194 HEREDITY. 



but who, in the heated darkness of the first eruption 

 of intellectual freedom, conclude too early that all 

 settled opinions are to be given up inside the domain 

 of religious truth, that the final hour of established 

 systems has at last struck, and that perhaps within 

 the range of the firmament of faith there are no gods. 

 The transitional state of culture very rarely under- 

 stands itself to be transitional. Its lack of self- 

 knowledge in this particular is a most subtle mis- 

 chief. Had Pliny understood that on the Apennines 

 the sun was shining, that the Mediterranean and the 

 great deep were gleaming under an unobscured noon, 

 he might have been at peace although encompassed 

 with perils. But the most dangerous thing to do 

 while any eruption of this sort is in progress is to 

 catch breath from the sulphur-fumes of bad' habits, 

 to lie down on some sailcloth of indolence, and take 

 a whiff from the nether regions. Occasionally the 

 undergraduate does that, and suffers the fate of the 

 elder Pliny. Sometimes galvanized corpses, that 

 have inhaled gross and noxious volcanic vapors, 

 strut through our professions several years ; but we 

 finally ascertain that they are dead men, and do riot 

 look to them for the initiation of reform. Books that 

 have in them spiritual as well as intellectual power 

 do not come from men who in college have followed 

 the elder Pliny in breathing sulphur. [Applause.] 



We must remember the wise proverb, however, 

 that, when inquiry is shut out at the door, doubt 

 comes in at the window. It is a necessary infelicity 

 in our college courses, that they awaken intellectual 



