merely formal, nor should its application be petty and captious. The externals of respectability are most easily aped when they are of the permanent and stereotyped kind, and may be used to conceal gross depravity; while the constant, fresh, gracious inspiration of a pure, good heart is unmistakable, and cannot be successfully counterfeited.

On the other hand, young persons should be desirous to learn the opinion of older ones as to what should and should not be done on the ground of general decorum and good taste. Youth is in such hot haste to obtain what it desires that it often will not wait to analyze the spirit of an occasion, but classes opposition to its inclinations as prejudice and antiquated superstition. But the very individual who in youth thus scoffs at restraint often pays homage to it in later days, having meanwhile ascertained the weighty reasons which underlie the whole law of reserve upon which the traditions of good society are based.

How much trouble, then, might it save if the young people, as a rule, were to come to the elders and ask at least why this thing or that is regarded as unbecoming or of doubtful propriety. And how much would it assist this good understanding if the elders, to the last, were careful to keep up with the progress of the time, examining tendencies, keeping a vigilant eye upon fashions, books, and personages, and, above all, encouraging the young friends to exercise their own powers of discrimination in following usages and customs, or in departing from them.

This last suggestion marks how far the writer of these pages is behind the progress of the age. In her youth, it was customary for sons and daughters both to seek and to heed the counsel of elders in social matters. In these days, a grandmother must ask her granddaughter whether such or such a thing is considered "good form," to which the latter will often reply, "O dear! no."

It is sad that we should carry all the barbarism of our nature into our views of the divine, and make our form of faith an occasion of ill-will to others, instead of drawing from it the inspiration of a wide and comprehensive charity. The world's Christianity is greatly open to this accusation, in dealing with which we are forced to take account of the slow rate of human progress.

A friend lately told me of a pious American, familiar in Hong Kong, who at the close of his last visit there, took a formal and eternal leave of one of the principal native merchants with whom he had long been acquainted. Mr. C—— alluded to his advanced age, and said that it was almost certain he could never return to China. "We shall not meet again in this world," he said, "and as you have never embraced the true religion, I can have no hope of meeting you in a better one."

I ask whether this was polite, from one sinner to another?

A stupid, worldly old woman of fashion in one of our large cities once said of a most exemplary acquaintance, a liberal Christian saint of thirty years or more ago: "I am very fond of Mrs. S—— but she is a Unitarian. What a pity we cannot hope to meet in heaven!" The wicked bystanders had their own view of the reason why this meeting would appear very improbable.

What shall we say of the hospitality which in some churches renders each man and woman the savage guardian of a seat or pew? Is this God's house to you, when you turn with fury on a stranger who exercises a stranger's right to its privileges? Whatever may be preached from the pulpit of such a church, there is not much of heaven in the seats so maintained and defended. I remember an Episcopal church in one of our large cities which a modest looking couple entered one Sunday, taking seats in an unoccupied pew near the pulpit. And presently comes in the plumed head of the family, followed by its other members. The strangers are warned to depart, which they do, not without a smile of suppressed amusement. The church-woman afterwards learned that the persons whom she had turned out of her pew were the English ambassador and his wife, the accomplished Lord and Lady Napier.

St. Paul tells us that in an unknown guest we may entertain an angel unawares. But I will say that in giving way to such evil impulses, people entertain a devil unawares.

Polite religion has to do both with manners and with doctrine. Tolerance is the external condition of this politeness, but charity is its interior source. A doctrine which allows and encourages one set of men to exclude another set from claim to the protection and inspiration of God is in itself impolite. Christ did not reproach the Jews for holding their own tenets, but for applying these tenets in a superficial and narrow spirit, neglecting to practise true devotion and benevolence, and refusing to learn the providential lessons which the course of time should have taught them. At this day of the world, we should all be ready to admit that salvation lies not so much in the prescriptions of any religion as in the spirit in which these are followed.

It is the fashion to-day to decry missions. I believe in them greatly. But a missionary should start with a polite theory concerning the religion which he hopes to supersede by the introduction of one more polite. If he studies rightly, he will see that all religions seek after God, and will imitate the procedure of Paul, who, before instructing the Athenians in the doctrines of the new religion, was careful to recognize the fact that they had a religion of their own.

I wish to speak here of the so-called rudeness of reform; and to say that I think we should call this roughness rather than rudeness. A true reformer honors human nature by recognizing in it a higher power than is shown in its average action. The man or woman who approaches you, urging upon you a more fervent faith, a more impartial justice, a braver resolve than you find in your own mind, comes to you really in reverence, and not in contempt. Such a person sees in you the power and dignity of manhood or womanhood, of which you, perhaps, have an insufficient sense. And he will strike and strike until he finds in you that better nature, that higher sense to which he appeals, and which in the end is almost sure to respond to such appealing.

I remember having thought in my youth that the Presbyterian preacher, John Knox, was probably very impolite in his sermons preached before poor Queen Mary Stuart. But when we reflect upon the follies which, more than aught else, wrecked her unhappy life, we may fancy the stern divine to have seen whither her love of pleasure and ardent temperament would lead her, and to have striven, to the best of his knowledge and power, to pluck her as a brand from the burning, and to bring her within the sober sphere of influence and reflection which might have saved her kingdom and her life.

With all its advances, society still keeps some traces of its original barbarism. I see these traces in the want of respect for labor, where this want exists, and also in the position which mere Fashion is apt to assign to teachers in the community.

That those who must be intellectually looked up to should be socially looked down upon is, to say the least, very inconsistent. That the performance of the helpful offices of the household should be held as degrading to those who perform them is no less so. We must seek the explanation of these anomalies in the distant past. When the handiwork of society was performed by slaves, the world's estimate of labor was naturally lowered. In the feudal and military time, the writer ranked below the fighter, and the skill of learning below the prowess of arms. The mind of to-day has only partially outgrown this very rude standard of judgment. I was asked, some fifteen years ago, in England, by people of education, whether women teachers ranked in America with ladies or with working women. I replied: "With ladies, certainly," which seemed to occasion surprise.

I remember having