66 quently the most prodigal of smiles abroad. They are not amiable, but they desire to be thought so. They go about in a mask, which if not very attractive has at least the merit of concealing their true features. But let us not be too severe upon mankind either in the abstract or the concrete. Something is due to the exigencies and convenances" " of society. It would never do to tell everybody what you think of him, nor would it at all conduce to your own comfort that everybody should treat you with the like candor. The sun of social favor shines with equal splendor, if not upon the just and the unjust, at least upon the genial and the ungenial. So that there be nothing against a man's moral character, he is not to be cold-shouldered for an ungainly presence which he cannot help, or a perverse temper which may perhaps be the result of a weak digestion. We must take the world as we find it. The sternest of moralists glancing inwardly will have some compassion for the innocent deceits of human bodies, if he would not shut the gates of mercy on himself. And, after all, man is not more wicked in this regard than Nature herself, who is everlastingly befooling him. Nothing endures; everything passes away, the brightest still the fleetest. Where is the rose of yesterday? Indeed, in some respects, Art has the "pull" of Nature, for artificial flowers are well-nigh as beautiful as the flowers of the garden, and last much longer, to say nothing of their never wanting to be watered. The azure sky that gets suddenly overclouded, the gorgeous rainbow vanishing as we gaze, the treacherous ice crashing beneath our feet, the sea now smooth and placid, anon rough and frantic, the mirage of the desert luring but to betray, and the dead-sea fruit which tempts the eye, but turns to ashes on the lip-these are illustrations of the delight that Nature takes in deceiving; and Man, regarded simply as the Son of Nature, is not much worse than his Mother. SUNSHINE AND SHADOW. IT may, perhaps, tend to our consolation in seasons of trial and depression to remember that a fleet alternation of sunshine and shadow is the inevitable law as well of the moral as of the physical world. Nor should we fail to observe how beneficial is the operation of that law in either sphere. The gracious rains beautify and fertilize the earth. We discern their delightful and salutary influence in the freshness and brilliancy of the landscape, in the verdure and lustre of the foliage, in the goldenness, and affluence of the corn-field, in the fragrance and effulgence of the garden. The scenery of the firmament is due altogether to the clouds. The violet arch of an Italian sky is lovely to look upon for a time; but wanting the magnificent drapery of clouds with their marvellous refinement of texture, their endless diversity of hue and tone, and their infinite variety of form, action, and grouping, it soon becomes wearisome and monotonous. There is no emotion—no picturesque passion in a cloudless sky. It lacks spirit and character. To rain as well as light we owe the radiant bow that spans the vault of heaven; and we may thank the clouds for those gorgeous effects of light, shade, and color which suffuse the mountain crests with splendor ineffable, and gives to sunset a dazzling grandeur-a mystic glory which is the despair of painters. There is not in the whole range of literature any more sublime thought than that of Sir Walter Raleigh, that sun, moon, and stars, resplendently luminous though they seem to our eyes, are but shadows of the Omnipotent:-"In the glorious light of heaven we perceive the shadows of His divine countenance." Descending from such celestial contemplations to the consideration of our sublunary home, we shall find that whatsoever things are majestic, whatsoever things are beautiful in the external world, are due in no small degree to the fleet alternation and poetic contrast of sunshine and shadow. What can be more exquisite than the tremulous network of lights and shades cast upon the green sward by the leaves and branches of a tree swaying in the breeze? What can be more graceful than the coursing of shadows over bending corn or athwart the sparkling surface of a summer sea? Thunder clears and purifies the atmosphere, which for a while it had troubled so alarmingly; and the oak strikes deeper root for its wrestling with the storm. How wayward soever a man's destiny may be, it will not fail to present analogies expressly correspondent with Nature, as well in her gladsome as in her pathetic aspects. No one who loves manly truth better than morbid prejudice will hesitate to admit that if there is much to endure, there is also not a little to enjoy in our earthly pilgrimage. If life were indeed the dark dismal bondage that it is sometimes pictured, who would care to live? Who would not welcome death as the most precious of boons? But we are unfair to Providence and ourselves. In the intelligent contemplation of the manifold beauties that surround us, in the zealous exploration of the fair domain of knowledge, in the converse of loyal friends, in the enchanting mystery called love-here, here we have, indeed, abundant sources of delight. Nor is this all. A thousand things around us administer to our physical and intellectual enjoyment. The ear is ravished with the melodious strains of music; the eye is gladdened with the cunning creations of art; eloquence and poetry exalt the imagination; wit and humor rejoice the fancy. As steel brighteneth steel, so doth the countenance of a man his friend. There is a solace beyond all price in the interchange of genial thoughts, and a comfort not to be told in the communion of sympathetic spirits. Go where they may, little children are ever the harbingers of innocent delight. Joy lurks in their rosy smile, glows on their cloudless brows, mantles in their damask cheeks, and no rhetoric is comparable to their lisping accents. "To press the velvet lip of infancy," as Thomson charmingly phrases it, is among our happiest privileges. We recall the days of our own childhood, and are lost in wonder to think what can have become of the children that we ourselves once were. Ah! what indeed? In the very sense of physical existence, when coupled with perfect health, there is an exhilaration to which no words can do justice. Who has not felt this the more particularly when engaged in any manly exercise, in the hunting-field, or on the cricketground, or while travelling on foot through a new and picturesqué country? There is yet another and a higher view of the question. Let no one complain of the want of sunshine, that brightest and most beneficial of all-the sunshine of the heart-who has not treated himself to the priceless luxury of doing good! Ah! there were no lack of sunshine, moral or natural, if it would but last. My only fault with all that is bright is that it fades too surely. What is truly tragic in human life is not, as some absurdly maintain that it is, destitute of joys-on the contrary, it abounds in them, but rather that they and we are of such brief duration. The wind passeth over us and we are gone! King James I., whom historians and dramatists delight to depict as a witless inelegant pedant, wrote a couplet of admirable melody and truth, which is more than can be said for any other monarch who ever sat upon the throne of England : : "Crowns have their compass, length of days their date, In the sad thoughts thus eloquently expressed, dwells all that the human imagination can conceive of poignant and disheartening. They are but too true, these tragic thoughts, and our personal experiences of their truth are the shadows with which our sunbeams are continually interlaced. "Life is but a walking shadow," says Shakespeare, and who that calls to mind his own shattered projects, his blighted hopes, his vanished youth, his broken strength, and, saddest of all, the friends he has seen around him fall like leaves in wintry weather, can doubt the justice of the saying?" Pulvis et umbra sumus!" "We are dust and shadow!" Our joys are but "the perfume and suppliance of a minutę; our life itself, what is it? A castle of frost-work confronting the sun. Faith points to happier spheres of everlasting duration, and bleak and dark, indeed, were life with all its sunshine but for that hope; yet am I fain to avow that |