will not abandon me though I again reach the heyday of health and vigor. This should be the first step to another impression still more salutary-the magnitude of eternity. Strip human life of its connection with a higher scene of existence, and it is the illusion of an instant, an unmeaning farce, a series of visions and projects and convulsive efforts which terminate in nothing. I have been reading Pascal's Thoughts on Religion; you know his history-a man of the richest endowments, and whose youth was signalized by his profound and original speculations in mathematical science, but who could stop short in the brilliant career of discovery, who could resign all the splendors of literary reputation, who could renounce without a sigh all the distinctions which are conferred upon genius, and resolve to devote every talent and every hour to the defence and illustration of the Gospel. This, my dear sir, is superior to all Greek and to all Roman fame."-P. 152. The work was, however, only begun as yet. It needed toil, and watching, and prayer, to reduce these sentiments to practice. We will illustrate the progress of the struggle by some extracts from a diary which commences at this period of his life: March 17th, 1810.-I have this day completed my thirtieth year; and, upon a review of the last fifteen years of my life, I am obliged to acknowledge that at least two thirds of that time have been useless pression of its criminality, repeated the same scene with high aggravations in the afternoon. * * ** April 22d.-I find that principle and reflection afford a feeble support against the visitations of melancholy. It is a physical distemper, and must be counteracted by physical means. *It is, perhaps, not my duty to summon up a cheerfulness of mind in the hour of unaccountable despondency, for perhaps this is an affair as completely beyond the control of reason as any other of our physical sensations; it is my duty to study, and, if possible, to devise expedients for restoring me from this useless and melancholy state. Now, all experience assures me that regular occupation is that expedient; and it is my duty, if I find myself unequal to the severity of my usual exercises, to devise slighter subjects of employment which can be resorted to in the time of necessity. This I esteem to be an important part of moral discipline. Writing a fair copy of any old production which you wish to preserve, setting your books and papers into a state of greater arrangement, writing letters, looking over your accounts, and making slight but interesting calculations about your future gains and future expenditure; these, and a number of other subjects of occupation, should occur to be ever ready to offer themselves as corrections to melancholy. Let me cultivate, then, that habit of exertion which will not shrink from a remedy which I find so effectual.-Pp. 158–166. The Scotch thrift which peeps out in the "slight ly or idly spent, and that there has all along been a but interesting calculations" alluded to in the last miserable want of system and perseverance in the passage, may excite a smile, but our readers will business of adding to my intellectual attainments. feel with us that this is the diary of a man, whose For by far the greater part of that time, too, there eyes have been opened to the all-pervading charachas been a total estrangement of my mind from re-ter of the divine law, stretching out as it were into ligious principle; and my whole conduct has been dictated by the rambling impulse of the moment, without any direction from a sense of duty, or any reference to that eternity which should be the end and the motive of all our actions. My prayer to Heaven is, that this record of my errors and deviations may be the happy means of recalling me from folly and wickedness; that my temper, and my passions, and my conversation may be brought under the habitual regulation of principle; that the labors of my mind may be subservient to the interests of the Gospel; that from this moment I may shake off caprice and indolence, and the mischief of ill-regulated passions; and that, with the blessing of the divine assistance, I may be enabled to soar above the littleness of time, and give all for eternity. * March 20th.-A day spent without any intercourse with people abroad. But in every situation there is a call for vigilance; and what a struggle one must maintain to render himself the agreeable inmate of a family! In this respect I have much to accuse myself of; I have little or no indulgence for the infirmities of the aged; and nothing galls me more than to be obliged to repeat the same thing to the deaf or the careless. It is only in the latter case that anger is at all justifiable; and I should recollect that if the person be old, the habit of carelessness may be beyond the possibility of correction. By far the best way is just to accommodate to it; it is the way of duty and of comfort. * * *This disposition, in fact, to get out of humor at what is irksome in others, lies at the bottom of that undutiful conduct which makes my parents unhappy with me at Anster; and I fear my aunt not altogether satisfied with her visit to myself. * * March 27th.-Had Mr. to drink tea. Detected myself in a slight tendency to evil-speaking. Got ruffled at Jane for the fretfulness with which she returned my questions about her accounts. * * April 9th.-I this day gave a most melancholy and alarming proof of the imbecility of my purposes; I got into a violent passion with Sandy in the morning; and, after I had reasoned myself into a thorough im the very corners and by-ways of daily life. They are the sentiments of one who feels the need of sanctification, and is striving, in an earnest, practical way, to attain to it. Such a season of effort is Sometimes it has terminated in gloom and despair, a critical period in the history of any man's soul. sometimes in fanaticisin; sometimes it has passed away fruitlessly, and left the heart callous, hardened, and impassive. With Chalmers the issue was happy; for it landed him on a religious system, which, though falling far short of the truth, and alloyed with some actual error, destined to produce more baneful fruits in the following generation, was nevertheless at that time the most vital and energizing form of Christianity within his ken. He read Wilberforce's View, and became an evangelical. The following is his own account of this event, given ten years subsequently in a letter to his brother : My dear Alexander-I stated to you that the effect of a very long confinement, about ten years ago, upon myself, was to inspire me with a set of very strenuous resolutions, under which I wrote a Journal, and made many a laborious effort to elevate my practice to the standard of the divine requirements. During this course, however, I got little satisfaction, and felt no repose. I remember, that, somewhere about the year 1811, I had Wilberforce's View put into my hands, and, as I got on in reading it, felt myself on the eve of a great revolution in all my opinions about Christianity. I am now most thoroughly of opinion, and it is an opinion founded on experience, that on the system of-Do this, and live, no peace, and even no true and worthy obedience, can ever be attained. It is-Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved. When this belief enters the heart, joy and confidence enter along with it. The righteousness which we try to work out for ourselves eludes our impotent grasp, and never can a soul arrive at a true or permanent rest in the pursuit of this object. The righteousness, which by faith we put on, secures our excited. The first is a very graphic picture from acceptance with God, and secures our interest in his "Peter's Letters to his Kinsfolk:"promises, and gives us a part in those sanctifying in-, fluences by which we are enabled to do with aid from on high what we can never do without it. We look to God in a new light-we see Him as a reconciled Father; that love to Him which terror scares away reënters the heart, and, with a new principle and a new power, we become new creatures in Jesus Christ our Lord.-Pp. 185, 186. It is not our intention to criticize these statements. Their language, vague and uncertain in itself, is apt in cold and worldly minds to degenerate into unmeaning conventionality, and in better spirits to pass into a denial of sacramental grace, or sometimes even to issue in an antinomian theory. They are, however, the expression of an undoubted truth, which is valuable even in its distorted form, and which have proved the rescue and support of many a fainting soul-the truth, namely, that we are already, if we will but use our privileges, "children of God, members of Christ, and inheri tors of the kingdom of heaven." This led Chalmers out of his mental agony, and gave him what he felt to be the clue of his future life. We will conclude this scene of his history by an extract from his journal three years later, when these ideas had taken full possession of his soul. The change of thought and tone is very striking :— * I was a good deal surprised and perplexed with the first glimpse I obtained of his countenance, for the light that streamed faintly upon it for the moment did not reveal anything like that general outline of feature and visage for which my fancy had, by some strange working of presentiment, prepared me. Byand-by, however, the light became stronger, and I was enabled to study the minutiae of his face pretty leisurely while he leaned forward and read aloud the words of the Psalm, for that is always done in Scotland, not by the clerk, but the clergyman himself. At first sight, no doubt, his face is a coarse one, but a mysterious kind of meaning breathes from every part of it, that such as have eyes to see cannot be long without discovering.-Vol. ii., p. 2. which must have perplexed many readers of Dr. The sentiments are seldom either striking or Of all human compositions there is none surely which loses so much as a sermon does, when it is made to address itself to the eye of a solitary student in his closet, and not to the thrilling ears of a mighty mingled congregation, through the very voice which nature has enriched with notes more expressive than words can ever be of the meanings and feelings of its author. Neither, perhaps, did the world ever possess any orator whose minutest peculiarities of gesture and voice have more power in increasing the effect of what he says-whose delivery, in other words, is the first, and the second, and the third excellence of his oratory June 16th, (1812.)-This is one of my dedication days, and the following is the record of it :-Prayed for a fixed intentness of thought upon God. Recurred often to the reigning object of my heart, and gave myself up to the plans and calculations which have this world for their object. Dedicated myself to God, as my Creator and Judge. Oh may I feel the weight of this dedication, and the dreadful sentence that hangs over my falling back from it! * *Thought of Christ as my sacrifice, and tried to bring up my mind to the doctrine of the Cross, in all its peculiar--than Dr. Chalmers. And yet, were the spirit of ity. * ** Prayed for a life and a heart worthy of the holy name by which we are called, and that I should love and obey Christ. Thought of my own insufficiency for this; repaired to the agency of the Spirit; dedicated myself to the Holy Ghost as my Sanctifier; and prayed that God would give me His Spirit to reform me, and make me a new creature in Christ Jesus our Lord.-Pp. 289, 290. A few years of quiet and earnest work at Kilmany, very different in kind and quantity from that which had satisfied him before his illness, allowed time for these impressions to ripen into matured and habitual conviction, before he was summoned to play his part on a more public stage. The only event of these years was his marriage with Miss Pratt, a lady whose family resided in his parish. The union proved a happy one, and yielded many years of unbroken domestic comfort. His ten years' ministry at Kilmany came to a close in his thirty-fifth year, in consequence of an invitation to the Tron Church in Glasgow, which, after some deliberation, he accepted. This was the beginning of a new existence to him. From a quiet and secluded country parish he passed at once into the position of the popular preacher of a great and overflowing city. The effect of his oratory was wonderful and instantaneous. From the first day of his appearance in Glasgow to his final departure from it, the multitudes flocked into his church with unremitting assiduity. We will extract some sketches descriptive both of the preacher himself and of the sensation which he the man less gifted than it is, there is no question bly I have never heard, either in England or Scotland, or in any other country, any preacher whose eloquence is capable of producing an effect so strong and irresistible as his.-Pp. 4, 5. There was a Thursday morning lecture at the Tron Church, which was supplied in turn by the city ministers. When Dr. Chalmers preached, these lectures were not less numerously attended than his Sunday sermons. The scene is thus described by one of his congregation: "If such an exaction," he said, "was ever laid by the omnipotence of custom on a minister of Christianity, it is such an exaction as ought never, never to be complied with. It is not for him to lend the sanction of his presence to a meeting with which he could not sit to its final termination. It is not for him to stand associated, for a single hour, with an assemblage of men, who begin with hypocrisy, and end with downright blackguardism.*** It is quite in vain to say that he has only sanctioned one part of such an entertainment. He has as good as given his connivance to the whole of it, and left behind him a disThe Tron Church contains, if I mistake not, about charge in full of all its abominations; and, therefore, 1,400 hearers, according to the ordinary allowance be they who they may, whether they rank among the of seat-room; when crowded, of course, proportionally proudest aristocracy of our land, or are charioted in more. *** Suppose the congregation thus assem- splendor along as the wealthiest of our citizens, or bled-pews filled with sitters, and aisles, to a great flounce in the robes of magistracy, it is his part to extent, with standers. The preacher appears. The keep as purely and indignantly aloof from such socidevotional exercises of praise and prayer having been ety as this, as he would from the vilest and most degone through with unaffected simplicity and earnest- basing associations of profligacy." the entire assembly seat themselves for the treat, The words which I have underlined (the narrator with feelings very diverse in kind, but all eager and was an eye-witness to the scene) do not appear in the intent. There is a hush of dead silence. The text is sermon as printed. While uttering them, which he announced, and he begins. Every countenance is up, did with a peculiar emphasis, accompanying them every eye bent with fixed intentness on the speaker. with a flash from his eye, and a stamp of his foot, he As he kindles the interest grows. Every breath is threw his right arm with clenched hand right across held-every cough is suppressed-every fidgety move-the book-board, and brandished it full in the face of ment is settled-every one, riveted himself by the spell of the impassioned and entrancing eloquence, knows how sensitively his neighbor will resent the very slightest disturbance. Then, by-and-by, there is a pause. The speaker stops-to gather breath-to wipe his forehead-to adjust his gown-and purposely, too, and wisely, to give the audience as well as ness, himself a moment or two of relaxation. The moment is embraced-there is free breathing-suppressed coughs get vent-postures are changed-there is a universal stir, as of persons who could not have endured the constraint much longer-the preacher bends forward-his hand is raised-all is again hushed. The same stillness and strain of unrelaxed attention is repeated, more intent still, it may be, than before, as the interest of the subject and of the speaker advance. And so, for perhaps four or five times in the course of a sermon, there is the relaxation, and the "at it again," till the final winding up. And then, the moment the last word was uttered, and followed by the "Let us pray," there was a scene for which no excuse or palliation can be pleaded, but the fact of its having been to many a matter of difficulty, in the morning of a week-day, to accomplish the abstraction of even so much of their time from business-the closing prayer, completely drowned by the hurried rush of large numbers from the aisles and pews to the door-an unseemly scene, without doubt, as if so many had come to the house of God, not to worship, but simply to enjoy the fascination of human eloquence.-Pp. 149, 150. 66 the town council, sitting in array and in state before him. Many eyes were in a moment directed towards the magistrates. The words evidently fell upon them like a thunderbolt, and seemed to startle like an electric shock the whole audience.-Pp. 152, 153. And no wonder! we hope Dr. Chalmers knew for certain that some members of the town council hurled at them. were really obnoxious to the reproach thus publicly If he only yielded to a sudden temptation, occasioned by the flash of scarlet and gold before him, we must pronounce it rather an unjustifiable expedient of oratory. But the man who could venture on such bursts, and yet retain his own popularity as well as the attention of his hearers, must have been no common character. The crowds which flocked to his sermons were so great as even to cause him annoyance, and to induce him to resort to an amusing artifice to thin them a little. One Sunday evening, after a tremendous pressure of multitudes upon the Tron church, which finally ended in the destruction of the doors, one of his friends gives the following anecdote: I stepped into the vestry at the dismission of the congregation, and walked home with him, our dwellings lying in the same direction. On the way home we talked inter alia of this occurrence. He expressed, in his pithy manner, his great annoyance at such crowds. "I preached the same sermon," said he, "in the morning; and, for the very purpose of preventing the oppressive annoyance of such a densely crowded place, I intimated that I should preach it again in the evening ;" and, with the most ingenuous guilelessness, he added, "Have you ever tried the plan?" I did not smile-I laughed outright. No, no," I replied, "my good friend, there are but very few of us that are under the necessity of having reHe enjoyed the joke, and he felt, though he modestly course to the use of means for getting thin audiences." disowned, the compliment.-P. 160. 66 The closing portion of this scene is not creditable to Dr. Chalmers; one cannot help feeling that the same eloquence which attracted his audience might have been made subservient to the purpose of detaining them till the service was decently closed; and we know that he did not at all shrink from the most direct and personal rebuke, when he thought it necessary. A remarkable instance of this occurs in a sermon on the Dissipation of large Cities," preached in the presence of the town council. He had been enlarging on the custom, then falling into In fact the hurry and bustle of his life was at desuetude, of ministers, when invited to an enter- this time so great that he often longed to escape tainment, carefully watching the right moment to from it, and take refuge in an ideal retirement, withdraw, when hard drinking was setting in, and which he describes in somewhat quaint language, the conversation likely to become such as it would as "a situation where there was less of glare and have been improper for them to hear. He was publicity and mobbish exhibition, and more of reprobating this practice with his utmost en- quiet study, relieved by converse with literary ergy : Christians. On another occasion, impressed probably by some they were severally responsible. Relief was dissuch occurrences as those above related at the Tron pensed only on the most rigid terms. We extract Church, he poured forth an energetic declamation a few sentences from a letter of advice to a new on the worthlessness of that which he described deacon:by a forcible felicity of expression, “a popularity of stare and pressure, and animated heat." habit with the applicants, this in itself is an evidence Instances are given of the working of this system: "There is a distinction to be observed," writes Dr. Chalmers, "between one sort of application and anBut we should do Dr. Chalmers great injustice other. The first is for relief grounded on age or if we regarded him merely as a successful and bodily infirmity, in virtue of which those applying are popular preacher. His eloquence, though the not able to work ;-this furnishes the cases for ordifoundation of his fame, was perhaps the least part nary pauperism. The second is for relief granted on of his real usefulness. He was most conscientious the want of work, or defect in wages-this it is not and indefatigable in the discharge of the more understood that by the law of Scotland we are obliged onerous, though less showy duties of his situation. to meet or to provide for, and therefore ought never His parish contained from eleven to twelve thou-to be so met out of the ordinary funds. Your present sand souls. Every single family in it was visited applications are all of the second order, and the likeby him in the course of a year or two. lihood is, that you will be able to meet them by work On his alone, or, if this will not suffice, by a small temporary first arrival scarcely a hundred children were in donation. In prosecuting the second sort of attendance on the Sunday school. He forthwith application, you have to ascertain, in the first instance, organized a new system, established forty distinct whether the applicants have resided three years in schools in different localities of the parish, and, at Glasgow; and, secondly, what are the profits coming the end of two years, upwards of twelve hundred into the family from their various sources and emchildren were under regular religious instruction. ployments. Be kind and courteous to the The laity of the parish were summoned to assist people, while firm in your investigations about them; him in a thousand ways, and numbers willingly and just in proportion to the care with which you obeyed the summons. In short, Chalmers had a investigate will be the rarity of the applications that real and vigorous notion of parochial management, are made to you. N. B.-If drunkenness be a and carried it out most effectually in all directions. For the execution of his own pet scheme, however, he had to wait a little longer. For many years he had been fond of dabbling-among the many other sciences which amused or occupied him-in political economy; and from the first moment of his acquaintance with it, the idea of a poor-law excited his unmitigated abhorrence and disgust. He is never tired of compassionating England and felicitating Scotland on this score. It checks the stream of private charity, destroys the feeling of honorable independence, and by producing a willingness to receive and an expectation of relief, engenders and increases the very evil it is intended to prevent. Pauperism, he declared, is pampered into preternatural dimensions by the existence of a poor-law. Take away the poor-law, and pauperism will vanish of itself. Such at least was his language at Kilmany; but on his arrival at Glasgow, his annoyance was considerable to find himself subject to the action of a system approximating to that of the latter English Union. All the inhabitants of the city contributed their alms to a general fund, which was disbursed by the orders of a central committee. The exact consideration of individual cases was therefore impossible; and the minister was separated in a great degree from the authority and responsibility of a superintendence over his own poor. Against this system Dr. Chalmers at once set his face. It was too strong for him, however, in the old parishes; but when by strenuous exertion he had procured the erection of a new parish-S. John's-out of the poorest and most neglected portion of the city, the point for which he fought most earnestly, and stipulated most pertinaciously, was the permission to manage his own poor in absolute independence. The collection at the church-doors was to be the only fund from which he was to draw; he undertook to need no more. In his own hands the pledge was amply redeemed. The pauperism which had previously exhausted £1,400 a year was supplied under his management by £280. This great reduction was effected by a most elaborate scheme of personal visitation and inquiry. A sufficient number of "deacons" were engaged to cover the whole parish, which was thus divided out into districts for which In one district two young families were deserted by their parents. Had the children been taken at once upon the parochial funds, the unnatural purpose of the parents would have been promoted, and the parochial authorities would have become patrons of one of the worst of crimes. The families were left to lie helplessly on the hands of the neighborhood, the deacon meanwhile making every effort to detect the fugitives. One of the parents was discovered and brought back ;-the other, finding his object frus An old and altogether trated, voluntarily returned. helpless man sought parish aid. It was ascertained whom his circumstances were represented, and into that he had very near relatives living in affluence, to whose unwilling hands, compelled to do their proper work, he was summarily committed. Typhus fever made its deadly inroads into a weaver's family, who, though he had sixpence a day as a pensioner, was reduced to obvious and extreme distress. The case was reported to Dr. Chalmers, but no movement towards any sessional relief was made; entire confidence was cherished in the kind offices of the immediate neighborhood. A cry, however, of neglect was raised; an actual investigation of what the man had received during the period of his distress was undertaken, and it was found that ten times more than any legal fund would have allowed him had been supplied willingly, and without any sacrifice whatever to the offerers. A mother and daughter, sole occupiers of a single room, were both afflicted with caucer, for which one had to undergo an operation; the other was incurable. Nothing would have been easier than to have brought the liberalities of the rich to bear upon such a case; but this was rendered unnecessary by the willing contributions of food and service and cordials of those living around this habitation of distress. "Were it right," asks Dr. Chalmers, " that any legal charity whatever should arrest a process so beautiful?"-Pp. 304, 305. This is somewhat stern philanthropy; but it is easily intelligible, that, under a system so adminis tered, the parochial expenditure would be considerably diminished. One would suppose, however, that it would be more likely to be far more effective in the transference, than in the real diminution of pauperism, and that the poor would emigrate by shoals into parishes where the conditions of relief were less stringent. This, however, is said not to have been the case in the present instance : At the beginning of March, 1823, fifteen of the S. John's poor had removed to other parishes, and twenty-nine from other parishes had been received the imports being thus about double of the exports. -P. 309. The plan was eminently and conspicuously successful. But the hand of the master was necessary for its administration, or at least his voice was wanted for its vindication. It subsisted indeed, and flourished, for thirteen years after Dr. Chalmers had withdrawn from its direction; but it subsisted as a solitary instance. The other parishes continued to be administered on the old plan; the conflicting systems generated jealousies and disputes, and at last, after an independent existence of eighteen years, the parish of S. John's lapsed into the general system of Glasgow. which could have elevated him to anything more From the Paris Correspondence of the Times, 29 May, 1851. THE Journal des Débats has the following, on the visit paid to Warsaw by the King of Prussia and the Emperor of Russia :— Dr. Chalmers' ministry in Glasgow lasted altoThe King of Prussia has only had to congratulate gether for about eight years. During all that himself on his stay at Warsaw, as he received the most time his desires were growing stronger and stronger cordial reception from the Emperor Nicholas and the for the literary retirement which he had sighed Empress Alexandra. It may be remembered that the after from the beginning of it. There was, how-empress, formerly Princess Charlotte, of Prussia is ever, then much to be done a whole parish to be reclaimed, many favorite sciences to be attempted, many new plans to be organized. He felt that he had a work before him which he must not desert; and the offer of a professorship in the University of Edinburgh-the earliest object of his youthful ambition-was more than once reluctantly declined. But when eight years had passed, when his work at the Tron Church had for some time been over, when the new parish of S. John's had been erected, and all its machinery set to work, when his favorite plan of pauper management had been established in it, and when, in proportion as his practical schemes were completed, the claims of literary labor seemed to grow upon him, he gladly availed himself of a similar opportunity, and returned once more in a new capacity to the University of S. Andrews— no longer the rising scholar, the turbulent assistant, or the indignant rival, but the Professor of Moral Philosophy. lations, which appeared for some time past to have the sister of King Frederick William. The good reslackened between the two sovereigns, are now reestablished, to the great satisfaction of the empress, whose affection for her brother is well known. The emperor took the king to one of his palaces, not far from Warsaw, where he treated him with every possible honor during three days. The emperor, however, will not go to Berlin. The public there is not altogether pleased, for though the intimacy between the sovereigns is considered a subject of congratulation, it is remarked that all the acts in consequence are on the side of the king; and persons ask each other why the emperor should not go to Berlin on the solemn occasion of the inauguration of the statue of Frederick esteem for the Prussian nation, and of deference for II.; they say that he ought to give that proof of the memory of the great man, who also belongs to his own family. It is so true that the meeting of the sovereigns at Warsaw is generally believed to have reference And here for the present our history leaves us. to the political state of Europe, and especially to We should like much to be able to add the pro- that of France, that it may not be considered out fessorial to the ministerial course: we should like of place if I mention some particulars with relation more to have the full account of that most remark-to an event which has excited public attention both able movement, which issued in the secession of the Free Kirk, and to learn the grounds on which the defender of church establishments and the promoter of church extension justified the prominent position which he occupied in that movement; but for this we must be content to wait the arrival of the third volume. in Germany and here. Private letters from Dresden, the most recent bearing date the 25th, show that considerable impatience is manifested to ascertain the results of that interview, which will be continued at Olmutz. The question is constantly asked, "What is the subject of these conferences? What are the questions discussed or resolved there? And Meanwhile we have enough in the work before us what are the intentions of the sovereign, the princes, to estimate the general character of Dr. Chalmers. and the statesmen, who have been summoned, or Ardent and enterprising, full of that self-confidence, may yet be summoned, to take part in them?" which is one of the most powerful elements of These questions, as frequent in France as they are success, with a genial good-humor and a hearty in Germany, are asked and discussed ir a more flow of spirits that enabled him to enlist all around earnest manner ever since it became known that him in an enthusiastic and sanguine cooperation the Emperor of Russia was about to visit Warwith his own designs, he possessed great means of saw; but to these questions few have been able to practical power. That power was sanctified and reply, so wrapped up are these conferences in aldirected by a most sincere and earnest devotion to most impenetrable mystery. It has even been said religion. His intellect was sound, clear and vig-that the King of Prussia and the Emperor of orous, rather than deep, searching, or comprehen- Austria know very little more than the public; sive. There is nothing in his published works that the Emperor Nicholas has intrusted his secret |