men. The things which are dear to men at this hour are so
on account of the ideas which have emerged on their mental horizon, and
which cause the present order of things, as a tree bears its apples. A
new degree of culture would instantly revolutionize the entire system of
human pursuits.

Conversation is a game of circles. In conversation we pluck up the
termini which bound the common of silence on every side. The parties are
not to be judged by the spirit they partake and even express under this
Pentecost. To-morrow they will have receded from this high-water mark.
To-morrow you shall find them stooping under the old pack-saddles. Yet
let us enjoy the cloven flame whilst it glows on our walls. When each
new speaker strikes a new light, emancipates us from the oppression of
the last speaker, to oppress us with the greatness and exclusiveness of
his own thought, then yields us to another redeemer, we seem to recover
our rights, to become men. O, what truths profound and executable only
in ages and orbs, are supposed in the announcement of every truth! In
common hours, society sits cold and statuesque. We all stand waiting,
empty,--knowing, possibly, that we can be full, surrounded by mighty
symbols which are not symbols to us, but prose and trivial toys. Then
cometh the god and converts the statues into fiery men, and by a flash
of his eye burns up the veil which shrouded all things, and the meaning
of the very furniture, of cup and saucer, of chair and clock and
tester, is manifest. The facts which loomed so large in the fogs of
yesterday,--property, climate, breeding, personal beauty and the like,
have strangely changed their proportions. All that we reckoned settled
shakes and rattles; and literatures, cities, climates, religions, leave
their foundations and dance before our eyes. And yet here again see
the swift circumspection! Good as is discourse, silence is better, and
shames it. The length of the discourse indicates the distance of
thought betwixt the speaker and the hearer. If they were at a perfect
understanding in any part, no words would be necessary thereon. If at
one in all parts, no words would be suffered.

Literature is a point outside of our hodiernal circle through which
a new one may be described. The use of literature is to afford us a
platform whence we may command a view of our present life, a purchase by
which we may move it. We fill ourselves with ancient learning, install
ourselves the best w