great has been done by youth," wrote Disraeli. "The world's interests are, under God, in the hands of the young," says Dr. Trumbull.

It was the youth Hercules that performed the Twelve Labors. Enthusiastic youth faces the sun, its shadows all behind it. The heart rules youth; the head, manhood. Alexander was a mere youth when he rolled back the Asiatic hordes that threatened to overwhelm European civilization almost at its birth. Napoleon had conquered Italy at twenty-five. Henry Kirke White died at twenty-one, but what a record for a youth he left. Byron and Raphael died at thirty-seven, an age which has been fatal to many a genius, and Poe lived but a few months longer. Romulus founded Rome at twenty. Pitt and Bolingbroke were ministers almost before they were men. Gladstone was in Parliament in early manhood. Newton made some of his greatest discoveries before he was twenty-five. Keats died at twenty-five, Shelley at twenty-nine. Luther was a triumphant reformer at twenty-five. Ignatius Loyola made his pilgrimage at thirty. It is said that no English poet ever equaled Chatterton at twenty-one. Melancthon gained the Greek chair at Wittemburg at twenty-one. Whitefield and Wesley began their great revival as students at Oxford, and the former had made his influence felt throughout England before he was twenty-four. Victor Hugo wrote a tragedy at fifteen, and had taken three prizes at the Academy and gained the title of Master before he was twenty.

Many of the world's greatest geniuses never saw forty years. Never before has the young man, who is driven by his enthusiasm, had such an opportunity as he has to-day. It is the age of young men and young women. Their ardor is their crown, before which the languid and the passive bow.

But if enthusiasm is irresistible in youth, how much more so is it when carried into old age! Gladstone at

eighty had ten times the weight and power that any man of twenty-five would have with the same ideals. The glory of age is only the glory of its enthusiasm, and the respect paid to white hairs is reverence to a heart fervent, in spite of the torpid influence of an enfeebled body. The "Odyssey" was the creation of a blind old man, but that old man was Homer. “I argue not against Heaven's hand or will," said Milton, when old, blind, and poor; "nor bate a jot of heart or hope; but still bear up and steer right onward." He was chilled with the frosts of time when he depicted the love of the first pair in Eden.

The contagious zeal of an old man, Peter the Hermit, rolled the chivalry of Europe upon the ranks of Islam.

Dandolo, the Doge of Venice, won battles at ninetyfour, and refused a crown at ninety-six. Wellington planned and superintended fortifications at eighty. Bacon and Humboldt were enthusiastic students to the last gasp. Wise old Montaigne was shrewd in his graybeard wisdom and loving life, even in the midst of his fits of gout and colic.

Dr. Johnson's best work, "The Lives of the Poets," was written when he was seventy-eight. Defoe was fifty-eight when he published "Robinson Crusoe." Newton wrote new briefs to his "Principia" at eightythree. Plato died writing, at eighty-one. Tom Scott began the study of Hebrew at eighty-six. Galileo was nearly seventy when he wrote on the laws of motion. James Watt learned German at eighty-five. Mrs. Somerville finished her "Molecular and Microscopic Science" at eighty-nine. Humboldt completed his "Cosmos" at ninety, a month before his death. Burke was thirty-five before he obtained a seat in Parliament, yet he made the world feel his character. Unknown at

forty, at forty-two Grant was one of the most famous generals in history. Eli Whitney was twenty-three when he decided to prepare for college, and was thirty

when he graduated from Yale; yet his cotton-gin opened a great industrial future for the Southern States. What a power was Bismarck at eighty! Lord Palmerston was an "Old Boy" to the last. He became Prime Minister of England the second time at seventy-five, and died Prime Minister at eighty-one. Galileo at seventy-seven, blind and feeble, was working every day, adapting the principle of the pendulum to clocks. "There was nothing remarkable about Goldsmith when he was young," said Johnson; "he was a plant that flowered late in life." George Stephenson did not learn to read or write until he had reached manhood. Richard Baxter did not know a single letter at eighteen. Some of Longfellow's, Whittier's, and Tennyson's best work was done after they were seventy.

At sixty-three Dryden began the translation of the "Eneid." John Colby, brother-in-law of Daniel Webster, learned to read after he was eighty-four, that he might read the Bible. Robert Hall learned Italian when past sixty, that he might read Dante in the original. Noah Webster studied seventeen languages after he was fifty. Ludovico, at one hundred and fifteen, wrote the memoirs of his times. Cicero said well that men are like wine: age sours the bad, and improves the good.

With enthusiasm we may retain the youth of the spirit until the hair is silvered, even as the Gulf Stream softens the rigors of northern Europe.

"How ages thine heart, towards youth? If not, doubt thy fitness for thy work."

"Common sense is the genius of our age."

"Fine sense and exalted sense are not half so useful as common sense."