sweets about his wife to neutralize his

"Helps to Devout Living" is the name of a collection of beautiful and
valuable passages, in prose and verse, compiled by Miss J. Dewey, in
the second edition of which she included, at her brother's request,
Mr. Wasson's "Bugle Notes," a poem which had been for years one of
his peculiar favorites. [350] supreme care for himself, and careless
disparagement of almost everybody else. Genius is said to be, in its
very nature, loving and generous; it seems but the fit recognition of
its own blessedness; was his so? I have been reading again "Adam Bede,"
and I think that the author is decidedly and unquestionably superior to
all her contemporary novel-writers. One can forgive such a mind almost
anything. But alas! for this one--. . . It is an almost unpardonable
violation of one of the great laws on which social virtue rests. . . .

Ever yours,

ORVILLE DEWEY.

To Rev. Henry W. Bellows, D.D.

ST. DAVID'S, June 30, 1881.

. . . SINCE reading Freeman Clarke's book, I have been thinking of the
steps of the world's religious progress. The Aryan idea, so far as we
know anything of it, was probably to worship nature. The Greek idolatry
was a step beyond that, substituting intelligent beings for it. Far
higher was the Hebrew spiritualism, and worship of One Supreme, and far
higher is Isaiah than Homer, David than Sophocles; and no Hebrew prophet
ever said, "Offer a cock to Esculapius." So is Christianity far beyond
Buddhism; and far beyond Sakya Muni, dim and obscure as he is, are the
concrete realities of the life of Jesus. Whether anything further is to
come, I tremble to ask; and yet I do ask it.[351] To the Same.

July 23, 1881.

DEAR, NAY, DEAREST FRIEND,--What shall I say, in what language express
the sense of comfort and satisfaction which, first your sermon years
ago,' and now your letter of yesterday, have given me? Ah! there is a
spot in every human soul, I guess, where approbation is the sweetest
drop that can fall. I will not imbitter it with a word of doubt or
debate. . . .

Come here when you can. With love to all, Ever yours,

O. D.

To the Same.

ST. DAVID'S, Sept. 23, 1881.

DEAR FRIEND,--I am waiting with what patience I can, to hear whether
you have been to Meadville or not. . . . In that lovely but just picture
which you draw of my wife, and praise her patience at the expense
of mine, I doubt whether you fairly take into account the difference
between the