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"No, no," said Sir Asinus, sighing; "no, I thank you. I have had all my noble aspirations chilled my grand ideas destroyed; my heart is no longer fit for merriment. I depart." And rising, Sir Asinus seated himself upon the table disconsolately. Jacques looked at him and smiled. "Do you know, my dear Asinus," he said, "that you present at this moment the grandest and most heroic picture?

In these chains Columbus is of more interest to us than when in full power as governor of the Indies; for so it is, that the most infelicitous times of a man's life are those which posterity will look to most, and love him most for. This very thought may have comforted him; but happily he had other sources of consolation in the pious aspirations which never deserted him.

If the half-savage Greek could share our feelings thus far, it is irrational to doubt that he went further, to find, as we do, that upon that brief gladness there follows a certain sorrow, the little light of awakened human intelligence shines so mere a spark amidst the abyss of the unknown and unknowable; seems so insufficient to do more than illuminate the imperfections that cannot be remedied, the aspirations that cannot be realized, of man's own nature.

And he was never tired of hearing that story of the Indian Mutiny, told the Grant Girls by their grandfather; how a Highland regiment held a shot torn position till help came, held against overwhelming odds while men fell on every side, held, crying to each other all up and down the sore-pressed line, "Stand fast, Craig-Ellachie!" And so Gavin could not but grow up filled with great aspirations.

Selby; and when, at his death, Isaura, in the innocent age between childhood and youth, had been left the most sorrowful and most lonely creature on the face of the earth, this famous woman, worshipped by the rich for her intellect, adored by the poor for her beneficence, came to the orphan's friendless side, breathing love once more into her pining heart, and waking for the first time the desires of genius, the aspirations of art, in the dim self-consciousness of a soul between sleep and waking.

We can arouse the indifferent to action; we can enkindle in the drunkard aspirations for a better life than that of debauchery; we hope, in time, by constant agitation, to change the social customs of the day. But against the influence of the licensed dram-shop we are powerless. We have no ability to cope with this most formidable enemy of virtue, prosperity and good order.

In other words, they think error useful, and that it may be the best thing for society that masses of men should cheat and deceive themselves in their most fervent aspirations and their deepest assurances. This is the furthest extreme to which the empire of existing facts over principles can well be imagined to go.

Luther stretched out his view and aspirations beyond this world, all the time that he was teaching Christians again how to honour the world in the moral duties assigned to them, and to enjoy its blessings and benefits with thankfulness to God. 'No man knoweth the day or the hour' of this he constantly reminded them, and warned them against idle speculations.

According to modern standards, we are struck with the absence of what we call art, in the writings of Isaiah. History, woes, promises, hopes, aspirations, and exultations are all mingled together in scarcely logical sequence. He exhorts, he threatens, he reproaches, he promises, often in the same chapter. The transition between preacher and prophet is very sudden.

Essentially a truth, as we already know, though the circumstances were all different; and the promise was to a devout High Priest, not to a crowned Blockhead and cowardly Do-nothing. Which occasions not a little obscurity in our early History, says the learned Selden. Vain aspirations, or perhaps not altogether vain.