TO write about Something is no extraordinary feat; to write about Nothing is a feat not so easily performed.

I propose to write about Nothing, as I have Nothing to write.

Any one can be Something in the world. It requires genius to be Nothing.

There are a very few people who have succeeded in being Nothing. In order to be Nothing it is not necessary to know Nothing. In fact, it requires a great deal of knowledge to be Nothing. By assiduous effort for the past quarter of a century, more or less, I have thoroughly succeeded in being Nothing, and I am now quietly enjoying the otium cum dignitate which appertains to that blessed condition, and can quietly philosophize on nullity under my fig-tree, lying flat on my back gazing at Nothing. You restless people who are Something can have no idea of the absolute ecstasy—an ecstasy more intoxicating than Hasheesh or Cannabis Indica, and not so brutal and vulgar as Opium—which results from being Nothing—with Nothing on your mind, Nothing in your pockets, Nothing to think of, Nothing to do.

But I fancy old Scroggs, who has been doing Something all his life, and thereby has been a nuisance all his life, and Mrs. Scroggs, who is Chairwoman of the Society for the Regeneration of Fourth Avenue, and is more of a nuisance than old Scroggs—I fancy them saying that I am of no use in the world.

Am I not?

Suppose I think Nothing, then at least I think no evil of any one. Suppose I say Nothing good of any one, I say Nothing bad. If I have Nothing, I have no taxes to pay; no interest to collect; no houses to burn; nobody to gouge or harass, and nobody to gouge or harass me. Which is cheerful. If I am Nothing, no one cares for me, and equally I care for no one, so that no one and I are on good terms. Thus, you see, being Nothing, although I may accomplish no good in the world, I accomplish no evil. Every evil, every misery, every war, every misfortune, all the high taxes, all the poor operas, all the tough beefsteaks, all the sour Green Seal, all the fires, murders, explosions, and other such cheerful casualties, are the direct result of the efforts of these people who are Something.

Then, from a theological point of view, remember that if we were all Nothings, the Devil would have Nothing to do, and would have to let his fires go down and hang up his pitchforks, which would be a blessed thing for some of these people who are Somethings.

Nullity is the primal state of man. The Rev. Dr. Homilectics tries to impress upon me, each Sunday, the importance of going back to the days when Adam and Eve, in the latest cut of fig-leaves, played Romeo and Juliet under the apple-trees in Eden. He never stops to think that their innocence was the immediate result of being Nothing and doing Nothing, and that just as soon as they set out to be Something, they entailed the curse of work upon all mankind.

But I go further back than Adam and Eve. In the good old days of chaos, Nothing was in all its glory. It existed everywhere. No sight, no sound, no smell, no taste, No-thing. This was the normal condition.

And of what use was it? says Mrs. Increase, who is bringing up a large family of children, to be used hereafter as grindstones for other people's noses.

Why, my dear woman of facts and figures and spheres of usefulness, God Almighty took it and made this great world out of it, with all its mountains and rocks and rivers, its sunsets and rainbows and stars, its panorama of beauty by day and night, and you yourself, although you are, probably, but a very small and a very ugly part of this creation. Yes, madame, you and I came from this Nothing. I have retained this Nothing with great success. You, on the other hand, have been striving to change your normal condition by being Something. It is not for me to say whether you have succeeded. A great many people who think they are Something are really Nothing, and a poor kind of Nothing at that.

If I have said Nothing in writing on this subject, it was because I had Nothing to say. When one is writing about Nothing, you know, he is not expected to say anything.

Which reminds me of a baby. If you ask me how it reminds me, I cannot tell you. I only know that it reminds me of those little but important animals.

It is cheerful news for the future census-takers that babies have become fashionable in Paris. The "idea" will, of course, come immediately into fashion here. I do not mean French babies, but babies in the abstract. A baby is a good thing, a blessed thing. I cannot conceive what I should have done if I hadn't, once upon a time, been a baby. A baby is a well-spring, and the quantity of lacteal fluid, lumps of sugar, soothing syrups, paregoric, squills, squalls, walking the floor in your long-tailed night shirts, mother's loves, lovey-doveys, and square spanking that one of those well-springs will absorb is astonishing to one who has not had a baby. I have had several; at least, I own stock in several.

Would I sell my experience, past, present or future, in babies?

Not much.

Therefore, I am glad babies are going to come into fashion. Just think of the new topics of conversation, when Mrs. Brown takes her little three-months up to see Mrs. Jones and her two-months, and the two Dear Creatures compare colics. The little cherubs will mollify conversation, and sympathy will take the place of severity. Instead of gossiping on poor Mrs. Cauliflower's unfortunate but innocent faux pas, the Dear Creatures will soothingly compare notes on the baby question and discuss the merits of quieting syrups and puff-boxes. And then there will be the baby reunions, when the great parlor will be filled with baby chairs, and in each chair will be a baby in blue ribbon and white muslin, and in each little rosebud of a mouth will be thrust a dimpled fist. How pleasant it will be to listen to the artless conversation. When Mrs. Jones' baby says "goo," Mrs. Brown's baby will answer "goo, goo," and Mrs. Thompson's baby, whose mother is very talkative, will "goo" a steady stream for five minutes; and then, when one of the cherubs is affected to tears by the point of a pin, or an unusually sharp stroke of the colic, which by so many confiding young mothers has been taken for an angel talking to the little one, how will they all be affected to tears and the room resound with the dear little trebles.

But I must draw a veil over the picture. In the universal rush which will ensue for babies and the competitive result which will inevitably follow between ward and ward and street and street, there must be discrimination used. When Mrs. Thompson and Mrs. Johnson sign articles of agreement as to an x number of babies in x time, Miss Aurelia and Miss Celeste must remember that, by the rules of the B. R., they are counted out. I would not advise all to adopt the fashion, but there are many, and there will be more, unless they adopt Swedenborg's notion of affinities, who can safely take up the new fashion.

And I recommend all such to adopt it immediately. As I said before, I don't know what I should have done if I hadn't been a baby.

June 8, 1867.