"With all our care, we may be deceived sometimes, but we are seldom taken in twice by the same person. Would you like to visit some of the cases, and see for yourself? If so, I shall be very glad to accompany you."

"Oh, thank you, that is just what I should like to do."

"Very well then; be it so." The two ladies then arranged to meet on a certain day, to make their visits and inquiries, and for the time parted company.

NOTES OF AN ADDRESS DELIVERED TO THE MEMBERS OF A MUTUAL IMPROVEMENT SOCIETY.

BY THE REV. J. THEW.

I HAVE determined to offer you a few practical hints on self-culture, a subject which I trust is not altogether unsympathetic with our present meeting and purpose. For valuable as Mutual Improvement Societies are, highly as one would choose to speak of them, their chief value I conceive to lie in this, that they quicken, and stimulate, and direct to private reading, reflection and study.

The chief use of society is to teach us the value of solitude, and the high aim of a Mutual Improvement Society is to help us in the patient improvement of ourselves.

that

Self-culture. I take it for granted that you recognise it as a dutyyou are not misled by foolish talk about "pride of human reason vanity of mere intellect "the unimportance of secular education as compared with religious "—and so on. All of which talk I hesitate not to pronounce misleading, and even bad. It is surely a poor compliment we pay to the Author of our being when we say that half of the powers He has given us are not worth cultivating, or can only be cultivated with infinite risk. Believe me, man is not such a wreck after all, that it is only the most valuable part of the cargo which can be saved. Body, soul, and spirit, is what the Apostle demands for Christ.

Again, you see not alone the duty, but the absolute necessity, of this a necessity arising from this double fact, that the uncultivated mind misses the highest enjoyments of life, and that a mind systematically neglected becomes uncultivated. That last fact I take to be the more serious of the two. A power unused falls into decrepitude and decay, becomes practically non-existent, ceases to be available for useful purOf all sad sights this is one of the saddest—a mind that might have been at home among the stars--among the subtlest problems or the most distant times-helpless to rise above the common thoughts or the material wants of life. It is the inexorable penalty attached by God to all unfaithfulness. "To him that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance: but from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath."

poses.

So far we are agreed, then. Self-cultivation is the object of our Society.

We help each other that we may learn to help ourselves. It is also our bounden duty as in the sight of God, and it is a necessity so sharp that the longer we delay it, the less chance we have of accomplishing it. Now as to the modus operandi? How to set about it? I must be permitted to say here, and to say with great emphasis, that unless we are in earnest about it the attempt is well nigh useless-and this for many reasons. I might remind you that earnestness is the condition of success in everything: not natural ability, aptitude, genius, but earnestness. Indeed, what is genius? One who knows whereof he affirms says, "It is the capacity for taking infinite trouble," which is simply saying that the earnest man is the genius. Or I might remind you that surface-knowledge is poor and misleading, that the depths of a thing are the realities of the thing, and that languid effort and fitful application will not carry you far down. But the chief reason for a spirit of real consecration to this work lies in the fact that young men are not insensible to other attractions, and that other attractions are exceedingly numerous. I know it is not easy, after a hard day's work, to force oneself to remain at home, to study Euclid, to read history, or what not. A hundred excuses may be offered for the social chat, the entertainment, &c., things I need not go into here. It is hard work; therefore, the man who would do it must be in earnest. He must take the work of self-culture not to while away an hour, but as the sober business of life. Half-hearted recruits are not wanted here. They may go back to their toys and their dolls as fast as they like.

You are in earnest about it, then? You mean business? I would lay down as a fundamental rule,―avoid too great discursiveness. It is very clear, looking around, that you cannot know everything, that you cannot excel in everything-that, indeed, to the most of us knowledge and excellence are very circumscribed, that our choice is not a large one, that time and opportunity narrow us down to one or two things, with a sort of grim expression, "These, or nothing." The thing to be dreaded is really the attempt to know too much, to cover too much ground, to gain a smattering of everything—an exhaustive knowledge of nothing. I know a man now who has a little science, a small knowledge of history, a taste for languages, moderate power in painting, is not ignorant of mathematics, and has a surface acquaintance with modern literature. Now a man like that may make a great show in society, provided he is not tempted out of his depths by more experienced swimmers. And of course, he had better be educated after that slipshod fashion, than not educated at all. But imagine what he might have been, had he thrown time and labour into one channel, instead of fitfully scattering them into fifty channels. I hold it to be essential to a student that there shall be one thing in which he shall excel, one thing which we may be said to know,—and to know it, not as some people know their creed, by hearsay and role, but to know it personally, intimately, and thoroughly. It gives a man self-respect; and not only so, it seems so much real power developed,

so much genuine discipline of mind, as well as so much absolute knowledge possessed. And not only so, it becomes a nucleus around which other things will gather, a centre to which cognate subjects will be attracted, a starting point for endless excursions.

Find out them what you have an aptitude for-which is in the main only saying, Find out what you like; and at all pain and risk, till mastered, stick to that. Enliven the journey as you please. Gather all you can carry of good and useful on the road: but keep in sight the goal. Be willing to be ignorant of much, that you may know what you know with a real and not a sham knowledge.

Again, I should say, Have the courage to begin low enough down. Look well to the foundations, is as valuable a piece of advice in the matter of education as it is in the building of houses. There are certain things which no man can afford to be ignorant of, the want of which he will feel more and more bitterly the older he grows-these are the plain, simple elements of a sound English education. Unhappily some of us have to mourn, through no fault of ours, our deficiencies in this respect. Perhaps we began to work at an age when other lads have not left their tops and balls. Anyhow our education was neglected-and we are not so apt at the construction of sentences -not so clear and correct in our pronunciation and grammar-not so well posted up in geography and the history of our own country, as sometimes we could wish. It is a source of regret to us, and not only of regret, but of frequent annoyance.

I am sure you will not be offended at my speaking thus plainly. If any one here is not conscious of such deficiencies, to him I do not speak. If any one is conscious-knows what it is continually to be pulled up and set fast-hampered and crippled by this early loss-he is not likely to be offended with what I say. I must say then that for lack of this nothing will compensate. Much will be learned in our course through life, for experience teaches the dullest of us wisdom. Much will be gained of practical knowledge by contact with men, much information furnished, and much benefit received, from societies such as this. Newspapers, books, magazines, discussions, passing events, all will help. But the early loss will continually betray itself, and thoughtful men will say of the best of us, "A decent fellow that if he had only been educated." But, gentlemen, why not begin now? This is what I mean by beginning low enough down. I have now in my mind a very dear friend. After that man was married and had two children I taught him to write. He is now known in a certain commercial circle as a clever, able, and thoroughly competent man of business. It required some courage in a man past thirty years of age to buy a copy-book, and be content to write capital letters and round hand for a month or two. He did it, and he has his reward. be our own schoolmasters then, and those of us who feel our need, be brave enough to begin sufficiently low down. In this, as in higher matters, "He that humbleth himself shall be exalted,' A pyramid,

Let us

you know, must stand upon its base, not upon its apex. And the education which begins with the imperial questions of the day-a metaphysical subtlety or a political crisis- seems to me to begin at the wrong end. It is impossible if we think at all to let those questions alone. Perhaps it would be best to say, the one thing we ought to do --the other we must not leave undone.

A word or two as to books. Personally I am becoming more and more fastidious, perhaps I might say select, in my reading. While anxious of course to keep as it is called "abreast of the times," I do not feel called upon to read every new thing that is put down in book, paper, or magazine. One gets into the habit of saying, and a good habit it is, "If the thing be true as well as new, it will come to me in time. Meanwhile there are things that I know to be good and true, and therefore always new, and so, unto them first."

And really it is necessary to do this in their self-defence. There was a time when men wrote books as the lark sings-wrote because they could not help writing-wrote because the truth burned like a fire in their bones. Now, alas! literature is a profession: and there as elsewhere one has to ask, "Does this man preach to live-or does he live to preach ?" It follows from this that one learns to read more slowly; the greater worth a book is seen to have, the greater care will you expend in reading it. As a general thing I should say that a book that is not worth reading twice the second time perhaps pen in hand-is not worth reading at all. As to novels, so they be of the right stamp, one or two in the course of a year will do a man nothing but good. But continuous novel-reading is almost as bad as brandydrinking. If you want change, rest, stimulus, take up a good biography. So helpful do I find it, that it is a rare thing for me not to have one in hand.

Let

And now, gentlemen, I have done. You will see I have formed a high idea of the student-life, while at the same time I contend that it is within the range and reach of us all. What is wanted is a spirit of earnest consecration. Let us gird ourselves for the work, then. us be ashamed to spend, under any pretext whatever, a single aimless, idle evening. Let us feel that eternity depends on the use we make of time and let us say to ease, and enjoyment, and pleasure, and wealth, and even the dimpling smiles of youth and beauty, "I can do without these if needs be, but knowledge and truth and understanding I cannot do without-so help me God!"

Leicester.

all intercourse with the peninsulaa necessary precaution against the premature disclosure of important military plans. Colonel Scott applied to Secretary Stanton for leave to return to Virginia on his melan

DURING the summer of the most disastrous and doubtful year of the late American war, the Colonel of a New Hampshire regiment lay for some weeks extremely ill of camp fever, near Hampton Roads, in Virginia. Hearing of his critical | choly duty. condition, his wife left her Northern "Impossible, Colonel," replied home, and after much difficulty Mr. Stanton, firmly; made her way to his bedside. Her cheerful presence and careful nursing so far restored him that he was in a short time able to be transferred to Washington.

66 no one can

have leave to go down the river at this time on any private business whatever. Our present exigencies demand the most stringent precautions, and I hope I need not say to you that no merely personal considerations should be allowed to interfere with a great national interests. Your case is a sad one, but this is a critical, perilous, cruel time. The dead must bury their

The Colonel would have entreated, but the busy Secretary cut him short with another "impossible," from which there was absolutely no appeal. He returned to his hotel quite overwhelmed.

In the Potomac River, the steamer in which the invalid officer, Colonel Scott, and his wife had taken passage, was sunk in a collision with a larger vessel in the night time. The crew and nearly all the soldiers on board were rescued or dead." saved themselves; but amid the horrible confusion of the scene, Colonel Scott became separated from his wife and she was lost. The Colonel was picked up in the water by the crew of the larger steamer, and under his direction every effort was made to discover his wife, or rather her body, for all hope of finding her alive was abandoned. The sad search was fruitless; it was resumed in the morning, the people along the shore, humane Confederates, lending their aid. But the grey, sullen river refused to give up its dead, and the young officer, half frantic with grief, was compelled to go to Washington. Within a week, however, he received word from below that the body of a lady had been washed on shore, but those good country people, generous foes, had secured it, cared for it, and were keeping it for him.

It happened just at that time imperative orders were issued from the War Department prohibiting

Fortunately, he was visited that afternoon by a friend, to whom he told the story of his unsuccessful application and sad perplexity, and who immediately exclaimed, "Why not apply to the President?"

The Colonel had but little hope, but, admitting that the plan was worth trying, drove with his friend to the White House.

There was then a popular belief that all the wronged, the troubled and suffering, could find a refuge in" Father Abraham's" capacious bosom; a belief not far out of the way. Yet there were times when, over-burdened, wearied, tortured, the patriarch longed to clear that asylum of its forlorn inmates, to bolt and double lock it against the world; times when life became too hard and perplexing for his genial,