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thought came quite spontaneously to punish the cause of so much evil, even if it were at the sacrifice of my own life. Only after I was firmly decided did I become calmer. At ten o'clock at night I left Carlsbad for Toplitz, whence I should be able to proceed by train. Heavy clouds, from which the lightnings flashed, lay piled up on the horizon, and pressed down heavily upon the mountain-peaks. The rain poured in torrents. In the mountains there was a large fire which lit up the heavens." Arrived at Berlin he concludes his letter thus: "I assure you that I do not rush into this undertaking without mature consideration. I am young; the world is open to me; it is with regret that I part with life. Everybody agrees in this, that if Bismarck were to abdicate, the war, at least the civil war, could still be prevented. If he is put aside, the same result may be brought about. It is surely worth an effort, to save many lives by the sacrifice of two."

These were the last words ever received from this young man; for Bismarck will not permit even the tears of a mother, still fresh, to win from his clutch the final adieu of her son.

We all know how it ended. The iron-clad breast was saved, and the patriot lay dead at the feet of Germany's despot. By the light of torches, at midnight, far away in a crypt, in utter silence, the young man who gave Bismarck has the triumph of plunging his life for his fatherland is buried. Europe into war. But no genuine deed is utterly powerless in this world. The blow that the youth aimed was the blow of all Germany; and Germany even now kisses this picture of the young hero with tears, whilst it execrates the tyrant with his heritage of triumphant wrong.

Let none here speak of the great sin of assassination; let that be left as the fiction of despots. Whether war be wrong, is another question; but whether it be the collision of armies, or the collision between John Brown with a score of comrades and slavery, or a youth encountering the throne of Germany with a pistol-it is all the same; it is war. Tyrants hate assassination of despots because it is the only method by which the weak can equalize themselves with the strong. They who trample on law, too plead the law! Those who slaughter thousands too prate against regicide! I do not approve of the method in many cases; but I do believe that the deed of Ferdinand Blind was inspired by the noblest feeling; that it was a deed of pure self-sacrifice by a young man for whom life had unusual charms, (for he had evidently determined in any event that he himself mus die,) and that it was therefore as genuine and necessary as any flash of the lightning which he saw on the horizon when the purpose arose in his mind, and, amid the storm, he became calm.

And believing as I do with Wadsworth, that really "all virtue doth suc ceed," I shall hereafter see a certain invisible spirit struggling with Count Bismarck; a spirit which cannot be resisted by any coat of mail; and expects the seeming failure of Ferdinand Blind to be proved in the end the War and violence are only tolerasheath of a more consummate success. ble, only true, when they thus leap from earnest human hearts, thrusting . aside the human will, scorning precedents; each are the thunderbolts of God; they do not miss their aim.

AMERICAN SOCIAL SCIENCE ASSOCIATION.

CONSTITUTION, ADDRESSES, AND LIST OF Members of THE AMERICAN ASSOCIATION FOR THE ProMOTION OF SOCIAL SCIENCE, with the questions proposed for Discussion, to which are added, Minutes of the Transactions of the Association. July, 1866.

We have received this pamphlet, which consists of sixty-four pages, and contains matter of great interest. It is a record of the first year's valuable work in which this Association has engaged. The discussions turn upon a variety of topics, and in some instances are very able.

The Reform School Conference, which met at the State House on the 5th of June, and kept in session three days, was called by the American Association, and some account of its proceedings are here given.

On the first day papers were read by F. B. Sanborn, of Concord, (which he has furnished us for publication), B. J. Butts, of Hopedale, Rev. Mr. Toles, of Boston, and by Rev. C. F. Barnard, who read a paper written by Rev. G. W. Holls, Superintendent of the Orphan's Farm School at Zelienople, Penn. His subject was, The European Reformatories, as compared with those of America.

The essay by Mr. Butts, was upon "Vagrancy and its Causes," in which the labor question was largely concerned, the assumption being that, to a great extent, vagrancy resulted from the unequal distribution of the fruits and burdens of labor.

The essay by Rev. Mr. Toles, Superintendent of the Baldwin Place Home for little Wanderers, was upon the object and the beneficial results of this institution. So successful had it been that homes could be found for a greater number of children than the House could supply.

Nearly five hundred children had been received in the Home, of all the various classes which furnish young vagrants, and which Mr. Toles described in detail. The success of this new establishment had been very gratifying.

There was, on the second day, a general attendance of the Conference at the State Reform School, in Westborough, where, after an examination of the establishment, a session was held in the chapel, and different papers read and discussed, a report of which is to appear in the printed report of the Conference.

On the third day the delegates visited the Industrial School at Lancaster, Mass. A report of this visit, the papers read, and of the discussions, will also appear in the report of the Conference.

"The Third General Meeting of the Association, which will include the Second Annual Meeting, will be held in New Haven, Conn., on TUESDAY, the 9th of OCTOBER, 1866, at 10, A. M. Notice of papers to be presented, or the papers themselves, should be sent to the Recording Secretary before the first of October. The first business on Wednesday, the roth, will be the election of officers for the year, after which provision will be made for printing the Transactions for 1865-6, for the annual assessment, and other matters of business. All members, whether Regular, Honorary or Corresponding, are invited to communicate papers on such topics as they may select; preference being given to those indicated on pages 18-24 of this pamphlet."

The paper by Mr. Sanborn, elsewhere printed, though partially reported in other papers, will prove, we think, of so much interest to our readers, that we are glad to be able to furnish it for them in full.

SEXUAL PHYSIOLOGY: A Scientific and popular Exposition of the Fundamental Problems in Sociology. By R. I. TRALL, M. D. New York and London: 1866. pp. xiv. 312.

We agree with the writer of this volume, that a great deal of social misery, and much ill health, disgust and infelicity in matrimony, result from the popular ignorance on matters that relate to sex and to the conception of children. The passions of men need to be restrained by knowledge, if they cannot be rebuked by the presence of moral and religious feeling. If American women are notoriously careless about their health, are lovers of in-door life, and dislike to make their dress and customs conform to a capricious climate, it is certain that the young men err most profoundly when they import their reckless temper into the estate of marriage, and subject the unconscious woman to something worse than her own delicate health. We have no objection to see the subject stated plainly in clear type. American women have too many children, and have them too often when every physical condition imperatively calls for repose and immunity. The experience of life teaches us that woman should have the control of her own person; for the soundness and happiness of her children are involved in it. We like to see the fact put plainly before the consideration of men, to make an appeal to them against their indiscriminate and uncalculating interference with the laws of nature. No further details are desirable beyond those which may impress men with the advantages of that delicate regard for woman by which she gains repose, long periods of immunity that nourish the health, sweetness, dignity and future comfort of the household. In this respect we welcome the plain talking that is to be found in many pages of this volume.

But we think it is too full of purely scientific details. Men may not shrink from reading them; perhaps it is better that everything knowable on this point should be known by men. But we would not have a daughter of ours find the book, nor catch a glimpse of some of the wood-cuts, which, we must say, are too liberal, and entirely superfluous. From a delicate motive the volume appears to lack delicacy; and we think that all the important matter in it, touching upon the relations of the sexes, might take some nobler strain, separated from many of the physical explanations.

How to do such a thing well, is certainly a great problem. How to tell the young all the needful truth without violation of a reserve which is not all mere ignorance, and not all a mere occasion for abuses of the fancy; how to keep knowledge innocent- that is the question for a prurient and eager age. Which shall we prefer, an eruption of all the secrets of the physician into print and wood-cuts, every counter strewn with them, and boys and girls invited to premature fancies- or the old ignorance of sacred laws of the sexual relation, the old subjection of woman to the slavery of superfluous child-bearing, with all the disgust, alienation, hidden chagrin, foundered health and spirits, which that brings? We think the alternative lies in telling the truth with greater economy of details. We would say, with greater modesty; but the writer of this volume is conscious only of a pure motive, and is earnestly moved by considerations of humanity.

American parents are very much to blame. They are the proper authorties upon these vital points of the happiness and dignity of their children. They can communicate in the wisest and clearest way all that their own mistakes, their own information, their own folly or wisdom has furnished to their middle age. Their reticence upon this matter is the absurdest thing we know about American domestic life. Not absurd, merely, but criminal and palpably contradictory of some of the purest and sanest objects of a home, and fruitful in unhappy marriages. The reform must begin in the sweet privacy of every house, where sons and daughters are growing in the strength and beauty which future marriages should reverence and preserve.

J. W.

VOL. XXVII. PUBLISHED EVERY SATURDAY.

AARON M. POWELL, EDITOR.

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The second volume of the RADICAL commences in September with an increase of its number of pages, an enlarged list of contributors, and under new and most favorable auspices.

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