“Paul Borghese, a writer of rhythmic verse, died of starvation. Tasso, himself the most amiable of poets, lived like a pauper, and passed away in an asylum. Bentivoglio, a creator of classic comedies, in the misery of his old age, was refused admittance to an hospital he had founded. Cervantes died of hunger, and Camoens ended his days in an almshouse. The body of Vaugelas was disposed of to surgeons that his debts might be paid. Spencer was forsaken and neglected in his old age. Decker, Cotten, Savage and Lloyd breathed their last in jails. “Might not these men have said, ‘Who can shut out fate?’ Were they the sport of circumstances, or could circumstances have been made their sport? Was each independent of fatality? Was he free from destiny; or, was he subject to an unalterable course--an invincible necessity?” The query of this venerable sage has been that of civilized man in every age. Coming into the world with the dawn of philosophy, it will remain until the veil of Isis is uplifted. Profoundest wisdom has ever taught the subordination of man to a higher law, by which his career is largely determined from the beginning. Investigation will disclose that such, to-day, is the real opinion of a vast majority of mankind. The thought was ascendant in the literature and religion of the ancient Greeks. Their Moira was a personification of law; the Goddess of Destiny, who assigned to everyone his fate, or “share.” At the birth of man she spun the thread of his future life, pursued his footsteps, and directed the consequences of his actions, according to the decrees of Zeus. By some she was conceived as a fatal divinity, who directed human affairs in such a manner as to restore the right proportions or equilibrium, wherever it had been disturbed; who measured out happiness and unhappiness, and allotted losses and sufferings to him who was blest with too frequent gifts of Fortune, to the end he might be humbled into acknowledging the existence of bounds beyond which human happiness cannot proceed with safety.