of whom, as
in the other case, I shall take no {224} more notice until he can contrive
to surpass himself, which I doubt his being able to do. He informs me that
by changing A into [Hebrew: t] in my name he can make a 666 of _me_;
adding, "This is too hard for me, although not so for the Lord!" Sheer
nonsense! He could just as easily have directed to "Prof. De Morg[Hebrew:
t]n" as have assigned me apartment 7A in University College. It would have
been seen for whom it was intended: and if not, it would still have reached
me, for my colleagues have for many a year handed all out-of-the-way things
over to me. There is no 7A: but 7 is the Museum of Materia Medica. I took
the only hint which the address gave: I inquired for hellebore, but they
told me it was not now recognized, that the old notion of its value was
quite obsolete, and that they had nothing which was considered a specific
in senary or septenary cases. The great platitude is the reference of such
a difficulty as writing [Hebrew: t] for A to the Almighty! Not childish,
but fatuous: real childishness is delightful. I knew an infant to whom,
before he could speak plain, his parents had attempted to give notions of
the Divine attributes: a wise plan, many think. His father had dandled him
up-side-down, ending with, There now! Papa could not dance on his head! The
mannikin made a solemn face, and said, _But Dod tood_! I think the Doctor
has rather mistaken the way of becoming as a little child, intended in
Matt. xviii. 3: let us hope the will may be taken for the deed.

Two poets have given images of transition from infancy to manhood:
Dryden,--for the Hind is Dryden himself on all fours! and Wordsworth, in
his own character of broad-nailed, featherless biped:

"The priest continues what the nurse began,
And thus the child imposes on the man."
"The child's the father of the man,
And I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety."

{225}

In Wordsworth's aspiration it is meant that sense and piety should grow
together: in Dryden's description a combination of Mysticism And Bigotry
(can this be the _double Vahu_?), personified as "the priest,"--who always
catches it on this score, though the same spirit is found in all
associations,--succeeds the boguey-teaching of the nurse. Never was the
contrast of smile and scowl, of light and darkness, better seen than in the
two pictures. But an acrostic distinction may be drawn. When mystici