If any one should still doubt that Bracciolini forged the “Annals,” let me recommend him to carefully read a work entitled “Tacitus and Bracciolini,” and published by Messrs. Diprose & Bateman, of Lincoln’s Inn Fields, London, in which will be found the most convincing proofs that Bracciolini, and no other than he, was the real author of the work. In that able indictment, from which I have drawn extensively for this essay, the writings and peculiarities of both Tacitus and Bracciolini have been most carefully detailed, with the result that no one can help arriving at the conclusion that one person could not have written both the “History” and the “Annals;” that Tacitus could not possibly have written the “Annals,” owing to chronological difficulties; and that suspicion points so forcibly to Bracciolini as the author that it almost amounts to positive proof. What I have endeavoured to show is (1) that, owing to the teachings of Abelard, Arnold, Wicliffe, Jerome, Huss, and other fifteenth-century reformers, the authority of the Church and the very existence of Christianity were seriously menaced; (2) that, on account of the failure of the Inquisition to stem the current of scepticism, large sums of money were offered for the discovery of ancient writings which would bear testimony to the divine authority of the Church and the divine establishment of Christianity; (3) that, in consequence of this bribe, shoals of writings were forged by needy monks and scholars, and attributed to ancient authors; and (4) that among these forgeries were the “Annals” of Tacitus, which were composed by Bracciolini and re-written by the Hirschfeldt monk in a style as nearly as possible like a very old copy of the “History” of Tacitus, which was supplied to him as a guide. CREATION AND FALL. The one great differential mark between man and the brutes is his higher development of brain power, by which he is enabled to discriminate between right and wrong, or good and evil, and thus to improve his bodily and social condition. The individual who obstinately refuses to avail himself of the great mental power within him not only deprives himself of the greatest pleasure in life, but also allows himself to sink to the level of the brutes from which he evolved, exhibiting at the same time a gross want of gratitude to the being who endowed him with so lofty an attribute. On the other hand, he who cultivates his mental faculties, and uses them for his own improvement and advancement, and also that of his fellows, fulfils the highest mission of man, and continually shows his deep gratitude to his mysterious benefactor.