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words of the Hebrew prophet, greet the phantom of their departed
greatness in the land of shadows: "What, art thou, also, become weak as
we? Art thou also like unto us? Thy pomp is brought down to the grave;
the worm is spread under thee, and the worms cover thee."

"We talk of our greatness," says Mr. Froude; "do we really know in
what a nation's greatness consists? Whether it be great or little
depends entirely on what sort of men and women it is producing. A
sound nation is a nation that is made up of sound human beings,
healthy in body, strong of limb, true in word and deed, brave,
sober, temperate, and chaste, to whom morals are of more importance
than wealth or knowledge; where duty is first and the rights of man
are second; where, in short, men grow up, and live, and work,
having in them what our ancestors called 'the fear of God.' It is
to form a character of this kind that human beings are sent into
the world. Unless England's greatness in this sense has the
principle of growth in it, it were better for us that a millstone
were hanged about our neck, and that we were drowned in the midst
of the sea."

"I feel more and more," said Mrs. Fawcett in words addressed to a
great meeting of men in the Manchester Free Trade Hall--words that
I wish could be written upon every heart--" that the great question
whether the relations of men and women shall be pure and virtuous
or impure and vile lies at the root of all national well-being and
progress. The main requisite towards a better state of things than
now exists cannot be brought about by any outside agency. There is
no royal road to virtue and purity. Law can do something to punish
wickedness, but improvement in the law is mainly valuable as an
indication that the public standard of morality is raised. Let us
get good laws if we can; but there is only one way of really
obtaining a nobler national existence, and that is by each of us
individually learning to hate and detest the vile self-indulgence
that covers the life of those who are the victims of it with shame
and degradation. Self-control and respect for the rights of others
are the only cure for the terrible national danger which threatens
us. If men and women would learn never to take pleasure in what
brings pain, shame, misery, and moral death to ot