own? A friend is Janus-faced: he looks to the past and the future. He is the child of all my foregoing hours, the prophet of those to come. He is the harbinger of a greater friend. It is the property of the divine to be reproductive.

I do then with my friends as I do with my books; I would have them where I can find them, but I seldom use them. We must have society on our own terms, and admit or exclude it on the slightest cause. I cannot afford to speak much with my friend. If he is great, he makes me so great that I cannot descend to converse. In the great days, presentiments hover before me, far before me in the firmament. I ought then to dedicate myself to them. I go in that I may seize them, I go out that I may seize them. I fear only that I may lose them receding into the sky in which now they are only a patch of brighter light. Then, though I prize my friends, I cannot afford to talk with them and study their visions, lest I lose my own. It would indeed give me a certain household joy to quit this lofty seeking, this spiritual astronomy or search of stars, and come down to warm sympathies with you; but then I know well I shall mourn always the vanishing of my mighty gods. It is true, next week I shall have languid times, when I can well afford to occupy myself with foreign objects; then I shall regret the lost literature of your mind, and wish you were by my side again. But if you come, perhaps you will fill my mind only with new visions; not with yourself but with your lusters, and I shall not be able any more than now to converse with you. So I will owe to my friends this evanescent intercourse. I will receive from them not what they have but what they are. They shall give me, that which properly they cannot give me, but which emanates from them. But they shall not hold me by any relations less subtle and pure. We will meet as though we met not, and part as though we parted not.

It has seemed to me lately more possible than I knew, to carry a friendship greatly, on one side, without due correspondence on the other. Why should I cumber myself with the poor fact that the receiver is not capacious? It never troubles the sun that some of his rays fall wide and vain into ungrateful space, and only a small part on the reflecting planet. Let your greatness educate the crude and cold companion. If he is unequal, he will

presently pass away; but thou art enlarged by thy own shining, and, no longer a mate for frogs and worms, dost soar and burn with the goods of the empyrean. It is thought a disgrace to love unrequited. But the great will see that true love cannot be unrequited. True love transcends instantly the unworthy object and dwells and broods on the eternal, and when the poor interposed mask crumbles, it is not sad, but feels rid of so much earth and feels its independency the surer. Yet these things may hardly be said without a sort of treachery to the relation. The essence of friendship is entireness, a total magnanimity and trust. It must not surmise or provide for infirmity. It treats its object as a god, that it may deify both.

THOMAS DUNN ENGLISH

THOMAS DUNN ENGLISH. Born in Philadelphia, June 29, 1819; died 1902. Author of "American Ballads," 1882, and of many miscellaneous pieces. His famous song, "Ben Bolt," was written in 1843.

BEN BOLT

DON'T you remember sweet Alice, Ben Bolt?
Sweet Alice, whose hair was so brown,

Who wept with delight when you gave her a smile,
And trembled with fear at your frown!

In the old churchyard, in the valley, Ben Bolt,
In a corner obscure and alone,

They have fitted a slab of the granite so gray,
And Alice lies under the stone!

Under the hickory tree, Ben Bolt,

Which stood at the foot of the hill,
Together we've lain in the noonday shade,
And listened to Appleton's mill.

The mill-wheel has fallen to pieces, Ben Bolt,
The rafters have tumbled in,

And a quiet that crawls round the walls as you gaze,

Has followed the olden din.

Do you mind the cabin of logs, Ben Bolt,
At the edge of the pathless wood,
And the button-ball tree with its motley limbs.
Which nigh by the doorstep stood?
The cabin to ruin has gone, Ben Bolt,

The tree you would seek in vain;

And where once the lords of the forest waved,
Grow grass and the golden grain.

And don't you remember the school, Ben Bolt,
With the master so cruel and grim,

And the shaded nook by the running brook,
Where the children went to swim?

Grass grows on the master's grave, Ben Bolt,
The spring of the brook is dry,

And of all the boys who were schoolmates then,
There are only you and I.

There is change in the things I loved, Ben Bolt,
They have changed from the old to the new;
But I feel in the depths of my spirit the truth,
There never was change in you.

Twelvemonths twenty have passed, Ben Bolt,
Since first we were friends

yet I hail

Thy presence a blessing, thy friendship a truth,
Ben Bolt, of the salt-sea gale!

EPICTETUS

EPICTETUS. Born at Hierapolis, Phrygia, about 50 A.D. At first a Greek slave, he eventually became a Roman citizen. A bed, a lamp, and one dish comprised his entire household furniture.

His maxims are found in his "Discourses," "Enchiridion," and "Commentaries." They relate to such topics as "The Divine Supervision," "Con

cerning Providence," "Concerning Parentage," "Concerning Difficulties," "Words and Deeds," "Of Tranquillity." Most of his discourses were written down from dictation by his disciple Arrian, a man of the highest reputation both as a philosopher and biographer. Marcus Aurelius ranked Epictetus with Socrates for the nobility of his character and his lofty ethical teaching. The date and circumstances of his death are unknown.

(From the "Discourses")

TO A PERSON WHO WAS ONE OF THOSE WHO WERE NOT VALUED BY HIM

A CERTAIN person said to him (Epictetus): Frequently I desired to hear you and came to you, and you never gave me any answer: and now, if it is possible, I entreat you to say something to me. Do you think, said Epictetus, that as there is an art in anything else, so there is also an art in speaking, and that he who has the art, will speak skilfully, and he who has not, will speak unskilfully? I do think so. He then who by speaking receives benefit himself, and is able to benefit others, will speak skilfully: but he who is rather damaged by speaking and does damage to others, will he be unskilled in this art of speaking? And you may find that some are damaged and others benefited by speaking. And are all who hear benefited by what they hear? Or will you find that among them also some are benefited and some damaged? There are both among these also, he said. In this case also then those who hear skilfully are benefited, and those who hear unskilfully are damaged? He admitted this. Is there then a skill in hearing also, as there is in speaking? It seems so. If you choose, consider the matter in this way also. The practice of music, to whom does it belong? To a musician. And the proper making of a statue, to whom do you think that it belongs? To a statuary. And the looking at a statue skilfully, does this appear to you to require the aid of no art? This also requires the aid of art. Then if speaking properly is the business of the skilful man, do you see that to hear also with benefit is the business of the skilful man? Now as to speaking and hearing perfectly, and usefully, let us for the present, if you please, say no more, for both of us are a long way from everything of the kind. But I think that every man will allow

this, that he who is going to hear philosophers requires some amount of practice in hearing. Is it not so?

Tell me then about what I should talk to you: about what matter are you able to listen? About good and evil. Good and evil in what? In a horse? No. Well, in an ox? No. What then? In a man? Yes. Do we know then what a man is, what the notion is that we have of him, or have we our ears in any degree practised about this matter? But do you understand what nature is? or can you even in any degree understand me when I say, I shall use demonstration to you? How? Do you understand this very thing, what demonstration is, or how anything is demonstrated, or by what means; or what things are like demonstration, but are not demonstration? Do you know what is true or what is false? What is consequent on a thing, what is repugnant to a thing, or not consistent, or inconsistent? But must I excite you to philosophy, and how? Shall I show to you the repugnance in the opinions of most men, through which they differ about things good and evil, and about things which are profitable and unprofitable, when you know not this very thing, what repugnance (contradiction) is? Show me then what I shall accomplish by discoursing with you; excite my inclination to do this. As the grass which is suitable, when it is presented to a sheep, moves its inclination to eat, but if you present to it a stone or bread, it will not be moved to eat; so there are in us certain natural inclinations also to speak, when the hearer shall appear to be somebody, when he himself shall excite us: but when he shall sit by us like a stone or like grass, how can he excite a man's desire (to speak)? Does the vine say to the husbandman, Take care of me? No, but the vine by showing in itself that it will be profitable to the husbandman, if he does take care of it, invites him to exercise care. When children are attractive and lively, whom do they not invite to play with them, and crawl with them, and lisp with them? But who is eager to play with an ass or to bray with it? for though it is small, it is still a little ass.

Why then do you say nothing to me? I can only say this to you, that he who knows not who he is, and for what purpose he exists, and what is this world, and with whom he is asso