IO
LABOUR.
dreary lives without a glimpse of that joy which
awaited only the bidding of relaxation to rush
in like a flood ; how many, endowed with
splendid mental powers, have found their light
of reason overclouded or wasted down into
drivelling idiocy ; how many poor toiling wretches
have had all their virtue and all their hope
crushed out by this, in many cases self-imposed,
evil. We are often told—it is one of the prac
tices of our day to write and lecture—of men
whose ambitious souls flx upon some great aim,
impossible of realisation to ordinary wills—
dazzling, glorious—the attainment of which,
ever before their mind’s eye, becomes the one
object of their lives ; adamantine resolve to
succeed, the spring of all their action. We are
told that by years of toil, toil from which
common mortals would shrink, toil hard, un
relaxing, despotic, they do succeed ; but it is
seldom revealed to us, it seldom can be re
vealed, at what heavy, heavy cost the prize has,
in many instances, been purchased. The un
thinking multitude, who see the outward halo
of triumph around the heroes’ heads, clap
hands, and shout, Well done ! well done ! The
ambitious, toiling far down on that same ladder