dict passed upon many an excellent project which after a short struggle against opposition has finally given up the attempt to gain the victory and disappeared from view. On every hand it is acknowledged that a warm enthusiasm is as necessary to success as warm blood to health. An enthusiasm, that is, which springs from a thorough comprehension of the advantages to be gained by a projected course of action, or of the truth and beauty of the principles involved. The whole soul is convinced that the purpose is one worthy of the utmost devotion. Hence there is an energy and a power which is almost irresistible. Difficulties melt away before its determined. efforts, like snow before the warmth of the sun. One man filled with such enthusiasm will stir up a thousand others by his success and stimulate them to follow his example. Far different is such a character from that of a man suddenly stirred from peace and quiet into headlong exertion by a new and unaccustomed idea which has taken possession of his emotions. His course is marked by the overrunning of a froth which has neither substance nor value and is soon wasted. He will gather no band of earnest disciples about him. At the first approach of difficulties, which in his thoughtlessness he had either despised or failed to notice at all, he is crushed into the depths of despondency and makes his way sadly nd disconsolately back to the abode of quiet from whence he came. While therefore it is in many cases impossible to separate the one of these classes of enthusiasts from the other, in the first moments of their appearance, the sequel always proves which is the real and which the superficial. The difficulty presented in the apparent connection between useful and useless enthusiasm has led to the idea that every man should compress the expression of his feelings within conventional bounds. Not so much has this been true of that enthusiasm which finds expression in the activity of the body, as in that which pertains to the expression of thoughts and ideas. So fearful has society been lest the truths of life should be debased by falling into the hands of mere enthusiasts, that it has frowned down on every side the attempt to speak as a full heart prompts. To remain perfectly cool and maintain a complete self-control is the one thing required. A man who has carefully considered the subject on which he is bent, who has found in it the thoughts which take complete possession of all his faculties, and who is therefore. moved to the very depths of his nature by the theme, is required to curb and repress all impetuousity of expression and to discuss the matter with as much unconcern as he who has no interest in it whatsoever. This is all wrong. The highest truths may be so tamely expressed as to have no force, and the brightest thoughts so dully worded as to escape attention. A man inspired as we have supposed with any subject of importance, is of necessity rendered warmer and more excited in his speech. He must speak more burning words than his companions who lack his deep feeling. To curb him and cause him to be as impassionate as those he addresses, is to deprive him of the very means by which he may gain success. Exchange Oct. 1875] JAN 2'40 Enthusiasm. 3 It is however considered by many, who are reckoned among the intellectual members of society, that it is a dangerous sign, a sign of weakness, when a man gives way to a burst of enthusiasm in discussion. They begin to suspect that he is not sound in his principles, and in fact manage to take away the very foundation on which he stands. Such torrents of eloquence as marked the orator of seventy-five or a hundred years ago are ridiculed to-day. We are more intellectual, it is said, and are not wholly controlled by our emotions. That there is, however, less patriotic zeal in the councils of this nation to-day than when she was in her infancy, few will deny. That there is more intellect displayed now than then, many will doubt. Indeed, as we look on the cold calculating maneuvers of those, who, instead of so performing the trust they have taken upon them as is best intended to increase the general prosperity, use the power with which they have been intrusted for private ends, we can not but regret this idea that enthusiasm impairs or destroys the virtue of good counsel. Probably nowhere is there a more powerful feeling of the inappropriateness of enthusiastic expression than among a body of students in college. Every influence is conservative and tends to shut a man up within himself, in so far as any radical movement in literature or debate is concerned. Excitement is fashionable in out-of-door employments, and unlimited zeal in popular sports is encouraged. Many a man recognizes the beauty of an enthusiasm which will carry the ball nine through a complete course of victory or which brings the champion flags in glory to Alma Mater, who would ridicule the man, who in the heat of debate should overstep the usual and conventional modes of expression. Such a distinction seems to be most unjust. Let one observe the extent to which the enthusiasm, so much admired and praised, in these pursuits will carry a man. Remember the two or three hours per day spent in hard work in the field or on the water, the self denial and sacrifices which have to be made, the loss of many of the advantages which form part of the plan of a collegiate education. All these are counted as of little account if only a victory is gained at last. While, now, we do not detract one particle from the honor which such enthusiasm deserves, still it seems far more to be dreaded than that more intellectual kind of emotion of which we are speaking. But whilst every encouragement is held out to this muscular enthusiasm, and praise without limit is showered upon its successful devotees, public sentiment has deprived debate of its force and composition of its attractiveness. The attempt to debate, where enthusiastic utterance is checked, is a most dismal spectacle to both debater and listener. Dry details of facts, coolly related without the slightest exhibition of zeal, possesses neither the beauty nor the force of a convincing argument. So, too, the fear of being considered. flowery, takes away from composition that sprightliness and life which form its main attraction. We turn from article after article with a sigh at its heaviness and dullness. The fault is not, however, preeminently with the writer. He has learned to expect that every trace of enthusiasm will be most severely criticized. He has witnessed the broad smile which greets any unusually feeling expression of the debater. He has listened to the ridicule heaped upon the line, in which some writer, stirred for a moment out of the customary track, has spoken more earnestly than is considered appropriate. Having these things in mind, he will be careful not to expose himself to the same treatment. When the public come to realize that there is a useful enthusiasm, as well as one which is profitless, and that such an enthusiasm is as much entitled to its own mode of expression in the higher and more important departments of life, as in those which are lower, then we may hope to see men coming out of their unattractive styles of expression and opening a more interesting period in our literature. In religion, far more than in anything else, there has always been a fear of enthusiasm. The dread lest our religion should become superficial and lacking in true Godliness, has toned down the expression of religious sentiments and brought about a coolly argumentative method in the presentation of holy truth. Exhortation is no longer deemed fit for a preacher. He must seek to reason his hearers out of unbelief without allowing himself to be overcome by the grandeur and beauty of the subject. As a result, we hear continual wailing on account of the low state of religious feeling in educated communities. The cause of the trouble is not, however, far to seek. That there is a religious zeal, which is but the expression of the emotions without a purpose, and is of less than no value, will be allowed. Of this it can be truly said: "If it warms, it is not with the fire of love; if it strengthens, it at the same time exhausts; if it elevates, it carries the mind, not into the clear regions of thought, but leaves it amid the mists and vapors which are neither earth nor heaven." This is zeal without knowledge-sound without sense. On the contrary, however, there is an enthusiasm which takes hold on the soul with mighty power, impressing it with the beauties and privileges of Christianity and spurring it on to earnest Christian work. It is this sort of enthusiasm, the loss of which has had much to do with the present state of affairs in religion. No man can expect to be successful in awakening the community about him, or even to keep a true Christian spirit alive in himself, who endeavors to guard against the approach of every all-pervading feeling in the matter. That such zealousness is dangerous to Christianity is contradicted by the character and actions of its most successful advocates in all time. The great founder Himself was full of enthusiasm and made no attempt to conceal it. That greatest of all preachers, the apostle to the Gentiles, was always running over with enthusiastic utterance. It is true that in times of great revivals men are often merely overcome by their emotions and so conduct themselves as to bring much discredit on the work. Yet we would expect much more lasting good to result from the exertions of men like those two great revivalists whose |