emselves have come into the habits and
attitudes of the patient donkey, who steps round and round the endlessly
turning wheel of some machinery, then they fancy that they have gotten
"the victory that overcometh the world."

All but this dead grind, and the dollars that come through the mill,
is by them thrown into one waste "catch-all" and labelled _romance_.
Perhaps there was a time in Mr. Smith's youth,--he remembers it
now,--when he read poetry, when his cheek was wet with strange tears,
when a little song, ground out by an organ-grinder in the street, had
power to set his heart beating and bring a mist before his eyes. Ah, in
those days he had a vision!--a pair of soft eyes stirred him strangely;
a little weak hand was laid on his manhood, and it shook and trembled;
and then came all the humility, the aspiration, the fear, the hope,
the high desire, the troubling of the waters by the depending angel of
love,--and a little more and Mr. Smith might have become a man, instead
of a banker! He thinks of it now, sometimes, as he looks across the
fireplace after dinner and sees Mrs. Smith asleep, innocently shaking
the bouquet of pink bows and Brussels lace that waves over her placid
red countenance.

Mrs. Smith wasn't his first love, nor, indeed, any love at all; but they
agree reasonably well. And as for poor Nellie,--well, she is dead and
buried,--all that was stuff and romance. Mrs. Smith's money set him up
in business, and Mrs. Smith is a capital manager, and he thanks God that
he isn't romantic, and tells Smith Junior not to read poetry or novels,
and to stick to realities.

"This is the victory that overcometh the world,"--to learn to be fat and
tranquil, to have warm fires and good dinners, to hang your hat on the
same peg at the same hour every day, to sleep soundly all night, and
never to trouble your head with a thought or imagining beyond.

But there are many people besides Mr. Smith who have gained this
victory,--who have strangled their higher nature and buried it, and
built over its grave the structure of their life, the better to keep it
down.

The fascinating Mrs. T., whose life is a whirl between ball and opera,
point lace, diamonds, and schemings of admiration for herself, and of
establishments for her daughters,--there was a time, if you will believe
me, when that proud, worldly woman was so humbled, under the touch of
some mighty power, that she actually thought herself capable of being a
poor m