to life what Newton's law is to astronomy. Sometimes men have a knowledge of it with regard to the world in general: they do not expect the outer world to agree with them in all points, but are vexed at not being able to drive their own tastes and opinions into those they live with. Diversities distress them. They will not see that there are many forms of virtue and wisdom. Yet we might as well say, "Why all these stars? Why this difference? Why not all one star?" * * * Many of the rules for people living together in peace follow from the above. For instance, not to interfere unreasonably with others, not to ridicule their tastes, not to question and requestion their resolves, not to indulge in perpetual comment on their proceedings, and to delight in their having other pursuits than ours, are all based upon a thorough perception of the simple fact that they are not we. The number of people who have taken out judges' patents for themselves is very large in any society. Now, it would be hard for a man to live with another who was always criticizing his actions, even if it were kindly and just criticism. It would be like living between the glasses of a microscope. But these self-elected judges, like their prototypes, are very apt to have the persons they judge brought before them in the guise of culprits. One of the most provoking forms of the criticism above alluded to is that which may be called criticism over the shoulder. "Had I been consulted," "Had you listened to me," "But you always will," and such short scraps of sentences, may remind many of us of dissertations which we have suffered and inflicted, and of which we cannot call to mind any soothing effect. Another rule is, not to let familiarity swallow up all courtesy. Many of us have a habit of saying to those with whom we live such things as we say about strangers behind their backs. There is no place, however, where real politeness is of more value than where we mostly think it would be superfluous. You may say more truth, or, rather, speak out more plainly, to your associates, but not less courteously than you do to strangers. ADVANTAGES OF FOREIGN TRAVEL. This, then, is one of the advantages of travel, that we come upon new ground, which we tread lightly, which is free from associations that claim too deep and constant an interest from us; and, not resting long in any one place, but travelling onwards, we maintain that desirable lightness of mind: we are spectators, having for the time no duties, no ties, no associations, no responsibilities; nothing to do but to look on, and look fairly. Another of the great advantages of travel lies in what you learn from your companions; not merely from those you set out with, or so much i from them as from those whom you are thrown together with on the journey. I reckon this advantage to be so great, that I should be inclined to say that you often get more from your companions in travel than from all you come to see. People imagine they are not known, and that they shall never meet again with the same company, which is very likely so; they are free for the time from the trammels of their business, profession, or calling; the marks of the harness begin to wear out; and, altogether, they talk more like men than slaves with their several functions hanging like collars round their necks. An ordinary man on travel will sometimes talk like a great imaginative man at home, for such are never utterly enslaved by their functions. Then the diversities of character you meet with instruct and delight you. The variety in language, dress, behavior, religious ceremonies, mode of life, amusements, arts, climate, government, lays hold of your attention and takes you out of the wheel-tracks of your everyday cares. He must, indeed, be either an angel of constancy and perseverance, or a wonderfully obtuse Caliban of a man, who, amidst all this change, can maintain his private griefs or vexations exactly in the same place they held in his heart while he was packing for his journey. The change of language is alone a great delight. You pass along, living only with gentlemen and scholars; for you rarely detect what is vulgar or inept in the talk around you. Children's talk in another language is not childish to you; and, indeed, every thing is literature, from the announcement at a railway-station to the advertisements in a newspaper. Read the Bible in another tongue, and you will perhaps find a beauty in it you have not thoroughly appreciated for years before. ROBERT BROWNING, 1812 IN no book that pretends to represent the literature of England of the nineteenth century should the name of Robert Browning be omitted. He was born in 1812, in Camberwell, a suburb of London, and was educated at the London University. The drama of Paracelsus, published in 1836, first brought him into notice. This was followed, in 1837, by Strafford, an Historical Tragedy; and this by Sordello, in 1840. From 1842 to 1846 he published a series of poems, entitled Bells and Pomegranates. In 1846 he was married to the celebrated poetess, Miss Elizabeth Barrett. In 1850 he published Christmas Eve, Easter-Day, and Pippa Passes; in 1855, Men and Women, a collection of miscellaneous poems; and in 1864, Dramatis Persona. After his marriage, Mr. 1 A sympathetic critic says that these poems, "for depth and subtlety of conception, profound analysis of the human mind in its most delicate and impassioned conditions, and abstract speculative insight, are unsurpassed in the English language."-CHAMBERS'S Eng. Lit. Browning resided principally at Florence; but upon the death of his wife he returned to London, where he now lives. Mr. Browning is a highly-finished scholar, and, besides poetry, has specialy cultivated the arts of music and painting, in which he is said to excel. That he is also a genuine poet we would not deny; but most of his poetry is of a claracter so exceedingly subtle and abstruse that it never can become popular. It has been said in his praise-if it be praise-that he writes only for "the intellectual few." But infinitely better does it seem to us so to write as to please. delight, and instruct the great mass of men and women, as Shakspeare and Milton and Pope1 and Cowper and Goldsmith and Campbell have done, that to be the author of thousands of such works as Sordello or the Dramatis Personal The one is like a fitful blaze, that flares up suddenly in a small circle, and soon | disappears; the others, like a bright and steady light, that throws its benignant rays around the horizon, shining on and on through successive ages: the one will be read and praised, temporarily, by a few, and then pass into comparative neglect and forgetfulness; the others will continue to give profit and delight to millions, through all time, wherever the English language is known. PARACELSUS ON HIS DEATH-BED3 SCENE:-A cell in the Hospital of St. Sebastian, at Salzburg, 1541. CHARACTERS :— Aurcola, Fest. No change! The weary night is wellnigh spent, 1"Since Pope and plain sense went out, and the last volume which he has published is per Shelley and the seventh heaven came in."-haps richer than any that have preceded it is CHARLES KINGSLEY. 2 To me (and it may be from my own obtuseness) much of Mr. Browning's poetry is altogether unintelligible; his meaning and aims seeming like Gratiano's reasons,-“ as two grains of wheat hid in two bushels of chaff: you shall seek all day ere you find them, and, when you have found them, they are not worth the search." In this my opinion long ago entertained, I am glad to be fortified by an admirable article in the Edinburgh Review of October, 1864, of which I will quote a few lines:-"The age now appears to be ripe for some Theory of the Obscure, which, like Pope's famous Treatise on Bathos, or the Art of Sinking in Poetry, might be copiously llustrated from the works of contemporary poets, and afford at least a warning to the young aspirant for the honors of verse. For such a book, Mr. Browning's volumes would form an inexhaustible mine of examples; and materials for such a purpose." Again:- It was said of an eminent lawyer that he wrote his opinions in three different kinds of handwriting, one which he and his clerk could read, another which only he himself could decipher, and a third which neither he tor anybody else could make out; and into similar categories are we compelled to parcel out the poems of the Dramatis Persona of Mr. Brown ing." Read that fine piece upon The T Prophets, by Horatius Bonar, page 693. 8 The moral thesis of Paracelsus (and this is to us the most readable of all Mr. Browning's works) seems to be the story of one starting out in life in the eager pursuit after know ledge. But the hero of the poem learns, by the defeat of his plans and the disappointment of his hopes, that the perfect man is not al head, that heart is absolutely necessary, and that there can be no true happiness without endeavoring to make others happy. My Aureole!-my forgotten, ruin'd Aureole! The days are gone, are gone! How grand thou wert: Could turn God's image to a livid thing. From the dying man: my brain swam, my throat swell'd, They told me how, when first brought here, he seem'd Thus striving to keep up his shatter'd strength, Until they bore him to this stifling cell: When straight his features fell,-an hour made white The flush'd face and relax'd the quivering limb; As though it recognized the tomb-like place; Ay, here! Here is earth's noblest, nobly garlanded,— Whom other men press round and kneel before,— Amid our pomps and glories: see it here! Behold earth's paragon! Now, raise thee, clay! God! Thou art Love! I build my faith on that! So doth thy right hand guide us through the world How has he sinn'd? How else should he have done? As to forget awhile its proper end. Dost thou well, Lord? Thou canst not but prefer Save him, dear God; it will be like thee: bathe him In light and life! Thou art not made like us; Fest. * * I will; I am come here To stay with you,-Festus, you loved of old; * * * Par. Festus, my own friend, you are come at last? * * Fest. -*- * * * Weli And the good boat speeds through the brightening weather. Which last is Death's affair; and, while I speak, With power; and, while my foot is on the threshold All preparations not complete within, I turn new knowledge upon old events, One day. Wait, Festus! You will die like me! CHARLES DICKENS, 1812-170 Or all the novelists of the nineteenth century (and if of the nineteenth, of a centuries), Charles Dickens, in point of genius, is unquestionably the greatest. He was born at Landport, Hampshire, February 7, 1812. His father, John |