s and gifts, and beckoning him up to their
thrones. On the instant, and incessantly, fall snow-storms of illusions.
He fancies himself in a vast crowd which sways this way and that, and
whose movement and doings he must obey: he fancies himself poor, orphaned,
insignificant. The mad crowd drives hither and thither, now furiously
commanding this thing to be done, now that. What is he that he should
resist their will, and think or act for himself? Every moment, new
changes, and new showers of deceptions, to baffle and distract him. And
when, by-and-by, for an instant, the air clears, and the cloud lifts a
little, there are the gods still sitting around him on their thrones--they
alone with him alone.

FATE[16]

Delicate omens traced in air
To the lone bard true witness bare;
Birds with auguries on their wings
Chanted undeceiving things,
Him to beckon, him to warn;
Well might then the poet scorn
To learn of scribe or courier
Hints writ in vaster character;
And on his mind, at dawn of day,
Soft shadows of the evening lay.
For the prevision is allied
Unto the thing so signified;
Or say, the foresight that awaits
Is the same Genius that creates.

It chanced during one winter, a few years ago, that our critics were bent
on discussing the theory of the Age. By an odd coincidence, four or five
noted men were each reading a discourse to the citizens of Boston or New
York, on the Spirit of the Times. It so happened that the subject had the
same prominence in some remarkable pamphlets and journals issued in London
in the same season. To me, however, the question of the times resolved
itself into a practical question of the conduct of life. How shall I live?
We are incompetent to solve the times. Our geometry cannot span the huge
orbits of the prevailing ideas, behold their return, and reconcile their
opposition. We can only obey our own polarity. 'Tis fine for us to
speculate and elect our course, if we must accept an irresistible
dictation.

In our first steps to gain our wishes, we come upon immovable limitations.
We are fired with the hope to reform men. After many experiments, we find
that we must begin earlier--at school. But the boys and girls are not
docile; we can make nothing of them. We decide that they are not of good
stock. We must begin our reform earlier still--at generation: that is to
say, there is Fate, or laws of the world.

But, if there be irresistible dictation, this