Language delicate and measured, the delicate Attic phrase, for instance, in which the eminent Aristeides could speak, was then a power to which people's hearts, and sometimes even their purses, readily responded.

And there were many points, as Marius thought, on which the heart of that age greatly needed to be touched.

He hardly knew how strong that old religious sense of responsibility, the conscience, as we call it, [156] still was within him--a body of inward impressions, as real as those so highly valued outward ones--to offend against which, brought with it a strange feeling of disloyalty, as to a person.

And the determination, adhered to with no misgiving, to add nothing, not so much as a transient sigh, to the great total of men's unhappiness, in his way through the world:--that too was something to rest on, in the drift of mere "appearances." All this would involve a life of industry, of industrious study, only possible through healthy rule, keeping clear the eye alike of body and soul.

For the male element, the logical conscience asserted itself now, with opening manhood--asserted itself, even in his literary style, by a certain firmness of outline, that touch of the worker in metal, amid its richness.