in maturer life, you associated with vile
persons, who would forego the contest of equality to be your allies in
trampling on inferiors,--and if, both then and since, you have been
suffered to deem your wealth the compendium or equivalent of every
ability and every good quality,--it would indeed be immensely strange,
if you had not become in due time the miscreant who may thank the power
of the laws in civilized society that he is not assaulted with clubs
and stones, to whom one could cordially wish the opportunity and the
consequences of attempting his tyranny among some such people as those
_submissive_ sons of Nature in the forests of North America, and whose
dependants and domestic relatives may be almost forgiven when they shall
one day rejoice at his funeral."

What do you think of _that_, my reader, as a specimen of embittered
eloquence and nervous pith? It is something to read massive and
energetic sense, in days wherein mystical twaddle, and subtlety which
hopelessly defies all logic, are sometimes thought extremely fine, if
they are set out in a style which is refined into mere effeminacy.

* * * * *

I cherish a very strong conviction, (as has been said,) that, at least
in the case of educated people, happiness is a grand discipline for
bringing out what is amiable and excellent. You understand, of course,
what I mean by happiness. We all know, of course, that light-heartedness
is not very familiar to grown-up people, who are doing the work of life,
who feel its many cares, and who do not forget the many risks which hang
over it. I am not thinking of the kind of thing which is suggested to
the minds of children, when they read, at the end of a tale, concerning
its heroine and hero, that "they lived happily ever after." No, we don't
look for that. By happiness I mean freedom from terrible anxiety and
from pervading depression of spirits, the consciousness that we are
filling our place in life with decent success and approbation, religious
principle and character, fair physical health throughout the family, and
moderate good temper and good sense. And I hold, with Sydney Smith, and
with that keen practical philosopher, Becky Sharpe, that happiness and
success tend very greatly to make people passably good. Well, I see an
answer to the statement, as I do to most statements; but, at least, the
beam is never subjected to the strain which would break it. I have seen
the gradual wor