2. Our natural anticipations deceive us--I say _natural_ in
contra-distinction to extravagant expectations. Every human life is a
fresh one, bright with hopes that will never be realized. There may be
differences of character in these hopes; finer spirits may look on
life as the arena of successful deeds, the more selfish as a place of
personal enjoyment.

With man the turning point of life may be a profession--with woman,
marriage; the one gilding the future with the triumphs of intellect,
the other with the dreams of affection; but in every case, life is not
what any of them expects, but something else. It would almost seem a
satire on existence to compare the youth in the outset of his career,
flushed and sanguine, with the aspect of the same being when it is
nearly done--worn, sobered, covered with the dust of life, and
confessing that its days have been few and evil. Where is the land
flowing with milk and honey?

With our affections it is still worse, because they promise more.
Man's affections are but the tabernacles of Canaan--the tents of a
night; not permanent habitations even for this life. Where are the
charms of character, the perfection, and the purity, and the
truthfulness, which seemed so resplendent in our friend? They were
only the shape of our own conceptions--our creative shaping intellect
projected its own fantasies on him: and hence we outgrow our early
friendships; outgrow the intensity of all: we dwell in tents; we never
find a home, even in the land of promise. Life is an unenjoyable
Canaan, with nothing real or substantial in it.

3. Our expectations, resting on revelation, deceive us. The world's