This _corpuscular_ view of the material universe,--which, of course, admits an infinite variety of applications, corresponding with the infinite variety of its phenomena,--has many most striking analogies in that moral universe, with the phenomena of which we are chiefly concerned. Indeed, when we consider any of the masses before us, as deriving all its apparent magnitude from a number of separate bodies, of which it is composed,--any one of which, _individually_, would be too minute to be distinguishable by us,--it is scarcely possible not to think of the similarity which it presents to the multitudes of human beings that are as it were, massed together in the great nations of the earth; and in which any single individual, if he could be supposed to have exercised his powers separately, would have been truly as insignificant as a single atom separated from the mass of which it is a part. What we call the greatness of a nation, is nothing more than the union of a number of little interests and little passions joined in one common object; to which insignificant elements, so wonderful when combined, if we could distinctly reduce, by analysis, the most unrivalled power that has ever commanded the admiration and envy of the world, it would, at first view, run some little risk of appearing contemptible. The advantages of this social union of mankind, as silently felt at every moment, are unquestionably so infinite in comparison, as almost to sink into nothing the occasional evils to which the aggregation and massing of so many powers, when ill directed, may give rise,--though these terrific evils, when they occur, may dwell more permanently in the mind;--like the visitations of storms and earthquakes, which we remember forever, while, with a sort of thankless forgetfulness, we scarcely think of the calm beauty and regularity which, season after season, passes over us. The rock which, descending from the top of a mountain, lays waste whatever it meets in its progress,--and to attempt to stop which, while its short career lasts, would be almost like instant annihilation,--derives this overwhelming force from an infinite number of independent corpuscles, any one of which, if it had fallen singly, would have been far less destructive than the flutter of an insect's wing; and that tyrannical power of a single man, before which, in unhappy ages of successful oppression, the earth has so often trembled,--as before some power of darkness, endowed with more than human sway,--has derived its irresistible might, not from powers included in itself,--which, in reference to the objects achieved by it, would have been feeble indeed,--but from the united powers of beings still feebler, who were trembling while they executed commands to which themselves alone gave omnipotence.