Our time is revolutionary. It drifts strong and fast into unitarianism and the empire of ideas. All things are undergoing reform and reconstruction; the fellowship of all souls intent on laying broad and deep the foundations of the new institutions. The firm of Globe Brothers & Co., prospers in both hemispheres, every citizen being a partner in the concern. The nations are leagued together on the basis of mutual assistance, finding the old alliances founded on force and fear to be insecure; the people seeing it best to be friends and copartners in conducting the world's affairs;--trade the natural knot tying them by the coarser wants only; world-politics their bond of union and prosperity. No longer playing independent parts safely, they co-operate and conspire for the common welfare, interposing such checks as each individually requires for his security. Ruling is conducted not by legislation nor diplomacy, but by social and commercial inter-communication; every man opening out for himself the sphere suited to his gifts, and taking his thinking and doing into head and hands as a loyal man and citizen. Power is stealing with a speed and momentum unprecedented from the few to the many; is played out on a theatre world-wide, whole populations taking part in affairs; the distance once separating extremes being bridged; middle men with human sympathies and broad common-sense taking the lead and setting the old pretensions aside. A daring realism overleaping the old barriers gives government into the hands of the whole people, rulers being their servants, not masters; presidents and kings the representatives of ideas and paying loyal homage to these crowned heads; the old virtues of reverence for man, fidelity to principle, so venerable and sacred in private stations, seeking reappearance in public life. If once the great, the wise, were in the minority, and none dreamed of reason becoming popular, reason is fast becoming republicanized; from being the exclusive property of the few is diffusing itself universally as the common possession of the multitude. Imperial thought now holds her powerful sway, And drives the peoples on their prosperous way. The freshest, best thoughts of the best minds of all times are claimed by the community; itself the awakened critic and prompter of the best; all thirsting for information,--world-wisdom,--and drinking off eagerly the lore of centuries. Knowledge everywhere diffused is accessible to all, rolls with the globe, dashes against the shores of every sea, delves the caverns, climbs the hill-tops with sun and moon, for the common benefit. If Hesiod wrote for his times that "Riches are the soul of feeble men," our time is fast translating his line practically: Riches are the hand of able men;