he trodden field.

Nay, deem not thus,--no earthborn will
Could ever trace a faultless line;
Our truest steps are human still,
--To walk unswerving were divine!

Truants from love, we dream of wrath;
--Oh, rather let us trust the more!
Through all the wanderings of the path,
We still can see our Father's door!

V

The Professor finds a Fly in his Teacup.

I have a long theological talk to relate, which must be dull reading to
some of my young and vivacious friends. I don't know, however, that any
of them have entered into a contract to read all that I write, or that I
have promised always to write to please them. What if I should sometimes
write to please myself?

Now you must know that there are a great many things which interest me,
to some of which this or that particular class of readers may be totally
indifferent. I love Nature, and human nature, its thoughts, affections,
dreams, aspirations, delusions,--Art in all its forms,--virtu in all its
eccentricities,--old stories from black-letter volumes and yellow
manuscripts, and new projects out of hot brains not yet imbedded in the
snows of age. I love the generous impulses of the reformer; but not less
does my imagination feed itself upon the old litanies, so often warmed by
the human breath upon which they were wafted to Heaven that they glow
through our frames like our own heart's blood. I hope I love good men
and women; I know that they never speak a word to me, even if it be of
question or blame, that I do not take pleasantly, if it is expressed with
a reasonable amount of human kindness.

I have before me at this time a beautiful and affecting letter, which I
have hesitated to answer, though the postmark upon it gave its direction,
and the name is one which is known to all, in some of its
representatives. It contains no reproach, only a delicately-hinted fear.
Speak gently, as this dear lady has spoken, and there is no heart so
insensible that it does not answer to the appeal, no intellect so virile
that it does not own a certain deference to the claims of age, of
childhood, of sensitive and timid natures, when they plead with it not to
look at those sacred things by the broad daylight which they see in
mystic shadow. How grateful would it be to make perpetual peace with
these pleading saints and their confessors, by the simple act that
silences all complainings! Sleep, sleep, sleep! says the
Arch-