There are some memories of the childhood of western men--unlike, and yet similar in their generous persuasions on all pure young hearts--upon whose "Decay" might, also, be written a "Complaint," which should come as truly, and yet as sadly, from the heart of him, who remembers his boyhood, as did that from the heart of Elia. Gatherings of the militia, burgou-hunts, barbecues, and anniversaries--phases of a primitive, yet true and hearty time!--are fast giving way, before the march of a barbarous "progress" (erroneously christened) "of intelligence." The hard spirit of money-getting, the harder spirit of education-getting, and the hardest of _all_ spirits, that of pharisaical morality, have divorced our youth, _a vinculo_, from every species of amusement; and life has come to be a probationary struggle, too fierce to allow a moment's relaxation. The bodies of children are drugged and worried into health, their intellects are stuffed and forced into premature development, or early decay--but their _hearts_ are utterly forgotten! Enjoyment is a forbidden thing, and only the miserable cant of "intellectual pleasure" is allowed. _Ideas_--of philosophy, religious observance, and mathematics--are supplied _ad nauseam_; but the encouragement of a generous _impulse_, or a magnanimous _feeling_, is too frivolous a thing to have a place in our vile system. Children are "brought up," and "brought out," as if they were composed exclusively of intellect and body: And, since the manifestations of any other element are pronounced pernicious--even if the existence of the element itself be recognised--the means of fostering it, innocent amusements, which make the sunshine brighter, the spirits more cheerful, and the heart purer and lighter, are sternly prohibited. Alas! for the generation which shall grow up, and be "educated" (God save the mark!) as if it had no heart! And wo to the blasphemy which dares to offer, as service to Heaven, an arrogant contempt of Heaven's gifts, and claims a reward, like the self-tormentors of the middle ages, for its vain mortifications.