We must have that last virtue which crowns the others by raising them to the dignity of martyrdom, the virtue which Rome called force- FORTITUDE, and the Greeks by the very name of Rome; for Rome in the Greek language, signifies strength; a prophetic name given by Providence to that city which it had destined to govern the world by the empire of right and the empire of char

acter.

LACORDAIRE TO YOUNG MEN.

("Letters to Young Men," translated by Rev. James Trenor.)

Spend a fair share of every day upon the serious occupations of your state, and look upon this work as one of your first duties, and as the personal accomplishment of that sentence passed by God upon our first father. In the sweat of thy brow shalt thou eat thy bread.

As to the lawful pleasures of the mind, the heart, or the senses, indulge in them with gratitude and moderation, drawing up sometimes in order to punish yourself, without waiting to be forced to do so by necessity.

Bear constantly in mind that we have two great vices to beat down and destroy, pride and sensuality; and two great virtues to acquire, humility and penance.

Raise from time to time your heart to God, and think upon the painful passion of our Lord, in order to neutralize by the contemplation of his mangled and bleeding body the involuntary impression produced upon you by the objects you are condemned to see.

Choose some poor person, and relieve him regularly according to your means, and look upon him as Jesus Christ Himself, visit him, talk to him, and if you have courage enough, kiss his clothes or his feet sometimes. Fasten yourself in spirit to His cross, hand yourself

over to the executioner: to dwell upon the thought of chastisement, and undergo it mentally, is a suffering in itself. The martyrs had immolated themselves a hundred times in their hearts before they were sacrificed in reality. Think too of the number of slaves and poor who get scarcely anything but a little bad bread moistened with their tears and even with their blood.

Endeavor to be good, amiable, simple in your dealings with every one, and do not consider the life of a Christian as necessarily one of moroseness and melancholy. Saint Paul is continually saying to the faithful, rejoice! The real Christian is filled with interior joy even in the midst of sufferings: he bears his cross good-humoredly; martyrdom and opprobrium don't affect his spirits; he offers. his body to be afflicted as Providence sees fit without losing his serenity; he turns into roses chains, hunger, thirst, rags, fire, scourges, the sword, death. He loves and is loved, what more does he need?

ton.

EMERSON

(A. D. 1803-1882.)

RALPH WALDO EMERSON was born in Boston, Massachusetts, on the 25th of May, 1803. After graduating from Harvard College in 1821, he taught school for five years, and then entered the ministry, to which he had seemed to be dedicated by a long line of reverend ancestors on one or the other side. In 1829 he became the colleague of the Rev. Henry Ware, in pastoral charge of the Second Unitarian Church, at BosThree years later, after preaching a sermon in which he made known a change of views with regard to the Lord's Supper, he resigned his charge and withdrew from the pulpit. His first visit to England was made that year, and his acquaintance and life-long correspondence with Carlyle began. After returning to America, he took up the calling of a public lecturer, and most of the now classic essays which he gave to the world during the remainder of his life were first prepared for reading on the lyceum platform. The first collection of his "Essays was published in 1841, the second in 1844, and a volume of his poems in 1846.

The influence of Emerson on thoughtful minds soon made itself felt, in England as well as in his own country, and when he went abroad a second time, in 1847, he found many admirers awaiting him. In 1850 he published the course of lectures entitled "Representative Men." His "English Traits" was published in 1856; "The Conduct of Life" in 1860; "Society and Solitude" in 1869, and “May-Day and other Poems the same year. These were his principal

writings.

Mr. Emerson's residence in Concord began in 1835, and he lived there until his death, which occurred on the 27th of April, 1882.

"We have not in Emerson a great poet, a great writer, a great philosophy-maker. His relation to us is not that of

one of those personages; yet it is a relation of, I think, even superior importance. His relation to us is more like that of the Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius. Marcus Aurelius is not a great writer, a great philosophy-maker, he is the friend and aider of those who would live in the spirit. Emerson is the same. He is the friend and aider of those who would live in the spirit. All the points in thinking which are necessary for this purpose he takes; but he does not combine them into a system, or present them as a regular philosophy. Combined in a system by a man with the requisite talent for this kind of thing, they would be less useful than as Emerson gives them to us. As Wordsworth's poetry is, in my judgment, the most important work done in verse, in our language, during the present century, so Emerson's Essays' are, I think, the most important work done in prose." MATTHEW ARNOLD, "Discourses in Amer

ica."

6

PASSAGES FROM "THE CONDUCT OF LIFE."

If now in this connection of discourse, we should venture on laying down the first obvious rules of life, I will not here repeat the first rule of economy, already propounded once and again, that every man shall maintain himself, — but I will say, get health. No labor, pains, temperance, poverty, nor exercise, that can gain it, must be grudged. For sickness is a cannibal which eats up all the life and youth it can lay hold of, and absorbs its own sons and daughters. I figure it as a pale, wailing, distracted phantom, absolutely selfish, heedless of what is good and great, attentive to its sensations, losing its soul, and afflicting other souls with meanness and mopings, and with ministration to its voracity of trifles. Dr. Johnson said severely, "Every man is a rascal as soon as he is sick." Drop the cant, and treat it sanely. In dealing with the drunken, we do not affect to be drunk. We must treat the sick with the same firmness, giving them, of course, every aid - but withholding ourselves. . . .

'Tis a Dutch proverb, that "paint costs nothing," such are its preserving qualities in damp climates. Well, sunshine costs less, yet is finer pigment. And so of cheerfulness, or a good temper, the more it is spent, the more of it remains. The latent heat of an ounce of wood or stone is inexhaustible. You may rub the same chip of pine to the point of kindling, a hundred times; and the power of happiness of any soul is not to be computed or drained. It is observed that a depression of spirits develops the germs of a plague in individuals and nations. . .

Genial manners are good, and power of accommodation to any circumstance, but the high prize of life, the crowning fortune of a man is to be born with a bias to some pursuit, which finds him in employment and happiness, whether it be to make baskets, or broadswords, or canals, or statutes, or songs. I doubt not this was the meaning of Socrates, when he pronounced artists the only truly wise, as being actually, not apparently so. . . .

The uses of travel are occasional, and short; but the best fruit it finds, when it finds it, is conversation; and this is a main function of life. What a difference in the hospitality of minds! Inestimable is he to whom we can say what we cannot say to ourselves. Others are involuntarily hurtful to us, and bereave us of the power of thought, impound and imprison us. As, when there is sympathy, there needs but one wise man in a company, and all are wise, so a blockhead makes a blockhead of his companion. Wonderful power to benumb possesses this brother. When he comes into the office or public room, the society dissolves; one after another slips out, and the apartment is at his disposal. What is incurable but a frivolous habit?

Ask what is best in our experience, and we shall say, a few pieces of plain-dealing with wise people. Our con