another, and at length his sister. Off to the monastery of Clairvaux they trooped, a complete monastic brotherhood. The youngest boy lingered a short time with his aged father, and then joined the rest. “Even the father died a monk of Clairvaux in the arms of Bernard.” But it was not, we are duly reminded, on his own kindred alone that Bernard wrought with this commanding power. “When he was to preach, wives hurried away their husbands, mothers withdrew their sons, friends their friends, from the resistless magic of his eloquence.” And those that went—what went they out into the wilderness to hear? A prophet? Yea, and almost more than a prophet, by the verdict of his own country and of his father’s house. _DESIRED BOON: REALIZED BANE._ PSALM cvi. 15; lxxviii. 22 sq. We read of those who tempted God in the desert, that He gave them their request, and sent leanness withal into their soul. So they did eat meat and were well filled, for He gave them their own desire; but while their meat was yet in their mouths, His wrath came upon them and slew the fattest of them, and smote down the chosen men of Israel. A latter-day poetess, almost masculine in genius, as in out-spoken vigour of diction, tells us that— “God answers sharp and sudden on some prayers, And thrusts the thing we have prayed for in our face,— A gauntlet with a gift in’t,” and sometimes poison in the gift. Well therefore may the authoress of these lines, which in their original import are scarcely applicable to our theme, make a distressed soul utter a petition that certainly is so:— ... “’tis written in the Book, He heareth the young ravens when they cry; And yet they cry for carrion. O my God,— And we, who make excuses for the rest, We do it in our measure. Then I knelt, And dropped my head upon the pavement too, And prayed, since I was foolish in desire Like other creatures, craving offal-food, That He would stop His ears to what I said, And listen only to the run and beat Of this poor, passionate, helpless blood....” _Ne mihi contingant quæ volo, sed quæ sunt utilia_: the aspiration has been accepted as an adage, worthy of all acceptation, and of acceptation by all. “Mais, sans cesse ignorants de nos propres besoins, Nous demandons au ciel ce qu’il nous faut le moins.” To Shakspeare for an illustration. Pompey, not the Great, is anxious for Divine sanction to speed his ambitious resolves to a prosperous issue. If the great gods be just, he assumes, they will assist the deeds of justest men,—and therefore himself, as pre-eminently entitled to that designation. He is impatient, too, for this manifest favour from above; and sage Menecrates takes occasion not only to check his impatience in particular, but to give him a salutary warning on the subject in general: