But is a value-currency possible? It is, to a people enjoying universal equality before the law, and knowing that every individual has a direct and immediate interest in it,--knowing that it is a part of the business-policy of each. And it is only such a people that will dare to inaugurate, and persevere to sustain it. Nevertheless, as it cannot but appear problematical to minds that have not given to the subject the most earnest attention, its adoption will doubtless be most strenuously opposed, by habits of thought, by modes of action, and by interests, as ancient, as universal, and apparently as fixed as the race itself. Yet, as M. Arago justly remarks in one of his biographies addressed to the French Academy,--"The moral transformations of society are subject to the laws of continuity; they rise and grow, like the productions of the earth, by imperceptible gradations. Each century develops, discusses, and adapts to itself, in some degree, truths--or, if you prefer it, principles--of which the conception belonged to the preceding century; this work of the mind usually goes on without being perceived by the vulgar; but when the day of application arrives, when principles claim their part in practice, when they aim at penetrating into political life, the ancient interests, if they have only this same antiquity to invoke in their favor, become excited, resist, and struggle, and society is shaken to its foundations. The tableau will be complete, Gentlemen, when I add, that, in these obstinate conflicts, it is never the principles that succumb." IN MEMORY OF J. W.--R. W. No mystic charm, no mortal art Can bid our loved companions stay; The bands that clasp them to our heart Snap in death's frost and fall apart; Like shadows fading with the day, They pass away. The young are stricken in their pride, The old, long tottering, faint and fall; Master and scholar, side by side, Through the dark portals silent glide, That open in life's mouldering wall And close on all. Our friend's, our teacher's task was done, When mercy called him from on high; A little cloud had dimmed the sun, The saddening hours had just begun, And darker days were drawing nigh: 'Twas time to die. A whiter soul, a fairer mind, A life with purer course and aim, A gentler eye, a voice more kind, We may not look on earth to find. The love that lingers o'er his name Is more than fame. These blood-red summers ripen fast; The sons are older than the sires; Ere yet the tree to earth is cast, The sapling falls before the blast; Life's ashes keep their covered fires,-- Its flame expires.