into insane fancies and wild fanaticism, and at other times was debased into a pander of propensities most alien to itself. And thus it was, that many an institution, founded for a nursery of piety, was transformed to a very conservatory of sin.

The history of philosophical systems, one would think, had solved the same problem as respects philosophy. How little, from the days of Pythagoras to those of Kant, have these achieved for the great mass of humanity! Intellects the acutest, most brilliant and comprehensive have, for ages, devoted their whole energy to philosophical culture, and how poor the result! Platonists and Peripatetics, Stoics and Epicureans, Schoolmen and Transcendentalists, emerge from the "void inane," glitter for a season, and disappear.

"Like waves of the summer, as one dies away,

Another as bright and as shining

comes on;

and yet the beach they wash remains but hard, barren sand at last. The Platonic cycle is completed far more rapidly with regard to philosophical opinions than any other, and ever and anon we are summoned to examine, as if momentous novelties, systems of thought which once and again were cultivated and exhausted ages ago.

In fact, the philosophy of our time differs not so much from those of the past in its principles, as in its objects and uses. The method of Lord Bacon is as old as Aristotle-nay, some thousands of years older-dating back to the period when earth's first-born child began exploring the new world, into which he had been ushered. Substantially it thus teaches, "Prove all things, hold fast that which is good." Eliphaz, the Temanite, was not the best of comforters to his afflicted friend. Nevertheless he uttered some things as true and weighty as they were unseasonable.

"Shall a wise man," he asks, "utter vain knowledge and fill his belly with the east wind? Should he reason with unprofitable talk, or with speeches wherewith he can do no good?"

Our age answers "No!" Not flowers merely, however brave in show, will serve its needs. It demands fruitfruit alike in religion, in philosophy, in schemes of polity-and the demand has

constrained a hearing. This test has been applied to physics-and a vernal breath is stealing over and renewing the face of earth. It has been applied to religion-and religion, feeling the keen significance of the question, "If thou lovest not thy brother whom thou hast seen, how canst thou love God whom thou hast not seen?" has quitted its seclusions, prolific of dreams and dogmatic subtleties, and come out into the midst of men's businesses and interest, not afraid to sit down with "publicans and sinners" as well as with "pharisees and scribes," not keeping back from the "receipt of customs" and the fisher's hut more than from the temple and the fuming sacrifice, and ready at all times and for all men with the "word fitly spoken." It has been applied to politics-and patriotism, no more content to rear a few palaces magnificent with painting and sculpture by the weary toil of the ill-sheltered many, strives the rather to sprinkle the land all over with comfortable cottages, "decorated with happy human faces." It has been applied to philosophy-and philosophy is no longer cultivated, as of old, as a mere system of mental gymnastics, but rather as the source of results that endure and bless. It has been found that the arm may develope muscular strength no whit the less, that, instead of "beating idly the air," it strikes the palpable stroke that rives the rock or fells the tree for ends of secular utility; and that architectural skill may be gathered quite as well by the exercise of rearing the edifice sheltering beings of flesh and blood as of building the air-castle, fit abode

"Of those gay creatures of the element: That in the colors of the rainbow live And play i' the plighted clouds."

Now, what jeopardy to man's highest interests is to be apprehended from all this? Says the very leading assailant of the tendencies of our time, "Undue cultivation of the inward or dynamical province leads to idle, visionary, impracticable courses." Therefore the requisition, which our age makes of philosophy, that it yield fruit-the demand that the professed teacher keep not his eyes so fixed on the stars as to stumble over the pebble in his path-is admirably suited to restrict inquiry within wholesome bounds.

Nor need it be feared that all depart

ments of culture shall not in turn receive fitting care. Nature is, after all, stronger than art, and original bias will break through all barriers of an uncongenial age. What have not the children of our age witnessed-the age on whose breast, it is lamented, broods the nightmare of mechanism? Mormonism, Irvingism, Mesmerism, Fourierism, Abolitionism, Non-resistance, and Radicalisms and Ultraisms beyond naming or reckoning. What time ever like this verified the poet's words,

"That all night to the sleeping wood Singeth a quiet tune;"

and mountains lifting far aloft their shapes of mystery and awe, and

"poured round all Old Ocean's grey and melancholy waste."

And in the very midst of our marts and storehouses and habitations are heard the frequent marriage peal and the funeral knell; and love

"here lights

have ?"

No, we have no ground to fear the world's being crushed into a dead level by the weight of mechanism. The freedom of thought and speech now prevailing and growing more prevalent, guaranties that whatever of genuine there is in individual minds worthy of utterance, shall find a hearing. Meanwhile the main concerns of the race may safely be left under the guidance of a genius which already (what the genius of antique philosophy never did) has greatly meliorated the condition of the mass of mankind.

But it is, after all, somewhat random talk to speak of universal or even general systems of thought. Each individual man (consciously or not) creates, or has created for him, his own. His peculiar organization and the circumstances that environ him,-the sins, sorrows, and struggles of this manifold life are his teachers and guardians. From the composite mass of his experience, principles are perpetually evolving and taking their place in that circle of ideas, of which his individuality is the centre. To live-yes, to live-is a more efficient instructor than were the combined Doctors of the Porch, the Academy, and the Sorbonne !

No chains forged by mechanism can long hurtfully bind that humanity which God willed to be free. Above all the smoke and din of this our social existence lie evermore the unspotted heavens, garnished with their starry pomp, and filled with that sacred silence which makes itself more than heard over all the world's uproar. And there is no highway of our journey so dusty that it is not bordered by blooms and greenery and venerable forests sheltering many a "hidden brook,"

wings,

Reigns here and revels;"

and here lisps and frolics infancy, with its own "Heaven lying about it;" and here youth is setting forth westward from being's threshold,

"And by the vision splendid

Is on its way attended ;”

and here is manhood, assailed by tumultuous passions within and hardships, griefs and disappointments without,-now, like the Hebrew champion, blinded and shorn of strength through a moment's weak oblivion of its better self, and anon, by a desperate struggle, redeeming its own freedom and putting under foot its mocking enslavers; and under happier stars exhibiting a luminous example of the conquest of self and of circumstance fully achieved and long undisturbedly enjoyed. While such things as these make part of our every day existence, we fear not the dying out of the higher faculties and aspirations of man.

We have no need, if we had space, to speak of the sins and imperfections of our time. All see them," he that runneth may read them." It is no age for the timorous, the indolent, the mere lovers of contemplative quiet. It is, and long must be, a time of change, of transition, of revolution, and turbulent activity. For the philanthropic, the noble, the brave, it is an era to quicken the pulse and make the heart beat high. But not lightly is he to be furnished forth, who would now work efficiently for his race. Not by dint of arms, but by force intellectual and moral must the conqueror achieve his triumphs. Nor can we so well set forth the fit endowments of such an one as in the words

of one who needed only a happier star to have gained from his contemporaries a crown more unfading than laurel.

"To suffer woes which Hope thinks infinite,

To forgive wrongs darker than death or night;

To defy Power that seems omnipotent; To love and bear, to hope till hope cre

ates

From its own wreck the thing it contemplates;

Neither to change, to falter, nor relent; This is thy glory, Man! This is to be Good, great and joyous, beautiful and free,

This is alone Life, Joy, Empire, and Victory!" D. H. B.

THE false and erroneous views of life which most works of fiction inculcate, is a theme that has so often employed the pen of the moralist, that it may almost seem an act of supererogation to waste time and paper upon it; and yet, so strong is my sense of its evils, that I cannot feel I have fully performed my "mission"-to adopt the cant language of the day, until I have given to the world my views upon the subject. I allude not now to works confessedly immoral, like those, for instance, which are daily emanating from the French press, works of so vile and infamous a character, that, says a lively writer, "Should you happen to touch a page, or turn a leaf, you must follow the old Levitical rule, bathe in the first running stream and remain unclean until the even;" but to those of our own countrymen and countrywomen; highly respectable people too, and who, doubtless, have no worse motive in giving them to the public, than to provide the "siller" for themselves, and amusement for their readers. It is not my intention, however, to pursue the subject in all its length and breadth; but simply to regard it in one particular aspect, and that is, the undue importance that is attached to personal beauty.

If physical perfection were essential to our well-being here, or if the representation of it would enable us to obtain it, there would be some reason for this continuous harping upon "the

might, the majesty of loveliness;" but since this is not the case, that writer who falls into this error, forfeits all claim to be considered a faithful delineator of life as it is, and does infinite mischief to the class for whom he writes. It gives false notions to the stronger sex, as to what is essential, and what they have a right to expect in a companion for life, and the effect is not less disastrous upon the youthful part of my own; for while it unreasonably elevates those who consider themselves as favored in respect to externals, it in the same degree depresses their less fortunate sister. To be personally agreeable is one of the strongest desires of our nature; and when this feeling is fostered and encouraged by their entire course of reading, it can scarcely be expected that plain common sense reasoning upon the subject will produce any permanent effect. "Yes, disguise it as thou wilt," homeliness, "thou art a bitter draught;" and though the utilitarian and philosopher may affirm, that the varied charms of nature fall as delightfully upon that eye that "looks seven ways for Sunday," as upon one that is "in itself a soul," or that the fragrance of the rose is inhaled as sweetly by that sense enshrined in a pug or a bottle, as by one chiselled by the very hand of Praxiteles, still this is poor consolation to her who never seeks her mirror without fearing she may snap it, or who moves about with an

ever-present consciousness that at any moment her looks may fall upon her stomach and destroy her.

Why our Creator, who has decked the world with beauty, should have dealt it so sparingly to the human family, is one of those questions it is impossible for us to understand; but since it is so, it is our unquestionable duty to acquiesce in the wisdom of the arrangement, and not by a constant dwelling upon its importance and advantages, impart to its possession a false value. That beauty is a great and glorious gift, far be it from me to deny, but it is the rarest and most perishable of all human possessions; for let poets and sentimentalists rave as they will, no truth is more evident than that the world is made up of ugly men and ugly women. We will confine ourselves to the latter, and let us take a practical, and, perhaps I might say, a statistical view of this matter. In these United States, there are ten millions of females-among them are a few beautiful women, perhaps an equal number of interesting ones, for the terms are not synonymous, a great many pretty ones, and the remaining two-thirds we will class under the head of sensible, homely, excellent women, most exemplary in the discharge of their duties, and who doubtless make their husbands as happy as -they deserve to be. Now what would be the most sensible and natural course for an author who wished to benefit his fellow beings, and give just views of life? Would it be to enlarge upon that which is wholly unattainable, or to dwell upon noble and elevated traits of character which all could at least endeavor to imitate? We will ascertain the truth of this, and let us take a modern love story.

Perhaps there are two female characters. One is a “dark-eyed one" with the air and mein of a Juno, and formed to command rather than obey; the other, and this is by far the most favorite creation, is a sweet, arch, merry, mischievous, wilful little mad-cap, and so playful, so intensely sportive, that she is fairly a living witch. Avoiding the opposite extremes of scragginess and obesity, she is of middle height, and of exquisite proportions, which the closely fitting dress obligingly reveals. Her hair is of "paly gold," and of that peculiar tint from which the light is reflected so bewitchingly. It is usually

"escaping from its confinement" in luxuriant ringlets, and what is most remarkable, is not affected by the changes of the atmosphere, but under all circumstances, favorable or unfavorable, is never to be seen except in full buckle. Unlike ordinary flesh and blood, she is not forced at evening's close, to do up, so to speak, those glossy tresses in unbecoming papillottes, and then reposing as best she may, with bullets, as it were, pressing into her temples (oh! man, man, man! what will we not endure for thee), but each little spiral ring is ready at a moment's notice to do duty, and fall in beautiful confusion upon her snowy shoulders. And then her eyes of such a heavenly liquid blue-that brow so dazzlingly pure, and those fair lips, one touch of those rosebud lips would be worth a kingdom-be calm, dear reader!-and that arm so exquisitely moulded, and that hand, that tiny hand, formed only to be worshipped, and if worst comes to worst, to be kissed! and that crowning beauty-the "fairy little foot" which peeps forth so daintily. It is a singular physiological fact, and one which I leave for wiser heads than mine to explain, that no heroine has ever achieved her conquests in slippers of a larger size than number 2 (think of that, poor mortals, who stub about in capacious fives and sixes!) Strange, and stranger still, that mounted upon such mere points, she should be able to trip about with such consummate grace and elegance! And then her voice, so

low and musical," and exercising such a bewildering power upon the heart; and her light "ringing" laugh, enough to wile the very bird from off the tree. But the best part remains untold; her loving heart so trustful and so confiding, she cannot control its impulses, and is ready the moment the beloved one begins to break ground as it were, to hide her burning blushes

Where? where? In her hands, I trust!

No, upon his breast, or manly shoulder, which he, dear creature, indulges her in, knowing the force of the temptation, and that though custom or nature has enjoined that he should be the first in the outward demonstration, yet in the hour of deep feeling strict etiquette must not be insisted on.

Now I would ask if such descriptions are true to nature, or if such delicious abandonment is common in real life?