Cetera de genere hoc mirande multa videmus, 
Que violare fidem quasi sensibus omnia quierunt : 
Nequidquam ; quoniam pars horum maxima fallit 
Propter opinatus animi quos addimus ipsei 
Pro visis ut sint, que non sunt sensibus visa. 
Nam nihil egrius est quam res secernere apertas 
Ab dubiis, animus quas ab se protinus addit. 
Lucretius, De Rerwm Natura, Lib. iy. 1. 464. 
The life of the brute has commonly one immense compensation in its 
favour; the perfection of the individual existence is so rarely sacrificed 
to the prosperity of the race. It is not necessary, in order that one 
hippopotamus should cut his food conveniently, that another hippopotamus 
should lead an unhealthy existence like a Sheffield grinder; nor does the 
comfort of any bird’s nest require that another bird should slowly poison 
itself in preparing acetates of copper, sulphurets of mercury, or oxides of 
lead. The pride and beauty of a brute are never based upon the enduring 
misery of another brute. The wild drake’s plumage, splendid as it is, 
suggests no painful thought of consumptive weavers, of ill-paid lace- 
makers, of harassed over-worked milliners: and the most sensitive of us 
may enjoy the sight of it without painful thoughts; for it is God's free 
gift, causing no heart-burning of envy, no care nor anxiety of any kind. 
—P. G. Hamerton, Chapters on Animals. 
We are then in a world of spirits, as well as in a world of sense; and 
we hold communion with it, and take part in it, though we are not con- 
scious of doing so. If this seems strange to anyone, let him reflect that 
we are undeniably taking part in a third world, which we do indeed see, 
but about which we do not know more than about the Angelic hosts ;—-the 
world of brute animals. Can anything be more marvellous or startling, 
unless we were used to it, than that we should have a race of beings about 
us, whom we do but see, and as little know their state, or can describe 
their interests, or their destiny, as we can tell of the inhabitants of the 
sun and moon? It is indeed a very overpowering thought, when we get 
to fix our minds on it, that we familiarly use, I may say hold intercourse 
with, creatures who are as much strangers to us, as mysterious, as if they 
were the fabulous, unearthly beings, more powerful than man, yet his 
slaves, which Eastern superstitions have invented.—Nrwman, Parochial 
Sermons, ‘The Inyisible World.’ 
——— eee OO 
