ifferent ages will
follow. Old age will be postponed so much that men of from sixty to
seventy years of age will retain their vigour, and will not require to
ask assistance in the fashion now necessary. On the other hand, young
men of twenty-one years of age will no longer be thought mature or ready
to fulfil functions so difficult as taking a share in public affairs.
The view which I set forth in the "Nature of Man" regarding the danger
which comes from the present interference of young men in political
affairs has since then been confirmed in the most striking fashion.

It is easily intelligible that in the new conditions such modern idols
as universal suffrage, public opinion, and the _referendum_, in which
the ignorant masses are called on to decide questions which demand
varied and profound knowledge, will last no longer than the old idols.
The progress of human knowledge will bring about the replacement of such
institutions by others, in which applied morality will be controlled by
the really competent persons. I permit myself to suppose that in these
times scientific training will be much more general than it is just now,
and that it will occupy the place which it deserves in education and in
life.

Our intelligence informs us that man is capable of much, and, therefore,
we hope that he may be able to modify his own nature and transform his
disharmonies into harmonies. It is only human will that can attain this
ideal.

HUGH MILLER

The Old Red Sandstone

Hugh Miller was born in Cromarty, in the North of Scotland, October
10, 1802. From the time he was seventeen until he was thirty-four,
he worked as a common stone-mason, although devoting his leisure
hours to independent researches in natural history, for which he
formed a taste early in life. He became interested in journalism,
and was editor of the Edinburgh "Witness," when, in 1840, he
published the contents of the volume issued a year later as "The
Old Red Sandstone." The book deals with its author's most
distinctive work, namely, finding fossils that tell much of the
history of the Lower Old Red Sandstone, and fixing in the
geological scale the place to which the larger beds of remains
found in the system belong. Besides being a practical and original
geologist, Miller had a fine imaginative power, which enabled him
to reconstruct the past from its ruinous relics. The fact that