faculties, until we become capable of entering into the life\nof every age and every people, has not been shown to them; and hence\nthey are not inspired by the high hope of dwelling, in very truth, with\nall the noble and heroic souls who have passed through this world and\nleft record of themselves. We bid the youth learn many things which he\ncannot but find both useless and uninteresting. And yet unless we\ndiscover the secret of winning him to the love of study, the educational\nvalue of what he learns is lost; for what leaves him unmoved, leaves him\nunimproved. His information and accomplishments are comparatively\nunimportant. What he himself is, and what his real self gives us grounds\nfor hoping he shall become, is the true concern. To be able to translate\nAEschylus or Plato is not a great thing; but it is a great thing to have\nthe Greek's sense of what is fair, noble and intellectual. To be able to\nsolve a complex mathematical problem may be unimportant; but to have the\nmental habit of accurate, close, patient thinking is important. It is\neasy to forget one's Greek or the higher mathematics; but an\nintellectual or a moral habit is not easily lost.\n\nHe who has right habits will go farther and rise higher than he who has\nonly brilliant attainments. It is an error, and a very common one, to\nsuppose that education is merely, or chiefly, a mental process, and\nconsequently that the best school is that in which the various kinds of\nknowledge are best taught. Our whole being, physical, intellectual, and\nmoral, is subject to the law of education. We may educate the eye, the\near, the hand, the foot; and each member of the body may be trained in\nmany ways. The eye of the microscopist has received a training different\nfrom that of the painter; the sculptor's hand has been taught a cunning\nunlike that of the surgeon; the voice of the orator is developed in one\nway, that of the singer in another. And so the faculties of the mind may\nbe drawn forth, and each one in various ways. The powers of observation,\nof reflection, of intuition, of imagination, are all educable. One of\nthe most important and most difficult lessons to learn is that of\nattention. We know only what we are conscious of, and we are conscious\nonly of that to which we give heed. If we but hold the mind to any\nsubject with perseverance, it will deliver its secret. The little\nknowledge we have is often vague and unreal, because we are heedless,\nbecause we have never taught ourselves to dwell in conscious communion\nwith the objects of thought. The trained eye sees innumerable beauties\nwhich are hidden from others, and so the mind which is taught to look\nright sees truths the uneducated can never know. We may be taught to\njudge as well as to look. Indeed, once we have learned to see things as\nthey are, correct opinions and judgments naturally follow. All faculty\nis the result of education. Poets, orators, philosophers, and saints\nbring not their gifts into the world with them; but by looking and\nthinking, doing and striving, they rise from the poor elements of\nhalf-conscious life to the clear vision of truth and beauty. Natural\nendowments are not equal; but the chief cause of inequality lies in the\nunequal efforts which men make to develop their endowments. The lack of\nimagination in the multitude makes their life dull, uninteresting, and\nmaterial, and it is assumed that we are born with, or without,\nimagination, and that there is no remedy for this misery. And those who\nadmit that imagination is subject to the law of development, frequently\nhold that it should be repressed rather than strengthened. Doubtless the\nimagination can be cultivated, just as the eye or the ear, the judgment\nor the reason, can be cultivated; and since imagination, like faith,\nhope, and love, helps us to live in higher and fairer worlds, an\neducator is false to his calling when he leaves it unimproved. The\nclassics, and especially poetry, are the great means of intellectual\nculture, because more than anything else they have power to exalt and\nennoble the imagination. To suppose that this faculty is one which only\npoets and artists need, is to take a shallow and partial view. The\nhistorian, the student of Nature, the statesman, the minister of\nreligion, the teacher, the mechanic even, if they are to do good work,\nmust possess imagination, which is at once an intellectual, a moral, and\na religious faculty. It is the mother and mistress of faith, hope, and\nlove. It is the source of great thoughts, of high aspirations, and of\nheavenly dreams. Without it the illimitable starlit expanse loses its\nsublimity, oceans and mountains their awfulness and majesty, flowers\ntheir beauty, home its sacred charm, youth its halo, and the grave its\nsolemn mystery.\n\nThose powers within us which are directly related to conduct, the\nimpulses to self-preservation, and to the propagation of the race, are\nsubject to the law of education, not less than our physical and\nintellectual endowments. And the importance of dealing rightly with\nthese powers is readily perceived if we reflect that conduct is the\ngreater part of human life, which is a life of thought and love, of hope\nand faith, of imagination and desire.\n\nAs we can educate the faculties of thought and imagination, so can we\ndevelop the power to love, to hope, to believe, and to desire. When\nthere is question of the intellect, teachers seek to impart information\nrather than to strengthen the mind, and when there is question of the\nmoral nature, they have recourse to precepts and maxims instead of\nstriving to confirm the will and to direct impulse. It is generally\nheld, in fact, that will is a gift, not a growth, and the same view is\ntaken of all our moral dispositions. We are supposed to receive from\nNature a warm or a cold heart, a hopeful or a despondent temper, a\nbelieving or a skeptical turn of mind, a spiritual or a sensual bent.\nNow as I have already admitted, endowments are unlike; but what has this\nto do with the drift of the argument? Minds, though by nature unequal,\nmay all be educated; and so wills may be educated, and so that which\nmakes us capable of faith, hope, and desire, may be drawn forth,\nstrengthened, and refined. Emerson, whose thought is predominantly\nspiritual, takes a low and material view of the moral faculties,\nconfusing strength of will with health. \"Courage,\" he says, \"is the\ndegree of circulation of the blood in the arteries.... When one has a\nplus of health, all difficulties vanish before it.\" But will is a moral\nrather than a constitutional power; and in so far as it is moral, it\nmay be cultivated and directed to noble aims and ends. And if the\nteacher perform this work with fine knowledge and tact, he becomes an\neducator; for upon the will, more than upon the intellectual faculties,\nsuccess or failure depends. Whatever we are able to will, we are able to\nlearn to do; and the best service we can render another is to rouse and\nconfirm within him the will to live and to work, that he may make\nhimself a complete man, that thus he may become a benefactor of men and\na co-worker with God. The rational will, which is the educated will,\nshould give impulse and guidance to all our thinking, loving, and doing.\nIt should control appetite; it should nourish faith and hope; it should\nlead us on through the illusory world of sensual delights, through the\nhardly less illusory world of wealth and power, still bidding us look\nand see that the world to which the conscious self really belongs, is\ninfinite and eternal, and that to seek to rest in aught else is to\napostatize from reason and conscience. Thus it would awaken in us a\ndivine discontent, a sacred unrest, which might urge us on through the\ndarkness of appetite and the unwholesome air of avarice and ambition,\nwhispering to us that our life-work is to know truth, to love beauty, to\ndo righteousness. To none is the education of the will so necessary as\nto the lovers of intellectual excellence, for they who live in the world\nof ideas are easily content to let the world of deeds take care of\nitself. As the astronomer sees the earth lost like a grain of sand in\ninfinite space, so to the wide and deep view of one who is familiar with\nthe course of human thought and action, what any man, what the whole\nrace of man, may do, can seem but insignificant. From the vanity and\nnoise of actors who fret and storm for their brief hour, and then pass\nforever from life's stage, he flies to ideal worlds where truth never\nchanges, where beauty never grows old, and lives more richly blest than\nlovers in Tempe or the dales of Arcady. And then the habit of looking at\nthings from many sides leads to doubt, hesitation, and inaction. While\nthe wise deliberate, the young and inexperienced have won or lost the\nbattle. Thus the purely intellectual life tends to weaken faith, hope,\nand desire, which are the sources whence conduct springs, the drying up\nof which leaves us amid barren wastes, where high thinking, if it be not\nimpossible, brings neither strength nor joy; for the secret of strength\nand joy lies in doing and not in thinking. It is a law of our nature\nthat conduct brings the most certain and the most permanent\nsatisfaction, and hence whatever our ideals, the pursuit should be\ninspired by the sense of duty.\n\n\n    \"Stern law-giver! yet thou dost wear\n    The Godhead's most benignant grace;\n    Nor know we anything so fair\n    As is the smile upon thy face.\n    Flowers laugh before thee on their beds\n    And fragrance in thy footing treads.\"\n\n\nThen only do we move with certain step when we hear God's voice bidding\nus go forward, as he commands the starry host to fly onward, and all\nliving things to spring upward to light and warmth. When we understand\nthat he has made progress the law of life, we learn to feel that not to\ngrow is not to live. Then our view is enlarged; we become lovers of\nperfection; we cherish every gift, and in many ways we strive to\ncultivate the many powers which go to the making of a man. They all are\nfrom him, and from him is the effort by which they are improved. We were\nborn to make ourselves alive in him and in his universe, and like the\nsetter in the field, we stretch eye and ear and nose to catch whatever\nmessage may be borne to us from his boundless game park. We observe,\nreflect, compare; we read best books; we listen to whoever speaks what\nhe knows and feels to be truth. We take delight in whatever in Nature is\nsublime or beautiful, and fresh thoughts and innocent hearts make us\nglad. Wherever an atom thrills, there too is God, and in him we feel the\nthrill and are at home. Our faith grows pure; our hope is confirmed; and\nour love and sympathy identify us with an ever-widening sphere of life\nbeyond us. The exclusive self passes into the larger movement of the\nsocial and religious world around us, which, as we now realize, is also\nwithin us, giving aims and motives to our love and self-devotion. We\nunderstand that what hurts another can never help us, and that our\nprivate good must tend to become a general blessing. Thus we find and\nlove ourselves in the intellectual, moral, and religious life of the\nrace, which is a type and symbol of the infinite life of God, the omen\nand promise of the soul's survival. As we become conscious of ourselves\nonly through communion with what is not ourselves, so we truly live only\nwhen we live for God and the world he creates,--losing life that we may\nfind it; dying, like seed-corn, that we may rise to a new and richer\nlife. Not what gratifies our selfish or sensual nature will help us to\nlead this right human life; but that which illumines and deepens thought\nand love, which gives to faith a boundless scope, to hope an everlasting\nfoundation, to desire the infinite beauty which, though unseen, is felt,\nlike memory of music fled. The unseen world ceases to be a future\nworld; and is recognized as the very world in which we now think and\nlove, and so intellectual and moral life passes into the sphere of\nreligion. We no longer pursue ideals which forever elude us, but we\nbecome partakers of the divine life; for in giving ourselves to the\nEternal and Infinite we find God in our souls. The ideal is made real;\nGod is with us, and through faith, hope, and love we are one with him,\nand all is well. Henceforth in seeking to know more, to become more, we\nare animated by a divine spirit. Now we may grow old, still learning\nmany things, still smitten with the love of beauty, still finding\ndelight in fresh thoughts and innocent pleasures, and it may be that we\nshall be found to be teachers of wisdom and of holiness. Then, indeed,\nshall we be happy, for it is better to teach truth than to win battles.\nA war-hero supposes a barbarous condition of the race, and when all\nshall be civilized, they who know and love the most shall be held to be\nthe greatest and the best.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII.\n\nUNIVERSITY EDUCATION.\n\n\nAs they who look on the ocean think of its vastness; of the many shores\nin many climes visited by its waves to ply \"their priest-like task of\nclean ablution;\" of cities and empires that rose beside its waters,\nflourished, decayed, and became a memory; of others that shall rise and\nalso pass away, while the moving element remains,--so we to-day\nbeholding ancient Faith, laying, in the New World, the cornerstone of an\ninstitution which better than anything else symbolizes the aim and\ntendency of modern life, find ourselves dwelling in thought upon what\nhas been and what will be.\n\nOn the one hand rises the venerable form of that religion whose voice\nre-echoed in the hearts of Abraham, Moses, David, and Isaiah; whose\nlips, when the Saviour spoke, uttered diviner truth and thrilled the\nhearts of men with purer love, living with them in deserts and\ncatacombs, leading them along bloodstained ways to victory and peace,\nuntil at length the Church gleamed forth from amid the parting\nstorm-clouds and shone like a mountain-built city bathed in sunlight. On\nthe other stands the Genius of the Republic, the embodied spirit of the\nsovereign people, who, accepting as literal truth the Christian\nprinciples that God is a Father, and men brothers and therefore equal,\nstrive to take from political society the blindness and fatality of\nnatural law, and to endow it with the divine and human attributes of\njustice, mercy, and intelligence. From the very beginning our American\nhistory is full of religious zeal, of high courage and strong endeavor.\nWhen Columbus, saddened by the frivolousness or the perfidy of courts,\nbut unshaken in his purpose, walked the streets of the Spanish capital,\nlonely and forsaken, the children, as he passed along, would point to\ntheir foreheads and smile, for was not his mind unhinged, and did he not\nbelieve the world was round and on the other side men walked like flies\nupon a ceiling? But a woman's heart understood that his folly was of the\nkind which is the wisdom of God, and with her help he set sail, not\ntimidly or doubting like the Portuguese who for fifty years hugged the\nAfrican coast, advancing and then receding, but facing the awful and\nuntraveled ocean with a heart stronger than its storm-swept billows, he\nsteered due west. In his journal, day after day, he wrote these simple\nbut sublime words, \"That day he sailed westward, which was his course.\"\nAnd still, as hope rose and fell, as misgivings and terrors seized on\nhis men, as the compass varied in inexplicable ways as though they were\nentering regions where the very laws of Nature change, the soul of the\ngreat admiral stood firm and each evening he wrote again the self-same\nwords, \"that day he sailed westward which was his course,\" until at\nlength seeing what he foresaw, he gave to Christendom another world and\nenlarged the boundaries and scope of earthly life. What hearts had not\nthe men who in New England, in Virginia, in Maryland, and elsewhere,\nsettled in little bands on the edge of vast and unexplored regions,\ncovered by interminable forests, where savages lay in wait, athirst for\nblood. We hear without surprise that wise and prudent men looked upon\nthe early attempts to take possession of America as not less wild and\nvisionary than the legendary exploits of Amadis de Gaul; but what\nUtopian dreamer, what poet soaring in the high regions of his fancy,\ncould have imagined two centuries and a half ago the beauty, the power,\nthe free and majestic sweep of the stream of human life which has poured\nacross this continent? Who could have dared to hope that the religious\nexiles who sought here a home for the Christian conscience were a seed,\nthe least of all, which was destined to grow into a tree whose boughs\nshould shelter the land, and bring refreshment to the weary and\nheavy-laden from every part of the earth?\n\nWho could have thought that these fugitives from the tyrant's power\nwould, in little more than a century, grow like the tribes of Israel\ninto a people able to withstand the onslaughts of the oppressor, and to\nabolish forever within their borders despotic rule? Who could have had\nfaith that men of different creeds, speaking various tongues, bred in\nunlike social conditions, would here coalesce and co-operate for the\ngeneral purposes of free government? Above all, who could have believed\nthat a form of government rarely tried, even in small States, and when\ntried found practicable only for brief periods, would here become so\nstable, so strong, that every hamlet, every village, is self-poised and\nmanages its own affairs? The achievement is greater than we are able to\nknow; nor does it lie chiefly in the millions who coming from many lands\nhave here made homes and found themselves free; nor in the building of\ncities, the clearing of forests, the draining of swamps, the binding of\ntwo oceans, and the opening of lines of rapid communication in every\ndirection. Not to numbers or wealth do we owe our significance among\nthe nations; but to the fact that we have shown that respect for law is\ncompatible with civil and religious liberty; that a free people can\nbecome prosperous and strong, and preserve order without king or\nstanding army; that the State and the Church can move in separate orbits\nand still co-operate for the common welfare; that men of different races\nand beliefs may live together in peace; that in spite of an abnormally\nrapid increase of population and of wealth, and of the many evils thence\nresulting, the prevailing tendency is to sanity of thought and\nsentiment, thus plainly manifesting the vigor of our life and\ninstitutions; that the government of the majority, where men put their\ntrust in God and in knowledge, is in the end the government of the good\nand the wise. We have thus helped to establish confidence in human\nnature; to prove that man's instincts, like the laws of Nature, are\nconservative; to show that the enthusiasts who would overturn\neverything, destroy everything, have no abiding place or influence in\nthe affairs of a free people, as volcanic and cyclonic forces are but\ntransitory and superficial in their action upon the earth. We have shown\nin a word that under a popular government, where men are faithful and\nintelligent, it is as impossible that society should become chaotic as\nthat the planets should dissolve into star dust.\n\nIt is difficult to realize what an advance this is on all previous views\nof political life; how full it is of promise, how accordant with the\nsentiments of the noblest minds in every part of the world. It gives us\nthe leading place among the nations which are moving along rising ways\nto higher and freer life. To turn to the Catholic Church in America; all\nobservers remark its great development here, the rapid increase in the\nnumber of its adherents, its growth in wealth and influence, the firm\nyet gentle hand with which it brings heterogeneous populations under the\ncontrol of a common faith and discipline, the ease with which it adapts\nitself to new conditions and organizes itself in every part of the\ncountry. It is not a little thing, in spite of unfriendly public opinion\nand of great and numerous obstacles, in spite of the burden which high\nachievements impose and of the lack of easy and supple movement which\ngathering years imply, to enter new fields, to bend one's self to\nunaccustomed work, and to struggle for the right to live in the midst of\na generation heedless of the good, and mindful only of the evil which\nhas been associated with one's life. This is what the Catholic Church in\nAmerica has had to do, and has done with a success which recalls the\nmemory of the spread of Christianity through the Roman Empire. It\ncounts its members here by millions, while a hundred years ago it\ncounted them by thousands; and its priests, churches, schools, and\ninstitutions of charity it reckons by the thousand, while then they\ncould be counted hardly by tens. Public opinion which was then hostile\nis no longer so in the same degree. Prejudice has not indeed ceased to\nexist; for where there is question of religion, of society, of politics,\neven the fairest minds fail to see things as they are, and the\nmultitude, it may be supposed, will never become impartial; but the\ntendency of our life and of the age is opposed to bigotry, and as we\nlose faith in the justice and efficacy of persecution, we perceive more\nclearly that true religion can neither be defended nor propagated by\nviolence and intolerance, by appeals to sectarian bitterness and\nnational hatred. By none is this more sincerely acknowledged, or more\ndeeply felt, than by the Catholics of the United States.\n\nThe special significance of our American Catholic history is not found\nin the phases of our life which attract attention, and are a common\ntheme for declamation; but it lies in the fact that our example proves\nthat the Church can thrive where it is neither protected nor persecuted,\nbut is simply left to itself to manage its own affairs and to do its\nwork. Such an experiment had never been made when we became an\nindependent people, and its success is of world-wide import, because\nthis is the modern tendency and the position toward the Church which all\nthe nations will sooner or later assume; just as they all will be forced\nfinally to accept popular rule. The great underlying principle of\ndemocracy,--that men are brothers and have equal rights, and that God\nclothes the soul with freedom,--is a truth taught by Christ, is a truth\nproclaimed by the Church; and the faith of Christians in this principle,\nin spite of hesitations and misgivings, of oppositions and obstacles and\ninconceivable difficulties, has finally given to it its modern vigor and\nbeneficent power. The spirit of love and mercy, which is the spirit of\nChrist, breathes like a heavenly zephyr through the whole earth, and\nunder its influence the age is moved to attempt greater things than\nhitherto have seemed possible. Never before has sympathy among men been\nso widespread; never has the desire to come to the relief of all who\nsuffer pain or wrong been so general or so intelligent. To feed the\nhungry, to clothe the naked, to visit the sick, seems now comparatively\na little thing. Our purpose is to create a social condition in which\nnone shall lack food or clothing or shelter; following the divine\ncommand: \"O Israel, thou shalt not suffer that there be a beggar or a\npauper within thy borders.\" Kindness to slaves ceased to be a virtue for\nus when we abolished slavery; and we look forward to the day when nor\nman nor woman nor child shall work and still be condemned to a life of\nmisery. That great blot upon the page of history, woman's fate, has\npartly been erased, and we are drawing near to the time when in the\nworld as in Christ there shall be made no distinction between slave and\nfreeman, between man and woman. If we compare modern with ancient and\nmedieval epochs, wars have become less frequent, and in war men have\nbecome more humane and merciful.\n\nIncreasing knowledge of human life as it is found in the savage, in the\nbarbarian, and in the civilized man, fixes us more unalterably in our\nbelief in the worth of progress. The savage and the barbarian are\nhopelessly ignorant, and therefore weak and wretched, since ignorance is\nthe chief source of man's misery. \"My people,\" says the prophet, \"are\ndestroyed for lack of knowledge.\" From ignorance rather than from\ndepravity have sprung the most appalling crimes, the most pernicious\nvices. In darkness of mind men have worshiped senseless material\nthings, have deified every cruel and carnal passion; at the dictate of\nunenlightened conscience they have oppressed, laid waste, and murdered;\nfor lack of knowledge they have perished in the snows of winter, been\nwasted by miasmatic air, have fallen victims to famine and pestilence,\nand have bowed for centuries beneath the degrading yoke of tyranny.\nScience is a ministering angel. The Jesuits by bringing quinine to the\nknowledge of civilized man have done more to relieve suffering than all\nthe builders of hospitals. Vaccine has wrought more potently than the\nall-forgetful love of mothers; more than all the patriots gunpowder has\nwon victories over tyrants; and the printing-press is a greater teacher\nthan philosophers, writers, poets, schools, and universities. Like a\nheavenly messenger the compass guides man whithersoever he will go,\nstill turning to the one fixed point, as turn the hearts of the children\nof men to God. The nations intermingle and lose their jealousies and\nhatreds, borne everywhere by the power of steam; and the thoughts of men\nare carried by lightning round the whole earth. Commerce has become a\nworld-wide interchange of good offices; and while it adds to the comfort\nof all, it enlarges thought and strengthens sympathy. Our greater\nknowledge has enabled us to lengthen human life; to extinguish some of\nthe most virulent diseases; to perform surgical operations without pain;\nto increase the fertility of the soil; to make pestilential regions\nhabitable; to illumine our cities and homes at night with the\nbrilliancy of day; to give to laborers better clothing and dwellings\nthan princes in other ages have had. It has opened to our vision the\nlimitless sidereal expanse, and revealed to us a heavenly glory which\ntranscends the imagination of inspired poets. Before this new light the\nearth has dwindled away and become an atom, as the stars hide when the\ngreat sun wheels upward from out the night. We have looked into the very\nheart of the sun itself, and know of what it is made; and with the\nmicroscope we have caught sight of the marvelous world of the\ninfinitesimally small, have seen what human eye had never beheld, and\nhave watched unseen life building up and breaking down all living\norganisms. We have learned how to walk secure in the depths of ocean, to\nsoar in mid-air, to rush on our way unimpeded through the stony hearts\nof mountains. We see the earth grow from a fire-ball to be the home of\nman; we know its anatomy; we read its history; and we behold races of\nanimals which passed away ages before the eye of man looked forth upon\nthe boundless mystery and saw the shadow of the presence of the infinite\nGod. Better than the Greeks we know the history of Greece; than the\nRomans that of Rome. Words that were never written have whispered to us\nthe dreams and hopes of people that perished and left no record; and the\nmore we have learned of the past the more clearly do we perceive how far\nthe present age surpasses all others in knowledge and in power.\n\nThe mighty movement by which this development has been caused, has not\nslackened, but seems each day to gain new force; and the marvelous\nchanges, political, social, moral, intellectual, and physical, which\ngive character to the nineteenth century are but the prelude to a drama\nwhich shall make all past achievements of our race appear weak and\ncontemptible. To imagine that our superiority is merely mechanical and\nmaterial is to fail to see things as they are. Greater individuals may\nhave lived than now are living, but never before has the world been\ngoverned with so much wisdom and so much justice; and the power back of\nour progress is intellectual, moral, and religious. Science is not\nmaterial. It is the product of intellect and will; and the great\nfounders of modern science, Copernicus, Kepler, Bacon, Descartes,\nGalileo, Newton, Leibnitz, Ampere, Liebig, Fresnel, Faraday, and Mayer,\nwere Christians. \"However paradoxical it may sound,\" says\nDuBois-Reymond, \"modern science owes its origin to Christianity.\"\n\nSince the course of events is left chiefly to the direction of natural\ncauses, and since science enables man to bend the stars, the lightning,\nthe winds, and the waves to his purposes, what shall resist the onward\nmarch of those who are armed with such power? Since life is a warfare, a\nstruggle, how shall the ignorant and the thoughtless survive in a\nconflict in which natural knowledge has placed in the hands of the wise\nforces which the angels may not wield? Since the prosperity of the\nChurch is left subject to human influence, shall the Son of Man find\nfaith on earth when he comes if the most potent instrument God has given\nto man is abandoned to those who know not Christ? Why should we who\nreckon it a part of the glory of the Church in the past that she labored\nto civilize barbarians, to emancipate slaves, to elevate woman, to\npreserve the classical writings, to foster music, painting, sculpture,\narchitecture, poetry, and eloquence, think it no part of her mission now\nto encourage scientific research? To be Catholic is to be drawn not only\nto the love of whatever is good and beautiful, but also to the love of\nwhatever is true; and to do the best work the Catholic Church must fit\nherself to a constantly changing environment, to the character of every\npeople, and to the wants of each age. Has not Christ declared that\nwhoever is not against us is for us; and may we not therefore find\nfriends in all who work for worthy ends,--for liberty and knowledge, for\nincrease of power and love? This large sympathy, which true religion and\nthe best culture promote, is Catholic, and it is also American; for here\nwith us, I think, the whole world is for men of good-will who are not\nfools. We who are the children of ancient Faith, who inherit the boon\nfrom fathers who held it to be above all price, are saved, where there\nis question of former times, from irreverent thoughts and shallow views.\n\n\n    For us the long past ages have not flown;\n    Like our own deeds they travel with us still;\n    Reviling them, we but ourselves disown;\n    We are the stream their many currents fill.\n    From their rich youth our manhood has upgrown,\n    And in our blood their hopes and loves yet thrill.\n\n\nBut if like the old, the Church can look to the past, like the young,\nshe can look to the future. If there are Catholics who linger regretful\namid glories that have vanished, there are also Catholics who in the\nmidst of their work feel a confidence which leaves no place for regret;\nwho well understand that the earthly environment in which the Church\nlives is subject to change and decay, and that new surroundings imply\nnew tasks and impose new duties. The splendor of the medieval Church,\nits worldly power, the pomp of its ceremonial, the glittering pageantry\nin which its pontiffs and prelates vied with kings and emperors in\ngorgeous display, are gone, or going; and were it given to man to recall\nthe past, the spirit whereby it lived would still be wanting. But it is\nthe mark of youthful and barbarous natures to have eyes chiefly for the\ngarb and circumstance of religion, to see the body only and not the\nsoul. At all events the course of life is onward, and enthusiasm for the\npast cannot become the source of great and far reaching action. The\npresent alone gives opportunity; and the face of hope turns to the\nfuture, and the wise are busy with what lies at hand, with immediate\nduty, and not with schemes for bringing back the things that have passed\naway. Leaving their dead with the dead, they work for life and for the\nliving.\n\nAs in each individual there is a better and a worse self, so in each age\nthere are conflicting tendencies; but it is the part of enlightened\nminds and generous hearts to see what is true, and to love what is good.\nThe fault-finder is hateful both in life and in literature; and it is\nIago, the most despicable of characters, whom Shakespeare makes say, \"I\nam nothing if not critical.\" A Christian of all men is without excuse\nfor being fretful and sour, for thinking and acting as though this were\na devil's world, and not the eternal God's, as though there were danger\nlest the Almighty should not prevail. We know that God is, and therefore\nthat all will be well; and if it were conceivable that God is not, it\nwould still be the part of a true man to labor to make knowledge and\nvirtue prevail. The criticism of the age which gives a better\nunderstanding of its needs is good; all other is baneful.\n\nOpinion rules the world, and a right appreciation of the influences by\nwhich opinion is molded is the surest guide to a knowledge of the time.\nIn ignorant and barbarous ages the notions and beliefs of men are crude,\nand are controlled by a few, for only a few possess knowledge and\ninfluence; and even in the age of Pericles and Augustus, the thought of\nmankind means the thoughts of some dozens of men. A few vigorous minds\nfounded schools of opinion and style, became intellectual dictators, and\nasserted their authority for centuries. As the art of printing was yet\nunknown, and books were rare, the teacher was the speaker; orators held\nsway over the destiny of nations; and the Christian pulpit became the\nworld's university. But the printing-press in giving to thought a\npermanent form which is placed under the eyes of the whole world has\nmade the passion, the splendor, the majestic phrase of oratory seem\nunreal as an actor's speech, evanescent as a singer's tones; and hence\nthe pulpit and the rostrum, though they still have influence, can never\nagain exercise the control over opinion which belonged to them when all\nmen had not become readers.\n\nWhat is true of eloquence may be affirmed of all art. In spite of\nourselves, even the best of us find it difficult to make art a serious\nbusiness; and unless taken seriously, it is vain, loses its soul, and\nfalls into the hands of pretenders and sentimentalists. Once painting,\nsculpture, architecture, and song were the expression of thoughts and\nmoods which irresistibly appealed for utterance; but with us they are a\nfashion, like cosmetics and laces. Poetry, the highest of arts, has lost\nits original character of song, and the poet now deals, in an\nimaginative way, with problems which puzzle metaphysicians and\ntheologians. The causes that have robbed art of so much of its charm and\npower have necessarily diminished the influence of ceremonial worship,\nwhich is the artistic expression of the soul's faith and love, of its\nhopes and yearnings. We are, indeed, still subdued by the majesty of\ndimly lighted cathedrals, by solemn music, and the various symbolism of\nthe ritual, but we feel not the deep awe of our fathers whose knees\nfurrowed the pavement stones, and whose burning lips kissed them smooth;\nand to blame ourselves for this would serve no purpose. To those who\nfind no pleasure in sweet sounds, we pipe in vain, and argument to show\nthat one ought to be moved by what leaves him cold, is meaningless.\nEmotion is spontaneous, and adorers, like lovers, neither ask nor care\nfor reasons. There is in fact an element of illusion in feeling; passion\nis non-rational; and when the spirit of the time is intellectual, men\nare seldom devout, however religious they may be. The scientific habit\nof mind is not favorable to childlike and unreasoning faith; and the new\nviews of the physical universe which the modern mind is forced to take,\nbring us face to face with new problems in religion and morals, in\npolitics and society.\n\nWhatever we may think of the past, whatever we may fear or hope for the\nfuture, if we would make an impression on the world around us, we must\nunderstand the thoughts, the purposes, and the methods of those with\nwhom we live; and we must at the same time recognize that though the\ntruth of religion be unchangeable, the mind of man is not so, and that\nthe point of view varies not only from people to people, and from age to\nage, but from year to year in the growing thought of the individual and\nof the world. As in travelling round the earth, time changes, and when\nit is morning here, it is evening there, so with difference of latitude\nand longitude, of civilization and barbarism, the opinions and manners\nof men grow different. They who observe from positions widely separate\ndo not see the same things, or do not see them in the same light. Proof\nfor a peasant is not proof for a philosopher; and arguments which in one\nage are held to be unanswerable, in another lose power to convince, or\nbecome altogether meaningless. It is not to be imagined that the hearts\nof Christians should again burn with the devotional enthusiasm and the\nwarlike ardor of the Crusaders; and just as little is it conceivable\nthat men should again become passionately interested in the questions\nwhich in the fourth and fifth centuries filled the world with the noise\nof theological disputation. It were mere loss of time to beat now the\nwaste fields of the Protestant controversy. Wiseman's book on science\nand revealed religion, which fifty years ago attracted attention, lies\nlike a stranded ship on a deserted shore, and attempts of the kind are\nheld in slight esteem. The immature mind is eager to reduce faith to\nknowledge; but the accomplished thinker understands that knowledge\nbegins and ends in faith. There is oppugnancy between belief in an\nall-wise, all-good, and all-powerful God, and belief in the divine\norigin of Nature, whose face is smeared with filth and blood; but we\nhold that the conflicting faiths and increasing knowledge cannot add to\nthe difficulty. On the contrary, the higher the intelligence, the purer\nNature seems to grow. The chemical elements are as fair and sweet in the\ncorpse as in the living body, and the earthquake and the cyclone obey\nthe same laws which make the waters flow and the zephyrs breathe\nperfume. It is the imagination and not the reason that is overwhelmed by\nthe idea of unending space and time. To the intellect, eternity is not\nmore mysterious than the present moment, and the distance which\nseparates us from the remotest stars is not more incomprehensible than a\nhand's breadth. Science is the widening thought of man, working on the\nhypothesis of universal intelligibility toward universal intelligence;\nand religion is the soul, escaping from the labyrinth of matter to the\nlight and love of the Infinite; and on the heights they meet and are at\npeace.\n\nMeanwhile they who seek natural knowledge must admit that faith, hope,\nand love are the everlasting foundations of human life, and that a\nphilosophic creed is as sterile as Platonic love; and they who uphold\nreligion must confess that faith which ignorance alone can keep alive\nis little better than superstition. To strive to attain truth under\nwhatever form is to seek to know God; and yet no ideal can be true for\nman, unless it can be made to minister to faith, hope, and love; for by\nthem we live. Let us then teach ourselves to see things as they are,\nwithout preoccupation or misgivings lest what is should ever make it\nimpossible, for us to believe and hope in the better yet to be. Science\nand morality need religion as much as thought and action require\nemotion; and beyond the utmost reach of the human mind lie the boundless\nworlds of mystery where the soul must believe and adore what it can but\ndimly discern. The Copernican theory of the heavens startled believers\nat first; but we have long since grown accustomed to the new view which\nreveals to us a universe infinitely more glorious than aught the\nancients ever imagined. We do not rightly see either the things which\nare always around us, or those which for the first time are presented to\nour eyes; and when novel theories of the visible world, which in some\nsense is part of our very being, profoundly alter our traditional\nnotions, the mind is disturbed and overclouded, and the lapse of time\nalone can make plain the real bearing of the new learning upon life,\nupon religion, and upon society. There can be no doubt but increase of\nknowledge involves incidental evils, just as the progress of\ncivilization multiplies our wants; but the wise are not therefore driven\nto seek help from ignorance and barbarism. Whatever the loss, all\nknowledge is gain. The evils that spring from enlightenment of mind will\nfind their remedy in greater enlightenment. Such at least is the faith\nof an age whose striking characteristic is confidence in education. Men\nhave ceased to care for the bliss there may be in ignorance, and those\nwho dread knowledge, if such there still be, are as far away from the\nlife of this century as the dead whose bones crumbled to dust a thousand\nyears ago.\n\nThe aim the best now propose to themselves is to provide not wealth or\npleasure, or better machinery or more leisure, but a higher and more\neffective kind of education; and hence whatever one's preoccupation,\nwhether social, political, religious, or industrial, the question of\neducation forces itself upon his attention. Pedagogy has grown to be a\nscience, and chairs are founded in universities to expound the theory\nand art of teaching. The learning of former times has become the\nignorance of our own; and the classical writings have ceased to be the\ntreasure-house of knowledge, and in consequence their educational value\nhas diminished.\n\nWhoever three hundred years ago wished to acquaint himself with\nphilosophic, poetic, or eloquent expression of the best that was known,\nwas compelled to seek for it in the Greek and Latin authors; but now\nGreek and Latin are accomplishments chiefly, and a classical scholar, if\nunacquainted with modern science and literature, is hopelessly ignorant.\n\"If any one,\" said Hegius, the teacher of Erasmus, \"wishes to learn\ngrammar, rhetoric, mathematics, history, or holy scripture, let him read\nGreek;\" and in his day this was as true as it is false and absurd in our\nown. In the Middle Ages, Latin was made the groundwork of the\neducational system, not on account of any special value it may have been\nsupposed to possess as a mental discipline, but because it was the\nlanguage of the learned, of all who spoke or wrote on questions of\nreligion, philosophy, literature, and science; but now, who that is able\nto think dreams of burying his thought in a Greek or Roman urn? The\nGermans in philosophy, the English in poetry, have surpassed the Greeks;\nand French prose is not inferior in qualities of style to the ancient\nclassics, and in wealth of thought and knowledge so far excels them as\nto preclude comparison.\n\nThe life of Greece and Rome, compared with ours, was narrow and\nsuperficial; their ideas of Nature were crude and often grotesque; they\nlacked sympathy; the Greek had no sense of sin; the Roman none of the\nmercy which tempers justice. In their eyes the child was not holy, woman\nwas not sacred, the slave was not man. Their notion of liberty was\npolitical and patriotic merely; the human soul, standing forth alone,\nand appealing from States and emperors to the living God, was to them a\nscandal. Now literature is the outgrowth of a people's life and thought,\nand the nobler the life, the more enlightened the thought, the more\nvaluable will the expression be; and since there is greater knowledge,\nwisdom, freedom, justice, mercy, goodness, power, in Christendom now\nthan ever existed in the pagan world, it would certainly be an anomaly\nif modern literature were inferior to the classical. The ancients,\nindeed, excel us in the sense for form and symmetry. There is also a\nfreshness in their words, a joyousness in their life, a certain heroic\ntemper in their thinking and acting, which give them power to engage the\nemotions; and hence to deny them exceptional educational value is to\ntake a partial view. But even though we grant that the study of their\nliteratures is in certain respects the best intellectual discipline,\neducation, it must be admitted, means knowledge as well as training; and\nthorough training is something more than refined taste. It is strength\nas well, and ability to think in many directions and on many subjects.\nNothing known to men should escape the attention of the wise; for the\nknowledge of the age determines what is demanded of the scholar. And\nsince it is our privilege to live at a time when knowledge is increasing\nmore rapidly even than population and wealth, we must, if we hope to\nstand in the front ranks of those who know, keep pace with the onward\nmovement of mind. To turn away from this outburst of splendor and power;\nto look back to pagan civilization or Christian barbarism,--is to love\ndarkness more than light. Aristotle is a great mind, but his learning is\ncrude and his ideas of Nature are frequently grotesque. Saint Thomas is\na powerful intellect; but his point of view in all that concerns natural\nknowledge has long since vanished from sight. What poverty of learning\ndoes not the early medieval scheme of education reveal; and when in the\ntwelfth century the idea of a university rises in the best minds, how\nincomplete and vague it is! Amid the ruins of castles and cathedrals we\ngrow humble, and think ourselves inferior to men who thus could build.\nBut they were not as strong as we, and they led a more ignorant and a\nblinder life; and so when we read of great names of the past, the mists\nof illusion fill the skies, and our eyes are dimmed by the glory of\nclouds tinged with the splendors of a sun that has set.\n\nCertainly a true university will be the home both of ancient wisdom and\nof new learning; it will teach the best that is known, and encourage\nresearch; it will stimulate thought, refine taste, and awaken the love\nof excellence; it will be at once a scientific institute, a school of\nculture, and a training ground for the business of life; it will educate\nthe minds that give direction to the age; it will be a nursery of ideas,\na centre of influence. The good we do men is quickly lost, the truth we\nleave them remains forever; and therefore the aim of the best education\nis to enable students to see what is true, and to inspire them with the\nlove of all truth. Professional knowledge brings most profit to the\nindividual; but philosophy and literature, science and art, elevate and\nrefine the spirit of the whole people, and hence the university will\nmake culture its first aim, and its scope will widen as the thoughts and\nattainments of men are enlarged and multiplied. Here if anywhere shall\nbe found teachers whose one passion is the love of truth, which is the\nlove of God and of man; who look on all things with a serene eye; who\nbring to every question a calm, unbiased mind; who, where the light of\nthe intellect fails, walk by faith and accept the omen of hope; who\nunderstand that to be distrustful of science is to lack culture, to\ndoubt the good of progress is to lack knowledge, and to question the\nnecessity of religion is to want wisdom; who know that in a God-made and\nGod-governed world it must lie in the nature of things that reason and\nvirtue should tend to prevail, in spite of the fact that in every age\nthe majority of men think foolishly and act unwisely. How divine is not\nman's apprehensive endowment! When we see beauty fade, the singer lose\nher charm, the performer his skill, we feel no commiseration; but when\nwe behold a noble mind falling to decay, we are saddened, for we cannot\nbelieve that the godlike and immortal faculty should be subject to\ndeath's power. It is a reflection of the light that never yet was seen\non sea or land; it is the magician who shapes and colors the universe,\nas a drop of water mirrors the boundless sky. Is not this the first word\nthe Eternal speaks?--\"Let there be light.\" And does not the blessed\nSaviour come talking of life, of light, of truth, of joy, and peace?\nHave not the Christian nations moved forward following after liberty and\nknowledge? Is not our religion the worship of God in spirit and in\ntruth? Is not its motive Love, divine and human, and is not knowledge\nLove's guide and minister?\n\nThe future prevails over the present, the unseen over what touches the\nsenses only in high and cultivated natures; and it is held to be the\nsupreme triumph of God over souls when the young, to whom the earth\nseems to be heaven revealed and made palpable, turn from all the beauty\nand contagious joy to seek, to serve, to love Him who is the infinite\nand only real good. Yet this is what we ask of the lovers of\nintellectual excellence, who work without hope of temporal reward and\nwithout the strength of heart which is found in obeying the Divine Will;\nfor mental improvement is seldom urged as a religious duty, although it\nis plain that to seek to know truth is to seek to know God, in whom and\nthrough whom and by whom all things are, and whose infinite nature and\nmost awful power may best be seen by the largest and most enlightened\nmind. Mind is Heaven's pioneer making way for faith, hope, and love, for\nhigher aims and nobler life; and to doubt its worth and excellence is to\ndeny the reasonableness of religion, since belief, if not wholly blind,\nmust rest on knowledge. The best culture serves spiritual and moral\nends. Its aim and purpose is to make reason prevail over sense and\nappetite; to raise man not only to a perception of the harmonies of\ntruth, but also to the love of whatever is good and fair. Not in a\ndarkened mind does the white ray of heavenly light break into prismatic\nglory; not through the mists of ignorance is the sweet countenance of\nthe divine Saviour best discerned. If some have pursued a sublime art\nfrivolously; have soiled a fair mind by ignoble life,--this leaves the\ngood of the intellect untouched. Some who have made strongest profession\nof religion, who have held high and the highest places in the Church,\nhave been unworthy, but we do not thence infer that the tendency of\nreligion is to make men so. They who praise the bliss and worth of\nignorance are sophists. Stupidity is more to be dreaded than malignity;\nfor ignorance, and not malice, is the most fruitful cause of human\nmisery. Let knowledge grow, let truth prevail. Since God is God, the\nuniverse is good, and the more we know of its laws, the plainer will the\nright way become. The investigator and the thinker, the man of culture\nand the man of genius, cannot free themselves from bias and limitation;\nbut the work they do will help me and all men.\n\nIndifference or opposition to the intellectual life is but a survival of\nthe general anti-educational prejudices of former ages. It is also a\nkind of envy, prompting us to find fault with whatever excellence is a\nreproach to our unworthiness. The disinterested love of truth is a rare\nvirtue, most difficult to acquire and most difficult to preserve. If\nknowledge bring power and wealth, if it give fame and pleasure, it is\ndear to us; but how many are able to love it for its own sake? Do not\nnearly all men strive to convince themselves of the truth of those\nopinions which they are interested in holding? What is true, good, or\nfair is rarely at once admitted to be so; but what is practically useful\nmen quickly accept, because they live chiefly in the world of external\nthings, and care little for the spiritual realms of truth and beauty.\nThe ignorant do not even believe that knowledge gives power and\npleasure, and the educated, except the chosen few, value it only for the\npower and pleasure it gives. As the disinterested love of truth is rare,\nso is perfect sincerity. Indeed, insincerity is here the radical vice.\nGood faith is essential to faith; and a sophistical mind is as immoral\nand irreligious as a depraved heart. Let a man be true, seek and speak\ntruth, and all good things are possible; but when he persuades himself\nthat a lie may be useful and ought to be propagated, he becomes the\nenemy of his own soul and the foe of all that makes life high and\ngodlike.\n\nNow, to be able to desire to see things as they are, whatever their\nrelations to ourselves may be, and to speak of them simply as they\nappear to us, is one result of the best training of the intellect, which\nin the world of thought and opinion gives us that sweet indifference\nwhich is the rule of saints when they submit the conduct of their lives\nwholly to divine guidance. Why should he whose mind is strong, and rests\non God, be disturbed? It is with opinion as with life. We cannot tell\nwhat moment truth will overthrow the one and death the other; but\nthought cannot change the nature of things. The clouds dissolve, but the\neternal heavens remain. Over the bloodiest battlefields they bend calm\nand serene, and trees drink the sunlight and flowers exhale perfume. The\nmoonbeam kisses the crater's lip. Over buried cities the yellow harvest\nwaves, and all the catastrophes of endless time are present to God, who\ndwells in infinite peace. He sees the universe and is not troubled, and\nshall not we who are akin to him learn to look upon our little meteorite\nwithout losing repose of mind and heart? Were it not a sweeter piety to\ntrust that he who made all things will know how to make all things\nright; and therefore not to grow anxious lest some investigator should\nfind him at fault or thwart his plans? As living bodies are immersed in\nan invisible substance which feeds the flame of life, so souls breathe\nand think and love in the atmosphere of God, and the higher their\nthought and love the more do they partake of the divine nature. Many\nthings, in this age of transition, are passing away; but true thoughts\nand pure love are immortal, and whatever opinions as to other things a\nman may hold, all know that to be human is to be intelligent and moral,\nand therefore religious. A hundred years hence our present machinery may\nseem to be as rude as the implements of the middle age look to us, and\nour political and social organization may appear barbarous,--so rapid\nhas the movement of life become. But we do not envy those who shall then\nbe living, partly it may be because we can have but dim visions of the\ngreater blessings they shall enjoy, but chiefly because we feel that\nafter all the true worth of life lies in nothing of this kind, but in\nknowing and doing, in believing and loving; and that it would not be\neasier to live for truth and righteousness were electricity applied to\naerial navigation and all the heavens filled with argosies of magic\nsail. It is not possible to love sincerely the best thoughts, as it is\nnot possible to love God when our aim is something external, or when we\nbelieve that what is mechanical merely has power to regenerate and exalt\nmankind.\n\n\n                    \"It takes a soul\n    To move a body; it takes a high-souled man\n    To move the masses ... even to a cleaner sty;\n    It takes the ideal to blow a hair's-breadth off\n    The dust of the actual--Ah, your Fouriers failed,\n    Because not poets enough to understand\n    That life develops from within.\"\n\n\nHe who believes in culture must believe in God; for what but God do we\nmean when we talk of loving the best thoughts and the highest beauty? No\nGod, no best; but at most better and worse. And how shall a man's\ndelight in his growing knowledge not be blighted by a hidden taint, if\nhe is persuaded that at the core of the universe there is only blind\nunconscious force? But if he believe that God is infinite power working\nfor truth and love, then can he also feel that in seeking to prepare his\nmind for the perception of truth and his heart for the love of what is\ngood and fair, he is working with God, and moves along the way in which\nhis omnipotent hand guides heavenly spirits and all the countless\nworlds. He desires that all men should be wiser and stronger and more\nloving, even though he should be doomed to remain as he is, for then\nthey would have power to help him. He is certain of himself, and feels\nno fear nor anger when his opinions are opposed. He learns to bear what\nhe cannot prevent, knowing that courage and patience make tolerable\nimmedicable ills. He feels no self-complacency, but rather the\nself-dissatisfaction which comes of the consciousness of possessing\nfaculties which he can but imperfectly use. And this discontent he\nbelieves to be the infinite God stirring within the soul. As the\nearthquake which swallows some island in another hemisphere disturbs not\nthe even tenor of our way, so the passions of men whose world is other\nthan his, who dwell remote from what he contemplates and loves, shake\nnot his tranquil mind. While they threaten and pursue, his thought moves\nin spheres unknown to them. He knows how little life at the best can\ngive, and is not hard to console for the loss of anything. There is no\ntrue thought which he would not gladly make his own, even though it\nshould be the watchword of his enemies. Since morality is practical\ntruth, he understands that increasing knowledge will make it at once\nmore evident and more attractive. Hatred between races and nations he\nholds to be not less unchristian than the hatred which arms the\nindividual against his fellow-man. It is impossible for him to be a\nscoffer; for whatever has strengthened or consoled a human soul is\nsacred in his eyes; and wherever there is question of what is socially\ncomplex, as of a religion or a civilization, there is question of many\nhuman lives, their hopes, their joys, their strivings, their yearnings,\ndisappointments, agonies, and deaths; and he is able to perceive that in\nthe ports of levity there is no refuge for hearts that mourn. Does not\nlove itself, in its heaven of bliss, turn away from him who mocks? The\nlover of the intellectual life knows neither contempt nor indignation,\nis not elated by success or cast down by failure; money cannot make him\nrich, and poverty helps to make him free. His own experience teaches him\nthat men in becoming wiser will become nobler and happier; and this\nsweet truth has in his eyes almost the elements of a religion. With\ngrowing knowledge his power of sympathy is enlarged; until like Saint\nFrancis, he can call the sun his brother and the moon his sister; can\ngrieve with homeless winds, and feel a kinship with the clod. The very\nagonies by which his soul has been wrung open to his gaze visions of\ntruth which else he had never caught, and so he finds even in things\nevil some touch of goodness. Praise and blame are for children, but to\nhim impertinent. He is tolerant of absurdity because it is so\nall-pervading that he whom it fills with indignation can have no repose.\nWhile he labors like other men to keep his place in the world, he\nstrives to make the work whereby he maintains himself, and those who\ncling to him, serve intellectual and moral ends. He has a meek and\nlowly heart, and he has also a free and illumined mind, and a soul\nwithout fear. He knows that no gift or accomplishment is incompatible\nwith true religion; for has not the Church intellects as many-sided and\nas high as Augustine and Chrysostom, Dante and Calderon, Descartes and\nDa Vinci, De Vega and Cervantes, Bossuet and Pascal, Saint Bernard and\nGregory the Seventh, Aquinas and Michael Angelo, Mozart and Fenelon? Ah!\nI behold the youthful throng, happier than we, who here, in their own\nsweet country,--in this city of government and of law with its wide\nstreets, its open spaces, its air of freedom and of light,--undisturbed\nby the soul-depressing hum of commerce and the unintellectual din of\nmachinery, shall hearken to the voice of wisdom and walk in the pleasant\nways of knowledge, alive, in every sense, to catch whatever message may\ncome to them from God's universe; who, as they are drawn to what is\nhigher than themselves, shall be drawn together, like planets to a sun;\nwhose minds, aglow with high thinking, shall taste joy and delight\nfresher and purer than merriest laughter ever tells. Who has not seen,\nwhen leaden clouds fill the sky and throw gloomy shadows on the earth,\nsome little meadow amid the hills, with its trees and flowers, its\ngrazing kine and running brook, all bathed in sunlight, and smiling as\nthough a mother said, Come hither, darling?\n\nSuch to my fancy is this favored spot, whose invitation is to the\nfortunate few who believe that \"the noblest mind the best contentment\nhas,\" and that the fairest land is that which brings forth and nurtures\nthe fairest souls. When youthful friends drift apart, and meet again\nafter years, they find they have been living not only in different\ncities, but in different worlds. Those who shall come up to the\nuniversity must turn away from much the world holds dear; and while the\ncompanions they leave behind shall linger in pleasant places or shall\nget money, position, and applause, they must move on amid\never-increasing loneliness of life and thought. Xanthippe would have had\naltogether a better opinion of Socrates had he not been a philosopher,\nand the best we do is often that for which our age and our friends care\nthe least; but they who have once tasted the delights of a cultivated\nmind would not exchange them for the gifts of fortune, and to have\nbeheld the fair face of wisdom is to be forever her votary. Words spoken\nfor the masses grow obsolete; but what is fit to be heard by the chosen\nfew shall be true and beautiful while such minds are found on earth. In\nthe end, it is this little band--this intellectual aristocracy--who\nmove and guide the world. They see what is possible, outline projects,\nand give impulse, while the people do the work. That which is strongest\nin man is mind; and when a mind truly vigorous, open, supple, and\nillumined reveals itself, we follow in its path of light. How it may be\nI do not know; but the very brain and heart of genius throbs forever in\nthe words on which its spirit has breathed. Let this seed, though hidden\nlike the grain in mummy pits for thousands of years, but fall on proper\nsoil, and soon the golden harvest shall wave beneath the dome of azure\nskies; let but some generous youth bend over the electric page, and lo!\nall his being shall thrill and flame with new-born life and light.\nGenius is a gift. But whoever keeps on doing in all earnestness\nsomething which he need not do, and for which the world cares hardly at\nall, if he have not genius, has at least one of its chief marks; and it\nis, I think, an important function of a university to create an\nintellectual atmosphere in which the love of excellence shall become\ncontagious, which whosoever breathes shall, like the Sibyl, feel the\ninspiration of divine thoughts.\n\nSweet home! where Wisdom, like a mother, shall lead her children in\npleasant ways, and to their thoughts a touch of heaven lend! From thee\nI claim for my faith and my country more blessings than I can speak,--\n\n\n    Our scattered knowledges together bind;\n      Our freedom consecrate to noble aims.\n    To music set the visions of the mind;\n      Give utterance to the truth pure faith proclaims.\n    Lead where the perfect beauty lies enshrined,\n      Whose sight the blood of low-born passion tames.\n\n\nAnd now, how shall I more fittingly conclude than with the name of her\nwhose generous heart and enlightened mind were the impulse which has\ngiven to what had long been hope deferred and a dreamlike vision,\nexistence and a dwelling-place,--Mary Gwendolen Caldwell.\n\n\nTHE END.\n\n\n\n\nBy RT. REV. J. L. SPALDING.\n\n\n=Thoughts and Theories of Life and Education=. 12mo, 235 pages, $1.00.\n\nThe bishop writes out of the fullness of his heart, and with abundant\nlove and charity. His works make the world wiser, happier, and better.\nThese \"Thoughts and Theories\" are couched in polished English, in\nsentences terse and full of meaning; few living writers command a more\ncharming style.\n\n\n=Education and the Higher Life=. 12mo, 210 pages, $1.00.\n\nBishop Spalding has struck a note which must vibrate in every heart\nwhich loves the glory of Christianity and the progress of humanity....\nThe book is a stimulant, a tonic, a trumpet-call to higher things, a\nbeacon light for better days.--_The Catholic Union and Times_.\n\n\n=Things of the Mind=. 12mo, 237 pages, $1.00.\n\nOut of a disciplined and fertile mind he pours forth epigrammatic\nsentences and suggestions in a fashion which recalls Emerson. He is\nalways and everywhere American, and the last chapter is at once wisely\ncritical and soundly laudatory of our country.--_The Sunday School\nTimes, Philadelphia_.\n\n\n=Means and Ends of Education=. 12mo, 232 pages, $1.00.\n\nBishop Spalding comes nearer being an essayist in education than any\nother American. He has that rarest of educational gifts,--the ability to\nthrow light brilliantly, and yet softly, making his paragraphs both\nbright and mellow, all without \"preaching,\" without pedantry, and\nwithout being cranky.--_Journal of Education_, Boston.\n\n\n=Opportunity, and Other Essays and Addresses=. 12mo, 228 pages, $1.00.\n\nIn this volume, as in his other books, Bishop Spalding is occupied with\nthe larger problems of education. In addition to the specifically\neducational subjects there are themes of the widest possible interest,\nto the treatment of which the ripe experience of the writer gives high\nvalue.\n\n\n=Songs, chiefly from the German=. 16mo, gilt top, $1.25.\n\nHe has gathered the flowers from the German garden of song and\ntranslated them, giving a literal rendering, but still preserving the\nmelody,--an art which was thought to have been lost with\nLongfellow.--_The Chicago Record_.\n\n\n_Sold by all booksellers, or mailed, on receipt of price, by_\n\nA. C. McCLURG & CO., PUBLISHERS,\nCHICAGO.\n\n\n\n\nBy Mrs. Elizabeth Wormeley Latimer.\n\n\n_JUDEA: From Cyrus to Titus, 537 B. C.--70 A. D._ Handsomely illustrated.\n8vo. $2.50.\n\nThis is a book for the people rather than for scholars, but written with\nthe resources of scholarship at command. Not entering into the mooted\nquestions of criticism, it is a well written narrative of the eventful\nperiod it covers, presenting the story of Judea in its connection with\nthe general movement of the world, as well as with the career of\nillustrious men.--_The Outlook_, New York.\n\n\n\n\nMrs. Latimer's Former Works.\n\n\n_My Scrap Book of the French Revolution._ Illustrated. 8vo. $2.50.\n\n_Spain in the 19th Century._ Illustrated. 8vo. $2.50.\n\n_Italy in the 19th Century._ Illustrated. 8vo. $2.50.\n\n_Europe in Africa in the 19th Century._ Illustrated. 8vo. $2.50.\n\n_England in the 19th Century._ Illustrated. 8vo. $2.50.\n\n_Russia and Turkey in the 19th Century._ Illustrated. 8vo. $2.50.\n\n_France in the 19th Century._ Illustrated. 8vo. $2.50.\n\n\n_Sold by all booksellers, or mailed on receipt of price by_\n\nA. C. McCLURG & CO., Publishers,\nCHICAGO.\n\n\n\n\nA GENERAL SURVEY OF AMERICAN LITERATURE\n\nBy MARY FISHER\n\nGilt top, deckle edges, 12mo. $1.50\n\n\nIn this volume Miss Fisher has treated a subject of vital interest and\nimportance for all American lovers of literature, and she has\naccomplished her task with rare feminine appreciation and sympathy, with\na clear and decisive interest, with a catholicity of judgment and a fine\nsense of discrimination and proportion and with a warmth and delicacy of\ntreatment that transform these biographical sketches into little gems of\nportraiture.--_The Commercial Advertiser_, New York.\n\nThe great value of the book lies in the fact that while Miss Fisher has\na thorough familiarity with the subjects of her essays, she writes as\nshe might if she were ignorant of the estimation in which they are held\nby the public or by the critics. She applies discriminating reason and\nsound principles of judgment to the work of the various writers, without\nthe slightest reference to their personal dignity or their literary\nfame.--_The Book Buyer_, New York.\n\nThe whole range of notable writers are dealt with in a style at once\ndiscriminating and attractive. The \"human touch\" is pleasingly apparent\nthroughout the book.--_The Living Age_, Boston.\n\n\n\n\nA GROUP OF FRENCH CRITICS\n\nBy MARY FISHER\n\n12mo. $1.25.\n\n\nThose who are in the habit of associating modern French writing with the\nmaterialistic view of life and the realistic method, will find\nthemselves refreshed and encouraged by the vigorous protest of men like\nScherer and other French critics against the dominance of these elements\nin recent years.--_The Outlook_, New York.\n\n\"A Group of French Critics\" deserves a friendly welcome from everybody\nwho desires to know something of the best in contemporary French\nletters.--_The Philadelphia Press_.\n\n_Sold by all booksellers, or mailed on receipt of price by_\n\nA. C. McCLURG & CO., Publishers,\nCHICAGO.\n\n\n\n\nTALES FROM FOREIGN LANDS.\n\n\n\n     MEMORIES. A Story of German Love. Translated from the German of MAX\n     MULLER by GEORGE P. UPTON.\n\n     GRAZIELLA. A Story of Italian Love. Translated from the French of\n     A. DE LAMARTINE, by JAMES B. RUNNION.\n\n     MARIE. A Story of Russian Love. From the Russian of ALEXANDER\n     PUSHKIN, by MARIE H. DE ZIELINSKA.\n\n     MADELEINE. A Story of French Love (crowned by the French Academy).\n     Translated from the French of JULES SANDEAU by FRANCIS CHARLOT.\n\n     MARIANELA. A Story of Spanish Love. Translated from the Spanish of\n     B. PEREZ GALDOS, by HELEN W. LESTER.\n\n     COUSIN PHILLIS. A Story of English Love. By Mrs. GASKELL.\n\n     KARINE. A Story of Swedish Love. Translated from the German of\n     WILHELM JENSEN, by EMMA A. ENDLICH.\n\n     MARIA FELICIA. A Story of Bohemian Love. Translated from the\n     Bohemian of CAROLINE SVETLA by ANTONIE KREJSA.\n\n     Handsomely printed on fine laid paper, 16mo, gilt tops, per volume,\n     $1.00. The six volumes in neat box, per set, $6.00; in half calf or\n     half morocco, gilt tops, $13.50; in half calf or half morocco, gilt\n     edges, $15.00; limp calf or morocco, gilt edges, $18.00.\n\n     This series of volumes forms perhaps the choicest addition to the\n     literature of the English language that has been made in recent\n     years.\n\n\nAn attractive series of stories of love in different countries,--all\ngems of literature, full of local coloring.--_Journal of Education,\nBoston_.\n\nThe stories are attractive for their purity, sweetness, and pathos.... A\nrare collection of representative national classics. _New York\nTelegram_.\n\nA series especially to be commended for the good taste displayed in the\nmechanical execution of the works. Type and paper are everything that\ncould be desired, and the volumes are set off with a gilt top which adds\nto their general appearance of neatness.--_Herald, Rochester_.\n\n_Sold by all booksellers, or mailed, on receipt of price, by the\npublishers._\n\nA. C. McCLURG & CO., CHICAGO.\n\n\n\n\nTHE BOOK-LOVER. A Guide to the Best Reading. By JAMES BALDWIN, Ph. D.\nSixth edition, 16mo, cloth, gilt top, 201 pages. Price, $1.00.\n\n=In half calf or half morocco=, $2.50.\n\n\nOf this book, on the best in English Literature, which has already been\ndeclared of the highest value by the testimony of the best critics in\nthis country, an edition of one thousand copies has just been ordered\nfor London, the home of English Literature,--a compliment of which its\nscholarly western author may justly be proud.\n\nWe know of no work of the kind which gives so much useful information in\nso small a space.--_Evening Telegram, New York_.\n\nSound in theory and in a practical point of view. The courses of reading\nlaid down are made of good books, and in general, of the\nbest.--_Independent, New York_.\n\nMr. Baldwin has written in this monograph a delightful eulogium of books\nand their manifold influence, and has gained therein two classes of\nreaders,--the scholarly class, to which he belongs, and the receptive\nclass, which he has benefited.--_Evening Mail and Express, New York_.\n\nIf a man needs that the love of books be cultivated within him, such a\ngem of a book as Dr. Baldwin's ought to do the work. Perfect and\ninviting in all that a book ought outwardly to be, its contents are such\nas to instruct the mind at the same time that they answer the taste, and\nthe reader who goes carefully through its two hundred pages ought not\nonly to love books in general better than he ever did before, but to\nlove them more wisely, more intelligently, more discriminatingly, and\nwith more profit to his own soul.--_Literary Worlds, Boston_.\n\n\n_Sold by all booksellers, or mailed on receipt of price, by_\n\nA. C. McCLURG & CO., PUBLISHERS.\n\n\n\n\nLIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN,\n\nBy the Hon. ISAAC N. ARNOLD. With Steel Portrait. 8vo, cloth, 471 pages.\nPrice, $1.50.\n\nIn half calf or half morocco, $3.50.\n\n\nIt is decidedly the best and most complete Life of Lincoln that has yet\nappeared.--_Contemporary Review, London_.\n\nMr. Arnold succeeded to a singular extent in assuming the broad view and\njudicious voice of posterity and exhibiting the greatest figure of our\ntime in its true perspective.--_The Tribune, New York_.\n\nIt is the only Life of Lincoln thus far published that is likely to\nlive,--the only one that has any serious pretensions to depict him with\nadequate veracity, completeness, and dignity.--_The Sun, New York_.\n\nThe author knew Mr. Lincoln long and intimately, and no one was better\nfitted for the task of preparing his biography. He has written with\ntenderness and fidelity, with keen discrimination, and with graphic\npowers of description and analysis.--_The Interior, Chicago_.\n\nMr. Arnold's \"Life of President Lincoln\" is excellent in almost every\nrespect.... The author has painted a graphic and life-like portrait of\nthe remarkable man who was called to decide on the destinies of his\ncountry at the crisis of its fate.--_The Times, London_.\n\nThe book is particularly rich in incidents connected with the early\ncareer of Mr. Lincoln; and it is without exception the most satisfactory\nrecord of his life that has yet been written. Readers will also find\nthat in its entirety it is a work of absorbing and enduring interest\nthat will enchain the attention more effectually than any\nnovel.--_Magazine of American History, New York_.\n\n\n_Sold by all booksellers, or mailed on receipt of price, by_\n\nA. C. McCLURG & CO., PUBLISHERS.\n\n\n\n\nLAUREL-CROWNED TALES.\n\n\n\n     ABDALLAH; OR, THE FOUR-LEAVED SHAMROCK. By EDOUARD LABOULAYE.\n     Translated by MARY L. BOOTH.\n\n     RASSELAS, PRINCE OF ABYSSINIA. By SAMUEL JOHNSON.\n\n     RAPHAEL; OR, PAGES OF THE BOOK OF LIFE AT TWENTY. From the French\n     of ALPHONSE DE LAMARTINE.\n\n     THE VICAR OF WAKEFIELD. By OLIVER GOLDSMITH.\n\n     THE EPICUREAN. By THOMAS MOORE.\n\n     PICCIOLA. By X. B. SAINTINE.\n\n     AN ICELAND FISHERMAN. By PIERRE LOTI.\n\n     PAUL AND VIRGINIA. By BERNARDIN DE ST. PIERRE.\n\n     Handsomely printed from new plates, on fine laid paper, 16mo,\n     cloth, with gilt tops, price per volume, $1.00.\n\n\nIn half calf or half morocco, per volume, $2.50.\n\nIn planning this series, the publishers have aimed at a form which\nshould combine an unpretentious elegance suited to the fastidious\nbook-lover with an inexpensiveness that must appeal to the most moderate\nbuyer.\n\nIt is the intent to admit to the series only such tales as have for\nyears or for generations commended themselves not only to the fastidious\nand the critical, but also to the great multitude of the refined reading\npublic,--tales, in short, which combine purity and classical beauty of\nstyle with perennial popularity.\n\nA contribution to current literature of quite unique value and interest.\nThey are furnished with a tasteful outfit, with just the amount of\nmatter one likes to find in books of this class, and are in all ways\nvery attractive.--_Standard, Chicago_.\n\n\n_Sold by all booksellers, or mailed, on receipt of price, by_\n\nA. C. McCLURG & CO., PUBLISHERS.\n\n\n\n\nLAUREL-CROWNED VERSE\n\nEdited by FRANCIS F. BROWNE.\n\n\n\n     THE LADY OF THE LAKE. By SIR WALTER SCOTT.\n\n     CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. A Romaunt. By LORD BYRON.\n\n     LALLA ROOKH. AN ORIENTAL ROMANCE. By THOMAS MOORE.\n\n     IDYLLS OF THE KING. By ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON.\n\n     PARADISE LOST. By JOHN MILTON.\n\n     THE ILIAD OF HOMER. Translated by ALEXANDER POPE. 2 Vols.\n\n     Each volume is finely printed and bound; 16mo, cloth, gilt tops,\n     price per volume, $1.00.\n\n\nIn half calf or half morocco, per volume, $2.50.\n\n\n_All the volumes of this series are from a specially prepared and\ncorrected text, based upon a careful collation of all the more authentic\neditions._\n\nThe special merit of these editions, aside from the graceful form of the\nbooks, lies in the editor's reserve. Whenever the author has provided a\npreface or notes, this apparatus is given, and thus some interesting\nmatter is revived, but the editor himself refrains from loading the\nbooks with his own writing.--_The Atlantic Monthly_.\n\nA series noted for their integral worth and typographical\nbeauties.--_Public Ledger, Philadelphia_.\n\nThe typography is quite faultless.--_Critic, New York_.\n\nFor this series the publishers are entitled to the gratitude of lovers\nof classical English.--_School Journal, New York_.\n\n\n_Sold by all booksellers, or mailed, on receipt of price, by_\n\nA. C. McCLURG & CO., PUBLISHERS,\nCHICAGO.\n\n\n\n\nLAUREL-CROWNED LETTERS\n\n\n\n     BEST LETTERS OF LORD CHESTERFIELD. With an Introduction by EDWARD\n     GILPIN JOHNSON.\n\n     BEST LETTERS OF LADY MARY WORTLEY MONTAGU. With an Introduction by\n     OCTAVE THANET.\n\n     BEST LETTERS OF HORACE WALPOLE. With an Introduction by ANNA B.\n     MCMAHAN.\n\n     BEST LETTERS OF MADAME DE SEVIGNE. With an Introduction by EDWARD\n     PLAYFAIR ANDERSON.\n\n     BEST LETTERS OF CHARLES LAMB. With an Introduction by EDWARD GILPIN\n     JOHNSON.\n\n     BEST LETTERS OF PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY. With an Introduction by\n     SHIRLEY C. HUGHSON.\n\n     BEST LETTERS OF WILLIAM COWPER. With an Introduction by ANNA B.\n     MCMAHAN.\n\n     Handsomely printed from new plates, on fine laid paper, 16mo,\n     cloth, with gilt tops, price per volume, $1.00.\n\n\nIn half calf or half morocco, per volume, $2.50.\n\n\nAmid the great flood of ephemeral literature that pours from the press,\nit is well to be recalled by such publications as the \"Laurel-Crowned\nLetters\" to books that have won an abiding place in the classical\nliterature of the world.--_The Independent, New York_.\n\nThe \"Laurel-Crowned Series\" recommends itself to all lovers of good\nliterature. The selection is beyond criticism, and puts before the\nreader the very best literature in most attractive and convenient form.\nThe size of the volumes, the good paper, the clear type and the neat\nbinding are certainly worthy of all praise.--_Public Opinion,\nWashington_.\n\nThese \"Laurel-Crowned\" volumes are little gems in their way, and just\nthe books to pick up at odd times and at intervals of waiting.--_Herald,\nChicago_.\n\n\n_Sold by all booksellers, or mailed, on receipt of price, by_\n\nA. C. McCLURG & CO., PUBLISHERS.\nCHICAGO.\n\n\nTHE STANDARD OPERAS. Their Plots, their Music, and their Composers. By\nGEORGE P. UPTON, author of \"Woman in Music,\" etc., etc.\n\n12mo, flexible cloth, yellow edges $1.50\n\nThe same, extra gilt, gilt edges 2.00\n\n\"Mr. Upton has performed a service that can hardly be too highly\nappreciated, in collecting the plots, music, and the composers of the\nstandard operas, to the number of sixty-four, and bringing them together\nin one perfectly arranged volume.... His work is one simply invaluable\nto the general reading public. Technicalities are avoided, the aim being\nto give to musically uneducated lovers of the opera a clear\nunderstanding of the works they hear. It is description, not criticism,\nand calculated to greatly increase the intelligent enjoyment of\nmusic.\"--_Boston Traveller_.\n\n\"Among the multitude of handbooks which are published every year, and\nare described by easy-going writers of book-notices as supplying a\nlong-felt want, we know of none which so completely carries out the\nintention of the writer as 'The Standard Operas,' by Mr. George P.\nUpton, whose object is to present to his readers a comprehensive sketch\nof each of the operas contained in the modern repertory.... There are\nthousands of music-loving people who will be glad to have the kind of\nknowledge which Mr. Upton has collected for their benefit, and has cast\nin a clear and compact form.\"--_R. H. Stoddard, in \"Evening Mail and\nExpress\" (New York)_.\n\n\"The summaries of the plots are so clear, logical, and well written,\nthat one can read them with real pleasure, which cannot be said of the\nordinary operatic synopses. But the most important circumstance is that\nMr. Upton's book is fully abreast of the times.\"--_The Nation (New\nYork)_.\n\n\n_Sold by all booksellers, or mailed, post-paid, on receipt of price, by_\n\nA. C. McCLURG & CO., PUBLISHERS.\n\n\nTHE STANDARD ORATORIOS. Their Stories, their Music, and their Composers.\nA Handbook. By George P. Upton. 12mo, 335 pages, yellow edges, price,\n$1.50; extra gilt, gilt edges, $2.00.\n\nIn half calf, gilt top $3.25\n\nIn half morocco, gilt edges 3.75\n\nMusic lovers are under a new obligation to Mr. Upton for this companion\nto his \"Standard Operas,\"--two books which deserve to be placed on the\nsame shelf with Grove's and Riemann's musical dictionaries.--_The\nNation, New York_.\n\nMr. George P. Upton has followed in the lines that he laid down in his\n\"Standard Operas,\" and has produced an admirable handwork, which answers\nevery purpose that such a volume is designed to answer, and which is\ncertain to be popular now and for years to come.--_The Mail and Express,\nNew York_.\n\nLike the valuable art handbooks of Mrs. Jamison, these volumes contain\na world of interesting information, indispensable to critics and art\namateurs. The volume under review is elegantly and succinctly written,\nand the subjects are handled in a thoroughly comprehensive\nmanner.--_Public Opinion, Washington_.\n\nThe book is a masterpiece of skillful handling, charming the reader with\nits pure English style, and keeping his attention always awake in an\narrangement of matter which makes each succeeding page and chapter fresh\nin interest and always full of instruction, while always\nentertaining.--_The Standard, Chicago_.\n\nThe author of this book has done a real service to the vast number of\npeople who, while they are lovers of music, have neither the leisure nor\ninclination to become deeply versed in its literature.... The\ninformation conveyed is of just the sort that the average of cultivated\npeople will welcome as an aid to comprehending and talking about this\nspecies of musical composition.--_Church Magazine, Philadelphia_.\n\n\n_Sold by all booksellers, or mailed on receipt of price, by_\n\nA. C. McCLURG & CO., PUBLISHERS.\n\n\n\n\nTHE STANDARD CANTATAS. Their Stories, their Music, and their Composers.\nA Handbook. By GEORGE P. UPTON. 12mo, 367 pages, yellow edges, price,\n$1.50; extra gilt, gilt edges, $2.00.\n\nIn half calf, gilt top            $3.25\nIn half morocco, gilt edges        3.75\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe \"Standard Cantatas\" forms the third volume in the uniform series\nwhich already includes the now well known \"Standard Operas\" and the\n\"Standard Oratorios.\" This latest work deals with a class of musical\ncompositions, midway between the opera and the oratorio, which is\ngrowing rapidly in favor both with composers and audiences.\n\nAs in the two former works, the subject is treated, so far as possible,\nin an untechnical manner, so that it may satisfy the needs of musically\nuneducated music lovers, and add to their enjoyment by a plain statement\nof the story of the cantata and a popular analysis of its music, with\nbrief pertinent selections from its poetical text.\n\nThe book includes a comprehensive essay on the origin of the cantata,\nand its development from rude beginnings; biographical sketches of the\ncomposers; carefully prepared descriptions of the plots and the music;\nand an appendix containing the names and dates of composition of all the\nbest known cantatas from the earliest times.\n\nThis series of works on popular music has steadily grown in favor since\nthe appearance of the first volume on the Operas. When the series is\ncompleted, as it will be next year by a volume on the Standard\nSymphonies, it will be, as the New York \"Nation\" has said, indispensable\nto every musical library.\n\n\n_Sold by all booksellers, or mailed on receipt of price, by_\nA. C. McCLURG & CO., PUBLISHERS.\n\n\n\n\nTHE STANDARD SYMPHONIES.\nTheir History, their Music, and their Composers.\nA Handbook. By GEORGE P. UPTON. 12mo, 321 pages, yellow edges, price\n$1.50; extra gilt, gilt edges, $2.00.\n\nIn half calf, gilt top            $3.25\nIn half morocco, gilt edges        3.75\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe usefulness of this handbook cannot be doubted. Its pages are packed\nfull of these fascinating renderings. The accounts of each composer are\nsuccinct and yet sufficient. The author has done a genuine service to\nthe world of music lovers. The comprehension of orchestral work of the\nhighest character is aided efficiently by this volume. The mechanical\nexecution of the volume is in harmony with its subject. No worthier\nvolume can be found to put into the hands of an amateur or a friend of\nmusic.--_Public Opinion, Washington_.\n\nNone who have seen the previous books of Mr. Upton will need assurance\nthat this is as indispensable as the others to one who would listen\nintelligently to that better class of music which musicians congratulate\nthemselves Americans are learning to appreciatively enjoy.--_Home\nJournal, New York_.\n\nThere has never been, in this country at least, so thorough an attempt\nto collate the facts of programme music.... As a definite helper in some\ncases and as a refresher in others we believe Mr. Upton's book to have a\nlasting value.... The book, in brief, shows enthusiastic and honorable\neducational purpose, good taste, and sound scholarship.--_The American,\nPhiladelphia_.\n\nUpton's books should be read and studied by all who desire to acquaint\nthemselves with the facts and accomplishments in these interesting forms\nof musical composition.--_The Voice, New York_.\n\nIt is written in a style that cannot fail to stimulate the reader, if\nalso a student of music, to strive to find for himself the underlying\nmeanings of the compositions of the great composers. It contains,\nbesides, a vast amount of information about the symphony, its evolution\nand structure, with sketches of the composers, and a detailed technical\ndescription of a few symphonic models. It meets a recognized want of all\nconcert goers.--_The Chautauquan_.\n\n\n_Sold by all booksellers, or mailed on receipt of price, by_\nA. C. McCLURG & CO., PUBLISHERS.\n\n\n\n\nGROUND ARMS!\n\n_The Story of a Life._\n\nBY BERTHA VON SUTTNER.\n\n12mo, 286 pages. Price, $1.00.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThis story is one of the strongest works of fiction of the present\ndecade. The author is a philosopher and a philanthropist. Her clear,\nincisive reasoning, her large sympathies, combined with rare power of\ndescription, enable her to give the world a story which will hold in its\nthrall even the most shallow novel-reader who can appreciate good\nliterature.--_The Arena_, Boston.\n\nThe author pierces to the marrow of the thing that has taken hold of\nher. By that thing she is verily possessed; it has made of her a\nseer.... The bare, bald outline of \"Die Waffen nieder!\" (\"Ground\nArms!\"), which is all we have been able to attempt, can give but a\nfaint, feeble idea of its power and pathos, and none at all of the many\nlight and humorous touches, the well-drawn minor characters, the\nthrilling episodes, the piquant glimpses of the great world of Austria\nand France, which relieve the gloom of the tragic story.--_International\nJournal of Ethics_.\n\nWe have here unquestionably a very remarkable work. As a plea for a\ngeneral disarmament it stands unrivaled. For a familiarity with the\ndetails of the subject treated, for breadth of view, for logical acumen,\nfor dramatic effect and literary excellence, it stands unequaled by any\nwork written with a purpose.--_Literary Digest_.\n\nWith a powerful pen the author tells of the horrors of war; not alone\nthe desolation of battlefields, but the scourges of typhus and cholera\nthat follow in their wake, and the wretchedness, misery, and poverty\nbrought to countless homes. The story in itself is simple but\npathetic.... The book, which is sound and calm in its logic and\nreasoning, has made a grand impression upon military circles of Europe,\nand its influence is destined to extend far into the future.--_Public\nOpinion_, New York.\n\n\n_Sold by all booksellers, or mailed, on receipt of price, by_\nA. C. McCLURG & CO., PUBLISHERS.","title":"Education and the Higher Life","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":51002}