forms. I do not think I have advanced much beyond that point in my philosophy to this day; I fancy all we know is about as much as this-that there must be an Infinite-and that it is a contradiction to think otherwise; that the mind has no positive notion of it, otherwise the finite would comprehend the Infinite, a contradiction too; and lastly, that the mode in which the notion is developed in us, is by some such process of successive augmentation of magnitudes as that to which my boyish logic was invited on that May evening. So, if you ask, as you doubtless will, for a philosophy of the Infinite-voilà! and in a form finite enough.

La philosophie

De l'Infini

C'est dans ces petits mots, tout compris.

Have you" perpended" and "prehended" my words? "Not a whit," you will say; "I really have not time to attend to any such nonsense; I must go and look after the Captain's curry." Well, I acknowledge that I have been too brief, but I was obliged not to be "tedious;" to which I can imagine you saying, as the cruel Canning once said to a clergyman who gave the same reason for his brevity-"But you were tedious." Now do not say that I have put the saucy speech into your mouth; I know beforehand that you will think some such thing; for in truth, Kate, you are incorrigible.

Well, then, to leave the Infinite. I saw on the Common the noble tree, a huge arm of which nearly crushed me when about nine years of age, as I was listening to the glorious music of its foliage, and that of its giant fellows on a stormy autumn day; the stream in which I was nearly drowned, at about the same age, and whence I was dragged insensible to the bank ;—and the pool in which I broke the ice, and sank up to my neck-a foot or two further in, and there would have been an end of me, I As I recalled these narrow escapes, I felt strangely moved, dear Kate, by opposite emotions; now filled with grateful love to that gracious Being, who, unseen, "guided me in the slippery paths of youth," and "led me up to man;" and now with something like

suppose.

repining, as I looked back on many a blotted, wasted page in my life, that the little history was not cut short with the first chapter. "It had been better," I muttered, "had the tree the stream the ice". but better feelings prevailed, and I ended with very sincerely calling myself an ungrateful dog. "You know," I said. to myself, "that, like all the rest of your grumbling race, you deserve more kicks than halfpence, and yet you have received more halfpence than kicks; be thankful that you have been spared so long, strive that the residue of your years may be more useful than the past, and remember the barren fig tree!'" And so I hope, dear Kate, that the ramble did me good.

I wish I could find a remedy for my lapses into doubt and despondency. They are, I often flatter myself, physical in their origin; so whispers indolence, and so whispers, perhaps, good sense. But it is a consolation I am slow to apply, for it is rather dangerous to administer such opiate cataplasms to an inert will and a feeble faith. They may go a great way to make a man contented not to strive against vincible infirmities. By the way, our men of science a few that is, and a few philanthropists as great fools as they—are providing admirable physical explanations of all moral evil. If a man puts his hand into his neighbour's pocket, poor soul! it is entirely the fault of a peculiar cerebral organisation! So runs the cant. If he commits murder, he is an unfortunate victim of a morbid condition of the nervous system! There is one comfort, to be sure, that society will hang him from a similar morbid condition of its nervous system; if the one be necessitated to murder, so will the other be to hang.

Thank you for the pretty little specimens of Indian coin; the two or three sicca rupees, however, I should rather have had a "lac" of. But my tastes, my dear, are not so exclusively antiquarian or foreign as to be displeased with our own coins; and if you can conveniently send a bushel or two of English sovereigns, I assure you they will range very well in my cabinet with the Indian specimens.

Your promise to send your little Kate next year fills me with delight; her education shall be well cared for. As for your

grave caution that I am not to spoil the little thing, I shall simply say, it is pretty well from a fond mother, and she too an Indian mother! Why, my dear, I shall be only too thankful if I do not find the thing already done to my hands. Kiss the little pet for me. I long to hear her gabble her Hindostanee gibberish, and sing "Ruanah Keesti." My kind regards to the Captain, and tell him I hope he will not forget his promise to send the MS. notes of his journey to the Himalayas.

Believe me, my ever dear sister,
Yours affectionately,

R. E. H. G.

LETTER X.

To C. Mason Esq.

London, Sept. 4, 1839.

My dear Mason,

He

I have just been spending a few days with our old relation, John Wilmot. Although at the age of eighty he is as cheerful as a cricket and with a voice, by the way, nearly as shrill. eats heartily, sleeps soundly, is vivacious in manner and expression, and has that most lovely feature of age, sympathy with the young. He bears the "burden" of years cheerfully, and is studiously anxious not to impose a grain's weight on others, if it can be avoided.

The spectacle of extreme old age is, generally, not pleasing, sometimes how supremely pitiable! To see it hobbling and shuffling along on its three legs (according to the fable), the third, by the way, the best of the three; flummocking down, like a sack, into its easy chair of piled cushions- uttering the inanity which indicates that intellect is gone, but exhibiting a peevishness and fretfulness which prove that passion is still alive; who, as

he sees this, with whatever compassion, would wish to be so compassionated? Who, on such terms, would wish for longevity? But our relation is another sort of person, and makes you feel that old age may be not only venerable but beautiful, and the object of reverence untinctured by compassion. The intellect, the emotions, the affections (the best of them), all alive, -it is the passions and appetites only that are dead; and who that is wise and has felt the plague of them, does not, with the aged Cephalus, in Plato's "Republic," account a serene freedom from their clamorous importunities a compensation for the loss of their tumultuous pleasures? In John Wilmot humanity is not a mere ruin; its grossness is refined and purged away, but that is all. He looks like some ancient edifice, only the more beautiful for the traces of antiquity. There is to me an indescribable charm in the contrast between his grey locks falling down his shoulders, and his still ruddy cheeks and sparkling eye. His whole face is a commentary on the conservative power of Virtue. How each placid and unfurrowed feature tells of moderate passions, temperance, and habitual self-control, benevolence, and, in a word, all healthful emotions! The change from youth, indeed, is perceptible enough, but it is all legitimate-the soft chisellings of Time alone; none of the rents, scars, and deep furrows which turbulent passions leave behind them. Such features are eloquent of goodness and its rewards.

I cannot look on him without feeling the exceeding beauty of the expression of Solomon about "the hoary head found in the way of righteousness, being a crown of glory."

You do not expect, perhaps, and hardly wish to be as old as he; but if you are, may such be your age! Your death can hardly fail to prove, as I doubt not his will-"Euthanasia."

It may

I was amused with the pertinacity with which he refuses all offers to do for him any thing he can possibly do for himself. He cannot bear to give trouble or seem an incumbrance. seem to some an indication of a desire not to appear old. Yet this is not the case, for he talks freely of his being the old man ; and never attempts anything he cannot do. It is a natural dislike

to be a child. —a baby—again. If you seek to assist him on such occasions, when he thinks he wants it not, there is, I noticed, a little impatience—the only times in which he ever shows it. And on such occasions he will have his own way. Your only plan is to busy yourself with something else, and seem not to notice him. He will then fumble for five minutes together to tie a shoe-string or button his great-coat, but do it he will. To assist him is like assisting a stammerer; who, you may observe, will never take your anticipations of the word he tries at but cannot pronounce, or any other you may suggest to him; but will persist in hammering away at the refractory vocable, till he has mastered it, at least, if you have patience to wait for him, if it takes him a fortnight.

My visit has prompted me to read again Cicero's "De Senectute," which I had hardly looked into since I was at school. How beautiful many parts of it appear now to what they did then! How very superior to the greater part of his philosophical writings! The tedious Tusculan Disputations are not to be compared with it, or with the "De Amicitiâ."

Yours, &c.

R. E. H. G.

LETTER XI.

To the same.

London, Dec. 27, 1839.

My dear Friend,

I write to introduce to you my benevolent and intelligent friend Dr. S. R—, a doctor of physic, but who has retired from practice, except as an amateur, if I may be allowed so odd an expression. Yet is it very proper; like Johnson's soapboiler, who wearied of the tedium of his suburban "box," and drove into London to give his gratuitous aid to his successor on boiling

66