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SENSIBILITY.

NOTHING in the world is single. From the planet in heaven, down to the minutest atom on the earth, all nature is bound together by a chain of mutual affections. Nor is man, the miniature of all other creation, insensible to the same unvarying laws. His physical nature is not more conformed to the laws by which all matter is governed, than his mind obedient to the influences by which it is surrounded. While God has given to mind a partial control over, He has made it subject to matter, in an equal, though not reciprocal degree. Subservience to this control, combined with that of the circumstances and men around him, is sensibility; susceptibility to impression from whatever is external. In either extreme this cannot but be an unhappy quality. The mind so delicately sensitive as to be appalled by the least fear, or elated by the most trifling joy; in constant alternation between despondency and hope, is ill adapted to the jostling of this turbulent and gairish world of ours. On the contrary, the mind so insensate as to remain unmoved amid every vicissitude, is equally unsuited to the battle-field of stern prejudice and stormy passion. Discarding therefore any ideal extremity, we shall consider this quality as exemplified in the men and scenes around us. First its influence upon the social; secondly, the intellectual being of man. No one will so far impeach the divine benevolence as to deny that there are more sources of joy than sorrow offered to the choice of man. Happiness is a primitive, unhappiness an incidental principle in the human breast. There is nothing in nature, in the relations of society or the pursuits of life, but it may subserve the highest enjoyment of mankind. If, therefore, an acute sensibility is equally alive to impressions of pain and pleasure; conceding the truth of our premise, the aggregate amount of happiness will be proportioned to the measure of susceptibility. This may be illustrated by a contrast of different nations, in their habits of life, which are in a great measure qualified by the degree of enthusiasm which pervades the mass of mind. Who shall say that the active and bustling American, ever absorbed in the current of business, now surrendering his energies to one, and now devoted with equal zeal to another pursuit; at one time succumbing to fortune, at another rising above its shafts, is less happy or less prosperous than the titled of other nations," who, moving in the same round of habitual associations, and placed as it were above the reach of circumstance, are insensible to the scenes around them. Even as the loftiest music is the unison of discordant sounds, so it is only by alternations of joy and sorrow that the highest happiness is attained. But let us inquire into the directer influence which a lively sensibility exerts upon the mind. We often hear it called a distorted medium, through which everything is brought to the mind in exaggerated colors. That the mind under its sway, veering from the true and steadfast course, turns aside to the mean absurdities which it swells into importance. A sort of microscope to which no

thing but atoms of things may be subjected. We shall venture to claim that it is the focus in which things apparently unimportant converge and grow to their proper measure. Were we to suppose a mind entirely aloof from the control of judgment, the former might be true. But Reason does not always sleep in Fancy's bower. From the most tumultuous pleasures, the mind ever retires within itself, and comparing the images which varying scenes have presented, reduces them to their proper shades. Often amid the noisiest revelry, when the voice, that daughter of music, and its twin sister, the dance, hold their devotees in spell, has the noble and generous action been inspired. If we consult the memorials of the great and good, we shall find them not from among a surly priesthood, in " grief and grogram clad," they were and they are those, who once tried in the same ordeal, have keenly felt the distresses of their fellows and nobly dared in their relief. Who have been our Sidneys, our Howards, and Henrys, the memory of whose splendid philanthropy will live till

"The last syllable of recorded time."

And whose are the names that will go down, branded with the dark distinctions of infidel and misanthrope? This leads us to another view of the subject. It is those of cold and insensitive minds upon whom the truths of revelation and the attributes of God make no impression.

Our convictions of the existence of a Deity arise not so much from the revelations which make such existence certain, as the impressions stamped upon us by the forms of nature. Most minds require something tangible, from which to draw their conceptions. A theorem in philosophy, however consistent, is unsatisfactory to the inquisition until confirmed by experiment. Such minds read in the star-paved heaven, in the terrible waters, the Bible of the universe, the only sure Apocalypse. If, then, there be among us some "hopeless, dark idolators of chance," who, wedded to a joyless idealism, feel no thrill at the grand and awful in nature, such apathy results from insensibility to the lessons which they convey. The truth of this is confirmed by the lives and characters of those who have become notorious for their skepticism. The calm life and seemingly resigned death of Hume is quoted by his blinded worshipers, as exemplifying the confidence which a great mind can repose in such dark fanaticism. He passed a tranquil indeed, and apparently a happy life, but the even tenor of his life was the result of that same insensibility which led him into such fatal error. He died a calm death, but was it

"The calmness of the good?

Or, guilt grown old in desperate hardihood?"

Voltaire, a younger brother, so witty, profligate, and thin, though of a more fiery temperament, was the same cold, unfeeling thing. Now the sage of Ferney, now lounger at the Café de Procope, now jeering in grim mockery at his God, and now lapped in the soft dalliance of the

"The

Marquise du Chatelet; wherever we view him he is the same. accomplished Frivialist." There are some who may seem exceptions. Shelley, of the generous heart, Shelley, of the golden wing, wrapped up in the fiery web of poesy, was indeed of a different order. But search all his grand imaginings, which were the transcript of his heart, and you find no breathing spirit there. His great conceptions stalk forth like ghosts amid the place of tombs, clad in the cold cerements of death.

We might quote other instances kindred to these, but it will perhaps be objected that such are insular cases, far outnumbered by those who, led on by a blind sensibility, rush into fanciful dangers, and become victims of misfortune and discontent. Let it be remembered, however, that the number of those who have the ability to conceive, and the daring to publish theories and head sects, is small compared with those who, insensible to the evidences of a God, cherish the same unbelief. "The friendless slaves, children without a sire, Whose mortal life and momentary fire, Lights to the grave a chance-created form,

As ocean wrecks illuminate the storm."

Indeed, we may assert that the majority of those who are "without God in the world," are of those who live in this apathy-too cold to be sensible of truth, and too stubborn to believe when convinced. We have so far considered sensibility as a happiness principle, in its influence to solder the relations of society; and as consequent to this its bearing upon the final destiny of man. Its sway over his intellectual character is equally great and salutary. Locke somewhere says "what is it to exert-it is to feel." The greatest are those who have felt most, lived most. Homer, Virgil, Dante, Ariasto, Tasso, Corneille, and Racine, and lastly, Milton, all in their respective ages and countries, were thrown among stormy times. If space were allowed to analyze the distinctive features of their minds, we might easily trace the influence of the scenes among which they moved. Our ideas spring from our sensations. Genius is the refiner of our sensations. It is the interpreter of nature. Whether it be employed to detect the secrets of the earth, to "unwind the dances" of the sky, or to analyze the heart of man, its office is ever the same:

"The wide-seeing eye,

Catching the delicate shades, yet apt to hold

The whole in its embrace.

The sphere of a great man is not always on the "spirit's Alpine peaks." He must be warm with the sympathies, and quick with the sensibilities of those around him. To make others feel, he must feel himself. Where were the power of the deep mind and eloquent tongue, were they deprived, Cassandora like, of the power of making others believe. How then can they perform the high offices, and achieve the high rewards of genius, who shut themselves entirely from the living, to hold converse with the dead. Many and melancholy examples might be adduced of those who have sought to quench acute sensibilities in

retirement. They are too familiar to need quotation. Let it not be supposed that we are of those who believe no time should be devoted to silent thought. Let it not be thought that we admire those intellectual worldlings who flirt among us, "with rings on their fingers, and baby-work to their shirts." The mind must have its seasons of retirement in which to harmonize its emotions into thought; its sensations into "forms that breathe." We believe, however, in community of mind. Those were dark ages in which all the knowledge, all the virtue was shut up in the cloisters of monks. We can not suppose that a man of genius is the epitome of all humanity. We can not think that he is affected by all the hopes, and fears, and loves, of his kind. He must, therefore, converse with man in all his relations, and moreover, he must have a quick sensation of all that affects man, else how can he know

"All the springs

That wake his joy and sorrow,

All that uplifts him on emotion wrings,

Each longing for a fair and blest to-morrow,

Each tone that soothes or saddens, all that rings,
Joyously to him.

Although among men, he is not of men. The real great man is no time-server. He is his own model and exemplar. High above the reach of his kind, by delicate perceptions it is his to show each man his relative position, and the character he must sustain. We often hear it said that great sensibility unfits a man of genius to answer his important end; that he can not brook the venom of critics-the jeers of a merciless world. Opinion is indeed a stern judge. Its minions are often treated like the banqueters of Sisera-with death. Still, were great minds suffered to prescribe their own laws, with how sad an independence were they vested. It is a nice regard for, a fear even of public criticism, which directs intellectual effort into proper and useful channels. So far from disheartening the great man, collision with the minds around him, "makes his armor bright." We seldom detect complaint in the truly great, whatever opposition they are forced to buffet. Sustained by the assurance that trials herald triumphs, "press on" is ever the watchword, and the excitement of conflict is the parent of great effort. Could we have known Milton after the reception of his noble poem, should we have heard sickly repinings at fate? No. To live in the present were bright,

"But brighter far,

The hope that drew him like a heavenly star.”

When a host of driveling scribblers were in notice and favor, and the plays of Dryden were hissed from the stage, did he droop? No. His was still

"The highest pinion

In the midway air."

There have been exceptions to such. "Fame puts her finger on her lips" when the name of Keats is spoken. A keen sensibility and a weak constitution, in him it was the blessing which proved the bane. Without that sensibility where were the touching tenderness which breathes through the Eve of St. Agnes? Great sensibility is inseperable from great ability. It is the distinguishing quality of genius. Talent may exist without it, but the inquisition, the creative power ever owns its influence. Finally, it makes life active, earnest, useful. It makes man, pure, social, and like his God.

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