Wednesday was only the day after to-morrow, but in the interim I bought a copy of Mr. Spence's Poems and also his volume of Essays, which contained "The Economy of Speech," "The Overmuch and the Undermuch," and "The Equipoise of Passion," the last-named being an exposition of the selfishness of unlimited love. His poems, which were for the most part written in early youth, were in striking contrast to the essays in tone. Indeed, in the extracts from the newspaper criticisms prefixed to the volume of verse he was in several instances spoken of as the Baudelaire of America. They were alternately morbid and convivial in style, and were concerned largely with death, the rapture of the wine-cup, or the bitterness of unreciprocated attachment. I was inclined to be shocked at the outset, for I had never read anything of the sort before, as Baudelaire was then merely a name to me. I even took the book to my own room from an unwillingness to leave it lying on the parlor table. But after the first surprise and qualms I found myself rather fascinated by the unusual nature of the man. At one moment he appeared to be flushed with ecstasy, and the next in the depths,--an alternative so opposed to the tenor of his later philosophy that I was fairly puzzled, until I reflected that these poems had undoubtedly been composed during his novitiate, while he was testing the extremes of life. It was obvious, if his verse was any criterion, that he had been very thorough in his investigations, and that Miss Kingsley's estimate of his offences against morality was not an over-statement, to say the least. But my curiosity was aroused to meet a person whose ideas and experiences were so signally unlike my own, especially in view of the seeming total transition of his sentiments as portrayed in his subsequent prose writings. I thought them a little vague, but extremely interesting. The skeleton of his system was unfolded in the essay on the "Overmuch and the Undermuch." Therein he sought to show in a general way the advantages of moderation. Nothing overmuch was the key-note of his theory,--an aphorism which found an analogy in the old Greek motto ~ouden agan~, which he adduced to prove the antiquity of the virtue, little as it had been practised. He represented moderation as the great principle upon which the future progress of civilization depended. Without heed to the restrictions which it imposed, human nature must despair of perfection. He ventured to predict that rigorous self-restraint, continued through successive generations, would appreciably lengthen the average duration of life, and although without more sufficient data it would be incautious to make extravagant claims, it seemed to him by no means improbable that death might in the end be conquered, or at least indefinitely postponed. The science was as yet embryonic, and until the general interest of the world in its development had been awakened, investigation in order to be trustworthy must needs be slow.