p of millions a vanquished
man. Bringing his life into the "light of the glory of God which shines
from the face of Jesus Christ," we are compelled to pronounce it a
miserable failure. We do not find either Christian faith or Christian
morality in it. As to faith, he had none; for he was an atheist, and
gloried in his disbelief of all revealed truth. As to morality, his
biographer informs us that he was an unchaste, profane, passionate,
arbitrary, ungenerous, unloving man. His apparent philanthropy was so
veined with selfishness that it was rarely ever exhibited except under
conditions which secured publicity. And even the college which
perpetuates his name proclaims, by its prohibition of _religious_
instruction, his hatred of "the only name given under heaven among men
whereby we can be saved." It is true that his will enjoins instruction
in morals; but it is heathen, not Christian, morality that he intended;
and, if the letter and spirit of his remarkable will were strictly
carried out, the graduates of Girard College would leave its walls as
ill instructed in the principles of genuine morality as were the
disciples of Socrates or the followers of Confucius. The only roots on
which pure morals can grow are faith in our heavenly Father and his
divine Son, and love which is born of that precious faith. That faith is
forbidden to be taught, and its divinely ordained teachers are
prohibited entrance within the walls his unsanctified ambition built.
Happily for the orphan boys who congregate there, the _spirit_ of that
antichristian will can not be executed in this Christian country. Its
_letter_ is no doubt respected; but the ethics of the institution are
not those of Voltaire, Rousseau, or Confucius, but of Jesus, whose life
is the only "light of men." Hence, while his college may perpetuate his
name, it will never cause mankind to love his character, nor to hope
that he is one of that exalted host which ascended to heaven through
much tribulation, and after washing their robes in the blood of the
Lamb.--DR. WISE, _in "Victors Vanquished_," Cranston & Stowe,
Cincinnati.

* * * * *

XXIV.

DISAPPOINTMENTS.

PLEASURE AFTER PAIN--PAIN AFTER PLEASURE.

Our illusions commence in the cradle, and end only in the grave. We have
all great expectations. Our ducks are ever to be geese, our geese swans;
and we can not bear the truth when it comes upon us. Hence our
disappointments; he