love _which are not mutual_ for the calm satisfactions of friendship and the tender confidence of habitual esteem. Before marriage, they will not assume any insolent airs, nor afterwards abjectly submit; but, endeavoring to act like reasonable creatures in both relations, they will not be tumbled from a throne to a stool." This is the character of the whole book. It contains nothing more subversive of morality than these words. You cannot do better than read it, and receive, as I did, a lasting lesson on the folly of prejudice. As a work of art, it is irregular in method, and impulsive in execution; facts not to be wondered at, since it was written and printed in the brief space of six weeks. Dr. Channing once wrote of her: "I have lately read Mary Wollstonecraft's posthumous works. Her letters towards the close of the first volume are the best I ever read. They are superior to Sterne's. I consider her the greatest woman of the age. Her 'Rights of Woman' is a masculine performance, and ought to be studied by her sex; the sentiments are noble and generous." What, then, was the character of the woman? Was it as strong and generous as the sentiments she advocated? Her life broke down some social barriers, and, though noble and heroic when viewed from within, looks hampered and unsatisfactory from the common stand-point. Godwin has erected an exquisite monument to her memory, in a sketch written soon after her decease. Mary Wollstonecraft was born near London in the year 1759. She came into an unhappy and uncongenial home. Her father was a passionate tyrant; her mother, compelled to submit to his caprice, became like every other slave, a tyrant where she had the power, and ruled her children with a rod of iron. By defending her mother from her husband's violence, Mary early extorted some degree of affection from the one, and respect from the other. Her father had some property, which he seems to have squandered by frequent changes of abode; and a day school at Beverley, in Yorkshire, gave her her principal advantages of education. An eccentric clergyman at Hoxton, named Clare, added some farther instruction. Under his roof, she formed an intimacy with Frances Blood, destined to influence her whole life. This girl was remarkably accomplished, and, at the age of eighteen, supported her father and mother and their family of younger children. She was delicately neat and proper in all she did; and her influence was of the greatest benefit to Mary, who had often desired to assist her family, but was deterred by the helpless condition of her mother. She now went as companion to a family at Bath, but soon relinquished the position, on account of her mother's serious illness. Mrs. Wollstonecraft was exacting and troublesome. Mary nursed her with devoted care, but, after her death, bade a final farewell to her father's roof. His affairs had become wretchedly involved; and, with Fanny Blood and her two sisters, she proceeded to open a day school.