up that can ever depart from the calm serenity
of the positive state. There is no variation in
the scale, their motion, mental, moral or phy
sical. They never would venture on cither
end of a see-saw, never go up, never go down,
but always stand still in the middle, while
their more animated associates experience the
rising and falling sensations that give anima
tion and delight to life.
The people of the comparative degree in
dulge in a little see-sawing, but not enough to
make them dizzy; yet it has the pleasing effect
of relieving life of the dull monotony which
would assail them, if they, like their positive
brethren, were so constituted that everything
they looked upon was to be viewed in the
same positive manner. They take one step
. higher in the scale of human existence, by
permitting themselves to find an occasional
thing of interest in their surroundings, which
lifts them into a comparative degree of bliss.
But being held taut by the check-rein of non
effusion, they are never able to reach either
the heights of ecstacy or the depths of woe
into which those people rise and fall who are
bubbling over with superlative emotions.
These nervous, high-strung individuals are
forever emphasizing their expressions with ex
clamation points, All their utterances are
excessively emotional, they breathe in a world
of superlatives, they feed on superlatives,
and their feelings are consequently in a
state of constant fermentation. They sel
dom if ever descend the scale the positive
key-note, but are ever pealing forth rhapso
dies, venting their enthusiasm as lavishly
on a quiet, romantic frog pond as upon the
rolling, throbbing ocean in all its boundless
restlessness. They indulge in so many falsetto
notes, throwing themselves into ecstacies over
trifling things at which their brethren of the
positive order would only glance unmoved,
that they lose much of the sublimity of utter
ance when their souls stand face to face with
those things which create within us the grand
eur of joy indescribable.
THE FREE LANCE.
But this superlative state of existence has the
advantage of bringing the mind in contact with
things which are ‘‘perfectly heavenly,” while
the lymphatic person of the positive order is
never propelled heavenward by the force of
his emotion, and the more fortunate and san
guine comparative may sometimes rise high
enough to see the faint light of a far-off star,
but the nervous, happy superlative sees stars
above him, stars around him, and is quite a
shooting star himself.
THOUGHTS ON NEW YEAR EVE
I sit mid drenm, though quite nwakc;
I ponder o’er tlic fading year,
And weary through the past I rake
And search with mingled hope and fear.
1 search for good that I have done,
And hope witli doubts and fears the while;
For good I search, the wrong would shun;
I rake for good yet find the vile.
I gaze made sad, and watch the glow
Of ruddy coals upon the grate.
For me these embers seem to show
Some things, some things of life or fate,
I see the past; my good deeds shine,
And shed their light like glowing coal,
Or cast their ray o’er mcm'ry's shrine
As hope sheds light within the soul.
Hours flee; some embers now are dead;
The shadows dim, my past mistakes,
Grow dimmer, colder, wider spread,
Till dark, cold fear my thought awakes.
I sit and dream, and in my trance
I hear a hymn of praise for good;
The hymn is drowned hy heavier chants
Which sound regrets in wailing flood.
Thus in my thought the closing year,
A page in the great book of life,
Lies bare; 1 gaze in woml'ring fear
Upon its joys, its doubts, its strife.
Each sin may warn, each good deed guide,
That future deeds excel the past,
For time points out with seeming pride
A page where yet no stain is east.
Now this white page is giv'u to each
To pen with light or blot with shame;
While last year’s page may plainly tench
Your deeds will always spell your name.