attorney system, the wholesale and retail system, the baronial system, or the fogling system? We shall see when we are all called to the bar.

What is the use or the

"Yes; but the use of theft! mystery of it? Great is the mystery of theft. The greatest of men died between two thieves, departed this life in the company of thieves, and promised to come again as a thief. 'Behold I come as a thief.' Is there, then, no mystery in theft when it is so intimately connected with the greatest of men ?—when even our heroes of war are thieves, and the founders of our great families the chosen companions and accomplices of thieves? What was William the Conqueror but a thief? and his Norman barons were they not all thieves? They came here as thieves, and founded a race of nobles. Thieves must be great men if they are only great thieves. And the greatest of all Coming Men is He who will steal the world and establish His law therein. He comes as a thief to take from whom He will and give to whom He will.

"As for the use of theft without the mystery of it, it is very evident that without theft there would be less prudence and order in society. Almost all our private arrangements have regard more or less to the prevention of theft, and these private arrangements become the source of order by which the rights of individuals are defined and maintained. It is therefore a useful stimuiant to society, though in itself an evil. It is also abstractly an act of justice, for the poor are grievously wronged by the rich, deprived of that to which they have a natural right, and oppressed by burdens which the rich do not feel, and from which they claim even an hereditary

CHAPTER XLVIII.

WE

EVA AND MINERVA.

E must now request the reader to return with us to London, and take a seat for a little while in Senior's drawing-room. There he will find Eva sitting very contentedly in an armchair, and a young female artiste engaged in painting her likeness. The artist herself is a very beautiful girl, somewhat taller than Eva, but a little fairer in complexion. Her eye is also larger in the pupil, and seems to be better adapted for bearing the light, being able to receive a larger amount without contraction or collapse. Her person seems firm, her flesh solid, smooth, and delicate; her fingers exquisitely clean and elegant in form; her dress plain but chaste in colour, rich in quality, and fashionable in make. She is both talking and working, and hand and tongue are as busy as if they were rivalling one another. Eva calls her by the name of Minerva, sometimes Minnie; and the two girls seem to be as fond of one another as if they were of two opposite sexes.

"Well, I don't know," says Minerva, "but I often think that I should not like to go even to heaven itself if there were no pictures or statues there-I am so fond of images; I adore them, I could sit and look at an Apollo

Well, let us see if we can make it out with our two heads. If my head be as perfect as yours we shall make something of it, for what with the original and my own representation of it, in which I think I have met with more than my usual success, I am quite fascinated; I feel such a spell upon me, that even a chain could not bind me more powerfully to the spot. Suppose idolatry to be the mother of our civilisation, then the no-idolatry of your paternal ancestors must be the father. Is not that right?"

"It must be so," said Eva; "we-I mean Jews-were forbidden to be idolators, just as men were forbidden to wear women's clothes. But the Gentiles were not forbidden; it was ordained amongst them by Providence, I suppose; I don't know."

"There can be no doubt of it; it was found fault with in the hearing of the Jews only to keep the Jews out of it; but not in the hearing of the Gentiles, to bring the Gentiles out of it. That was not intended. Grecian idolatry was the cradle of the fine arts. When did the Jews ever study one of the arts, or lend their aid to the cultivation of taste in any respect whatever? A learned author, whose name I forget,-it was Higgins, or at least it was a name something like that surely,remarks, that wherever the feminine principle or Deity is worshipped, there is idolatry, and where it is not worshipped there is no idolatry. The feminine principle is Nature, which is visible, and has form or shape like a statue or picture. Therefore, we Catholics of the Roman Church, who worship the Virgin, the queen of heaven, besides saints and saintesses, keep up the Gentile system; whilst Protestants, who do not worship a feminine prin