There is a legend of Friar Roger Bacon, so conspicuous in what may be called the mythology of modern science, which enforces the importance of seizing the present moment; nor could I hope to close this appeal with anything better calculated to impress upon all the lesson I have sought to teach. With wizard skill he had succeeded in constructing a brazen head, which, by unimaginable contrivance, after unknown lapse of time, was to speak and declare important knowledge. Weary with watching for the auspicious moment, which had been prolonged through successive weeks, he had sought the refreshment of sleep, leaving his man Miles to observe the head, and to awaken him at once, if it should speak, that he might not fail to interrogate it. Shortly after he had sunk to rest, the head spake these words, _Time is_. But the foolish guardian heeded them not, nor the commands of his master, whom he allowed to slumber unconscious of the auspicious moment. Another half-hour passed and the head spake the words, _Time was_, which Miles still heeded not. Another half-hour passed, and the head spake yet other words, _Time is past_, and straightway fell to the earth, shivered in pieces, with a terrible crash and strange flashes of fire, so that Miles was half dead with fear; and his master awoke to behold the workmanship of his cunning hand and the hopes he had builded thereupon shattered, while the voice from the brazen throat still sounded in his ears, TIME IS PAST! BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF THE LATE JOHN PICKERING. ARTICLE IN THE LAW REPORTER OF JUNE, 1846. It was a remark of Lord Brougham, illustrated by his own crowded life, that the complete performance of all the duties of an active member of the British Parliament might be joined to a full practice at the bar. The career of the late Mr. Pickering illustrates a more grateful truth: that the mastery of the law as a science and the constant performance of all the duties of a practitioner are not incompatible with the studies of the most various scholarship,--that the lawyer and the scholar may be _one_. He dignified the law by the successful cultivation of letters, and strengthened the influence of these elegant pursuits by becoming their representative in the concerns of daily life and in the labors of his profession. And now that this living example of excellence is withdrawn, we feel a sorrow which words can only faintly express. We would devote a few moments to the contemplation of what he did and what he was. The language of exaggeration is forbidden by the modesty of his nature, as it is rendered unnecessary by the multitude of his virtues. * * * * *