munity and the welfare of man in general. The toil of a road-mender or trench-digger, however faithfully performed, can never be as great a contribution to the welfare of his country or his kind as that of a great jurist or poet or thinker. One Edison is worth more than a million Chinese coolies to the world. A George William Curtis, dedicating his great brain and heart to the upbuilding of true political and social ideals among his countrymen, is worth more to American civilization than a hundred thousand foreign-born voters in New York, whose influence and ballot are devoted to overthrowing them. While there exists in mankind this native disparity of intellectual and moral endowment, there can be no absolute equality among men. The rewards for labor may be more equably adjusted, and manual toil receive a larger share of the world's goods and opportunities. This seems to have been in Jesus' thought also; for in his parable of the talents he who had received the ten and he who had received the five talents were promised the same reward,the joy of their Lord. But no human adjustment of compensation for labor can ever remove native differences of endowment or make one occupation equal to another in importance to mankind. Even if the social istic philosophy were to be put into practice, and, through governmental compulsion, every worker, whether with brain or hand, be equally compensated, still intellectual and moral superiority would make itself felt, and those vocations which exercised the most wide-reaching influence on human affairs would receive the greatest consideration and dignity,-would be most admired, sought after, and rewarded with social distinction. This would be the more true if those who pursued them were inspired, as they should be, by a lofty sense of moral obligation to their Creator and their kind, and, remembering that, from those who have received much, much is required, dedicated their exceptional gifts and opportunities to the service of the common brotherhood.

But all high forms of intellectual activity involve a corresponding moral endeavor. In them the human mind becomes conscious of its larger and spiritual relations, its kinship with the Eternal and Divine. This loftier exercise of the intellectual faculties in man we call Inspiration.

Inspiration is not an absolutely free gift of God, disassociated from all human effort. It presupposes not a passive and perceptive, but an active and responsive condition of the mind. These two must co-operate,the purpose of God and the will of man, the influx of the divine spirit and the open and eager mind that yearns to receive it.

In even the most usual exercise of the thinking powers the mind can act only as it is quickened from above. How much greater, then, is its obligation to divine impulses when it is concerned with the profounder problems of human investigation! The holy spirit of God is to the mind what light is to the eye. Its office is not to impart truth, but to show it; to so awaken the intelligence and kindle the moral and spiritual nature of man that he may see the truth, love the good, and do the right; that with fear and trembling he may work out his own salvation, and yet know that it is God who worketh in him to do his will and pleasure.

Inspiration comes to men in different forms, according to the character of their seeking. Moses and Gladstone are inspired to make laws, the Psalmist to pour out his soul in song, Plato and Emerson to impart wisdom, Isaiah and Wendell Phillips to utter prophecies, Luther and Channing to free the soul of man, Raphael and Mozart to breathe beauty into the sordid world, Jesus to lift it by his cross toward heaven and God. And not only these crowned spirits of the race,-every honest thought, however humble, every loving deed, every unselfish prayer, from the lowliest as well as the highest-placed among men, has its Godward side. "There are diversities of gifts, but the same spirit; . . . diversities of operations, but it is the same God who worketh all in all."

...

This implies that man must do his part, the human intelligence and will must co-operate with the Divine Purpose. Then truly the voice is heard from heaven, "Write, for my words are true and faithful," then a great conviction seizes upon each faithful servant of the Most High, whatever his gift or station; then the mind is clear, the heart enlarged, truth is seen at first hand, right is second nature, and God is all in all.

This divine inspiration is continuous and universal. It quickens the thought and

nerves the will of men to-day as truly as in ancient and Bible times. It is ours in fulness proportioned to our obedience and trust; and we may sing with grateful confidence in the Divine Presence and Communication the inspired hymn of Whittier :

"All souls that struggle and aspire,

All hearts of prayer, by thee are lit; And, dim or clear, thy tongues of fire On dusky tribes and centuries sit.

dred and sixty-nine years before the birth of Jesus; and the seventy years of his memorable life saw the political rise, the culminating glory and political fall, of his native city. These seventy years included nearly all that was most illustrious in the history of Athens,-in philosophy, in literature, in art, if not in arms.

As a boy, Socrates may have heard from their own lips the stories of Athenian soldiers who fought the Persian army at Mar

knowest;

Wide as our need thy favors fall; The white wings of the Holy Ghost Stoop, unseen, o'er the heads of all." CHARLES W. WENDTE.

Oakland, Cal.

SOCRATES: A SKETCH.

I.

It is related of Erasmus that, when he read for the first time the account of that last conversation of Socrates with his friends in prison, he exclaimed with reverent heart, "Sancte Socrates, ora pro nobis." Can we wonder that the great German critic and scholar, who had been taught from his youth to seek the intercession of the Christian saints, should in his maturer years ask for the prayers of the holy Socrates,—a man who, in purity of life, genuine religious insight, and sublimity of moral character, towered high above any medieval saint, a man whom a vast majority of those best qualified to judge deem one of the three greatest moral teachers of the race? The illustrious philosopher of India, who voluntarily renounced the throne and the wealth of his ancestors, that he might devote a life of poverty and meditation to the good of his fellowmen; the divine teacher of Palestine, rising above the narrow prejudices of his age, and giving the years of his majority, and finally his life, to impress upon mankind the single, simple, sweet doctrine of love,-for he taught absolutely nothing else (love to God and love to man), these two, among all the sons of men, are alone worthy to take rank, as moral teachers, with the Athenian sage.

Socrates was born at Athens, of pure Athenian blood, about seven or eight years after the death of Buddha and four hun

sailors who sank the Persian fleet at Salamis. As a boy, he may have attended the public games of Greece, and listened, with a boy's enthusiasm, while Herodotus read to the assembled thousands the pages of that great history which after the lapse of more than twenty-three centuries have not lost their interest or their charm. He may have been acquainted with Thucydides, the historian, and conversed with the Theban Pindar. He was contemporary with all the great tragic and comic poets of Greece whose works have come down to us,-Eschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Aristophanes. Often in the early morning, before sunrise, as was the custom at Athens, he had joined the vast throng of citizens on their way to the great Dionysian theatre, and laughed there at the keen personal wit of the Clouds, wept at the touching pathos of the Antigone, and been moved to horror as he saw represented on the immortal stage the sufferings of Prometheus and the awful fate which followed the house of Edipus.

He was in his prime during the entire administration of Pericles, when, with the revenues of tributary provinces and cities, that great statesman erected at Athens those magnificent public edifices which have been the admiration and despair of all succeeding architects. He watched the building of that magnificent Propylæa which guarded and crowned the passage-way to the Acropolis. He saw the formless blocks of Pentelic marble as they slowly grew, month by month and year by year, into the matchless proportions, harmonious beauty, and loveliness of the perfected Parthenon. From youth to old age he saw the busy workmen engaged upon that mighty temple of Olympian Zeus-never completed-whose solitary columns still stand upon the plain of Athens,-silent and solemn mementos of a

glorious past. Often he may have visited the Acropolis, and discussed high questions of philosophy and politics with Pericles and Aspasia, and perhaps Theodota, while, seated together, they watched the workmen of Phidias, as, under the direction of that great artist, they erected of ivory and gold, upon the highest point of the Acropolis, that colossal statue of Athene, one of the wonders of the world, whose golden helmet and brazen spear borne aloft, reflecting the rays of the rising sun, were a beacon light and guide to the watching sailor far out at

sea.

When we look upon the map of Attica, we realize at once the insignificant extent of Athenian territory; and I have stated the foregoing facts to impress upon the mind, what it is hard to realize, that the great names of Athens and the triumphs of Athenian genius, which have had such a marvellous influence upon the human mind during all the succeeding ages, were crowded into a period of time almost as insignificant, -into the threescore and ten years which rounded the life of Socrates.

Socrates was the son of a stone-cutter, and followed that trade of his father until he was forty years of age; and Pausanias tells us that in the second century he saw upon the Acropolis a statue of the Three Graces, and that not only its inscription, but the tradition of more than six hundred years, ascribed the work to the hand of Socrates. During most of his life Athens, his native city, was engaged in war,-either with Persia, with Sparta, or with the petty States and tribes of Greece. The Peloponnesian War, continuing more than twenty years, and in the end so disastrous to Athens and all Greece, occurred during his manhood. Socrates, like all other citizens, took his turn in the army; and many stories and anecdotes are told of his endurance, his courage and magnanimity as a soldier. As a soldier, he was remarkably healthy. He was never recorded as sick in hospital just before a battle, thus laying the foundation for a successful pension claim. As a soldier, he was never absent from a post of duty and never deserted a post of danger. Tradition says that, however perilous the risk or the danger, he never failed to fly to the succor of a weak or wounded comrade At the fatal battle of Delium, when the

Athenian army had fled from the field in utter and disastrous rout, Socrates, unmoved by the panic, calmly took the youthful Alcibiades-who was too frightened to fly-upon his broad shoulders, and carried him to a place of safety, outdoing in unselfish bravery and courage the pious hero of Virgil, who bore his aged father upon his shoulders from burning Troy.

When the remnants of the Athenian army met, after the battle, to determine to whom should be awarded the prize of valor, by unanimous vote it was conferred upon Socrates; but he declined to accept it, and insisted that it should be conferred upon the handsome and brilliant but frightened youth whom he had carried from the field. Alcibiades afterward became one of the most popular and influential citizens of Athens, and the Symposium of Plato records his estimation of that noble friendship of one who was ready to save the life of another at the risk of his own. We are accustomed to think of Socrates as a philosopher merely he was more,-at least he was not one of those philosophers safely ensconced in his quiet and comfortable library, -shy of too much sunlight and drafts of air; lolling in slippers and dressing-gown; valiantly "fighting with his mouth," and urging others forward to the "imminent deadly breach," to "the rough edge of battle where it joins." He was, rather, like the brave and generous Zwingle, most heroic and lovable of the German reformers, whose glory it was that he died upon the field of battle in defence of his country and of civil and intellectual freedom. Or, rather, like Theodore Parker,-most heroic of American preachers, who, when the minions of Slavery attempted to steal a poor colored woman from his congregation, inspired by his generous impulses and by the sight of the old musket hanging upon his study wall, which his father had borne at Lexington and Bunker Hill, armed himself, and was prepared to take life, if necessary, in defence of the poor slave woman.

Twice during his life Socrates held office in his native city. On one occasion, when he was presiding at a public assembly of the citizens, who, wild with rage, were de manding that generals who, without fault, had lost a battle should be put to death, Socrates at the peril of his life refused to

put the motion, and, bidding defiance to the raging mob, declared that he would sooner die himself than have any part in the destruction of those innocent men. On another occasion, when the Thirty Tyrants, who were as omnipotent at Athens as were Robespierre and Danton at Paris during the Reign of Terror, ordered him and five others to go to an island in the Ægean and bring to Athens an innocent citizen, that they might confiscate his property and take his life, Socrates alone refused to obey, and declared that no power in the State could compel him to do an act of injustice. Thus, twenty-three centuries before William H. Seward made his famous declaration, Socrates had declared that there is a "Higher Law" even than the laws of our country. W. D. HARRIMAN.

Ann Arbor, Mich.

THE MISSION OF HUMOR.*

The subject of humor is not lacking in elements of seriousness,—a conclusion which one might indeed arrive at from perusal of some of the alleged comicalities in current journals, but which is also to be deduced from consideration of the part it really plays in life.

As an incitement to mirth, it is its "own excuse for being"; but this is not the end of its mission. It serves a profoundly useful purpose in the economy of existence. Philosopher, moralist, and preacher may regard it as worthy of study. It is a striking characteristic of advanced mental and moral development, and it is never discovered in perfection save in connection with humane, generous, and religious individuality. Ideas which have hung a weary and dragging weight on mankind's shoulders, superstitions, baleful beliefs, have been destroyed by humor. Humor is the sunshine of life, which illuminates, warms, invigorates, and supplies the condition of healthy growth. Laughter restores worn tissues, calms tired nerves, places the entire physical system in harmonious relations with all that is good and wholesome in its surroundings. Laughter is the ripple on the water, the shine on the green leaves, the wave on the meadow grass, the gleam and dance of the sunbeam.

Abstract of a lecture given in Iowa City, Ia., February, 1893.

As these tell of forces tender, genial, and beautiful in nature, so laughter reports an innate kindliness, gentle heartedness, and sympathy in the human soul.

"How much lies in laughter!" says Carlyle: "it is the cipher-key wherewith we decipher the whole man. The man who cannot laugh is not only fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils, but his whole life is already a treason and a stratagem." And to somewhat similar purport Emerson says: rogue alive to the ludicrous is still convertible. If that sense is lost his fellow-men can do little for him."

"A

The sense of humor is a necessary and important factor in mental development. Man's wonderful intellectual endowments, his genius for observation, his faculty for serious study and deep reflection, his intense sympathy, would lead to morbid conditions of mind far oftener than now if the most serious toil and mental strain were not lightened by this divinely provided antidote and tonic. The person of great parts, high motives, and earnest conscience, is to be commiserated, if he has been denied a capacity for appreciating and entering into the enjoyment of humor. Affectation of humor fails. Humor is not a veneer, but a gift, like any other true attribute of the soul. Artificiality makes it an unpleasant parody. Some truly great men have failed to appreciate humor; but, in general, insensibility to humor indicates a nature not quite full, rounded. Life's work is heavier, thorns, stones, and tempests more frequent, even to great men, when the grand passion for right, justice, and mercy lacks capacity for full, free, and innocent merriment.

Quick apprehension of humor is one of the best guides one can have in the matter of sensible conduct. People who are lacking in this respect often say and do things very innocently which expose them to ridicule. Learning and even genius, when unattended by humor, are not sufficient to carry the individual with perfect equipoise through life.

There is no civilized calling that is lacking in humorous material, none that is not lightened and cheered by the genial influence of humor. The laborer has his jokes and pranks, and they are not always coarse ones,—and these help sustain the tired arms and weary bodies through many a dull and

heavy day. Ministers, lawyers, doctors, statesmen, authors, have each well-filled volumes in the library of wit. The more serious the occupation, the more appreciative those engaged in it are apt to be of that sentiment which volatilizes thought by processes which fill the whole being with delight. Humor is at once amusement and mental discipline, recreation, and education. Let a party of divines meet after dinner, and the roof will ring with their laughter; and they will do better work in parish and study for such mirthful interlude. The habitual occupation of clergymen with grave themes, and their frequent contact with the pathetic side of life in the course of pastoral work, make the perception of the humorous a gift of very great value to the preservation of cheerful and healthy temperament. And the quite general possession of the gift by members of this profession may be regarded as an instance of the wise adjustment by Providence of qualifications for specific ends. Quaint and odd gleams of humor are always falling upon a clergyman's path within the circle of his duties and he grows after a time to have a very keen scent for a jeu d'esprit, pun, or pleasantry of any sort. It is a poor parish that has not among its members a Mrs. Partington or a Mrs. Malaprop, with a mission for stirring the risibilities of the tired minister, and providing him with material for many a quiet chuckle. A poor parish, too, that has not its "original," either male or female, generally the former, whose words and ways, shrewdly, dryly humorous, are a never-failing source of amusement. Then there are the children,-involuntary cause of no end of merriment by their perfectly innocent yet exceedingly funny sayings and doings. When you add to all these sources of humor the unfailing source which exists in the denominational peculiarities of religious people, it will be seen that Providence has been very kind to the clergy, and the existence of "a funny column" in every religious paper will be fully explained. Professional humor is often heartless. Seeking only a laugh, it often jests at sacred things, at that which should excite tears, not laughter. The true interpreter of the humorous must be a person of soul, must feel for human nature, be touched by its profound pathos, before his art or talent can do its best. This moral quality gives the

glow of golden splendor to the pages of the great American humorists' work. Their humor is like the shining of the autumn sun, soft, mellow, genial, and natural.

This is an age of profound problems, of questioning, doubt, uncertainty; of cynics and pessimists, with scornful and despairing creeds. What will help most to solve these weighty matters? A cheerful, hopeful disposition, that can reflect back the sunshine when it appears, though never so many days be cloudy. It is Mark Tapley's jollity, brave, good humor and honest gay ety, which mount higher as life's difficulties rise,-which heartens one for sober work. Gloom saps the energies, and leads to nerveless despondency. Capacity for mirth and laughter, and a temper generous in giving it expression, are an antidote against discouragement, and the promise of such persistent and dauntless wrestling with difficulties as must, in the end, conquer them.

Iowa City, Ia.

CHARLES E. PERKINS.

AT THE DAWNING OF THE MORNING.

At the dawning of the morning,
At the rising of the sun,
All things wear an added splendor;
For the victory is won.
Night and darkness have no power
At the coming of the day:
They endure but for an hour,

Then they fade and pass away.
At the dawning of the morning,

At the passing of the night,
Things will have a different meaning,
As we see with clearer sight.
Paths we travelled in the darkness,
Viewed in the clear light of day,
Will be full of light and beauty

When the night has passed away.

At the dawning of the morning
Puzzling things will be made clear;
Joy will take the place of sorrow,
Love will cast away all fear.
Darkened shadows cannot linger
At the coming of the day:
Light and love will win the victory,
And the night will pass away.
MAUD L. COTTON.

Bemis Heights, N.Y.

There are glimpses of heaven granted to us by every act or thought or word which raises us above ourselves.-Dean Stanley.