presence will surround you at all times, and whose blessing, "even length of days and life forevermore," will consecrate and reward your obedience to his perfect laws.

"So live, that when the summons comes to join
The innumerable caravan that moves

To the pale realms of shade, where each shall take
His chamber in the silent halls of death,

Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night,
Chained, to his dungeon; but, sustained and soothed
By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave
Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch
About him, and lies down to pleasing dreams,"

CHAPTER V.

FORMATION AND DEVELOPEMENT OF CHARACTER.

1. THE formation of character, from its incipient manifestation, through all its various stages of progressive advancement, to the period when death affixes its final seal to the record of human life, is subject to so many and such diversified influences, that any attempt minutely to trace its progress, or accurately to define the principles by which it may be regulated, must prove futile. Where the elements of mental and moral developement are inexhaustible, their arrangement in those infinitely varied combinations which make the character of each individual of the race so essentially to differ from that of every other, can be regarded neither with wonder nor surprise. It is a part of that stupendous and beautiful system of perfect adaptation and boundless wisdom which prevails throughout the universe, as well of matter as of mind; and while it effectually precludes analysis, impresses upon us the important conviction—a conviction which, amid the depressing scenes of time and sense, we are too often in danger of losing—that to each one of us is committed a peculiar destiny, which we are to work out for ourselves alone. While we cannot hope so to combine or to arrange the materials of mental growth and progress, which lie scattered in such boundless profusion around us, as to discover all their peculiar adaptations in the wonderful and mysterious fabric of existence, we may, perhaps, attain to some conception, however inadequate, of the solemn responsibility involved in the daily and hourly discharge of the

duties appertaining to human life; of the worth and intrinsic value of the soul, its powers, capabilities, origin, and destination; and the nature of that preparatory discipline, to which, in its present stage of being, it is, in the order of Providence, subjected.

2. From the cradle to the grave, the elements both of the physical and the moral world, which constantly surround us, are perpetually undergoing transmutation and change. Like the ample volume of the atmosphere, which presses upon us with an equal weight on every hand, those particles which are present, with an all-pervading influence, at one moment, are instantaneously succeeded by others in their turn; while the former have rushed onwards with an undiminished current to permeate the broad surface of humanity. Not unfrequently, the most apparently trifling events are fraught with the most momentous issues to the determination of character, as well as to the fortunes of individuals and the welfare of society. So finely spun is the web of human destiny, so interwoven and interlaced in endless diversities of combination, that nothing visible or audible, occurring in the wide expanse of nature and of art, can be said to be wholly without influence upon even its most casual observer. That overruling Providence, without whose special ordinance and note "not a sparrow falleth to the ground," in its supervision of the boundless universe, so adjusts the harmonious play of myriads of worlds and of systems, with their infinity of existences, to the apparently fleeting interests of time, and the most apparently trifling concerns of individuals, that "even the very hairs of our head are numbered;" and those occurrences which, in our ignorance and our weakness, we are accustomed to deem the merest chances of the passing hour, are dependent upon principles and subjected to laws as invariable and unchanging as are those by which the "stars in their courses "fulfil their appointed rounds.

If we will consent to pause in our thoughtless and careless career sufficiently long to apprehend the solemn and deeply interesting truth, shall we not find reason to believe that, at every instant of our lives, we are encompassed by innumerable agents, seen and unseen, silently weaving the thread of our destiny, and imperceptibly directing the current of our fate? Shall we not be convinced that, while the vast operations of creative wisdom and goodness are guided and directed with a view to the grand results of the combined whole, yet that no incident is permitted to occur within the range of our ! individual perception, which has not its special mission for us, and which does not, in some manner, immediately or remotely, affect our interests and well-being? In a word, shall we not find that we are surrounded with solemn, but eventful mysteries, moving among scenes and associations of momentous import to our destiny, and daily and hourly shaping the character of an existence which is to know no termination?

"Millions of spiritual beings walk the earth

Unseen, both when we sleep and when we wake."

3. Whoever is accustomed to even an occasional process of self-examination cannot fail to have been conscious of the presence of powerful influences, which, from time to time, have affected his mind and swayed his actions, and given a more or less permanent hue to his character-influences, perhaps, which, "come like shadows, so depart," from the world of imagination, from the regions of the ideal, from the variegated and changing face of Nature, in her agitation and repose, her sublimity and her beauty; often too subtile to be detected and fixed in the mind, or to be recalled or traced to their source, and yet imbibed as a constituent portion of that mental and moral aliment upon which the soul exists, and from which, by its own intrinsic power, it derives the elements of progress and of growth. If, therefore, we would investigate those

elements of character which are best adapted to the harmonious developement of all the various faculties of our nature, if we would direct the future pilgrim of humanity in that straight and narrow path which leads to life, and pleasantness, and peace,- -we must descend at once to the deep fountains of the soul, and penetrate, so far as we may, through the aid of revelation and a sound philosophy, into the sources of human motive and conduct-the invariable well-spring of character and destiny. That mental culture which has been formed and is maturing upon foundations less solid, deep, and durable, than those which underlie the entire surface of humanity, is destitute of those elements of power, of expansion, and of strength, which are requisite to the perfect developement of the faculties with which every intelligent and responsible being has been endowed. Perfection or perfectibility has been written, in legible characters, on every emanation of creative wisdom and power; and we are not, for a moment, to indulge the idea that, in its greatest work, the birth of humanity in the image and with the benediction of its Author, a work designed to survive the catastrophe of the universe, and to exist when time itself shall be no longer, any insuperable obstacle has been interposed to the ultimate attainment of the highest objects of intellectual, moral, and immortal being.

4. The earliest and most enduring foundations of character are laid in the unrestrained intercourse of the family circle, and in the institutions for elementary instruction. The ideals of excellence and the motives for exertion are first conceived from the lessons and the examples of home; and, whatever may be the tendency of the influence thus exerted, it is so far permanent, that nothing less than a complete revolution in character, effected by years of counteracting impressions, and the slow process and painful results of