object to accomplish; but if there is any vocation or pursuit in which gradual, slow-coach processes are scouted with peculiar de station, it is that of acquiring riches. Especially is this true at the present day, when fortunes are continually changing hands, and men are so often, by a lucky turn of the wheel, lifted from the lowest depths of poverty to the loftiest pinnacle of wealth and affluence. Exceptional persons there are, who are content with slow gains-willing to accumulate riches by adding penny to penny, dollar to dollar; but the mass of business men are too apt to despise such a tedious, laborious ascent of the steep of fortune, and to rush headlong into schemes for the sudden acquisition of wealth. Hence honorable labor is too often despised; a man of parts is expected to be above hard work. There is, with a great majority of men, a want of constancy in whatever plans they undertake. They toil as though they doubted that life had earnest and decided pathways; as though there was no compass but the shifting winds, with each of which they must change their course. Thus they beat about on the ocean of time, but never cross it, to rest on delightful islands or mainlands. Despair. No calamity can produce such paralysis of the mind as despair. It is the cap stone of the climax of human anguish. The mental powers are frozen with indiffer ence, the heart becomes ossified with melancholy, the soul is shrouded in a cloud of gloom. No words of consolation, no cheerful repartee, can break the deathlike calm; no love can warm the pent-up heart; no sunbeams dispel the dark clouds. Time may effect a change; death will break the monotony. We can extend our kindness, but cannot relieve the victim. We may trace the causes of this awful disease; God only can effect a cure. We may speculate upon its nature, but cannot feel its force until its iron hand is laid upon us. We may call it weakness, but cannot prove or demonstrate the proposition. We may call it folly, but can point to no frivolity to sustain our position. We may call it madness, but can discover no maniac actions. We may call it stubbornness, but can see no exhibitions of indocility. We may call it lunacy, but cannot perceive the incoherences of that unfortunate condition. We can call it, properly, nothing but dark, gloomy despair, an undefined and undefinable paralyzation of all the sensibilities that render a man happy, and capable of imparting happiness to those around him. It is a state of torpid dormacy, rather than a mental derangement of the cerebral organs. Me miserable! which way shall I fly Which way I fly is hell; myself am hell? To which the hell I suffer seems a heaven. -Milton. It is induced by a false estimate of things, and of the dispensations and government of the God of mercy. Disappointments, losses, severe and continued afflictions, sudden transition from wealth to poverty, the death of dear friends, may cast a gloom over the mind that does not correctly comprehend the great first cause, and see the hand of God in every thing, and produce a state of despair, because these things are viewed in a false mirror. Fanaticism in religious meetings has produced the most obstinate and melancholy cases of despair that have come under my own observation. Intelligence, chastened by religion, are the surest safeguards against this state of misery; ignorance and vice are its greatest promoters. Despair is the destruction of all hope, the deathless sting that refines the torment of the finally impenetent and lost. It is that undying worm, that unquenchable fire, so graphically described in holy writ. Remember this, that God always helps those that help themselves, that he never forsakes those who are good and true, and that he heareth even the young r. vens when they cry. Moreover, remember too, that come what may, we must never give up in life's battle, but press onward to the end, always keeping in mind the words -NEVER DESPAIR. Despair is the death of the soul. If we will sympa. thize with God's system of salvation, there is no occa sion for despondency or a feeling of condemnation, as we discover our defects from time to time; but, on the other hand, of cheerful hopefulness, and confidence of this very thing, that "He who hath begun a good work in us will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ" Stepping Stones. STEPPING STONES are advantages, auxiliaries, power. etc., and these are attained in no other way than through personal experiences. Our trials of life strengthen us; discouragements, disappointments, misfortunes, failures, adversities, and calamities, are all stepping stones for us; each successive victory raises us higher in strength and power. It is through trials that stout hearts are made. It is through adversities that our patience and courage are increased. Men are frequently like tea-the real strength and goodness is not properly drawn out of them till they have been a short time in hot water. The ripest fruit grows on the roughest wall. It is the small wheels of the carriage that come in first. The man who holds the ladder at the bottom is frequently of more service than he who is stationed at the top of it. The turtle, though brought in at a rear gate, takes the head of the table. "Better to be the cat in the philanthropist's family than a mutton pie at a king's banquet." He who bears adversity well gives the best evidence that he will not be spoiled by prosperity. It has been truly remarked that many a man, in losing his fortune, has found himself. Adversity flattereth no man. Oft from apparent ills our blessings rise. Who never fasts, no banquet e'er enjoys. Adversity exasperates fools, dejects cowards, draws out the faculties of the wise and industrious, puts the modest to the necessity of trying their skill, awes the opulent, and makes the idle industrious. Many a promising reputation has been destroyed by early success. It is far from being true, in the progress of knowledge, that after every failure we must recommence from the beginning. Every failure is a step to success; every detection of what is false directs us toward what is true; every trial exhausts some tempting form of error. Not only so, but scarcely any attempt is entirely a failure; scarcely any theory, the result of steady thought, is altogether false; no tempting form of error is without some latent charm derived from truth. Doubtless a deeper feeling of individual responsibility, and a better adaptation of talent to its fields of labor, are necessary to bring about a better state of society, and a better condition for the individual members of it. But with the most careful adaptation of talent and means to pursuits, no man can succeed, as a general principle, who has not a fixed and resolute purpose in his mind, and an unwavering faith that he can carry that purpose out. Man is born a hero, and it is only by darkness and storms that heroism gains its greatest and best develop. |