It is a fine thing for a man to get hold of a good cause; one of the finest sights that earth can boast is that of a man or set of men standing up to put into action what they know to be some blessed God-sent truth. A Cromwell mourning the flat Popery of St. Paul’s—a Luther, before principalities and powers, exclaiming, “Here stand I and will not move, so help me God!”—a Howard making a tour of the jails of Europe, and dying alone and neglected on the shores of the Black Sea—a Henry Martyn leaving the cloistered halls of Cambridge, abandoning the golden prospects opening around him, and abandoning what is dearer still, the evils of youth, to preach Christ, and Him crucified, beneath the burning and fatal sun of the East—or a Hebrew maiden, like Jepthah’s daughter, dying for her country or her country’s good,—are sights rare and blessed, and beautiful and divine. All true teachers are the same, and are glorious to behold. For a time no one regards their testimony. The man stands by himself—a reed, but not shaken by the wind—a voice crying in the wilderness—a John the Baptist nursed in the wilds, and away from the deadening spell of the world. Then comes the influence of the solitary thinker on old fallacies; the young and the enthusiastic rush to his side, the sceptic and the scoffer one by one disappear, and the world is conquered; or if it be not so, if he languishes in jail like Galileo, or wanders on the face of the earth seeking rest and finding none, like our Puritan forefathers; or die, as many an hero has died, as the Christ did, when the power of the Prince of Darkness prevailed, and the veil of the Temple was rent in twain; still there is for him a resurrection, when a coming age will honour his memory, collect his scattered ashes, and build them a fitting tomb. Yet even this kind of heroism has come to be but a monotonous affair. Now-a-days the thing can be done, and in one way—a meeting at Exeter Hall, a dinner at Freemasons’ tavern, Harker for toast-master, a few vocalists to sing between the pieces, and for chairman a lord by all means; if possible, a royal duke. The truest thing about us is our appetite. Our appreciation of a hero is as our appreciation of a coat; a saviour of a nation and a Soyer we class together, and do justice to both at the same time. We moderns eat where our fathers bled. Our powers we show by the number of bottles of wine we can consume; our devotion is to our dinners; the sword has made way for the carving-knife; our battle is against the ills to which gluttonness and wine-bibbing flesh is heir; the devil that comes to us is the gout; the hell in which we believe and against which we fight is indigestion; our means of grace are blue pill and black draught. All art and science and lettered lore, all the memories of the past and the hopes of the future— “All thoughts, all passions, all delights— Whatever stirs this mortal frame,”