The disrespectful, who, in some way or other, are disposed to make faces at their superiors, would require to be rapped rather soundly in and about “veneration;” and we are not now to be told that a smart blow on the eye is sure to awaken vociferous displays of the faculty of “language.” For him who comes too late, which is bad—or stays too late, which is worse—what could be better than a forcible appeal to “time?” And if a boy—your boy, or any other body’s boy—cannot be easily made to see the essential difference between his own selfish will and your authoritative behest, you have only to perform for him a tune upon his slumbering organ of “comparison,” and you shall have music, you may depend upon it. If the same rebellious individual is slow to discern why he should obey, lend him a smart fillip upon his “casualty,” educive of the why, and provocative of the wherefore; and if you yourself cannot discover the point of a joke, taking the fact for granted that it is a joke which comes to a point—some jokes, like some people, come to nothings—depend upon it that your “wit” is beginning to lose its edge, and is getting to be somewhat rusty in the method of its operation. No one, we presume, will venture to deny that “cautiousness,” well rubbed and roused, has a tendency to keep our fingers out of the fire; or that an inflammation of our “combativeness” will give us joy in the facing of our foe. But what, let us ask, what is to be done, if, like the peculiar one who now comes under our special notice—what is to be done, if in all the qualities which go to make up our mentality, we have not one scintilla of self reliance and expectation, and are like TRIBULATION TREPID, A MAN WITHOUT A HOPE! You see, the case is in every way a hopeless one—for Tribulation Trepid never had a hope. He has no more idea of what you mean by a hope than a blind man can understand what you are talking about when you speak of colors. Hope!—how do you go about it—how do you begin when you want to hope? The first principle of hopefulness is not resident within the confines of the craniology of Tribulation Trepid; and, therefore, from the very moment of his birth, up and down—but more down than up—poor Tribulation Trepid has been lost in despond and in despair. Who ever called him “Young Hopeful?” It would have been the very heartlessness of cold derision.