an have not sympathy, there is no point of
the universe--none so wide even as the Mahomedan bridge over the
bottomless pit--where he can meet with his fellow. Such an one is indeed
floundering in the bottomless pit, with only the shadows of men ever
flitting about him.

I have mentioned elsewhere, what will well bear repetition,--that an
American merchant, who had made several voyages to China, dropped a
remark by his own fire-side on the narrowness which causes us to
conclude, avowedly or silently, that, however well men may use the
light they have, they cannot be more than nominally our brethren, unless
they have our religion, our philosophy, and our methods of attaining
both. He said he often recurred, with delight, to the conversations he
had enjoyed with his Chinese friends on some of the highest speculative,
and some of the deepest and widest practical subjects, which his
fellow-citizens of New England were apt to think could be the business
only of Protestant Christians. This American merchant's observations on
oriental morals and manners had an incalculable weight after he had said
this; for it was known that he had seen into hearts, as well as met
faces, and discovered what people's minds were busy about, as their
hands were pursuing the universal employment of earning their
subsistence.

Unless a traveller interprets by his sympathies what he sees, he cannot
but misunderstand the greater part of that which comes under his
observation. He will not be admitted with freedom into the retirements
of domestic life; the instructive commentary on all the facts of
life,--discourse,--will be of a slight and superficial character. People
will talk to him of the things they care least about, instead of seeking
his sympathy about the affairs which are deepest in their hearts. He
will be amused with public spectacles, and informed of historical and
chronological facts; but he will not be invited to weddings and
christenings; he will hear no love-tales; domestic sorrows will be kept
as secrets from him; the old folks will not pour out their stories to
him, nor the children bring him their prattle. Such a traveller will be
no more fitted to report on morals and manners than he would be to give
an account of the silver mines of Siberia by walking over the surface,
and seeing the entrance and the product.

"Human conduct," says a philosopher, "is guided by rules." Without these
rules, men could not live together, and they ar