satisfaction of saying to the believers of a creed
different from their own, "I told you so"? Are not others oppressed with
the thought of the great returns which will be expected of them as the
product of their great gifts, the very limited amount of which they do
not suspect, and will be very glad to learn, even at the expense of their
self-love, when they are called to their account? If the ways of the
Supreme Being are ever really to be "justified to men," to use Milton's
expression, every human being may expect an exhaustive explanation of
himself. No man is capable of being his own counsel, and I cannot help
hoping that the ablest of the, archangels will be retained for the
defence of the worst of sinners. He himself is unconscious of the
agencies which made him what he is. Self-determining he may be, if you
will, but who determines the self which is the proximate source of the
determination? Why was the A self like his good uncle in bodily aspect
and mental and moral qualities, and the B self like the bad uncle in look
and character? Has not a man a right to ask this question in the here or
in the hereafter,--in this world or in any world in which he may find
himself? If the All-wise wishes to satisfy his reasonable and reasoning
creatures, it will not be by a display of elemental convulsions, but by
the still small voice, which treats with him as a dependent entitled to
know the meaning of his existence, and if there was anything wrong in his
adjustment to the moral and spiritual conditions of the world around him
to have full allowance made for it. No melodramatic display of warring
elements, such as the white-robed Second Adventist imagines, can meet the
need of the human heart. The thunders and lightnings of Sinai terrified
and impressed the more timid souls of the idolatrous and rebellious
caravan which the great leader was conducting, but a far nobler
manifestation of divinity was that when "the Lord spake unto Moses face
to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend."

I find the burden and restrictions of rhyme more and more troublesome as
I grow older. There are times when it seems natural enough to employ
that form of expression, but it is only occasionally; and the use of it
as the vehicle of the commonplace is so prevalent that one is not much
tempted to select it as the medium for his thoughts and emotions. The
art of rhyming has almost become a part of a high-school education, and
its practice is far f