All this came to our mind the other day when some one accused us of being "juvenile." What hideous stigma was thereby put upon us? The only grievous thing about juvenility is its unwillingness to be frank; it usually tries to appear very, very old and very, very wise. _The Germ_ was quite frankly young; otherwise it could not have been so full of death poetry, for it is youth's most natural affectation to steep itself in death. But _The Germ_ might have been even more "juvenile" and so avoided some of the heavy, sumptuous sentences in that Browning review. It would have gained in readableness without any possible sacrifice of beauty or truth. In their poetry the Pre-Raphaelites were as simple and spontaneous as children; in their criticism they were rhetorical. Our sympathy is somehow very strongly with the spontaneity--whatever dark juvenile crimes it may be guilty of--in the eyes of those who merely look but do not see. Rebellion GEORGE SOULE Sing me no song of the wind and rain-- The wind and the rain are better. I'll swing to the road on the gusty plain Without any load, And shatter your fetter. And when you sing of the strange, bright sea, I'll leave your dark little singing For the plunging shore where foam leaps free And long waves roar And gulls go winging. Sorrow-dark ladies you've dreamed afar; I stay not to hear their praises. But here is a woman you cannot mar, In life arrayed; Her spirit blazes. I shall not stiffen and die in your songs, Flatten between your pages, But trample the earth and jostle the throngs, Try out life's worth-- And burst all cages! Man and Superman GEORGE BURMAN FOSTER In his voluptuous vagabondage Rousseau at length halted at Paris, where he managed to worry through some inconstant years. The thing that saved the day for him was the fragment of a pamphlet that blew across his path in one of his rambles, announcing a prize to be awarded by the Academy of Dijon for the best answer to an extraordinary question. Had the renascence of the arts and sciences ennobled morals? That was a flash of lightning which lit up a murky night and helped this bewildered and lonely wanderer to get his bearings. Thoughts came to him demoniacally which shaped his entire future and won him no small place in the history of humanity. Answer is "No!" said Rousseau. And his answer was awarded the academic prize.