The charm in this ca^ is not that the dinner is
all before me, where the man is bound by his wa-
ges to place it. This every waiter I have had has
done just as punctually as this man. No, it is ex-
clusively the way in which it is set before me, a
way altogether peculiar to this man, which attests
that in doing it he is not thinking either of earning
his wages, or doing his duty towards me, but only
of satisfying his own conception of beauty with the
resources before him. The consequence is that the
pecuniary relation between us merges in a higher
one. He is no longer the menial, but my equal or
superior, so that I have felt, when entertaining doc-
tors of divinity and law, and discoursing about di-
vine mysteries, that a livigg epistle was circulating
behind our backs, and quietly ministering to our
Wants, far more apocalyptic to an enlightened eye
than any yet contained in books.
Digitized by LjOOQIC



THE 0IV1NB MAN. 89

The reader may deem the illustration beneath
the dignity of the subject. The more the pity
for him in that case, since it is evident that his eyes
have been fixed upon the shows of^ things, ratber
than upon the enduring substance. It is not indeed
a dignified thing to wait upon tables. There is no
dignity in any labor which is constrained by one's
necessities. Bui still no function exists so abject or
servile as utterly to quench the divine or personal
element in it. It will mtke itself manifest in all of
them, endowing them all with an immortal grace,
and redeeming the subject from the dominion of
mere nature and custom.
