“For wisdom is more moving than any motion: she passeth and goeth through all things by reason of her pureness. “For she is the breath of the power of God, and a pure influence, flowing from the glory of the Almighty; therefore can no defiled thing fall into her. “For she is the brightness of the everlasting light, the unspotted mirror of the power of God, and the image of his goodness. “And being but one she can do all things; and remaining in herself she maketh all things new: and in all ages entering into holy souls she maketh them friends of God, and prophets. “For God loveth none but him that dwelleth with wisdom. “For she is more beautiful than the Sun, and above all the order of Stars: being compared with the light she is found before it. “For after this cometh night: but vice shall not prevail against wisdom.” He read this with a solemnity that gave weight to every word. Then closing the book, after a short pause, he proceeded in a lower tone. “The Philosophers of whom you have read in the Dictionary possessed this wisdom only in part, because they were heathens, and therefore could see no farther than the light of mere reason sufficed to shew the way. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and they had not that to begin with. So the thoughts which ought to have made them humble produced pride, and so far their wisdom proved but folly. The humblest Christian who learns his duty, and performs it as well as he can, is wiser than they. He does nothing to be seen of men; and that was their motive for most of their actions. “Now for the philosophy which relates to knowledge. Knowledge is a brave thing. I am a plain, ignorant, untaught man, and know my ignorance. But it is a brave thing when we look around us in this wonderful world to understand something of what we see: to know something of the earth on which we move, the air which we breathe, and the elements whereof we are made: to comprehend the motions of the moon and stars, and measure the distances between them, and compute times and seasons: to observe the laws which sustain the universe by keeping all things in their courses: to search into the mysteries of nature, and discover the hidden virtue of plants and stones, and read the signs and tokens which are shown us, and make out the meaning of hidden things, and apply all this to the benefit of our fellow creatures. “Wisdom and knowledge, Daniel, make the difference between man and man, and that between man and beast is hardly greater.