It would be grateful to our feelings if this compromise of individual character were confined to the men who disregard the claims of virtue. It is by no means so. A philosophic statesman, J. Stuart Mill, in his Essay on Liberty, complains that no period of England’s history has been so little marked by individual originality and force as our own. Certainly, whether we look upon the merely moral or the professedly religious circles of our country, we find everywhere the tendency to sink the man in the crowd, the Christian in the church. This shifting of personal responsibility from the one to the many is the secret alike of national and of individual ineffectiveness. Only look around you, and you will see hundreds who might assert for themselves, and for the cause of truth and philanthropy, a position of dignity and power, who are hindered by the maxims and habits of others. There is a prevailing impression that it is women, with their quick sensibilities, who are the most susceptible to the influences of fashion and opinion. It admits of question whether this prevailing weakness in our days is not on the side of young men. They do not so much make manifest their subserviency, but it is not the less deteriorating and real. Take a few examples. Here, in a select neighborhood, is a young man who affects style. A place in the omnibus would fit his limited means. But no; the omnibus is all very well for men whose position is made, and for young fellows who have no standing in society; but for him, a horse and groom must form a part of his appointments. So he burdens himself, or speculates, or runs into debt, that horse or “trap” may be at command. And thus he, who by manly independence, and an expenditure according with his circumstances, could have risen to be honored and esteemed, shrinks away at length into some lower neighborhood, or drags out a vexed and discontented life, because he has forgotten the honor which he might have commanded at the outset, had he lived out his honest conviction and not made himself a mere imitator.