ON READING. 83 



in less than two days, some stagnant water in a bottle in my study, 

 which when first subjected to the microscope was not remarkably crowd- 

 ed with infusories, became a moving mass of them. 



These animals are short lived. Ehrenberg could not keep them 

 alive longer than three weeks, but probably they live longer in open wa- 

 ter. But it is wonderful how those which have been apparently dead 

 and even dried up, can be revived by pouring a little water on them. — 

 It is said that some have been thus resuscitated, after they had been dri- 

 ed up for years. Even some which were frozen with the water in which 

 they were found, came to life when the ice was melted. 



No arithmetic can reach down to the minuteness or number of these 

 animals. Some of them, it is true, can be seen with a good naked eye. 

 There are some as large as the ^'^ of a line, and a line is ^^^ of an inch, 

 but the smallest that I have seen, are only the -^J^^ of a line in size, 

 and of course, require a good microscope to be observed. It has been 

 calculated that a drop of water may contain five thousand millions of 

 these smallest infusories. 



ON READING. NO. III. 

 "The habitual indulgence in such reading (novel reading) is a silent, mining 

 mischief. Though there is no act, and no moment, in which any open assault on 

 the mind is made ; yet the constant habit performs the work of a mental atrophy : 

 it produces all the symptoms of decay, and the danger is not less, tor being more 

 gradual, and therefore less suspected. " H. More. 



We believe that one of the greatest evils that now trouble our land 

 is the abundance of works of fiction, and the wide-spread indulgence 

 in their perusal. They constitute a fans malorum, from which bitter 

 streams flow forth, scathing and desolating many a spot which else had 

 been green and flourishing. To these books is to be traced much of 

 the corruption of morals and the prevalence of crime. They have giv- 

 en activity to slumbering passions ; they have suggested dark deeds and 

 foul thoughts ; they have developed in fearful strength and vividness, 

 the depravity of hearts which else had been schooled to purity and gen- 

 tleness ; they have banished modesty from the soul of youth, and have 

 taught the lip to utter profanity and obscenity, and led to deeds of licen- 

 tiousness and baseness, which defile human nature and make a virtuous 

 man blush to own himself a man. 



It were absurd, indeed, to pass a sweeping condemnation on all works 

 of fiction. Even that particular class of fictitious writings, called JVov- 

 els, may claim some exceptions. We believe that Fiction may be read. 



