How precious a thing is youthful energy! if only it could be preserved entirely englobed, as it were, within the bosom of the young adventurer, till he can come and offer it forth a sacred emanation in yonder temple of truth and virtue. But, alas! all along as he goes towards it, he advances through an avenue, formed by a long line of tempters and demons on each side, all prompt to touch him with their conductors, and draw the divine electric element with which he is charged away. JOHN FOSTER.

AND, surely, if the purpose be in good earnest not to write at leisure that which men may read at leisure, but really to instruct and suborn action and active life, these Georgics of the Mind, concerning the husbandry and tillage thereof, are no less worthy than the heroical descriptions of virtue, duty, and felicity. Wherefore the main and primitive division of moral knowledge seemeth to be into the Exemplar or Platform of Good, and the Regiment or Culture of the Mind; the one describing the nature of Good, the other prescribing rules how to subdue, apply, and accommodate the will of man thereunto. LORD BACON. Adv. of Learning.

CHAPTER XVI.

Reduplication of Character-Return of Action into the strength of principles-Restrictions on the law of seeds and of reproduction in morals-The seed-time of sensibility and passion-Necessity of living roots for the permanence of good habits.

THE analogy between the verdant fulness, exuberance, and activities of Summer, and the active development of our intelligent and moral being, is exceedingly impressive. Seeds are not only an illustration of the germs of character, but character likewise returns upon itself. If the Earth were one vast forest from the progress of a Banyan Tree, this mighty spectacle would be but a faint image of the manner in which the branches of character return into the parent soil, and take new root there, and spring up into new trees, that again shoot back their branches for new roots, thence to rise into new trunks and foliage, till the man becomes his own wilderness, aud wanders every where beneath the shadow of his own being:

"A pillar'd shade, and echoing walks between!"

So character reduplicates itself. First, the principles form the actions and the habits, then the actions and the habits themselves form new principles. Every action becomes in its turn a

germ, a seed, a governing power of other action. Thus, in today for ever walks to-morrow-to-day is the promise, and to a vast extent the regent, of to-morrow; for not only as a man thinks and acts to-day is he likely to think and act to-morrow, but he sets causes at work to-day that must operate to-morrow, and he drops germs of feeling and of habit into the furrows of life to-day, which will be developed to-morrow. Thus character, by action, forms character, reproduces it, and gathers strength, and is renewed; and thus intercourse with others, from being at first the simple development of seeds, principles, germs, laws, within, reacts still more powerfully from without, and gives new laws, and works new forms, and communicates new life and energy to opinion, emotion, and habit.

Just here it is, that one of the most extraordinary analogies is to be traced between the goings on of life in developing and developed plants, and the opening and concentrating activities of our own immortal being, our tendencies consolidating into habits. We are told, as the result of deepest scrutiny into the mysteries of life and character in plants, that the changes of sap, by which they acquire their peculiar and distinctive qualities, take place chiefly in the leaves; and also that the effect is to the greatest extent produced by the combined agency of light and air. Until the leaves are formed, the sap seems to rise and fall in the tree, according to the state of the weather, as the temperature of the surrounding atmosphere may affect it. But as soon as the plant has expanded its leaves, the sap flows regularly towards them, and is so firmly held by them, or changed and concentrated in returning from them, that the plant ceases to bleed when incisions are made.*

* Sacred Philosophy of the Seasons.-Duncan.

How very striking and solemn are the analogy and the lesson from this, in regard to the active habits of the soul, and the intercourse of our being in society. That fastens our principles, steadies them, either for good or evil, even if they have been unsteady or undecided before. For as a man acts, so is he, though he may have been so vacillating in his thoughts, that he could hardly tell whether they had assumed any definite and settled form or color. But action and social intercourse soon settle them, of whatever nature they may be. And, after a certain time, the Sap in us, the vital quality and character, is determined by our actions, manners, words, which are, indeed, our leaves, and the laws of life and character are held and governed by them, instead of governing them.

It is during the transmission of the sap through the leaves that what remains in the plant, what constitutes its growing and consolidated substance, receives its peculiar consistence, color, odor, and taste. A process of perspiration through the leaves goes on, by which the superfluous watery particles of the sap are thrown off, while that which goes to the food, substance, and habit of the plant, is secreted and retained. It has been found by actual experiment that a single sprig of mint, weighing only twenty-seven grains, gained in seventy seven days, fifteen grains in weight. In that time it had imbibed 2,558 grains of water, and consequently had thrown off 2,543 grains. The 15 grains of increased weight in the growing substance of the plant, were the results of this arrangement, and of the other vegetative processes.

There is in human life, and in the growth of the mind, a similar law and arrangement, by which our habits of action, and our intercourse with others, react upon our inward being, pro

ducing a permanent increased weight and coloring of character, of one kind or another. And as in vegetables and plants the sap undergoes, in the buds and leaves, that change which is necessary, that it may return into the plant with a new fitness and power for its growth and development, so in our conversation, manners, actions, which represent the buds and the leaves of our social development, our principles have a trial, and return upon us with change or confirmation, as the case may be. Thus our active life not only demonstrates, but determines, our inward; it so confirms and holds the character, that an incision in the maiu body does not bleed it.

Down

Then again there is the influence of light upon the vegetative process. The root requires and seeks the darkness. beneath the surface, in secresy and mystery, it carries on its magnetic secretions; but the plant itself, to which for its life and growth those secretions are conveyed, seeks the light, and must have it. All vegetating substances push towards it; they are pale, colorless, tasteless, sickly, without it; so that vegetation owes to the light all that constitutes the worth of its forms and substances; its taste, smell, color, its adaptedness for fire as fuel. And here again, how striking the analogy! It is light, heavenly light, that forms all the distinctive worth of character. Whatever the original faculties may draw to themselves from earth, or possess by intuitions without it, those native knowledges can pass into charities, into life, only by heavenly light. All the distinctions of moral qualities we see in reality only by that; only in God's light do we see truly even earthly light. And when the true life is hid with Christ in God, the fruits develope themselves, and the processes of life go on, only beneath the constant light of Truth Divine in God's own Word.