Vir] AND SYMBOLS. 389 



it passes from its peaceful to its furious mood Violence often, 

 slumbers under an appearance of serenity. A crowd of joyous 

 holiday-makers to-day may become to-morrow a foaming mob of 

 insurrectionists ! i. o. 



The Safe Conduction of Violent Elements. 



The electric fluid will not leave its centre to enter a bad 

 conductor if it can find a good one. On this simple principle 

 depends the utility of the lightning-rod. In its flight towards 

 the earth the lightning avoids a bad conductor, and selects a 

 good one if it is to be had ; hence it will spare the house or the 

 tower so long as there is sufficient iron-rod attached through 

 which it may descend to the earth. In this \\ r ay the electric 

 discharge, which would have shattered the bad-conducting 

 tower, glides easily and safely past it into the ground. In 

 dealing with any violent elements the same principle should 

 guide us ; we should arrange not to oppose them, for that is 

 useless, but to conduct them away harmlessly. The spirit of a 

 starving mob would often strike down valuable institutions, but it 

 may be diverted into the paths of hopeful industry, in which 

 it will expend all its fire. The appetites of a people may 

 threaten to run riot in the temples of drunkenness and 

 debauchery ; but if they are conducted into the pure atmosphere 

 of wholesome amusement and recreation, they will spend them- 

 selves as harmlessly as the lightning spends itself on the green- 

 sward when the genial showers conduct it thither. "The 

 quality of mercy," which "droppeth as the gentle dew from 

 heaven," is the best conductor of all violent social elements. 



BE. 



A Virtue may Exist where least Expected. 



In the most unlikely places we may discover an unexpected 

 virtue. On the low rocks, on the summits of all the loftiest 

 Highland hills, there is a curious leafy lichen (Parmelia fahlun- 

 ensis), found abundantly, scorched by the sun apparently into a 

 black cinder. Of all lichens, this species, judging from its out- 

 ward colour and appearance, would seem to be the least capable 



