In Reason's light. Not oft she visits earth, Through Faith, may sometimes see. Give her thy soul, But from the one which Passion forges-be The rule o'er chance, sense, circumstance. Be free. Seek Virtue. Wear her armor to the fight; Seek Virtue. She alone is all divine; And having found, be strong, in God's own strength and thine Neglect them-thy celestial gifts are vain- 38. AMERICA'S CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE WORLD.-Gulian C. Verplanck. WHAT, it is asked, has this Nation done to repay the world for the benefits we have received from others? Is it nothing for the universal good of mankind to have carried into successful operation a system of self-government,-uniting personal liberty, freedom of opinion, and equality of rights, with national power and dignity, — such as had before existed only in the Utopian dreams of philosophers? Is it nothing, in moral science, to have anticipated, in sober reality, numerous plans of reform in civil and criminal jurisprudence, which are, but now received as plausible theories by the politicians and economits of Europe? Is it nothing to have been able to call forth, on every emergency, either in war or peace, a body of talents always equal to the difficulty? Is it nothing to have, in less than half a century, exceedingly improved the sciences of political economy, of law, and of medicine, with all their auxiliary branches to have enriched human knowledge by the accumulation of a great mass of useful facts and observations, and to have augmented the power and the comforts of civilized man by miracles of mechanical invention ? Is it nothing to have given the world examples of disinterested patriotism, of political wisdom, of public virtue; of learning, eloquence and valor, never exerted save for some praiseworthy end? It is sufficient to have briefly suggested these considerations; every mind would anticipate me in filling up the details. thee. No, Land of Liberty!-thy children have no cause to blush for What, though the arts have reared few monuments among us, and scarce a trace of the Muse's footstep is found in the paths of our forests, or along the banks of our rivers, yet our soil has been consecrated by the blood of heroes, and by great and holy deeds of peace. Its wide extent has become one vast temple, and hallowed asylum, sanctified by the prayers and blessings of the persecuted of every sect, and the wretched of all Nations. Land of Refuge, Land of Benedictions! -Those prayers still arise, and they still are heard: "May peace be within thy walls, and plenteousness within thy palaces!" "May there be no decay, no leading into captivity, and no complaining, in thy streets!" May truth flourish out of the carth, and righteousness look down from Heaven!" 39. THE TRUE KING.-Translated from Seneca, by Leigh Hunt. 'Tis not wealth that makes a King, Nor a brow that's bound with gold, The King is ho, who, void of fear, What shall move his placid might? 10 DEATH IS COMPENSATION.—Original Trans. from Rousseau. B. 1712; d. 1778. THE more intimately I enter into communion with myself, — the more I consult my own intelligence, the more legibly do I find writ ten in any soul these words BE JUST, AND THOU SHALT BE HAPPY! But let us not base our expectations upon the present state of things. The wicked prosper, and the just remain oppressed. At this frustration of our hopes, our indignation is kindled. Conscience takes umbrage, and murmurs against its Author, it murmurs. "Thou hast deceived me!"-"I have deceived thee, say'st thou? How dost thou know it? Who has proclaimed it to thee Is thy soul annibilated? Hast thou ceased to exist? O, Brutus: 0, my son not thy noble life by turning thine own hand against it. thy hope and thy glory with thy mortal body on the field of Philippi. Why dost thou say, virtue is nothing, when thou goest to enjoy the price of thine? Thou goest to die, thou thinkest; no, thou goest to live, and it is then that I shall fulfil all that I have promised thee." Soil Leave not gone One would say, from the murmurs of impatient mortals, that God owed them recompense before merit, and that He ought to requite their virtue in advance. O! let us first be good, and afterwards we shall be happy. Let us not exact the prize before the victory, nor the wages before the labor. It is not on the course, says Plutarch, that the conquerors in our games are crowned; it is after they have cver it. If the soul is immaterial, it can survive the body; and, in that survival, Providence is justified. Though I were to have no other proof of the immateriality of the soul than the triumph of the wicked and the oppression of the just in this world, that spectacie alone would prevent my doubting the reality of the life after death. So shocking a dissonance in this universal harmony would make me seek to explain it. I should say to myself: "All does not finish for e with this mortal life; what succeeds shall make concord of what Tent before." 41. FATE OF CHARLES THE TWELFTII. —Samuel Johnson. Born, 1709; died. 1784 ON what foundation stands the warrior's prido No dangers fright him, and no labors tire; War sounds the trump, he rushes to the field, And one capitulate, and one resign; Peace courts his hand, but spreads her charms in vain, "Think nothing gained," he cries, "till naught remain; On Moscow's walls till Gothic standards fly, And all be mine beneath the Polar sky." Stern Famine guards the solitary coast, And Winter barricades the realms of Frost; He left the name, at which the world grew pale, 42. OUR DUTIES TO THE REPUBLIC.-Judge Story. Born, 1779; died, 1845 THE Old World has already revealed to us, in its unsealed books, the beginning and end of all its own marvellous struggles in the cause of liberty. Greece, lovely Greece, "The land of scholars and the nurse of arms," where Sister Republics, in fair procession, chanted the praises of liberty and the Gods, where and what is she? For two thousand years the oppressor has ground her to the earth. Her arts are no more. The last sad relics of her temples are but the barracks of a ruthless soldiery. The fragments of her columns and her palaces are in the dust, yet beautiful in ruins. She fell not when the mighty were upon her. Her sons were united at Thermopyla and Marathon; and the tide of her triumph rolled back upon the Hellespont. She was conquered by her own factions. She fell by the hands of her own People. The man of Macedonia did not the work of destruction. It was already done, by her own corruptions, banishments, and dissensions. Rome, republican Rome, whose eagles glanced in the rising and setting sun, where and what is she? The eternal city yet remains, proud even in her desolation, noble in her decline, venerable in the majesty of religion, and calm as in the composure of death, The malaria has but travelled in the paths worn by her destroyers. More than eighteen centuries have mourned over the loss of her empire. A mortal disease was upon her vitals before Cæsar had crossed the Rubicon; and Brutus did not restore her health by the deep probings of the Senate-chamber. The Goths, and Vandals, and Huns, the swarms of the North, completed only what was already begun at home. Romans betrayed Rome. The Legions were bought and sold; but the People offered the tribute money. We stand the latest, and, if we fail, probably the last experiment of self-government by the People. We have begun it under circum stances of the most auspicious nature. We are in the vigor of youth. Our growth has never been checked by the oppressions of tyranny. Our constitutions have never been enfeebled by the vices or luxuries of the Old World. Such as we are, we have been from the beginning, simple, hardy, intelligent, accustomed to self-government, and to self-respect. The Atlantic rolls between us and any formi dable foe. Within our own territory, stretching through many degrees of latitude and longitude, we have the choice of many products, and many means of independence. The Government is mild. The Press is free. Religion is free. Knowledge reaches, or may reach, every home. What fairer prospect of success could be presented? What means more adequate to accomplish the sublime end? What more is necessary than for the People to preserve what they have themselves created? Already has the age caught the spirit of our institutions. It has already ascended the Andes, and snuffed the breezes of both occans. It has infused itself into the life-blood of Europe, and warmed the sunny plains of France and the low lands of Holland. It has touched the philosophy of Germany and the North; and, moving onward to the South, has opened to Greece the lessons of her better days. Can it be that America, under such circumstances, can betray herself? Can it be that she is to be added to the catalogue of Republics, the inscription upon whose ruins is: THEY WERE, BUT THEY ARE NOT? Forbid it, my countrymen! Forbid it, Heaven! 43. LOVE OF COUNTRY AND HOME.-James Montgomery O, thou shalt find, howe'er thy footsteps roam, On Greenland's rocks, o'er rude Kamschatka's plains. When the wild hunter takes his lonely way, |