ELECTRICITY, only. As civilization advances, we become more susceptible to its influence-hence the greater diversity of occupations. Its activities lead us to conclude that men are innately adapted, or fitted, for some special line of work-some as financiers, others as agriculturists, or any labor incident to the welfare of humanity. It is not necessary to offer proof, for it is now evident that the secret of a successful life, lies mainly, in knowing what we are adapted to follow, and not in a good education. Were it not for the evil power in the world it would be an easy matter to discern the true path; but this monster, called Satan, is ever to work perverting and disqualifying armies of men for the professions or avocations for which they would be adapted in their normal condition. Wherever there is a talent, some seemingly unimportant common-place occurrence will be the spark that kindles its fires. A falling apple-a very ordinary, trival thing, awakened the genius of Isaac Newton and suggested to him the great laws of gravitation. Were our eyes not blinded by pride and false aspirations, we could daily witness occurrences designating the particular path on which we may travel with the greatest ease and usefulness, How numerous the young men who have been led by pride and avarice, against their inborn adaptation to accept that which will ever be to them a drudge, and an unsurmountable obstacle to true success and happiness. Our ad vice to all seekers after success, is to study self, and not let false ambition delude and inculcate notions within us that we are fitted for the halls of Congress, while in truth you would be of greater usefulness to humanity and your maker, if you tilled the soil. We are all instruments in the hands of an absolute power to accomplish some great end. Study your relations 179 to this power, keep his commandments, and your life would be a success, even if you have not the advantages of a course at some college, or have been reared mid such romantic and inspiring scenes, as poets delight to sing about. ELECTRICITY. BY MR. WILLIAM D. JONES, NEW YORK, When and by whom electricity was first discovered we do not know. The earliest mention that we have of it is by Thales of Miletus about 600 B. C., and both Threophrastus (321, B. C.) and Pliny, (70 B. C.) speak of it; but Otto de Guericke, about the 17th century was the first to observe the electric spark. In 1752 Franklin demonstrated the identity of lightning and electricity; and fifty years after that, Volta, through the construction of the electric pile, inaugurated a new era in the history of electricity. It was also reserved for him to lay the foundations of the numerous discoveries in dynamic electricity. Coming down to our own century, in 1830 we have Faraday giving the science a new field, and a little later Morse comes out with the telegraph, and then a host of other scientific men appear, devoting their time and energy to this subject, each adding to the general store of kuowledge and putting it to use in different direstions. The name electricity is of Greek derivation. It was noticed that when amber was rubbed, light substances near it became animated with motion and was attracted to and repelled from it. When other substances exhibited the same peculiar property, they were amber-like; hence the origin of the word, from Elechtron— amber. The true idea of force is very difficult to fix in the mind. The learned Greeks, with their erroneous philosophy and misconception of things in general, classed the elements under two different heads, namely: The ponderable and imponderable, or in other words, the gross which we can weigh and that which we cannot weigh. Therefore heat, light and electricity were said to be imponderable. Investigations have led tion have been towards a far closer relation than was formerly suspected, between the various modes of forcea great idea which might perhaps have been worked out earlier but for the conception that each force is a peculiar and distinct kind of matter. As we know nothing of force except through matter and by changes in it, the proper light to regard it is, as only an activity, or mode of motion, of common matter. an earthly omnipresence. And yet having accomplished all this, it does not stop, but keeps on its onward march; so much so that in the near future we will see it competing successfully with steam on our railroads. The modes of producing the current are varied and depend entirely on the application which it is to be put to. The electrical machines, (friction machines and so forth,) have given no results. The high tension currents which they give have only been used for amusing experiments, for lecture and for purely scientific research, and are absolutely of no use from a practical point of view. We shall therefore not consider them. All the apparatus used until now for the production of an electric current can be divided into three distinct classes, viz : 1. Apparatus in which chemical action is utilized and which directly transforms chemical affinity into electricity. These are galvanic piles or galvanic batteries. 2. Apparatus which directly transforms heat into electricity. These are Thermo-electric batteries. 3. Apparatus which directly transforms work into electricity. These are electro-dynamo machines; and they are sub-divided into magnetoelectric and dynamo-electric machines. For more than 2000 years nothing was done to disclose this element and yet the wonderful strides that this science has made in the last century, is more astonishing than the blank ignorance of that long period. Electricity has been demonstrated as the cause of the grandest phenomena of the atmosphere and the most extensive changes of the earth. It has given to chemistry new and powerful resources for analysis and synthesis. It has added to her elements, multiplied its compounds aud has effected an entire change in its theory. It has given to the physiologist a deep- THE GLORY OF NON-ATTAINer insight into the forces of life and tr the physician a new method of combating disease. It copies pictures, moulds, metals, separates ores, explodes the blasting charges in the earth and sea, it has given to us light nearly equal to the sun in its dazzling brilliancy, and as if to crown its brief and splendid career with a new endowment of civilization it has literally broken down the barriers of space and time, and in the telegraph and telephone it has conferred upon man MENT. While we praise the successful missionaries for the sacrifices and services they have wrought in the name of Christ, we should not forget the unsuccessful ones, those who have done their best, but in circumstances where they could reap but little, and perhaps cut off in an untimely way, and thrust out of their field with never an opportunity to do what they had an ambition to do. What about hem? Think of George Schmidt, A GROCER'S Bor. with his heart burning to preach in Africa, who went there and was driven off by the settlers, and not allowed to return, and who used to pray day after day, "Lord, permit me to go to Africa," until he was found dead on his knees without ever going back. Think of that noble Bishop Pattison, so splendidly endowed that they said, "Why waste your talents on the heathen?" Yet he went to the Pacific Islands, and they took him as an enemy. As he was saying, "Peace be unto you," they slew him, and, like his Lord, he was sent back from the very people he came to bless, with five bleeding wounds upon his person. Think of Melville Cox, that noble Methodist who went out from America, who had a consuming passion to preach 181 the gospel on the western coast of Africa. He had hardly reached the shore when he was stricken down with fever, and all there is left of him is a grave, with the words, "Though a thousand fall, let not Africa be given up." Then think of Adam M'Call, who stricken down, dying, said: "Lord Jesus, thou knowest that I consecrated my life to Africa; if thou dost choose to take me instead of the work which I purposed to do for thee, what is that to me? Thy will be done." Where was their success? If they could speak to us, they would say in the words of the great missionary St. Paul: “I have but one ambition, that whether I be absent from the body or present with the Lord, I may be well-pleasing unto him." For the Young People. A GROCER'S BOY. One or two slight circumstances may bend the twig, and thus incline the tree. A Christmas gift bent Dr. Schliemann, the discoverer of buried Troy, to his life work. He was eight years old when his father, a poor man, pinched himself to give him a "Universal History," with an engraving of Troy in flames. "If the walls," said the boy to his father, "were as thick as those in the picture, there must be some remains of them, and I shall excavate them some day.' Another trivial event gave the boy an impulse toward his life work. He was working as a grocer's boy from early in the morning until late at night, sweeping the shop, selling her rings and candles. One day a drunken miller entered the shop and recited a hundred lines of Homer in the original Greek. The boy did not understand a word of it, but he was so affected by the rhythmic cadence that he wept, and paid the man to repeat the lines three times. From that moment he prayed to God that he might learn Greek. He was next helped to the realization of his boyish ideal by two apparent accidents. In lifting a cask too heavy for him he strained himself, and could work no more in the grocar's shop. He went to sea as a cabin boy. He was so poor that he sold his coat to buy a blanket. The vessel was wrecked on the coast of Holland. A friend secured him a situation in a counting room, at a salary of one hundred and sixty-two dollars a year. He spent half the small salary on his studies, lived in a garret on ryemeal porridge, and mastered English in six months. Then he learned French, Dutch, Spanish, Italian and Portuguese. His knowledge of languages got him a situation as correspondent and book-keeper in the office of an Amsterdam Banker. A Spaniard brought in a bill which no one could read; young Schliemann translated it, and the banker promoted him. He began the study of Russian; subsequently he became a Russian merchant, and amassed a fortune. Then he engaged a Greek teacher. His method of study was original. He began by studying modern Greek. He procured a modern Greek translation of "Paul and Virginia," and read it through, comparing every word with its equivalent in the French original. When he had finished his task, he knew at least one half the Greek words the book contained. He repeated the task, and then knew all the words, and thus acquired a modern Greek vocabulary without using a dictionary. In six weeks he had mastered the difficulties of modern Greek; then he applied himself to the ancient Greek. Within three months he had learned sufficient to understand some of the classical Greek authors, and especially Homer, whom he read and re-read with enthusiasm. Before beginning the work of his life, he made a journey around the world, and studied archæology in Paris. Then, with a well-stored mind, he began those investigations around Troy which had been the dream of his life. His success made him the great excavator of modern days. THE WINTER IS PAST. Winter has its charms, but one of its charms is that it does not last forever. Its diamonds are not to be given as heirlooms from generation to generetion. Its tingling nights use up our bodily fuel too fast. Its isolation becomes solitude; and when the calender tells us that it is past and the story is confirmed by the earlier sun and the shorter eve, despite the joys that we have had in it, we involuntarily say: Thank God! That the winter is past does not mean that all at once summer shall spread over the wide earth, Many a morning will be dark with clouds, and many an eve ragged with the rack of storms. The leafless trees are yet rocked by contending gales, and the sunlight struggles brokenly through rifts in the laden clouds. But the calendar is correct, and the sun tells a true tale: the winter is past. in God does not work in nature or ed the winter solstice when Jesus was grace by bounds. The world passthe solstice of spring is just before placed in the tomb of Joseph, and us. Slowly, it may be, the light gains upon the darkness; the ground of confidence is not in the measure, but the direction. It is with the world as a whole as it is with the individual Christian. God does not at conversion transplant the redeemed one to Paradise. Light breaks out of the skies above his head, and he shall vet know carnal buffetings. He has his course to run, his fight to win. Doubts may shadow him, but he will keep the faith. He may be cast down but he shall not be destroyed. He may be tossed upon the wave, but he shall not be submerged by it. He may fall like Peter, but like Peter he shall yet face his foes undaunted. Does the world ask the grounds of his strength and confidence? Jesus, the Sun of Righteousness, has risen; and whatever the present distress, he knows that for him the winter is past and the summer of his soul is coming. 錄 AUTHOR AND PRIMA DONNA. AUTHOR AND PRIMA DONNA. The beautiful song known as the "Marseillaise" was written about the year 1792 by Joseph Rouget de l'Isle, a young officer connected with the French Revolution of 1789. Being in delicate health, he was invalided, and took up his quarters in Marseilles on a six months' leave of absence, during which time it is supposed his pecuniary circumstances were not of a very promising nature, as very little else was seen to enter his room but paper. The occupier of this scantily furnished room remained continually therein, writing or dotting something on paper, an occupation he alternated with music. Thus months passed over. The young man grew thinner and paler. After a time he visited one or another of the music-sellers of the city for the purpose of disposing of his productions. On one occasion he was asked to sit down at the harpsichord which adorned the shop, and began at once with the "Song of the Army of the Rhine." The music publisher, when the young man ended, said, "Rough, crude, but clever. You may some day, young man, produce something good." The singer rose with anguish at his heart; he had not a sou in the world, and his rent was in arrears. He returned to his room, where he sat motionless. Hunger and despair had driven every calm and good thought from his head. It was then that he formed a dreadful resolve. He closed up his window and the chimney and every crevice where air could enter; then he filled a burner with charcoal, which he proceeded to ignite. At this time a young prima donna -Claudine-the Jenny Lind of the period, was the occupant of rooms in the same house. She had so frequently heard the young composer 183 that it was no task to her to learn both the air and the words of his When she appeared at the theatre in "Song of the Army of the Rhine." lesseeship of the music publisher rea new opera that evening, under the ferred to, she introduced this marvelband played the unknown air the auous song in the opera, and when the dience looked at each other, while every breath was hushed, and strong every breath was hushed, and strong men trembled with emotion. the first stanza was ended, and then arose a frantic shout, the whole assembly starting to their feet with a shriek of delight-a thousand voices thundering forth the chorus-showthem. The music publisher frowned, ing how the song had electrified for he saw it was the "Song of the Army of the Rhine" he had refused that morning. But When silence was restored Claudine exclaimed, "This song is written by dying in a garret. His compositions a young unknown man, who is now have been submitted to every music publisher in Marseilles, and all have refused them. For myself, I thought this the greatest musical effort of modern times; and as such I practised it to-day, unknown either to manager or author. But he is not here; let us go and awake him; all who have hearts, follow me, and chant the miyhty song as we go." Claudine rushed towards the door, followed by the audience to the lodgings of the young author, who lay nearly senseless on his bed; but he listened, exclaiming, "My Song of the Rhine." Hope and joy now gave him strength. him strength. He fell heavily across the floor of his room, and with one hand omashed the panes of his window to atoms. The broken window let in the cool sea breeze and the splendid song, both of which gave life to the young man. When Claudine entered the room he was able to |