no work exist for thee on God's Earth; if thou find no commanded duty there but that of going gracefully idle? Ask, inquire earnestly, with a half-frantic earnestness; for the answer means Existence or Annihilation to thee. We apprise thee of the world-old fact, becoming sternly disclosed again in these days, That he who cannot work in this Universe cannot get existed in it: had he parchments to thatch the face of the world, these, combustible fallible sheepskin, cannot avail him. Home, thou unfortunate; and let us have at least no noise from thee!'

Suppose the unfortunate Idle Aristocracy, as the unfortunate Working one has done, were to 'retire three days to its bed,' and consider itself there, what o'clock it had become?

How have we to regret not only that men have 'no religion,' but that they have next to no reflection; and go about with heads full of mere extraneous noises, with eyes wideopen but visionless,-for most part in the somnambulist state!

From Past and Present.

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY (1800-1859)

W

HEN Macaulay was five or six years old, his father took him to call on some friends. While his elders were conversing, the boy read a book he found on the table nearby. Upon his return home his mother asked him how he had amused himself. Thereupon the lad quoted verbatim what he had read. His marvelous memory and the wide range of his reading astounded his contemporaries and has caused his readers to wonder. Thackeray said, "Macaulay reads twenty books to write a sentence and travels one hundred miles to make a line of description."

Macaulay was not primarily a literary man. The large majority of his essays were written in the early morning or late at night after the day's work was done. Like Chaucer he was a politician and government official. After graduation from college he studied law and as soon as possible sought a seat in Parliament. Through his eloquent speeches and industry he gained recognition and promotion. Many offices he declined because of his work as a legal advisor to the Supreme Council of India. His advocacy for the Reform Bill was a chief cause of its passing. Whenever he spoke in Parliament, his colleagues listened to him with respect and admiration.

This oratorical ability influenced his writing, which is particularly clear and convincing. He is a master of paragraph development, for each section of his essays was clearly outlined in his mind before he wrote. Every subject he discussed from a historical point of view, pointing out how an author's works were influenced by the period in which he lived. Unfortunately, Macaulay became so enthusiastic about his interpretation of his subjects that he forgot that the chief essential of historical writing is accuracy. He allowed his prejudices to color his view of the facts and personalities with which he dealt. Therefore the reader must realize that he is reading history not as it actually occurred but

as Macaulay saw it. His great service to historical writing was that he made it vivid and interesting.

sea.

COMMERCE OF ITALY IN THE 14TH CENTURY

Thus liberty, partially indeed and transiently, revisited Italy; and with liberty came commerce and empire, science and taste, all the comforts and all the ornaments of life. The Crusades, from which the inhabitants of other countries gained nothing but relics and wounds, brought to the rising commonwealths of the Adriatic and Tyrrhene seas a large increase of wealth, dominion, and knowledge. The moral and geographical position of those commonwealths enabled them to profit alike by the barbarism of the West and by the civilisation of the East. Italian ships covered every Italian factories rose on every shore. The tables of Italian money-changers were set in every city. Manufactures flourished. Banks were established. The operations of the commercial machine were facilitated by many useful and beautiful inventions. We doubt whether any country of Europe, our own excepted, have at the present time reached so high a point of wealth and civilisation as some parts of Italy had attained four hundred years ago. Historians rarely descend to those details from which alone the real state of a community can be collected. Hence posterity is too often deceived by the vague hyperboles of poets and rhetoricians, who mistake the splendour of a court for the happiness of a people. Fortunately, John Villani has given us an ample and precise account of the state of Florence in the early part of the fourteenth century. The revenue of the Republic amounted to three hundred thousand florins; a sum which, allowing for the depreciation of the precious metals, was at least equivalent to six hundred thousand pounds sterling; a larger sum than England and Ire

land, two centuries ago, yielded annually to Elizabeth. The manufacture of wool alone employed two hundred factories and thirty thousand workmen. The cloth annually produced sold, at an average, for twelve hundred thousand florins; a sum fully equal in exchangeable value to two millions and a half of our money. Four hundred thousand florins were annually coined. Eighty banks conducted the commercial operations, not of Florence only but of all Europe. The transactions of these establishments were sometimes of a magnitude which may surprise even the contemporaries of the Barings and the Rothschilds. Two houses advanced to Edward the Third of England upwards of three thousand marks, at a time when the mark contained more silver than fifty shillings of the present day, and when the value of silver was more than quadruple of what it now is. The city and its environs contained a hundred and seventy thousand inhabitants. In the various schools about ten thousand children were taught to read; twelve hundred studied arithmetic; six hundred received a learned education.

From Machiavelli.

ORIGIN OF THE NATIONAL DEBT

During the interval between the Restoration and the Revolution the riches of the nation had been rapidly increasing. Thousands of busy men found every Christmas that, after the expenses of the year's housekeeping had been defrayed out of the year's income, a surplus remained; and how that surplus was to be employed was a question of some difficulty. In our time, to invest such a surplus, at something more than three per cent., on the best security that has ever been known in the world, is the work of a few min

utes. But, in the seventeenth century, a lawyer, a physician, a retired merchant, who had saved some thousands and who wished to place them safely and profitably, was often greatly embarrassed. Three generations earlier, a man who had accumulated wealth in a trade or a profession generally purchased real property or lent his savings on mortgage. But the number of acres in the kingdom had remained the same; and the value of those acres, though it had greatly increased, had by no means increased so fast as the quantity of capital which was seeking for employment. Many too wished to put their money where they could find it at an hour's notice, and looked about for some species of property which could be more readily transferred than a house or a field. A capitalist might lend on bottomry or on personal security: but, if he did so, he ran a great risk of losing interest and principal. There were a few joint stock companies, among which the East India Company held the foremost place: but the demand for the stock of such companies was far greater than the supply. Indeed the cry for a new East India Company was chiefly raised by persons who had found difficulty in placing their savings at interest on good security. So great was that difficulty that the practice of hoarding was common. We are told that the father of Pope the poet, who retired from business in the City about the time of the Revolution, carried to a retreat in the country a strong box containing nearly twenty thousand pounds, and took out from time to time what was required for household expenses; and it is highly probable that this was not a solitary case. At present the quantity of coin which is hoarded by private persons is so small that it would, if brought forth, make no perceptible addition to the circulation. But, in the earlier part of the reign of William the Third, all the greatest writers on currency were of opinion