If, therefore, facts can prove anything, it is that just such a condition of life as that which is growing more and more general among us, and which our common-school system directly fosters, where every man is becoming an educated man,--where the farmer upon his acres, the merchant at his desk, and the mechanic in his shop, no less than the scholar poring over his books shall be in the truest sense educated,--that such a condition is the one of all others which promotes habits of thought and action, an elasticity of temper and a breadth of vision and interest most conducive to health and vigor. It is the fashion to talk of the appearance of superior robustness so characteristic of our English brethren. But we suspect that in this case, too, appearances are deceitful. That climate may produce in us a restless energy inconsistent with rounded forms and rosy cheeks we freely allow. But in strength and real endurance the New England constitution will yield to none. And the stern logic of facts shows beyond a peradventure, that here there are no influences, climatic or intellectual, which war with longevity. What may be hidden in the future, what results may come from a still wider diffusion of education, we cannot tell, but hitherto nothing but good has come of ever-increasing knowledge. * * * * * We hasten now to inquire concerning the health and years of special classes of literary men: not, indeed, to prove that there is no real war between the mind and the body,--for we consider that point to be already demonstrated,--but rather to show that we need shrink from no field of inquiry, and that from every fresh field will come new evidence of the substantial truth of our position.