The older, the more tranquil, and pious a man is, so much the more holy does he esteem all that is _innate_, that is, _feeling_ and _power_; whereas in the estimate of the multitude whatsoever is _self-acquired_, the ability of practice and science in general has an undue pre-eminence; for the latter is universally appreciated, and therefore even by those who have it not, but the former not at all. In the twilight and the moonshine the fixed stars, which are suns, retire and veil themselves in obscurity; whilst the planets, which are simply earths, preserve their borrowed light unobscured. The elder races of men, amongst whom man _was_ more, though he had not yet _become_ so much, had a childlike feeling of sympathy with all the gifts of the Infinite--for example, with strength--beauty--and good fortune; and even the _involuntary_ had a sanctity in their eyes, and was to them a prophecy and a revelation: hence the value they ascribed, and the art of interpretation they applied, to the speeches of children--of madmen--of drunkards--and of dreamers. * * * As the blind man knows not light, and through that ignorance also of necessity knows not darkness,--so likewise, but for disinterestedness we should know nothing of selfishness, but for slavery nothing of freedom: there are perhaps in this world many things which remain obscure to us for want of alternating with their opposites. * * * Derham remarks in his Physico-theology that the deaf hear best in the midst of noise, as, for instance, during the ringing of bells, &c. This must be the reason, I suppose, that the thundering of drums, cannons, &c., accompany the entrance into cities of princes and ministers, who are generally rather deaf, in order that they may the better hear the petitions and complaints of the people. MISCELLANEOUS PIECES. REMINISCENCES OF THE BEST HOURS OF LIFE FOR THE HOUR OF DEATH. "Give me," said Herder to his son, as he lay in the parched weariness of his last illness,--"give me a great thought, that I may quicken myself with it."