If Roger Bacon's Brazen-head could have repeated and continued his oracular utterances at fixed intervals he would have been a very sensational performer over some prominent public time-piece of the present day. If only once in twelve months, say at midnight, when the year ends, he could have pronounced his three important speeches, 'Time is;--Time was;--Time's past!' he might have rivalled some of our best actors or orators in attracting the multitude; unfortunately, however, our mechanical clockwork performers have never risen to the dignity of speech, and the secret of Friar Bacon's magic died with the inventor of gunpowder,--which last it is a pity, perhaps, did not also slip out of use and memory along with it. 'Time is, time was, time's past' seems to comprise a whole world of hopes, fears, and lost opportunities, and sounds like a little condensed history of all that ever has happened or ever can happen. Herein we may imagine we can observe the wonder-working qualities of Time, solving all mysteries, bringing everything whether of good or evil to fruition, testing friendship and love, solacing troubled and wounded hearts, and healing all manner of griefs; but then we also remark that he is the abaser of the proud as well as the uplifter of the humble. If he builds, he as surely destroys, being, indeed, the Great Spoiler, _edax rerum_, before whose breath myriads of living things through all generations have faded away, in regular sequence, and towns and cities and the several civilizations of the world have one after another decayed and perished with all their wondrous works, and glories, and aspirations. 'Who shall contend with Time--unvanquished Time, The conqueror of conquerors, and lord Of desolation?'