What right has she to bear a child at all, While thus a grievous wrong she multiplies.

Go tell to man, would he redeem his race
To happiness, the goal of all mankind,
Must teach of his neglected body here,
No longer thus subservient to his soul;
Tell him that all is false, false as the hell,
Which his religions heretofore have taught,
That teaching him his body to despise,
So set his soul before that body here,
And his religion thus must be dispelled.
A superstition of a bygone day,

By truth, which ever cleaves its way to light,
Dispersing mists of ignorance and gloom;
Yet shall a brighter, happier, faith arise
From out the false conceptions of the past,
To take the place of all the worn out creeds.
The last green shoot, an outgrowth of the tree,
Implanted deep within the heart of man,
The tree of knowledge, and the tree of truth;
So on the dawn of happier days to come,
Bright shines the promise of this rising sun,
A true and noble faith-humanity.

Alas, mankind: my soul has wept for thee,
For thou hast misery sore to undergo,
And madness yet must bring its antidote,
When thus the mind outgrows the body here.
But yet this antidote has come to teach
The soul and body, equal to revere,
For perfect souls alone can dwell in shrines,
Of bodies in perfection here below;
A mighty soul in a degraded frame
May come to be a very fiend himself.
Alas poor soul, condemned this time to dwell,
To suffer, to redeem our bodies here,
His time thus spent, shall be a martyrdom;
Yet shall it bear its fruits, for future times,
In wringing thoughts of anguish from his soul,
To serve the future of his coming race.
The Devil himself, it is a dream of earth,
A nightmare of the agony of soul,
To answer for the horror of this wrong

Bequeathed by man to man in ignorance,
And thus the star of hope, perfection's state
Of man more blessed in our future race,
Is ever rising clear, while sunset comes
Of individuality of soul,

Of personality in future life,

Delusive visions of man's faulty brain,
A sweet illusion that must be dispelled,
To give place to the nobler thought divine
Of man immortal in perfections all.

So go thy way, my task is now fulfilled,
A blessing will I breathe upon thy soul.

Which breathe thou back in blessings on thy race.
Seek thou to find the good there is in man—
That germ of good which dwells in every soul;
Be tolerant of the evil that is found,

Know that it is the instrument by which
The eternal power has shaped thy universe;
And so be hopeful, and let not despair
Enter thy soul for all the ill that is.
Learn thou the insignificance of life—
A single day within eternity,

A grain of sand upon the golden shore,
A drop within the ocean of all time—
How small is individuality,

How great the individuals combined,
Which men in striving to define a God
Have shaped within the form of perfect man.

So

go, and fear no truths that can be spoke.
Thy thoughts which uppermost within thy soul
Are ever striving to express themselves,
Are not thine own to keep, but are the fruits
Of generations that have long gone by,
And units of the eternal power

Which yet shall make mankind a perfect race.
While yet she spake, I woke; it was a dream;
And yet a dream I'd fain believe was true,
For ever since that night her Soul divine.
Has hovered o'er my path; and in my dreams.
Her presence sweet oft comes to comfort me.
And so I turned, leaving the Matterhorn,
To seek the Zermatt valleys far below.

We ought to state that on the return of the Marquess of Queensberry from sea, he entered at Magdalen College, Cambridge. Some have thought that had he gone to the sister university he would have continued in his earlier beliefs, although, for ourselves, we are of opinion that his individuality is of so robust a stamp that even the Lectures of a Liddon on the Exegesis would scarcely have biassed him in an orthodox direction. And yet we shrink from calling a man possessing so profound an intellect, and with a mind so full of the poetic impulse, the tabooed nameATHEIST. Let us, rather, gather from Lord Queensberry's own words, some of his thoughts on these deeper problems, and in the result we find that what is popularly understood as Atheism-in its vulgar and ad captandum sense-is far from being descriptive of Lord Queensberry's theological position. By what seems more than a coincidence the motto of the Douglases is "Forward," and this seems to be the key-note of the whole situation. As Lord Queensberry stated to the writer of this memoir, he believes religion to be "progressive," and that in the quest of Truth much that is old, orthodox, and generally accepted, must be left far behind. No one will accuse the editor of CELEBRITIES OF THE DAY of the least sympathy with Secularism, but it behoves the thoughtful and impartial biographer to do justice to men, and it seems that with respect to the allegation brought against the Marquess of Queensberry, namely, that he held as a negation all that his brother peers regarded most sacred, was inaccurate, and a distortion of the truth. Of course there was a foundation, but if they had substituted the word "much" for "all," there would have been more fairness in the charge. The careful reader of "The Spirit of the Matterhorn," previously quoted, will have observed that there is the expression of a distinct belief in Immortality, a Great First Cause, the Spirit of Truth, and the like. Moreover, he has a profound faith in the ultimate immortality of the race, although he may not believe (in fact, does not believe) in the reassertion of individuality (or, rather, personality), beyond the grave. His lordship says in his Preface to the poem we have printed:— "With the selfish longing after an individual and personal hereafter removed,-as go it must in time, when man comes to his senses, and which removal seems a blessing to those who have accustomed themselves to look it in the face, what a terrible thing would be this clinging to one's

personal individuality all through eternity? With the departure of this baneful delusion will come the only hope and consolation,-the hopes we bear respecting our posterity, in whom it is quite possible, and I think probable, the life in us shall be revived again and again, until the final state is attained of the perfect mind in the perfect body. Out of our errors and consequent miseries shall those our children-perhaps ourselves repeated,-reap the fruits of our experience,-how much more so from the good to which even we may attain.

"The enigma of life shall dwindle into insignificance with the glorious hope before us of the ultimate perfection of mankind, should man come to realize as I firmly believe he yet will, that this is his mission here upon this earth! To what aspirations may he not rise? Life and its purposes will no longer seem incomprehensible or an insoluble riddle. Man's religion then would be to live for his posterity, worshipping (that is, serving) his body and his intellect in endeavouring to attain a more perfect existence, and improved condition physically and mentally, for those to come after him. In endeavouring to realize this he would be doing most good to himself individually, for to attain this end one should lead the most temperate and virtuous life, which of itself would result in happiness. Live purely and be healthy both in mind and body: this will bring its own reward to yourself and to your posterity. "How much of the truest religion consists in doing good for the sake of good?"

In some respects-owing to the action of the peers at Holyrood-the Marquess of Queensberry is in the same position with regard to the House of Lords that Mr. Bradlaugh is in with regard to the House of Commons, and with whom his lordship has shown much practical sympathy. But the National Reformer can scarcely be called the organ of so cultured a man as Lord Queensberry, his views finding better expression in the more moderate paper which is edited by Mr. Watts (the Secular Review). To sum up what has been written, and which will summarise the views of the Marquess of Queensberry, he believes with Herbert Spencer that the creative purpose is the eventual happiness of mankind; and upon this, and through the laws of adaptation, man must eventually become absolutely adapted to his surroundings, and, as Spencer says, so surely must man ultimately become perfect, inasmuch as his happi

ness would be the spontaneous result of such a condition of things. Happiness, as here expressed, consisting in the due exercise of all man's faculties, mental and physical, the greatest happiness would be when future generations-perhaps ourselves repeated, or the vital force in us repeated in the generations we shall produce-have inherited healthy, evenly-balanced organisations, breathing forth beautiful and pure Souls, whose faculties would be so balanced that, like the completed and united parts of a great puzzle, they so fitted one with another that the due exercise, and the due exercise only, of all people's faculties, would be the natural result of such a condition of things, whereby each man, perfectly fulfilling his own nature in all things, would be enabled to do so without causing pain or deterring any of his fellow men from obtaining the same privilege, whereby all men and women might be happy.

In his politics, as may be supposed, the Marquess of Queensberry is an Advanced Liberal.

Lord Queensberry is an ardent sportsman, and has ever taken a great interest in the turf. Indeed, he has recently founded the Junior Turf Club. He is a Lieutenant-Colonel in the Dumfries Volunteers. His lordship married, in 1865, Sybil, daughter of Alfred Montgomery, Esq., and niece of Sir Henry C. Montgomery, Bart., by whom he has had issue five children, four sons and one daughter.

THE MOST REVEREND LORD PLUNKET,
BISHOP OF MEATH.

AMONG the men who during the present half-century have come to the front and become known as earnest workers for good, there are few whose influence in his own sphere has been more beneficially exercised, and none more thoroughly deserving of respect, than William Conyngham Plunket, Lord Plunket, and Bishop of Meath, the premier diocese of Ireland. His lordship has come of a race noted for talent, being descended from two grandsires who led the