Pass over that long struggle,
        Read where the comfort came,
     And when the first is written
        Within the book your name.

     Again it comes, and oft'ner
        Linked, as it now must be,
     With all the joy or sorrow
        That Life may bring to me.

     So all the rest—you know it:
        Now shut the clasp again,
     And put aside the record
        Of bygone hours of pain.

     The dust shall gather on it,
        I will not read it more:—
     Give me your hand—what was it
        We were talking of before?

     I know not why—but tell me
        Of something gay and bright.
     It is strange—my heart is heavy,
        And my eyes are dim to-night.

TAXES.

TAXATION is one of the fundamental pivots
of all legislation and government. The ruler
who taxes well and wisely, is a blessing to
his people; the tyrant who taxes
iniquitously, is a scourge and a curse. Nor is
it the mere gross amount of taxation which
constitutes the crushing or the well-applied
impost. As, in the body corporeal, there are
spots where a slight touch will cause acute
pain; others, where a ruder brush will
tickle; and others, where a gentle blow or
pressure will scarcely have the effect of
awakening attention;—so, in the body politic,
the hand of. the tax-gatherer will hardly be
felt here; will meet with no resistance
there; while, elsewhere, its application will
cause fearful convulsions. A heavy hair-
powder tax is truly comical, when we think
of tall footmen strutting proudly, because a
little white dust has been sprinkled on their
heads without regard to expense, especially
as we powder our babies, free. A moderate
tax on private pleasure-carriages or show
saddle-horses, will cause no complaint;
because persons who complained of such a
trifling addition to their outgoings, would
convict themselves of living beyond their
means, and of indulging in a luxury to which
they had no right. But a salt-tax has
furnished the incidents of many a tragic drama,
—from sudden assassinations which have
struck its collectors like a thunderbolt, to
the slow but inevitable death from wasting,
atrophy, and intestine pests, to which are
condemned the pitiable victims who are
debarred from that necessary of human life.

" Away with you! You hurt me," said
the sheep to the crow, who was pulling a few
flocks of wool to line his nest.

"What affectation!" answered the crow.
"You let the shepherd shear you bare,
without saying, a word; and you make a
great fuss, when I only pluck a handfull."

"Granted, " rejoined the sheep. " It is
true. But I hardly feel the shepherd's
fingers, when he eases me of my hot and
heavy coat; while you—get away with you,
you peevish, cruel crow! Help, brother
sheep! To arms! Down with the crow!"

Nations are flocks of sheep; and rulers
should be shepherds and not crows; for the
taxation to which a people consents
voluntarily, is legitimate in the strictest sense.
The first French Revolution was brought
about very much in order to obtain the
mastery over certain taxes,—aides, tallies, gabelle,
capitation, main-mortes, droits, féodaux,
corvées seigneuriales, and half-a-hundred other
abominations. But people have willingly
submitted to be taxed for the supply of
acknowledged conveniences—sometimes even
for the gratification of favourite and popular
pleasures and indulgences. Never are taxes
more readily paid than for common safety.
When a leaky vessel threatens to founder,
the despairing passenger will tax himself to
the whole amount of his worldly goods,
which he throws overboard, to lighten the
ship. When an invader menaces to destroy
households with fire, sword, and insult worse
than death, the householder volunteers his
utmost personal tax, his life even, to ward off
the danger. Taxation, resolved to its primary
intention and meaning, is the price of the
protection afforded by the State to the goods
of the tax-payer, comprising in the term
"goods" his honour, his family, and his safe
existence. He who has most to be protected,
is reasonably called on to pay the highest
price for the security he enjoys; that is,
taxes should be levied according to value,
All have something to be protected in time
of need, even if they are inmates of a Union
House or homeless beggars in a strange city;
for they have themselves. Patents of nobility,
privileged immunities, or the usurped
converson of a temporary into a perpetual and
hereditary freedom from state imposts, can
be no just ground for exemption from the
payment of taxes. Unequal taxation has
proved itself sufficiently volcanic to cause
death-dealing earthquakes in the social
world, and to upset thrones and dynasties.

The power of taxation, for evil, stands
confessed; can it be made equally potent for
good? Is it possible that a fair assignment
of taxes over the surface of a country, and
the just employment of the amount collected,
should act as a bond of union, a spreader of
peace, and an insurer of tranquillity, to the
same degree that bad taxation is dangerous
and explosive in its tendency? May that
little-understood specific, TAX, be made to
work medicinally with as great healing virtue
as the history of the last century records it
to have acted virulently as a poison? The
problem is a noble one to solve.

The recent awful inundations in France
have only fanned the flames of, instead
of extinguishing, a controversy which has
been discussed with gradually increasing