But, when a whisper of the truth began to be heard, first here, then there, and then everywhere among those who knew him, his star set in the horizon of Philadelphia. So flagrant a violation of all honest principles met its just rebuke. He stood alone. No man of honor and respectability showed him any attentions or passed him the compliment of an invitation to his house. There was a ban upon him; so much so that men pointed at him in the streets and related the story of his affair with old Mr. Harrison. In less than a year there was a public sale of his elegant furniture in Arch street, and he moved somewhere South with his wife. Of his domestic felicity nothing need be said. Enough can be imagined. CHAPTER XIX. CONTRASTS. THE history of this young man, as far as we have traced it, and much further beyond this point it is not our intention to go, exhibits the result of mere ambition, acting upon a mind unsustained by sound principle. To rise in the world was the end with him. Thousands start with that end, and rise to a certain height; but rarely attain a distinguished position, for the reason that they are met at almost every step with temptations to deviate more or less from strict rectitude, in order to rise faster than would otherwise be the case, and thus invariably defeat the object they have in view. There is in the public mind a certain degree of virtue, which will not tolerate known wrong actions. In fact, the public weal depends upon integrity in the community, and every man, therefore, instinctively condemns all departures from just principles in others, because he feels that such acts done to him would be wrong. On the other hand, a virtuous man is esteemed by all, both good and bad, for all feel that their interests are safe in his hands. If he possess equal ability to serve the community with another man in whose principles no faith is had, he will, as a natural consequence, rise above that man. And there is no danger of his falling back from any eminence he may gain; because it is a real elevation from the force of internal principles acting upon his external conduct, and the force that elevated him is all-potent to sustain him in his elevation. To rise truly in the world, is to rise internally as well as externally. If a man, while he is rising into eminence in any pursuit, be really growing corrupt and base—be admitting evil counsellors into his mind and acting from their suggestions—he is not truly rising, but is actually in the descending scale, and will, either in this life or the next, find his right position. No man is truly elevated who is not truly good. He may occupy an imaginary height; he may think himself great, and men who do not know what is really in him, may call him great; but true greatness is inseparable from that benevolence which regards the common good.