in replying, goes further. She values letters, she says, as the 'most vital part of biography.' She is astonished that any rational human being should 'put his foot on the traditions of his kind in this particular class.' We should lose, for example, such a delightful book as Voltaire's correspondence. She could enjoy 'book after book of such reading.' Were we to accept Miss Martineau's principle (apparently that such letters might be circulated in manuscript, but never printed) 'death would be deader henceforth.' We ought all to be ready to say that if the secrets of our daily lives and inner souls may instruct other sorrowing souls, let them be open to men hereafter as they are to God now. Dust to dust, and soul secrets to humanity.' And she proceeds to say that, though she shrinks 'from the idea of publicity on any terms,' and would destroy papers of 'her own, sacred to her for personal reasons,' she would not 'call this natural weakness a virtue,' or justify it as a general maxim for public acceptance. If 'soul secrets' belong to humanity, if we are all entitled to look into the most intimate experiences of all our predecessors, it appears that no line can be drawn. Anything and everything is public property; and, after our death, the world is to be allowed to listen to what-
