taking no heed for himself what he shall eat and wherewithal he
shall be clad. No! the feeling is far more akin to that which we have for
a deep-playing gambler, whom we know to have some noble impulses. How
eagerly, yet sorrowingly we watch his movements! The dice rattle, they are
thrown, and again thrown; thousands after thousands he wins and lays
aside; and at last, in the madness of the game, stakes the whole sum, with
his house, estate, all on the hazard of one cast. With beating heart we
listen to the rattling of the dice, and with strained gaze watch the blow.
The box is lifted--all is lost. Now we are excited by the daring of this
being, and feel deeply, more so if we know him to have something of a
better nature, some nobler impulses, but the interest is still in the
great gambler, not in the great _man_; and though his boldness startles,
and for the moment carries us away, yet ever with our admiration comes a
still small voice from the 'inner sanctuary,' which whispers of those whom
his winnings ruined, or the dependents who were reduced to beggary by his
loss. Would the _great_ man have played the game at all?

We have always felt that Napoleon stepped down from his greatness when he
let them hurry him away alive to that island-prison; and there is
reasoning in this feeling itself, which most persons feel on reading of
his career, which his worshippers would do well to consider in its various
bearings; for if Napoleon, (when the royal guard, his last hope, was cut
to pieces at Waterloo, and crying to Bertrand, 'It is finished,' he turned
and fled,) had placed himself before the last cannon which sent
destruction to his foes, and let its ball end his career and life
together, who is there but would feel that he was acting truer to his
greatness, than to 'eat his heart away' a captive? If throughout his
career we had seen the brave fighter for country, for principle, for
right, instead of for self, this feeling would never arise. Place
WASHINGTON in a similar situation; imagine him to have believed it best to
gather all his country could give him of hardy defenders, and on the
result of one battle let his country's fate be decided. The battle is
fought and lost; his army is routed and cut to pieces; he has asked for
liberty with his whole strength, with his whole soul, and the answer is
'No!' written with bayonets in blood, and voiced by the enemy's cannon.
Would WASHINGTON have been true to _his_ greatness in pl