wspaper, and in almost every speech in favor of popular education."

_Riccabocca._--"Then that should be a warning to you never again to fall
into the error of the would-be scholar--viz. quote second-hand. Lord
Bacon wrote a great book to show in what knowledge is power, how that
power should be defined, in what it might be mistaken. And, pray, do you
think so sensible a man would ever have taken the trouble to write a
great book upon the subject, if he could have packed up all he had to
say into the portable dogma, 'Knowledge is power?' Pooh! no such
aphorism is to be found in Bacon from the first page of his writings to
the last."

_Parson_ (candidly).--"Well, I supposed it was Lord Bacon's, and I am
very glad to hear that the aphorism has not the sanction of his
authority."

_Leonard_ (recovering his surprise).--"But why so?"

_Parson._--"Because it either says a great deal too much, or
just--nothing at all."

_Leonard._--"At least, sir, it seems to be undeniable."

_Parson._--"Well, grant that it is undeniable. Does it prove much in
favor of knowledge? Pray, is not ignorance power too?"

_Riccabocca._--"And a power that has had much the best end of the
quarter-staff."

_Parson._--"All evil is power, and does its power make it any thing the
better?"

_Riccabocca._--"Fanaticism is power--and a power that has often swept
away knowledge like a whirlwind. The Mussulman burns the library of a
world--and forces the Koran and the sword from the schools of Byzantium
to the colleges of Hindostan."

_Parson_ (bearing on with a new column of illustration).--"Hunger is
power. The barbarians, starved out of their energy by their own swarming
population, swept into Italy and annihilated letters. The Romans,
however degraded, had more knowledge, at least, than the Gaul and the
Visigoth."

_Riccabocca_ (bringing up the reserve).--"And even in Greece, when Greek
met Greek, the Athenians--our masters in all knowledge--were beat by the
Spartans, who held learning in contempt."

_Parson._--"Wherefore you see, Leonard, that though knowledge be power,
it is only _one_ of the powers of the world; that there are others as
strong, and often much stronger; and the assertion either means but a
barren truism, not worth so frequent a repetition, or it means something
that you would find it very difficult to prove."

_Leonard._--"One nation may be beaten by another that has more physical
strength and more military discipline; whi