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time, which brings all evils to an end. For such is the constitution of human nature, that things are always either on the increase or decrease, are getting better or growing worse, and never stand still. When they have reached their summit, the fall is far more rapid than the rise. If, therefore, you discern the times and observe moderation, having a mind well toned and regulated under all circumstances, you may turn to good account what would be otherwise out of season.

Wherefore

"Quis mater, nisi mentis inops, in funere nati
Flere neget? Non hoc illa monenda loco est.»

"Dum dolor in cursu est, currenti cede dolori;
Tempore cum residet, tum medicina valet.»

It appears, then, that music acts in contrary ways: when employed to give intensity to the feelings, it inflames; when to abate them, it lulls. Hence the Irish and Spaniards, and some other nations, mix plaintive music with their funereal wailings, giving poignancy to their present grief, as well as, perhaps, tranquilizing the mind when the worst is past. Music also alleviates toil, and in labor of various kinds the fatigue is cheered by sounds uttered in measured time. Hence, artificers of all sorts relieve the weariness of their tasks by song. The very beasts, not to speak of serpents, and birds, and porpoises, are attracted by musical harmony to listen to its melody; and what is still more remarkable, swarms of bees are recalled to their hives, and induced to settle, by musical sounds. I have sometimes observed, when on a voyage, shoals of porpoises long following in the wake of the ship when she is pursuing her course, and how they leaped above the surface, and erected their ears to listen to the tones of the harp or the trumpet.

Moreover, as Isidore remarks, "No teaching can be perfect without harmony. Indeed, there is nothing in which it is not found. The world itself is said to be harmoniously formed, and the very heavens revolve amidst the harmony of the spheres. Sounds, the materials of which melodies are composed, are threefold: firstly, they are harmonic, being produced by the voices of singers; secondly, they are organic, being produced by wind; thirdly, they are rhythmical, produced by the touch of the fingers. For sounds are either produced by the voice, through the throat,

or by wind, as a trumpet or pipe; or by the touch, as by the harp, or any other instrument the melody of which is produced by the finger." What Cassiodorus says in favor of the harp well deserves a place here. He writes thus: "These are the benefits which the harp confers: It changes grief and melancholy to mirth; assuages the effervescence of rage; charms away the most savage cruelty; effaces cowardice; rouses the languid and sleepy; and sheds a soothing repose on the wakeful. It recalls man from foul lusts to the love of chastity; and heals that weariness of the mind which is always adverse to good thoughts. It converts pernicious sloth into kindly succor; and, what is the most blessed sort of cure, expels the passions of the mind by its sweetest of pleasures. It soothes the spirit through the body, and by the mere sense of hearing molds it to its will, making use of insensible things to exercise dominion over the senses. The Divine mercy has scattered abroad its favors, and made all its works to be highly praised. David's lyre expelled the devil; the evil spirit obeyed its sound; and while the minstrel sung to the harp, thrice was the king released from the foul bondage to which he had been subjected by his spiritual enemy." I have made a delightful digression, but to the purpose; for it is always pleasant to converse of science with those who are skilled in it.

Complete. "The Topography of Ireland,"
Chap. xii., Distinction 3.

V-120

WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE

(1809-1898)

ILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE, the greatest English statesman of the second half of the nineteenth century, was born at Liverpool, December 29th, 1809. His father, a member of an old Scottish family, was a Liverpool merchant, with means sufficient to give him the best education England afforded. He graduated at Oxford in 1831, suggesting his future eminence by making "a double first-class" in the classics and mathematics. Returned to Parliament a year later (1832), he was immersed for the rest of his life in politics; and, though literature was his constant recreation, he acquired as a political speaker the style which characterizes all his essays. Among English orators since Macaulay he has had no equal in eloquence, and among English essayists since Gibbon no superior in capacity for research. As we read the luminous passages which shine out through his prose, we feel that the only thing he needed to take his place with Macaulay among essayists was Macaulay's power of self-limitation. This Gladstone distinctly lacked. He wrote many admirable treatises and delivered not a few noble orations, but in doing so he sacrificed the faculty supremely necessary for the essayist, that ability to hew the unity of his governing thought out of the stubborn mass of his material, as a sculptor hews his statue out of the block. Gladstone "goes on and on,” adding one thought to another, until out of the great wealth of his own intellect he has enriched us beyond our deserts, and - if he is writing on the Hittites or on some of the Homeric topics he so dearly loved - beyond our abilities, it may be, to stagger away under the burden of his gifts. But if such excessive generosity be a fault, what cannot be forgiven Gladstone!

MACAULAY AS AN ESSAYIST AND HISTORIAN

MONG the topics of literary speculation, there is none more

A legitimate or more interesting than to consider who, among Α

the writers of a given age, are elected to live; to be enrolled among the band of the Immortals; to make a permanent addition to the mental patrimony of the human race.

There is

THE LUXEMBOURG PORTRAIT OF GLADSTONE.

After a Photograph from the Original by Hamilton.

Is noted portrait of Gladstone was painted by Hamilton in 1890. It is now Number 1402 in the Luxembourg gallery.

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