e known, to look at him, that anything
unusual had happened.

* * * * *

During the nest week Hiram was occupied in making his will. A new and
important idea seemed to have possession of him.

* * * * *

From that period he never permitted his daughter's name to be mentioned,
and would receive no communication from her.

Arabella's hysterics continued, at intervals for several days. Her
husband, in view of his violence toward her, was very considerate, but
the affair was never alluded to by either.

Arabella, perhaps, felt that she deserved some punishment for tolerating
the 'Count in disguise;' and Hiram never got over a certain feeling of
mortification when he thought of the scene in the parlor.

Here we leave all the parties for the present.

THE MECHANICAL TENDENCY IN MODERN SOCIETY.

There is no greater absurdity than the attempt to demonstrate anything
from historical evidence, or to frame from it an argument whose cogency
shall even approach to a demonstration. Granting the hypothesis that
like causes will always produce like effects, we find ourselves unable
to show that the cases are exactly, or even proximately, the same.
History is not a record of every circumstance, but of those only that
were deemed worthy of perpetuation; and even were all circumstances
known to us, we must receive them as seen through the opinions of the
historian, while the present is as it seems to us; so two cases, while
appearing to agree, may in reality be very unlike. And, in addition to
this, so many are the events that precede any given effect, that it is
impossible to determine which is the cause, and which only the
circumstance attending that cause. So, while our literature is flooded,
with so many 'demonstrations from history,' many a philosopher finds
himself in the situation of the sage who demonstrated that 'Tenterton
steeple' was the 'cause of Godwin Sands.'

From this it has arisen that practical men have come to despise not only
all reasonings from history, but social science altogether, deeming it a
pleasant tissue of thoughts that may amuse a leisure hour, but nothing
of practical importance. On most subjects this is unfortunately true,
but sometimes in the state of a nation there are indications, repeated
again and again, showing the existence of a cause which, unless
counteracted, will eventually produce certain disastrous effects. Though