plies every object of sense, every fact of observation and life, with countless queries. Wonder is the profound, worshipful astonishment at the answers. Curiosity is the mental craving for more. Continually and with befitting avarice it goes forth to gather new treasures into the intellectual storehouse. Wonder is the soul's unrestrained luxuriance in fresh and large acquisitions. In the mental life of every man, curiosity is the pioneer, exploring regions unvisited by him before, and in the onward. march at every new domain, the heart, if it be a living one, rises and expands with wonder-deep, transcendent wonder.

These, both of them, have not a little to do with our culture and growth, our happiness and usefulness. By their freedom, activity and power, are determined the wealth of our nature and the efficiency of our life. So constant and various are their workings in us, that until we pause and consider, we do not realize how strange and curious curiosity is, nor how exalted and wonderful is wonder. Swayed by these, man has extended the empire of knowledge over all the kingdoms of nature, explored all lands and seas, and carried the pursuit after new light and more truth even beyond the stars. At the peril of his life he has climbed all the mountains in the world, simply for the sake of seeing. In the same hope he has penetrated the wilderness and jungle, when violence, pestilence and death stared him in the face. He has traced rivers to their sources and continents to their ends. He has classified the rocks, counted the flowers, and to all the beasts of the field has given names. He has fathomed the depths of air and sea. The history and character of their inhabitants he has learned by heart. of even the winds and waves he has written down in books. He has penetrated the realms of perpetual Winter, and the barriers which for untold ages the Ice-king has been rearing, man has passed. And there he has christened with an honored and memorable name a vast sea concealed for sixty centuries from human sight. And the globe as it is, is little better known than the globe as it was. But it is useless to enumerate. All Science is a compendium of what man's Curiosity has impelled him to find out. It is, too, a Temple of Wonder.

The habits

Yet man's knowledge is not surprisingly extensive. Considering the fact that six thousand years have been spent in its accumulation, it is small. Discovery has been conducted by the few. The race has never been alive with the desire to know. The spirit of inquiry has been, and is, lamentably dormant. Perhaps the present age surpasses any other, in the activity and energy of its investigations. This is one of the good omens of the day. Yet to know, the especial prerogative of man, is

seldom made one of the great objects of life. Everywhere we find wealth, fame, the means of existence or its concomitants, made its ends. Surely something must be wrong in our educational system, either in theory or practice. The training which leaves the man's upward im. pulses less active and efficient than the child's, is not only defective but criminal. That curiosity and wonder-innate, both of them-are thus blighted, no one will doubt.

Look at the little child. What inquiring and wondering eyes he opens upon the world at the very dawn of his being. How closely and eagerly he observes everything new, studying with all his power. His desire is alive even to anxiety. His curiosity thwarted, he cries as if for food. Mark, too, the rapidity of his acquisition. Even before he masters speech, he learns the use of the body he inhabits, is familiar with various forms, colors, sounds, practically acquaints himself with the laws of gravitation and force, interprets expressions of countenance and tones of voice, and knows the meaning of smiles and frowns. Constantly, too, as the Panorama of life passes, he is thrilled with wonder. At length, when words are his, with strange energy he applies them to investigations. Incessantly he asks questions. To him the world is a vast cabinet of curiosities, a mammoth Museum of Wonder, and not a thing fails to suggest numberless interrogatories. And here comes the chilling frost, in the very spring time of life, the first frost that nips the opening bud. The mother, the nurse, through ignorance, impatience or from weight of care, cannot, will not be perpetually plied and tried with the child's inquisitiveness. His curiosity is summarily rebuked. To be sure, Nature rebels. The child perseveres. But so does the mother, and the stronger will prevails. Curiosity is crushed, not regulated. Without food the desire fails. The flame goes out for want of air. To that new born, opening soul, a multitude of things are as if they were not. The great book God has written for him, is the same as sealed, for she whom He appointed to turn over the leaves, will not. This influence is the same in school as at home. There he learns the allotted lessons, not the thousand things he longs to know. With food enough in his Father's house, he is compelled to feed on husks. Thus he goes on, and life is really a dream. The questionings, that should have brought its realities to view, cease their importunity.

The flame goes out, did we say? No, not altogether. It is undying as the soul. It slumbers to be kindled anew by fresh fuel, by some favoring breeze. As the youth merges into manhood, a change of circumstances, strange position, the assumption of responsibilities, awaken

him to newness of life. This waking process we believe to be universal. Again the spirit of inquiry is active, and things being seen as they are, the sentiment of wonder is alive. The shackles are burst asunder, but the freedom is not destined to last. A pursuit is to be chosen, and the choice of profession means, as the world goes, the selection of some sphere, wherein to follow a given routine like others, and ask few questions that go outside of it or above. It is to go around in the beaten path, treadmill style, without a look at the green fields and golden fruits beyond. And will the wakened soul submit to this? Not without a struggle, perhaps a severe one. But clouds gather, foes multiply, external influences are tremendous. The heart has yielded once, and the second surrender is easier. The plant was blighted in Spring and in Summer it is weak and sickly. The world is hard upon him and the man gives up, content to be as intelligent as his fellows, and as ignorant too. Such we believe to be in the main, the experience of multitudes. This, though imperfectly drawn out, is sufficient explanation of the indifference among men to further knowledge, and the coldness with which they regard the most wonderful phenomena.

But we have something of a more local nature to offer. It is a natural supposition that those who choose an educational course of some length, and come to college for the pursuit of knowledge, are more keenly alive to its value and more active in its acquisition than those who do not. This is without doubt true. Yet it must be confessed a lamentable indifference to the attainment of eminence in knowledge, exists among students. With every desirable facility in our power, we make little effort to acquaint ourselves with the truths of momentous importance. There are exceptions to the general rule, noble ones, too. Yet how rare is enthusiasm in physical or mental science. The man who sincerely loves study for the intellectual wealth it brings him, stands far apart from the mass. Who gets absorbed in it? Yet many come here really in love with their work for its own sake. But they change in great numbers for the worse. Here then is something radi cally wrong in the influences we are under. We believe the evil is in public sentiment. It is not fashionable to manifest an eager curiosity after truth, nor a just and wondering appreciation of it. These in some quarters, are considered indubitable evidences of greenness. Some men are proud that they know nothing of Astronomy, little of Latin and less of Greek. But why is this public opinion here, where it ought not exist at all? There are strong influences to make it. Some men, and the number is not so small as it ought to be, come here

with no interest in literary pursuits. They come here merely to comply with their parents' wishes. A diploma from Yale is all they are after. Such men, though of no great account any way, weaken public sentiment in literary matters. Their influence is like that of water upon wine-dilution. Others aim at a profession with too narrow views. They go not out of a limited sphere, do not attempt to lay a broad basis for their profession, and take no interest in general knowledge. These, too, exert a chilling influence on the true student enthusiasm.

But there is another strong influence which seems for the most part to account for the fact. It is the system of marking and awarding prizes. No one familiar with college life can deny the power of this. It establishes the standard of scholarship and moulds scholarly sentiment. It operates constantly. Day and night, term after term, year in and year out, it actuates and controls college pursuits. It makes no appeal to a healthy curiosity, and does nothing to excite it. It ignores the existence of such a motive, and calls into action a basera purely selfish one. Inducement to hard study is not the intrinsic value of the acquisition, but a high stand. Hence lessons are learned not for their own sake, but for a good mark-for a prize. So incessant is the appeal to this petty ambition, that a better principle of action is almost wholly excluded. The wonder is that any leave college with a pure love of science and literature. But there are a few. Coming under such influences, the freshman finds himself in a new atmosphere, and that studying to learn is a mistake. He is disgusted at first, but at length, after a struggle, yields. This we believe to be the experience of

many.

We do not know but the marking system is the best that can be adopted. We are aware that it is easier to find a fault than a remedy for it. Easier to tear down than to build up. It seems to us, however, that the love for knowledge ought to be appealed to in some way and developed. Without this a man will cease to study at graduation, and the structure begun will be left incomplete. The object of College is to open for us the doors to the Temple of Learning. What good will it do, if all disposition to enter is ground out of us in the process? To be sure the result we speak of is not necessary. But it is almost certain. As we have already said, perhaps no better plan can be offered, and the only way for the student, is to divide the evil from the good, and choose the latter. He can if he will. Untoward influences can be resisted, and the man grow strong in the victory.

It is amazing how some men suppress their wonder, as if to manifest

it were a weakness. Especially do they disdain to be affected by common things. Poor Cowards! Is not the growth of a Forest, the rising of the Sun or any other work which none but an Infinite Hand can perform, enough to excite your emotion? Ah, it is the woe and the crime of our life, that we get used to things, that we can look unmoved on the greatest facts. It is the prerogative of genius to do otherwise. To Goethe and Milton, a new born day was always full of glory and wonder. They were childlike. To be a man in power and a child in emotion and life, is the attainment, the miracle of genius. We can all approach it nearer than we imagine. To be alive to all around us is our privilege and our duty. That man is nearest right who most truly can say,

"To me the meanest flower that blows can give

Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears."

We take the excitement of wonder to be one of the main objects of acquisition. We do not learn in order to gratify curiosity. Curiosity is a means, not an end, and is never satisfied. Man, though finite in capacity is infinite in his longings.

He satiates his hunger after knowledge and quenches his thirst, only to hunger and thirst the more. The reason is obvious. Truth is infinite. Knowledge is that part of it to which man has attained. He gathers a little here and a little there, but it is only a single drop from an immeasurable ocean. So he goes on. He is pursuing a journey, wherein, though he leave more and more of the way behind, he seems to have none the less before him. At times he may think that surely at the horizon heaven and earth meet, but at every step he takes toward it, it recedes. Why then pursue? Because thereby we grow. Wonder is essential to worship. Go on acquiring, the character is exalted and the life ennobled. It matters not so much what a man has, as what he is. He who pursues knowledge with a right spirit, is enriched less by his acquisition than by his growth. He is like one ascending a mountain. The higher he goes, the wider is his view, the purer the air he breathes. To him, who hopes in his immortality to go on acquiring and growing forever, it is no slight thing to begin well here.

S. H. L.