PRUDENCE 171

figures in this picture of life. Let them stand on their feet, and not float and swing. Let us know where to find them. Let them discriminate between what they remember and what they dreamed, call a spade a spade, give us facts, and honor their own senses with IIIUSI.

But what man shall dare tax another with impru- dence? Who is prudent? The men we call greatest are least in this kingdom. There is a certain fatal dislocation in our relation to nature, distorting our modes of living, and making every law our enemy, which seems at last to have aroused all the wit and virtue in the world to ponder the question of Reform. We must call the highest prudence to counsel, and ask why health and beauty and genius should now be the exception, rather than the rule, of human nature. We do not know the properties of plants and animals and the laws of nature through our sympathy with the same; but this remains the dream of poets. P0- etry and prudence should be coincident. Poets should be lawgivers; that is, the boldest lyric inspiration should not chide and insult, but should announce and lead, the civil code, and the day’s work. But now the two things seem irreconcilably parted. We have vio- lated law upon law, until we stand amidst ruins; and when by chance we espy a coincidence between rea- son and the phenomena, we are surprised. Beauty should be the dowry of every man and woman, as in- variably as sensation; but it is rare. Health or sound organization should be universal. Genius should be the child of genius, and every child should be in- spired; but now it is not to be predicted of any child, and nowhere is it pure. We call partial half-lights,