ing knowledge with a satisfaction the same in kind
as that which rewarded the maturest labors of Humboldt or Newton. There
are sequences of facts every one of which, imparted in its natural
order, brings an immediate interest. It is no nebulous scheme of
combining instruction with amusement which is to be sought. One might as
well look after the Philosopher's Stone or the Elixir of Life. Good
things are to be had upon no easier terms than privation and work. But
there is a wide difference between a man toiling to gain material
comforts for those who are dear to him, or laboring to enlighten and
reform his own spirit that he may give good gifts to his generation, and
a beast whipped round a treadmill to the din of its own everlasting
clatter. It is only work whose end shall, in some faint degree, be
intelligible, which is demanded for the child; and with this sort of
work we believe that it is very possible to furnish him. But our
philanthropies in this direction may not be wrought by deputy; they must
be aimed at the few, and not at once at the many.

The reader of "Levana" will find much incidental commendation of those
true relations of intellectual sympathy and confidence between parents
and children which in this country are far rarer than they should be.
Seldom do we hear the average American citizen speak of either parent in
that tone of tender and respectful companionship with which the average
Frenchman pronounces "_ma mere_" or "_mon pere_." Seldom do we see that
relation between an eminent man and his mother which, in the Old World,
has been exemplified from Augustine to Buckle. Some of the causes of
this have been admirably set forth in a recent essay in these pages. The
article by Gail Hamilton in the April number of the "Atlantic" contains
much _uncommon_ sense, which our lady-readers cannot ponder too often.
All honor to those mothers who, meeting extreme and unexpected poverty,
turn themselves into drudges that their children may be decently clothed
and wholesomely fed! But dishonor to those women who stunt their own
intellectual powers, which should educate and accompany the immortal
souls of their sons and daughters through this world and perhaps
another,--and this, in order that their bodies may be fed luxuriously,
or dressed in lace and ruffles to vie with the children of richer
neighbors! There can be no tolerance for the _indolence_--we emphasize
the word--which elects a mechanical routine instead of