THE KNOWN AND UNKNOWN.

GREAT though man is, intellectually, still all the knowledge which he possesses is as vanity, compared to the great mysterious unknown—that which he does not know. He makes the lightning his messenger, and sends words of hope, love, or fear to distant places on its fiery wings. He takes iron from the mine and wood from the forest; of the one he makes his steed, and the other his driver, and away he roars on the iron track faster than the eagle cleaves the air. He throws his bridge over the sea; and his iron cords span the yawning chasm, where Niagara's water runs dark and deep.

The ocean billows are smoothed by the wheel of his steamship; he pierces through the Alps with the chisel and drill; he makes his pathway under great rivers, and walks dry-shod beneath the keels of huge ships.All this he does, and much more by the force of his splendid mind--that constructive faculty implanted in him by his great Creator. But great though man is intellectually, and vast though the powers of his mind are, to comprehend and plan; extensive as is his knowledge of things in earth, water, air and sky, still all this but teaches him that he knows nothing in comparison with that which is far beyond his ken.

The astronomer hath constructed his telescope six feet in diameter, and with it he beholdeth clearly five hundred times farther than he can with his naked eye; with it, he hath made many discoveries in the starry heavens, for he can tell the height of the mountains and the depth of the valleys in

the moon.

He hath counted other systems besides our own solar corner of the universe; but these things only impress more strongly upon his mind the simple fact, "he is but a babe in knowledge."

He sees double, triple, and quadruple stars; one red, another blue, and crowned with revolving rings, and another oscillating like a pendulum; and viewing these immensities, the conclusion is forced upon his mind, that Vol. 7, No. 1—2.

this earth, in the universe of worlds, is like a cork on the great ocean, and himself like a beautiful butterfly which dances in the

warm sunbeam.

It may be acknowledged that man can know but little of those immensities which are so far removed from the sphere in which he dwells, but it is different with those things which are brought under his strict observation. The knowledge which man has accumulated in all the generations of his existence, forms but a small mound in comparison with the unknown.

No machine hath yet been built which can cleave the air like the swallow, or dwell amid the storm like the "Petrel." No steam or other engine ever constructed, can give out such an amount of power every day with three pounds of fuel, as the human machine, which, in a full grown man, consumes only three poun ls of food.

In apparently very simple things, we know Who can detect that comparatively little. influence in a bank note which carries disease and death from an infected person to another, hundreds of miles distant? Plagues and fearful diseases are carried on the wings of the winds, but no chemist, by the most refined analysis, has been able to detect the subtle destroyer, which tells man "he dwells in a cottage of clay, and is crushed before the moth."

We enter the flowery garden, and one sense tells us there are substances floating in the atmosphere which have been cast off by the rustling rose and geranium, to give pleasure to the mind; but those substances cannot be seen by the eye, heard by the ear, nor felt by the hands; they are too fine for the scale of the chemist. His weight and measure are yet far too coarse to weigh an atom, or circumscribe its dimensions; and here may lie some of the secrets of those substances which, for want of a better term, chemists give the name of “isomeric compounds.”

In the organic cell of the loftiest and lowliest known existences, there is a world beyond the search of the most powerful microscope that has yet been constructed. If there is an overpowering sense of man's ignorance

derived from an examination of the immen-ous country, and were held in such high essities of the universe, as strong a sense of our ignorance is derived from the contemplation of a single molecule of matter, or the universe of a drop of water.

It is not to be supposed, however, that because many things are now hidden and seeret to us, they will always remain so.There is a limit to the mental grasp of man; beyond it he cannot go, but the world is full of wonders yet to be discovered. Nature hath already revealed many of her secrets and she will tell us many more.

The qualities of a great and good discoverer and inventor, are, a good judgment, common sense, reflection, industry, observation, and arrangement.

teem that a male and female were valued at thirty pounds, English money. We are told that when Alexander was in India, he found them flying wild, in vast numbers on the banks of the river Hyarotis, and was so struck with their beauty, that he laid a severe fine on all who should kill or disturb them. Nor are we surprised at it, as the Greeks were so much struck with the beauty of this bird, when first brought among them, that every person paid a fixed price for seeing it, and several people came from Lacedæmon and Thessaly purely to satisfy their curiosity.

Like other birds of poultry the peacock Newton was pre-emi-feeds on corn, though its predilection is for barley. But it is a very proud and fickle bird, there is scarcely any food that it will not at times covet and pursue. Insects and tender plants are often sought at a time that it has a sufficiency of natural food provided more near.

nently distinguished for those qualities; and by the falling of an apple, his observing mind took up that which, to all others had, since the world began, excited no curious emotion; and it led to the discovery of that law which binds the sweet influences of the Pleiades, guides the planets in their course in the stellar heavens.

Every man who has the least ambition to extend the borders of our knowledge--and oh, what a field there is before us still should observe, reflect, arrange, and gather up facts, for science is but a collection of well arranged truths.--Scientific American.

THE PEACOCK.

The pea-hen seldom lays above five or six eggs in this climate before she sits. Aristotle describes her as laying twelve in her native clime. She may be thus prolific, for it is certain that in the forests where they breed naturally, they are numerous beyond expression. The bird lives about twenty years, and not until its third year has it that beautiful and variegated plumage that adorns its tail.

In the Kingdom of Cambaya, says Tavener, near the city of Barock, whole flocks SINCE the introduction of peacocks into of them are seen in the fields. They are Independence Square, much inquiry has shy, however, and it is impossible to come been made respecting its history and habits. near. They perch at night upon trees, and Goldsmith says, that peacocks were first in- the fowler often approaches them with a troduced into England from the East Indies, kind of banner on which a peacock is paintand it is asserted that vast flocks are stiled to life on either side. A lighted torch is in a wild state on the Islands of Java and Ceylon. So beautiful a bird, he adds, and one esteemed such a delicacy at the table of the luxurious, could not continue to be long at liberty in its distant retreats. So early as the days of Solomon, we find in his navies, among the articles imported from the East, apes and peacocks. Elian relates that they were brought to Greece from some barbar-'ing in its plumage all the most varied colors,

fixed on the top of this decoy; and the peacock when disturbed flies to what it takes for another, and is then caught in a noose prepared for that purpose.

There are varieties of this bird, some of which are white, others crested; that which is called the Peacock of Thibet is the most beautiful of the feathered creation, contain

ris still listen to heathen songs. Thus,near-joyment. It is but justice to the Turks to say, they did not even affect to enjoy it-beyond the pipes and coffee.

ly all the altars of the old religions have contributed to this which in the darkest ages dedicated to Christianity, and now the symbol of the Cross is again defaced to make room for the Crescent.

The faith of the Turks, however false, evidently exerts a moral and controling influence upon their actions. Their most striking characteristic is devotion to their religion. The habits, customs, manners, even the regulations of their health, are formed in a great measure by it. To it they are doubtless much indebted for their universal temperance. It forms, too, the acknowledged basis of their civil as well as moral law. Thus, notwithstanding the semi-barbarous appearance of everything around him, one sees in Constantinople less drunkenness, less beggary, less apparent misery and utter destitution than in any great metropolis of Europe. Do not Christian countries stand rebuked by the example of these followers of a false prophet? Were a true faith as faithfully followed there would scarce be any room for scepticism. Devoted as the Turks are to their religion, they give in one respect an example of toleration that is as generous as it is rare. In most, even Christian countries, the established religion of the State imposes contributions from other sects. In Turkey the religion of the State and the law of the land protects the property of sectarians against government taxes.

The social condition of woman in Turkey, -or rather the want of social position-is both a cause and constantly acting effect of the degradation of the people, and the slow progress they make in civilization and advancement. But even in this respect innovation is commencing. The late Sultan made an almost successful effort to banish at least, the hideous yashmac.

By accident, we had an opportunity of seeing a Turkish soiree. It was a formal circle of men who looked as though they had come together for some disagreeable duty. It might be a Congress Committee or an adjourned lyceum, but one would scarcely have imagined that the object was social en

Though an American is constantly meeting with customs and manners that iun counter to his prejudices and his principles, candor will compel him to admit he sees much in the elements of the Turkish character, in their honesty, hospitality and and sincerity, to admire. J. S.

Constantinople, April 23d, 1852.

SHAKSPEARE, BUNYAN, AND

BURNS.

The three greatest natural geniuses of Britain hitherto, have been a player, a tinker, and a guager, Shakspeare, Bunyan and Burns. It is marvellous to think of the Divina particula aura passing by palaces and courts as in scorn, and shedding its selectest influences on heads not only uncrowned, but actually loaded by a penumbra of contempt, and the "foregone conclusion" of three of the most unpoetical of professions. Marvellous, and yet not, perhaps, to remain forever unparallelled; for would our readers believe that the three most rising poets of our day are a brewer; a wine merchant, and a seller of shawls? Verb. Sat. Sap.

Facts like these prove, unquestionably, that poetry is a gift, not an art; that poeta nascitur non fit; that genius, like the will of that Being of whose breath it is a minor inspiration, is sovereign, and like the wind, bloweth where it listeth; and that to feel contempt for any lawful trade is a vulgarism and a fallacy liable to the exposure and reversal of the Almighty himself.

Shakespeare might have been a chimney sweep instead of a stage--player; Burns might have been a hind instead of a farmer holding his own plow; and Bunyan a campsutler instead of a soldier in the parliamentary army. It had been the same to the great breath, which, in poetry, as in religion, seems to search about, to wait long and to "return according to its circuits," in order,

by choosing the weak and base things, yea, | Shakspeare flaming out of mean structures and the very nonentities of this world, to bring to nought the things that are, and to confound the things that are mighty. The walls of the seventh heaven of invention are not to be scaled by mere ambition or art; inspiration, if genuine, descends from above, and in descending, must like the lightning be permitted its own proud and imperial choice.

of farce and tragi-comedy, Bunyan's power overflowing the banks of narrow controversial treatises, and the great soul of Burns o'er informing the tenement of fugitive poems, jevx d'esprits, satires, and semi-scandalous ballads. All sprang from the people, but while Shakspeare and Burns belonged to its upper stratum, Bunyan appeared amid its lowest dregs, like a new creation amid the slush of chaos. All had something of a religious tendency, but while in Shakspeare it akes a vague diffusive form, and in Burns never amounts to much more than what he himself calls "an idiotic piety," in Bunyan it becomes a deep burning principle of thought and action, at once swallowing up and sanctifying his native genius.

The fate of the three was curious and characteristic. Shakspeare the sublime stageplayer, outliving his early self, with those mysterious errors which are partially re

Let, then, the stage-player, the tinker and the guager, appear for a moment togeth-, er upon our stage. The first is a swarthy and Spaniard looking man, with tall forehead, sharp sidelong eyes, dark hair, curling over his lips and chin, and firm, deep-cut nostril. The second has a fresh complexion, auburn locks, round brow, hair on his upper lip after the old English fashion, and sparkling, glowing eyes, not the least like those of a dreamer, but resembling rather the eyes of "some hot amourist," as John Woodvil hath it. The third has a low brow palpitating | vealed in his sonnets, subsided into a decent, with thought and suffering, eyes, shivering retired, self-indulgent gentleman, like a dull, in their great round orbs with emotion, sleepy, soaking evening following a day of like the star Venus in the orange west, nos- blended storm and splendor. Burns after tril lightly curved upward, dusky skin, black many a vain attempt to rally against the masses of hair, and dimpled, undecisive misfortunes of his life and temperament, chin and cheek. All three have imagination fell down at last their proud recalcitrating as their leading faculty, but that of the play-victim, dying and making but dubious signs; er is wide as the globe; that of the tinker is intense, almost to lunacy; and that of the guager is narrow and vivid as a stream of forked lightning. All three have strong in-his tears and tortures into the elements of tellect, but the intellect of one is capacious, hope and triumph, crossed the black river, that of the other casuistic, and that of the singing in concert with the shining ones, and third clear. All are partially educated, but passed into eternity, perfect through sufferShakspeare's culture is that of the society of ing, and resembling rather one of its own his age, Bunyan's that of solitary reading, native children, than a poor burdened sinand Burns a compound of both. All are ner from the City of Destruction. Phimen of "one book," Shakspeare's being the losophers might speculate long and vainly on universe, Bunyan's the Bible, and Burns' the the causes of those very different destinies. ballad poetry of Scotland. All are men of Our theory is the simple Christian one: God intensely ardent temperament, which in endowed the three with almost commensuShakspeare is subdued by the width of rate powers, but one only, through patient mind in which the furnace glows, which in struggle and solemn search, reached the Bunyan becomes a purged flame, but which blessed hope and new life of Christianity.in poor Burns, bursts out of all restraint into And we come to the further analysis and ila destructive conflagration. In the works of lustration of Bunyan's genius, with this exall, materiem superat opus the genius of ulting thought" we are not about to speak

while John Bunyan, strong in supernatural might, victorious over his tendencies, having bound his very madness in chains, and turned