There seems to be a general, though unconscious conspiracy existing, against each other's individuality and manhood. We discourage self-reliance, and demand conformity. Each must see with others' eyes, and think through others' minds. We are idolaters of customs and observances, looking behind, not forwards and upwards. Pinned down and held back by ignorance and weakness, we are afraid of standing alone, or of thinking and acting for ourselves. Conventionalism rules all. We fear stepping out into the free air of independent thought and action. We refuse to plant ourselves upon our instincts, and to vindicate our spiritual freedom. We are content to bear others' fruit, not our own. In private affairs, the same spirit is alike deleterious. We live as society directs, each according to the standard of our class. We have a superstitious reverence for custom. We dress, and eat, and live, in conformity with the Grundy law. So long as we do this, we are "respectable," according to class notions. Thus many rush open-eyed upon misery, for no better excuse than a foolish fear of "the world." They are afraid of "what others will say of them;" and, in nine cases out of ten, those who might probably raise the voice of censure, are not the wise or the far-seeing, but much oftener the foolish, the vain, and the short-sighted. Sir William Temple has said, that "a restlessness in men's minds to be something that they are not, and to have something that they have not, is the root of all immorality." The statement is strictly correct. It has been attested by universal experience. Keeping up appearances is one of the greatest social evils of the age. There is a general effort, more particularly amongst the middle and upper classes, at seeming to be something that they are not. They put on appearances, live a life of sham, and endeavour to look something superior to what they really are. "Respectability" is one of the chief aims. Respectability, regarded in its true sense, is a desirable thing. To be respected, on right grounds, is an object which every man and woman is justified in obtaining. But modern respectability consists of external appearances. It means wearing fine clothes, dwelling in fine houses, and living in fine style. It looks to the outside,--to sound, show, externals. It listens to the chink of gold in the pocket. Moral worth or goodness forms no part of modern respectability. A man in these days may be perfectly "respectable," and yet altogether despicable.