way, and it is impossible that of all who have stirred men's hearts through the ages, no one can be found to arouse your sympathies. And when the right author is at length found, you live on a higher plane than before. This great poet, philosopher, or dramatist has become your friend and familiar companion--a gain far greater than the acquirement of any mere book knowledge. The greater part of another person's life may be spent in sordid surroundings, with companions and in an occupation tending to depress and degrade the better nature. I can easily conceive that it might be the highest duty of such an one to remain ignorant of much useful knowledge in order to quicken the imagination, to enlarge the tastes, and heighten the enjoyments. So that when the day's work is done, he may exchange the sordid companions, suggestive only of mean thoughts and low aims, for intercourse with men of purest and noblest nature--men, too, it may be, who have lived, thought, and written under circumstances as depressing as those in which he lives and works. So there may be some one who regretfully feels that in Nature there is nothing which gives to him, as to others, the keenest pleasure, refreshing him when wearied, encouraging him when downcast. Who sees nothing in the skies save signs of the coming storm, nothing in the trees or flowers, the rivers or the hills, save something relating to his material comfort or discomfort. The best use to which this man could put a library and his reading hours might be to study the works of the great interpreters of nature, as White of Selborne, Ruskin, or Emerson. And if they should open his eyes so that he can look "through Nature up to Nature's God," his gain is immeasurable.