insult, there is but little, if any, necessity for personal contest or altercation; and those who do indulge in them, are the violent, who cannot controul their feelings, or the ignorant, who are not yet impressed with the importance of social order.

But powerful as may be those combative feelings, which prompt men to quarrel and fight, there can be no question, but that the approbation and disapprobation of their fellows are strong auxiliary motives; and form, perhaps, the principal incentive to most of the encounters that take place, either with fist, sword or pistol.

Unhappily so much has been said and written about the "glory" and "heroism" of fighting, when men had no higher merits to boast of, and so many of the present day live by fostering the delusion, that not to fight, when challanged, is considered a disgrace, and a degradation; and to forgive your enemies, a piece of cowardice to be scouted by what is called "a man of honour.”

It is this absurd immoral feeling in society, that occasions most of the fighting exhibitions we now hear of; and to the extirpation of that feeling, must men direct their attention, if they would promote peace and human brotherhood.

For as long as persons are found to stamp their approbation on a man's pugilistic skill, and urge him to the contest, so long will men be found, striving to excel in that profession; but when those approvers begin to consider it as a kind of merit due to a bull-dog, rather than to a man, the fighter will begin to grow ashamed of the practice.

When men begin to draw the distinction between bravery and courage, they will learn to estimate the man who has mental resolution sufficient to refuse the duellers challenge, and the moral courage to brave the prejudice and

sneers of his companions, rather then be guilty of a deed of wrong; and will they, at the same time, despise the bravery of him, who, from wounded vanity, would take the life of another, and thus render a family desolate, and fill happy beings with sorrow and anguish. They will then learn that the truly courageous is he who will risk life to save, cherish and prolong the life of another; while he who, with animosity and revenge, is intent on destroying and rendering others miserable, is at heart a moral coward, not brave enough to sacrifice his own vanity, for the wellbeing of those who have given him no cause for offence.

And when men begin to perceive the hollowness of most of their fighting victories—those death-struggles between bretheren for the benefit, for the most part, of their oppressors; when they begin to find that soldiers are oftener instruments of tyranny, than champions of freedom; and the fomenters of war, rather than the preservers of peace; when experience has taught them that the world's free traffic is the best guarantee for the world's peace, and enlightened freemen the best of national defences; they will then begin to estimate as glorious victories, the mental and moral triumphs over ignorance, poverty, and crime; and to reckon as their best heroes, those who have blest mankind by their labours and inventions, or elevated and refined them by their mental and moral achievements.

INDIVIDUAL DUTIES.

AGAINST SWEARING AND COARSE LANGUAGE.

SWEARING is an irrational expletive used by the vulgar, in place of more appropriate language, to give, as they conceive, more forcible expression to their anger; greater strength to their asseverations; more weight to their selfimportance; and more power to their authority; the accompanying expressions being generally discourteous, gross and offensive to all persons of cultivated minds.

An angry oath may be said to be a sentence expressing the feeling of destructiveness in a spiteful and venomous manner; in place of the manly expostulation, the firmness, and resolution suited to the occasion.

An oath to accompany any affirmation made, implies that the speaker has some apprehensions of not being believed on his bare statement, and so seeks to convince others by swearing to the truth of it. A low and foolish practice which, in all probability, had its origin in the custom of public swearing; for ignorant minds, conceiving that the state would not believe without an oath, copy their superiors in swearing in support of their every-day statements.

The oaths which spring from the feelings of self-approbation and esteem, generally exhibit a shallowness of intellect, as well as uncultivated morals, in those who utter them; as such persons foolishly believe that swaggering oaths and loud boastings add to their worth and importance in the opinion of their audience; while, by such expressions, they are presenting them with the strongest proofs of their own vanity, conceit and folly.

The oaths which are often heard accompanying the orders, or commands, of those in authority, would seem to proceed from a desire to enforce obedience from fear, rather than from duty; a course of conduct which generally fails to be effective; for though it may in some cases succeed in cowing timid minds into a reluctant compliance, it generally inspires the resolute to thwart or evade mandates thus given.

The coarse, indelicate and offensive expressions we so often hear in our streets and workshops, are, for the most part, to be traced to the impure feelings, uncultivated minds and corrupt morals of those who utter them.

Such being the nature of these unmanly oaths and vulgar epithets, it may be well to enquire how it is that the custom of swearing is still so prevalent in society; although there are few found to defend it, and most of those who indulge in it readily admit its impropriety.

Is it not, that, as one of the old barbarisms of the past, it is so blended with our dramatic and other popular literature (common enough in the age in which it was written), that we, in our reverence for the sterling ore, have been induced to look even upon the dross with some degree of respect? And thus hearing and reading these coarse expressions so frequently, we are too apt to imbibe them, and perhaps to be imperceptibly impressed with the notion that they are not so improper and immoral as we have been taught to believe them; and they being thus stored in the memory as the language of passion and feeling, are too often unconsciously used whenever passion prompts us.

This may somewhat account for oaths being so often used by those who know that it is exceedingly wrong to use them; persons whose example in this particular have a pernicious effect on those around them, and more especially upon the young and unreflecting.

Children, also, are too prone to copy coarse expressions from their parents and associates, as well as what they hear repeated in the streets. And this fact should cause parents not only to prevent their children from playing in the public streets, where so much vice and temptation await them, but to avoid, by all possible means, fixing their habitations in low neighbourhoods, where the ears of their wives and children are constantly assailed by every description of coarse and filthy language.

The custom of swearing, therefore, may be said to be chiefly the result of habit, and like all other habits is strengthened by indulgence; from which circumstance parents cannot be too careful in guarding their children against its contaminating influence; and those persons who have already adopted it, cannot be too determined in their efforts to eradicate a habit so degrading to their general character.

Having thus far treated of its vulgarity and offensiveness, we may now consider its immoral effects; both as regards the character of the individual, and the welfare of that society of which he is a member.

In the first place, swearing and coarse language are repellant in their nature, causing persons of cultivated minds and morals to avoid as much as possible the company of those who indulge in them; by which means the swearer not only loses the improvement in mind and morals, that might have been gained by the association, but by being left to consort with kindred minds is liable to be still further corrupted.

Not only this, but prejudice, mistrust and apprehension are generated by the two parties being kept apart from each other. The man of coarse and vulgar manners is too apt to look upon his superior in conduct with envious feelings, and to express those feelings in low and abusive