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cent;” fearful of bad investments, of
gold rings in gold markets, of bard
times —and yet the world says, with
an annual income of a couple of mil
lions, he has not time to go and hear
Patti sing; but the clerks go every
night. That, eternallj’ sitting down
over account-books, agency reports,
collectors’ returns, he has not time to
read Ijucile, to admire a painting, to
enjoy good music, nor the sun, moon
and stars, mountains and vallies, riv
ers or ocean; and this, with a libra
ry, art gallery, pianos and harps in
his house; carriages, buggies and
horses in his stables, and a yacht
floating in one of the grandest har
bors in the world. And, what is
worse, he has knocked up his venti
cle sky-high with unwholesome ab
dominous inflations of gold-bogetting
labors—hence diets off the simplest
of food and of liquids, fearing he may
be lifted like a balloon, from the
clinging weight of wealth. Is this
not literally valuing the body, flesh
and flood, as so much gold, without
the capacity or the will to enjoy a
cent? Is this bodily freedom ?
Now, one might say, “ But your
soldier, is he bodily free?” My an
swer is, that though under orders to
drill, to march, and to fight, by the
will of his commanding officer, he is
fully as free bodily, as the gold-chain
ed slave of the office chair by the
weight of his property responsibili
ties. Both obey orders, and the last
the most obediently of the two, be
cause the discipline clogs the mind
like the body; and as to the abdomi
nous apparatus, why there can be no
comparison, for I saw my Yankee
soldier one day, feasting upon a roast
guinea hen, savory and poignant to
the old miller’s nose. Whether he
bought it or stole it, has nothing to
do with the question. The next day,
he was royally royal—tight as a
drum.-head, glorious in glee. “ God
save the Queen,” (for the fellow was
from Wales,) “The star-spangled
banner,” “ Pussey put the kittle on,”
etc. It is true the sergeant put him
in irons, but he slept the twenty-four
hours as strait as a line, and swore
when he awoke, he had been tho
whole time in the valley of Cardegan,
one of the most beautiful in Wales,
and “ his own, his native land.” The
world saith John Jacob is a million
aire, and the world falls at his feet.—
Your soldier is not worth his shirt,
sir, and despised in his poverty. The
Philosopher who keeps a clear con
science, should not care a fig for the
world, sir, and asks you which of the
two is the happiest while alive?—
When nailed in their coffins, they are
literally on a dead level; and while
history will bequeath a wreath to the
memory of the last, the first, in his
golden sarcophagus will be forgotten
by his own blood in a single genera
ion. So far then, you will admit
THE GEORGIA COLLEGIAN".
that in corporeal freedom, they are
equal.
Permit us philosophically to consi
der it in its mental type.
We state the broad proposition
that, a man who has time to look at
all things, is freer, mentally, than he
who has only time to think of one
thing; and as a corollarj’, the freer the
mind, the more ennobling to the soul
—and hence, tho man of one idea de
grades it, and is an idolator—hence
again, lost!
I bad a friend once, who was in the
lard business, wholesale and retail.—
“ John !” he said to me one day, in a
most plaintive voice, “ 1 may as well
be a bog.” “ How so, my friend ?”
“ Why, I am obliged to koep lard con
tinually on my brain, and nothing
else. I meet a lady and bow to her,
and say, good morning, madam.”—
Lard! I meet a gentleman, “ How
do-you-do, sir.” Lard! And I pass
on to the counting-room and ejacu
late as I go—lard ! lard! lard l lard !
I go to breakf'at and eat lard ; and
my wife is sure to talk of the last
lard, as being bettor or worse than
the first lard. The same lard ! lard!
lard! lard! from breakfast to din
ner, and from dinner to tea. And at
night my head is all lard. Lard in
Europe; lard in America. Lard
afloat; lard ashore. Lard in New
York, Cincinnati, St. Louis, It is the
last thought at night, the last grunt
on the pillow, I may just as well be
a hog and be done with it.” And so
said I, but not aloud my friend ; for
my friend lived in elegant style, far
more elegant than any man of mere
lard should live.
Now, it makes not a bit of differ
ence, whether it is lard or gold, as in
John Jacob’s style, it is the one
thing, the one idea—gold or lard ; or
any thing which commands and en
slaves the mind.
Os all enjoyments, those of the
mind are the most delightful, the
most varied, the least expensive, the
most improving, the most innocent,
for laws punish deeds not thoughts;
ahd finally the most lasting, becauso
it is eternal. Think of that, eternal
enjoyment! That while the gold
weighted brain is clogged to sink
lower and lower for the want of free
dom, even the poor soldier’s mind is
free as air; glorious in the range of
thought; unshackled, if the body is,
and with half a chance at least, that
when released from the clay by the
whistling shell, he wings upwards in
the smoke of the explosion, released,
everlastingly and gloriously free. I
say he has half a chance at least, of
this immortal glory. We know that
this cannot be the case with the idol
ator, which a man necessarily is, with
a single, constant thought of ccnt
per-cont, or any exclusive idea.
A single engrossing thought will
cut off one from the enjoyment of the
beauties of God’s creation. Because
it is only when human nature can
shake from the mind the memories of
anguish, and from the heart its
weight of cares, that the feelings are
open to the pleasures and charms and
beauties of the natural world. Then,
what enjoyment, even in the waving
of a bough, the color of a flower, the
majesty of tho mountain, the grand
eur of the sea. Even when the ele
ments are at war, the unenslaved
soul rises with joy above the raging
storm with a trusting courage in the
might of Him who raaketh the faith
ful conquerors over all. But alas!
false to our birthright, wo tear these
joys from our own grasp by nursing
covetousness, passions rendering
the beauty of God’s creation loath
some by contrast with the cancerous
throbbing of the heart for the world
of man.
This being an almost certain result
of mind-engrossing labors, especially
in that for wealth, which increases
witli the weight of years, is it not
positively an increase of poverty of
the most destructive character, since
its range of injury extends beyond
tho life of the labourer? hence it is
true that—
“ Magna servitus est magna fortu
nas, quoduna est magnas opesfortuna.”
Observer.
Library, Sept. 17, 3570.
For the Georgia Collegian.
Why is It ?
Ever since the birth of records,
women have been a subject of re
mark. Many adjectives, epithets,
and words, remain from different
minds, giving us the character of
their reflections. Poets have lived
and died, whose articulations were
dulcit sighs or hoarse curses. Tra
gedians and comedians have testated
to posterity their picturings. Such
have been the types of intellect, and
the specimens of thinkers, who have
worried their brains and wasted their
time upon what every school-boy
thinks he understands! Not a sha
ded lip, but would dub me contempt
uously an old fogy, or wife-ridden,
were I to doubt that he understood
“ the women” —his sweet heart. In
spite of the anathemas of the “young
America’s,” I crave your considera
tion, while I weave out a cursory of
this subject. Can there boa reason
able doubt, that she is understood ?
I9 this a question ? Precipitates of
other minds, will aid us in the an
swer. The Moon bears the feminine
gender. Inconstancy, anger, and
grief, were likewise, by the Latins,
put in the same gender. This meth
od of denomination may throw some
light upon the original; and if the
settlings are promiscuous, we can de
pend they are not at random ; and
when collected, their information,
though crude, will be valuable. Ho
mer has charmed us with his martial
epic, brilliant with stately machines
ry, trembling with quick-pulsed ac
tion and heroic valor —the gallant
rescue of Greece, of the truant and
thankless wife of Menelaus, from the
tender embraces of Paris. Old wise*
head, Ulysses, is told to have buc
cumbed to the wiles of Calypso;
while Penelope, the chaste, wove tho
web, which on account of him sho
never filled. So ancient thinking
commends ue; and as such thoughts
come from genius, they will with
stand the test of constancy. Pope,
>in electrical compositions, in his
“ Wife of Bath,” confessed his mind.
Byron, in his miscellanies, hesitated
not to leave his experiences, and his
Haidee and Dudu are not tho shad*
ows, but the substance, of his calm
judgment. The breath of Moore’s
conception, Hinda, “ the loveliest
and gentlest of all Arabian maids,”
faltered forth to the Gheber, in a
parting scene—
“ To see thee, hear thee, call thee mine,
0 mis’ry ! must I lose that too ;”
Shakespeare, with a breadth of ge
nius, believed there could be a Cleo
patra, aud Juliet —
She who had rather die with him
Than live to gain the world beside.”
The saintly Desdemona, hedecorated
with jewel traits. Her existence was
her love —her only plaint, I forgive
him. He draped the dark, “ unsex
ed,” Lady Macbeth, with chilling re
ality. The wolf’s loud howls, the
black stormy night, the cold shrieks
of the owl—all alarums of “withered
murder”—Macbeth’s pallor, disorder
ed looks, shrinking eyes and bloody
hands —the dizzied dupe of the “weird
sisters” become sulphurous and lurid
when the centre figure scoffs
“ A foolish thought to say a sorry night!”
Why is it? Are these several per
sonages, from these various authors,
natural ? Can these extremes of life
be real ?
It may be instructive and interests
ing, to glance at some of the oddities
abundant in woman. If we can hit
upon the rationale of them, we may
find the due point, at which tho
mazes of many whims and follies will
bo condensed—her strango freaks,
surprising impulses, revolting loves,
inexplicable aversions and curious
fancies may be plainer. Women are
constitutionally different from men.
They have sympathies in common,
but their natures are diverse. This
very variance is for her, a prepossess
sion. The chief pleasure of the con
versation between the sexes, pro
ceeds from these facts. Women have
the keenest talents. Men furnish
the material, while women carve up
on it ingenious devices. She carves,
she curves, she twists, sho twines;
furnishes old ideas; gives dolicate
suggestions beyond tho reach of his
faculties. Men relish her art, her no*
velty, her imagery. Women swim
in the ecstacy of being enjoyed! That