fuel to the feuds of the neighborhood, seek technical flaws in titles to compel settlements and secure peace, and hunt for skeletons in the closets of the living and the dead, that pride or affection may be compelled to pay, to avoid exposures which are certain to cause mortification, and may leave a stain upon the character or memory, are public nuisances, and disgrace the profession. But when they pacify quarreling friends, adjust the disputes which threaten partnerships, and above all present in the spirit of conciliation and forgiveness their faults and interests to husband and wife, whose estrangement threatens the wreck of the family in the Divorce Court, they use their unusual opportunities to be the benefactors of mankind.

That there are sixty thousand lawyers in the United States, and that the profession is crowded, need discourage no one who deserves success. Part of them have neglected their opportunities, and many have mistaken their calling. The gifts of men are infinite in character and degree, but the rarest is the faculty for honest work. The carpenter and mason, the painter and plumber, the lumberman and the stone-cutter, all furnish and place the materials for the creations of the great architect. A famous lawyer told me, that in his early practice he carried to Webster a brief he had been six months in preparing. That marvellous intellect absorbed his labor in a night, and built upon it an argument which illumined the case, and exhibited controlling principles, which neither opposing counsel or the Court below had seen. Because Webster and Curtis, Evarts and O'Conor dominate their generations, the remark has become trite, that there is plenty of room at the top. But while all may not reach their level, persistent and intelligent industry will command their recognition. Some men are the first scholars of their class in College, and marvels of memory in the Law School who are never heard of afterwards. They have a talent for acquisition and recitation, but they can neither use nor apply their material. They never see the point in their case, nor discover the truth in their doctrines. They are deficient in grey matter and sense, and should find their places outside the liberal professions before their careers are hopelessly ruined.

When, however, you are satisfied with your vocation, then the golden hours for preparation for business, when it comes, are in the early years of practice. The whole field of human knowledge furnishes material for use in after life. History and biography, literature and science, philosophy and politics, will add their share to the fully equipped mind, while the law and again the law becomes more thoroughly imbedded in memory and assimilated in thinking. Busy men are often carried safely through the latter half of their lives by drawing upon these invaluable accumulations of the leisure period for the wise man, and the lazy one for the fool. I sometimes think that there is no limit to what a man can do, if the idle hours usually given to waiting for somebody or something, to worthless gossip, to the social glass at the club in the afternoon, which unfits him for work in the evening, and to the fascinating luxury of empty-headedness, were hailed as special gifts of Providence to be treasured and used for study.

Lord Coleridge, while on his visit to Yale, asked me where he could find in this country the villages so common in England, where old lawyers, sixty years of age and upwards, who had fixed incomes from their investments of from two to three thousand dollars a year, and had retired from practice, could spend the remainder of their lives in the congenial companionship of educated neighbors, with no other occupation than the cultivation of a garden, and the mild excitement of the whist club and tea party. I told him we had no such lawyers. Few of them had accumulated that amount of capital, and those who had were still rising young men at the bar. Our curse as a Nation is the prevalence of false standards of success. It encourages gambling, leads to breaches of trust, and is the daily cause of the flight of the cashier with the deposits of the bank, and of the attorney and executor with the funds of the estate. Independent income sufficient for the maintenance of a comfortable home is success. After that, it is a question of degree. It has been demonstrated by a multitude of long and honorable lives, that work and an active interest and participation in current events repair the waste of time and age.

"Nil admirari" is the aim of the student, and ends in torpor and imbecility in the man. The history of our country justi

fies optimism, and to keep pace with the times requires enthusiasm. Do not fear that it will impair the opinion of the community in the solidity of your judgment to cheer, and hail as a special gift of Providence the opportunity to laugh. Behind you are the precepts and examples of great lawyers and judges whose learning and labors have enriched the world, and achieved imperishable renown for the statesmanship, the bench and the bar of our country. Before you are the fields in which these eminent men won their laurels and received their rewards, and where the larger opportunities of to-day give you hope, promise, and welcome.

ARTICLE V.-BETHESDA.

YEA it is true, most strange sights have I seen.
These three days journey from Jerusalem
With all the throng returning from the feast
I've pondered o'er and o'er the wondrous tale
Which I would fain repeat to thee my friend,
To thee alone, and first; for thou and I
Think not as do the vulgar crowd, nor as
Some persons of our sect the Sadducees
Who but maintain the opposite to that
The Pharisees are pleased to call the law.
But thou and I have ever sought the truth,
Lifting her veils, one after one, perchance
At last to see some glimpse of her real face.

Thou knowest the sheep gate of Jerusalem?
Dost mind thee too, there is a pool near by?
A tank it is, with water dark and red,
Not pleasing to the eye. Around is built
A colonade, with roof and porches five,
A place that's sheltered from the sun, and cool
At midday. Here there lay sick folk, a throng
Of blind, and lame, with divers sore diseased.
The place was full, so full that walking through-
It was the Sabbath day-I gathered close
My mantle's fringe, lest I should touch some one
And be defiled. Why lay they there, sayest thou?
An angel, say they, comes at certain times.
To move the water; whosoever then
First steps in afterward is healed. An angel
Say they! Thou and I hold that none exist.
Rather say the spring which feeds the tank
Sends bubbles from its secret source. How they
Can cure I know not. 'Tis one delusion more
The ignorant believe.

I waited though

To see this so-called wonder, marveling much
At the great numbers gathered there in hope
Of being cured. I spoke to one or two,
One blind man, one deformed, and one who was
Possessed with devils-so they said-but that
Again is but a name, since we believe
There are no spirits. One old man I saw
For eight and thirty years in suffering bent.
He lay so patiently, he was so old

I gladly would have helped him if I could.
And many more there were, disease and sin
Writ on their faces. So I walked about;
But still the angel tarried, and I laughed
In secret, thinking he would tarry long.

And as I stood there waiting some one came
And spoke to the old man I told thee of.
His face I saw not; the old man's I saw,

And heard him tell his tale as he told me.

And then I heard clear and distinct the voice
Of him he spoke to. It was not loud, or strong,
But with a power of energy and life.

Rise, he said, take up thy bed and walk.

And the man rose, took up his bed, and walked!

I tell thee that I saw him, one moment lying
A helpless, shapeless mass of suffering,

The next erect and strong upon his feet!

What shouts of praise went up from all around!

The man himself seemed dazed, and said no word

But moved about as in a dream, his bed

Upon his back, as if he feared to change

From that one posture, in which he found his strength.
Then those who looked on of the Pharisees
Forbad him, saying 'twas the Sabbath day.
But of the man himself, who bade him rise,
I saw no trace; the crowd was great, and he
Had no apparel to distinguish him.

Thou knowest we are wont to think the people
Run to superstition, are credulous,

Like to believe the marvelous. In proof