can go backward. What wonder then that the most thoughtful of men are particularly careful of their time, regulating their use of it with the utmost precision and weighing it out as scrupulously as a miser would his gold? What wonder that they should sigh and grieve over a wasted day, and with bitter self-reproach should say to themselves as Titus did, 'Perdidi diem,'--I have lost a day? What wonder is it that such should teach themselves to wrestle with Time, even as Jacob wrestled with the angel, for a blessing; and to regard those reckless ones, in whose butterfly existence are counted only the 'shining hours,'--as the bee might be supposed to regard the idle gnats which frolic in the sunbeams heedless both of to-day and of to-morrow. The poets are our best interpreters of Time, and they seem never tired of referring to it and symbolising it by every possible figure, emblem, and trope.[1] Celerity of motion and brevity of duration are discovered to be its chief characteristics. Time is therefore depicted as flying,--fast, noiselessly, and uninterruptedly. It is a river, speeding on with imperceptible but resistless pace to the ocean of eternity. It is a stern vigorous old man--Time is already old--rushing by us with never-slackening strides, bearing blessings for each and all, but we must be upon the alert to strive with him for his gifts--'to seize Time by the forelock'--or he will forget to bestow them. We too often charge upon Time the evil which is the result of our own lack of energy, and thus it happens that although in kindly moments our poets seem to delight in exalting and glorifying him for all manner of enjoyments, at others they can find no word too coarse or uncivil to apply to him. 'Time,' says Shakespeare, 'is a very bankrupt,' adding, 'Nay, he's a thief too; have you not heard men say That time comes stealing on by night and day?' +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ | FOOTNOTE: | | | | [1] Poebus Apollo in Ovid's Metamorphoses claims that he is Time's | | special exponent:-- | | | | ----'Per me, quod eritque, fuitque, | | Estque, patet; per me concordant carmina nervis.' | +----------------------------------------------------------------------+