LXXIV. THE WONDERS OF AN ATOM.

ALL things visible around us are aggregations of atoms. From particles of dust, which under the microscope could scarcely be distinguished one from the other, are all the varied forms of nature created. This grain of dust, this particle of sand, has strange properties and powers. Science has discovered some, but still more truths are hidden within this irregular molecule of matter which we now survey than even philosophy dares dream of. How strangely it obeys the impulses of heat-mysterious are the influences of light upon it-electricity wonderfully excites it-and still more curious is the manner in which it obeys the magic of chemical force. These are phenomena which we have seen; we know them and we can reproduce them at our pleasure. We have advanced a little way into the secrets of nature, and from the spot we have gained we look forward with a vision somewhat brightened by our task; but we discover so much yet unknown that we learn another truth-our vast ignorance of many things relating to this grain of dust.

It gathers around it other particles; they cling together, and each acting upon every other one, and all of them arranging themselves around the little center, according to some law, a beautiful crystal results, the geometric perfection of its form being a source of admiration.

It quickens with yet undiscovered energies; it moves with life; dust and vital force combine; blood and bone, nerve and muscle result from the combination. Forces which we can not by the utmost refinements of our philosophy detect, direct the whole, and from the same dust which formed the rock and grew in the tree, is produced a living and a breathing thing, capable of receiving a divine illumination, of bearing in its new state the gladness and the glory of a soul.

-Hunt's "Poetry of Science."

LXXV. THE MODEL CHURCH.

WELL, wife, I've found the model church! I worshiped there

to-day!

It made me think of good old times before my hairs were gray;
The meetin'-house was fixed up more than they were years ago,
But then I felt when I went in it was n't built for show.

The sexton didn't seat me away back by the door,-
He knew that I was old and deaf, as well as old and poor;
He must have been a Christian, for he led me boldly through
The long aisle of that crowded church to find a pleasant pew.

I wish you'd heard the singin': it had the old-time ring:
The preacher said with trumpet-voice, “Let all the people sing!"
The tune was "Coronation," and the music upward rolled,
Till I thought I heard the angels playing on their harps of gold.

My deafness seemed to melt away; my spirit caught the fire;
I joined my feeble, trembling voice with that melodious choir,
And sang, as in my youthful days, “Let angels prostrate fall;
Bring forth the royal diadem, and crown him Lord of all."

I tell you, wife, it did me good to sing that hymn once more;
I felt like some wrecked mariner who gets a glimpse of shore;
I almost wanted to lay down this weather-beaten form,
And anchor in the blessed port forever from the storm.

The preachin'? Well, I can't just tell all that the preacher said:
I know it wasn't written; I know it wasn't read;
He hadn't time to read it, for the lightnin' of his eye
Went flashing long from pew to pew, nor passed a sinner by.

The sermon was n't flowery: 'twas simple gospel truth;
It fitted poor old men like me; it fitted hopeful youth;
'Twas full of compensation for weary hearts that bleed;
'Twas full of invitations, too, to Christ, and not to creed.

The preacher made sin hideous, in Gentiles and in Jews;
He shot the golden sentences down in the finest pews;
And though I can't see very well-I saw the falling tear
That told me hell was some ways off, and heaven very near.

How swift the golden moments fled, within that holy place; How brightly beamed the light of heaven from every happy face; Again I longed for that sweet time when friend shall meet with

friend,

"When congregations ne'er break up, and Sabbath has no end.”

I hope to meet that minister-that congregation, too—
In the dear home beyond the stars that shine from heaven's blue;
I doubt not I'll remember, beyond life's evening gray,
The happy hours of worship in that model church to-day.

Dear wife, the fight will soon be fought—the victory be won;
The shinin' goal is just ahead: the race is nearly run;
O'er the river we are nearin', they are thronging to the shore,
To shout our safe arrival where the weary weep no more.
-John H. Yates.

LXXVI. THE PERSONALITY AND USES OF A LAUGH.

I WOULD be willing to choose my friend by the quality of his laugh, and abide the issue. A glad, gushing outflowa clear, ringing, mellow note of the soul, as surely indicates a genial and genuine nature as the rainbow in the dew-drop heralds the morning sun, or the frail flower in the wilderness betrays the zephyr-tossed seed of the parterre.

A laugh is one of God's truths. It tolerates no disguises. Falsehood may train its voice to flow in softest cadences— its lips to wreathe into smiles of surpassing sweetness-its face

but its laugh will betray the mockery. Who has not started and shuddered at the hollow "he-he-he!" of some velvet-voiced Mephistopheles, whose sinuous fascinations, without this note of warning-this premonitory rattlemight have bound the soul with a strong spell!

Leave nature alone. If she is noble, her broadest expression will soon tone itself down to fine accordance with

life's earnestness; if she is base, no silken interweavings can keep out of sight her ugly head of discord. If we put a laugh into strait-jacket and leading-strings, it becomes an abortion; if we attempt to refine it, we destroy its pure, mellifluent ring; if we suppress a laugh, it struggles and dies on the heart, and the place where it lies is apt ever after to be weak and vulnerable. No, laugh truly, as you would speak truly, and both the inner and the outer man will rejoice. A full, spontaneous outburst opens all the delicate valves of being, and glides, a subtle oil, through all its complicated mechanism.

Laugh heartily, if you would keep the dew of your youth. There is no need to lay our girlhood and boyhood so doggedly down upon the altar of sacrifice as we toil up life's mountain. Dear, innocent children, lifting their dewy eyes and fair foreheads to the benedictions of angels-prattling and gamboling because it is a great joy to live, should flit like sunbeams among the stern-faced and stalwart. Young men and maidens should walk with strong, elastic tread and cheerful voices among the weak and uncertain. White hairs should be no more the insignia of age, but the crown of ripe and perennial youth.

Laugh for your beauty. The joyous carry a fountain of light in their eyes, and round into rosy dimples, where the echoes of gladness play at "hide and go seek." Your "lean and hungry Cassius" is never betrayed into a laugh, and his smile is more cadaverous than his despair.

Laugh, if you would live. He only exists who drags his days after him like a massive chain, asking sympathy with uplifted eyebrows and weak utterance as the beggar asks alms. Better die, for your own sake and the world's sake, than to pervert the uses and graces and dignities of life. Make your own sunshine and your own music-keep your heart open to the smile of the good Father, and brave all things.

"Care to our coffin adds a nail, no doubt;

And every laugh so merry draws one out."

LXXVII. TOASTS AND SENTIMENTS.

MAY the honest heart never know distress. May care be a stranger where virtue resides. May hemp bind those whom honor can not. May our prudence secure us friends, but enable us to live without their assistance.

May sentiment never be sacrificed by the tongues of deceit. May our happiness be sincere and our joys lasting. May the smiles of conjugal felicity compensate the frowns of fortune.

May the tears of sensibility never cease to flow.

May the road to preferment be found by none but those who deserve it.

May the liberal hand find free access to the purse of plenty.

May the impulse of generosity never be checked by the power of necessity.

May we always forget when we forgive an injury.

May the feeling heart possess the fortune the miser abuses.

May we draw upon content for the deficiencies of fortune. May Hope be thy physician when calamity is the disease.

CONVERSATION.

CONVERSATION calls into light what has been lodged in all the recesses and secret chambers of the soul. By occasional hints and incidents, it brings old useful notions into remembrance; it unfolds and displays the hidden treasure of knowledge with which reading, observation, and study have before furnished the mind. By mutual discourse the soul is awakened and allured to bring forth its hoards of knowledge, and it learns now to render them most useful to mankind. A man of vast reading, without conversation, is like a miser, who lives only for himself.