I do not think, thus musing upon our occasional glimpses of the Future, of such fancies as those of early youth,—­fancies and anticipations of greatness, of felicity, of fame; I think of the onward views of men approaching middle age, who have found their place and their work in life, and who may reasonably believe, that, save for great unexpected accidents, there will be no very material change in their lot till that “change come” to which Job looked forward four thousand years since.  There are great numbers of educated folk who are likely always to live in the same kind of house, to have the same establishment, to associate with the same class of people, to walk along the same streets, to look upon the same hills, as long as they live.  The only change will be the gradual one which will be wrought by advancing years.

And the onward view of such people in such circumstances is generally a very vague one.  It is only now and then that there comes the startling clearness of prospect so well set forth by Mansie Wauch.  Yet sometimes, when such a vivid view comes, it remains for days, and is a painful companion of your solitude.  Don’t you remember, clerical reader of thirty-two, having seen a good deal of an old parson, rather sour in aspect, rather shabby-looking, sadly pinched for means, and with powers dwarfed by the sore struggle with the world to maintain his family and to keep up a respectable appearance upon his limited resources; perhaps with his mind made petty and his temper spoiled by the little worries, the petty malignant tattle and gossip and occasional insolence of a little backbiting village? and don’t you remember how for days you felt haunted by a sort of nightmare that there was what you would be, if you lived so long?  Yes; you know how there have been times when for ten days together that jarring thought would intrude, whenever your mind was disengaged from work; and sometimes, when you went to bed, that thought kept you awake for hours.  You knew the impression was morbid, and you were angry with yourself for your silliness; but you could not drive it away.

It makes a great difference in the prospect of Future Years, if you are one of those people who, even after middle age, may still make a great rise in life.  This will prolong the restlessness which in others is sobered down at forty:  it will extend the period during which you will every now and then have brief seasons of feverish anxiety, hope, and fear, followed by longer stretches of blank disappointment.  And it will afford the opportunity of experiencing a vividly new sensation, and of turning over a quite new leaf, after most people have settled to the jog-trot at which the remainder of the pilgrimage is to be covered.  A clergyman of the Church of England may be made a bishop, and exchange a quiet rectory for a palace.  No doubt the increase of responsibility is to a conscientious man almost appalling; but surely the rise in life is great.  There you are, one of four-and-twenty,