as Dr. Watts cheerfully observed of the poor little insects, even when he was calling us to remark their wondrous forethought and industry. And larger animals more nearly akin to us were little more “regarded” than the ants, till the widening circles of our sympathies at last began to embrace the higher races of the brute creation; and their sufferings then, as a necessary consequence, immediately took a prominent place among the difficulties of theology. Geology first gave a shock to the received explanation of their destiny by proving that animals died painful deaths æons before “man’s first disobedience” could have taken place, or man himself had existence on this planet; and since those, now distant, days of Dean Buckland’s controversies, the questions so opened out have pressed continually more upon the thought of humane and religious men. The faith for which such men yearn in our day is to be assured-- “That not a moth with vain desire Is shrivelled in a fruitless fire, Or but subserves another’s gain.” Not one of their grandsires, probably, ever entertained any similar idea, but rather indulged a sublime contempt of the “poor Indian” whose “untutored mind” permitted him to hope that his dog might share his paradise. These causes, then, I think,--namely, the growth of a finer sense of pity for human woes, and the inclusion of the lower animals in the scope of our sympathies,--suffice to explain in great measure the reasons why some of the best of men in our generation feel the evil and misery of the world, and display a leaning toward Pessimism unexampled in harder times. Nearly all religious men, looking back upon life, seem disposed to be thankful _on their own account_, and to acknowledge that goodness and mercy have followed them all the days of their lives. They have not been “dealt with according to their sins,” but have many a time been set free from nets of their own weaving, and helped out of the mire and clay of vice and passion. Viewed from _within_, such appears to be the common testimony concerning every good man’s career. It is the inexplicable mysteries in the destinies of their neighbors, as viewed _from outside_, and (as I have just said) the sufferings of the harmless brutes, which causes such men now to doubt God and think the world evil. Satan tempted the old Chaldæan by heaping afflictions on his own person. He tries the modern Job more cunningly,--by giving him, Asmodeus-fashion, a wide bird’s-eye view of the woes and wrongs of other people. * * * * *