—­Do not think, because I talk to you of many subjects briefly, that I should not find it much lazier work to take each one of them and dilute it down to an essay.  Borrow some of my old college themes and water my remarks to suit yourselves, as the Homeric heroes did with their melas oinos,—­that black sweet, syrupy wine (?) which they used to alloy with three parts or more of the flowing stream. [Could it have been melasses, as Webster and his provincials spell it,—­or Molossa’s, as dear old smattering, chattering, would-be-College-President, Cotton Mather, has it in the “Magnalia”?  Ponder thereon, ye small antiquaries who make barn-door-fowl flights of learning in “Notes and Queries!”—­ye Historical Societies, in one of whose venerable triremes I, too, ascend the stream of time, while other hands tug at the oars!—­ye Amines of parasitical literature, who pick up your grains of native-grown food with a bodkin, having gorged upon less honest fare, until, like the great minds Goethe speaks of, you have “made a Golgotha” of your pages!—­ponder thereon!]

—­Before you go, this morning, I want to read you a copy of verses.  You will understand by the title that they are written in an imaginary character.  I don’t doubt they will fit some family-man well enough.  I send it forth as “Oak Hall” projects a coat, on a priori grounds of conviction that it will suit somebody.  There is no loftier illustration of faith than this.  It believes that a soul has been clad in flesh; that tender parents have fed and nurtured it; that its mysterious compages or frame-work has survived its myriad exposures and reached the stature of maturity; that the Man, now self-determining, has given in his adhesion to the traditions and habits of the race in favor of artificial clothing; that he will, having all the world to choose from, select the very locality where this audacious generalization has been acted upon.  It builds a garment cut to the pattern of an Idea, and trusts that Nature will model a material shape to fit it.  There is a prophecy in every seam, and its pockets are full of inspiration.  —­Now hear the verses.

THE OLD MAN DREAMS.

O for one hour of youthful joy! 
Give back my twentieth spring! 
I’d rather laugh a bright-haired boy
Than reign a gray-beard king!

Off with the wrinkled spoils of age! 
Away with learning’s crown! 
Tear out life’s wisdom-written page,
And dash its trophies down!

One moment let my life-blood stream
From boyhood’s fount of flame! 
Give me one giddy, reeling dream
Of life all love and fame!

—­My listening angel heard the prayer,
And calmly smiling, said,
“If I but touch thy silvered hair,
Thy hasty wish hath sped.

“But is there nothing in thy track
To bid thee fondly stay,
While the swift seasons hurry back
To find the wished-for day?”