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coming? Exulting millions rejoice in it; and their loud, long, transporting shout, like the mingling of many winds, rolls on, undying, to freedom's farthest mountains. A congregated nation comes around him. Old men bless him, and children reverence him. The lovely come out to look upon him; the learned deck their halls to greet him; the rulers of the land rise up to do him homage. How his full heart labors! He views the rusting +trophies of departed days; he treads upon the high places where his brethren molder; he bends before the tomb of his FATHER; his words are tears, the speech of sad remembrance. But he looks round upon a ransomed land and a joyous race; he beholds the blessings, those trophies secured, for which those brethren died, for which that FATHER lived; and again his words are tears, the eloquence of gratitude and joy.

6. Spread forth creation like a map; bid earth's dead multitude revive; and of all the pageants that ever glittered to the sun, when looked his burning eye on a sight like this? Of all the myriads that have come and gone, what cherished minion ever ruled an hour like this? Many have struck the redeeming blow for their own freedom; but who, like this man, has bared his bosom in the cause of strangers? Others have lived in the love of their own people; but who, like this man, has drank his sweetest cup of welcome with another? Matchless chief! Of glory's immortal +tablets, there is one for him, for him alone! Oblivion shall never shroud its splendor; the everlasting flame of liberty shall guard it, that the generations of men may repeat the name recorded there. the beloved name of LA FAYETTE.

SPRAGUE.

LESSON CLVIII.

CHARACTER OF LA FAYETTE.

1. THERE have been those who have denied to La Fayette the name of a great man. What is greatness? Does goodness belong to greatness, and make an essential part of it? Is there yet virtue enough left in the world, to echo the sentiment, that

"T is phrase absurd, to call a villain great?”

If there is, who, I would ask, of all the prominent names in history, who has run through such a career, with so little reproach, justly or unjustly bestowed? Are military courage and conduct the measure of greatness? La Fayette was intrusted by Washington with all kinds of service; the laborious and complicated which required skill and patience; the perilous, that demanded

nerve; and we see him keeping up a pursuit, effecting a retreat, out-maneuvering a wary adversary with a superior force, harmonizing the action of French regular troops and American militia, commanding an assault at the point of the bayonet, and all with entire success and brilliant reputation. Is the readiness to meet vast responsibility, a proof of greatness? The memoirs of Mr. Jefferson show us, that there was a moment in 1789, when La Fayette took upon himself, as the head of the military force, the entire responsibility of laying down the basis of the revolution.

2. Is the cool and brave administration of gigantic power, a mark of greatness? In all the whirlwind of the revolution, and when, as commander-in chief of the National Guard, an organized force of three millions of men, who, for any popular purpose, needed but a word, a look to put them in motion, and he their idol,-we behold him ever calm, collected, disinterested; as free from affectation as selfishness, clothed not less with humility than with power. Is the fortitude required to resist the multitude pressing on their leader to glorious crime, a part of greatness? Behold him, the fugitive and the victim, when he might have been the chief of the revolution. Is the solitary and unaided opposition of a good citizen to the pretensions of an absolute ruler, whose power was as boundless as his ambition, an effort of greatness? Read the letter of La Fayette to Napoleon Bonaparte, refusing to vote for him as consul for life.

3. Is the voluntary return, in advancing years, to the direction of affairs at a moment like that, when, in 1815, the ponderous machinery of the French empire was flying asunder, stunning, rending, crushing thousands on every side, a mark of greatness? Contemplate La Fayette at the tribune, in Paris, when allied Europe was thundering at its gates, and Napoleon yet stood in his desperation and at bay. Lastly, is it any proof of greatness to be able, at the age of seventy-three, to take the lead of a successful and bloodless revolution; to change the dynasty; to organize, exercise, and abdicate a military command of three and a half million of men; to take up, to perform, and lay down the most momentous, delicate, and perilous duties, without passion, without hurry, without selfishness? Is it great to disregard the bribes of title, office, money; to labor and suffer for great public ends, alone; to adhere to principle under all circumstances; to stand before Europe and America conspicuous for sixty years, in the most responsible stations, the acknowledged admiration of all good men?

4. I think I understand the proposition, that La Fayette was not a great man. It comes from the same school, which, also, denies greatness to Washington, and which accords it to Alexander and Cesar, to Napoleon and his conqueror. When I analyze the greatness of these distinguished men, when contrasted with that

of La Fayette and Washington, I find either one idea omitted, which is essential to true greatness, or one included as essential, which belongs only to the lowest conception of greatness. The moral, disinterested, and purely patriotic qualities, are wholly wanting in the greatness of Cesar and Napoleon; and on the other hand, it is a certain splendor of success, a brilliancy of result, which, with the majority of mankind, marks them out as the great men of our race. But not only are a high morality and a true patriotism essential to greatness; but they must first be renounced, before a ruthless career of selfish conquest can begin.

5. I profess to be no judge of military combinations; but, with the best reflection I have been able to give the subject, I perceive no reason to doubt, that, had La Fayette, like Napoleon, been, by principle, capable of hovering on the edge of ultra-revolution; never halting long enough to be denounced; never plunging too far to retreat; but with a cold and well balanced selfishness, sustaining himself at the head of affairs, under each new phase of revolution, by the compliances sufficient to satisfy its demands; had his principles allowed him to play this game, he might have anticipated the career of Napoleon. At three different periods, he had it in his power, without usurpation, to take the government into his own hands. He was invited, urged to do so.

Had

he done it, and made use of the military means at his command, to maintain and perpetuate his power, he would then, at the sacrifice of all his just claims to the name of great and good, have reached that which vulgar admiration alone worships, the greatness of high station and brilliant success.

6. But it was the greatness of La Fayette, that looked down on greatness of the false kind. He learned his lesson in the school of Washington, and took his first practice in victories over himself. Let it be questioned by the venal apologists of time-honored abuses; let it be sneered at by national prejudice and party +detraction; let it be denied by the admirers of war and conquest; by the idolaters of success; but let it be gratefully acknowledged by good men; by Americans; by every man who has sense to distinguish character from events; who has a heart to beat in concert with the pure enthusiasm of virtue.

7. There is not, throughout the world, a friend of liberty, who has not dropped his head, when he has heard that La Fayette is no more. Poland, Italy, Greece, Spain, Ireland, the South American republics, every country, where man is struggling to recover his birth-right, has lost a benefactor, a patron in La Fayette. But you, young men, at whose command I speak, for you a bright and particular lodestar is henceforward fixed in the front of heaven. What young man, that reflects on the history of La Fayette; that

sees him in the morning of his days, the associate of sages, the friend of Washington, but will start with new vigor on the path of duty and renown

8. And what was it, fellow-citizens, which gave to our La Fayette his spotless fame? The love of berty What has consecrated his memory in the hearts of good men? The love of liberty. What nerved his youthful arm with strength, and inspired him in the morning of his days with sagacity and counsel ? The living love of liberty. To what did he sacrifice power, and rank, and country, and freedom itself? To the horror of licentiousness; to the sanctity of plighted faith; to the love of liberty, protected by law. Thus, the great principle of your revolutionary fathers, of your pilgrim sires, the great principle of the age, was the rule of his life; the love of liberty, protected by law.

EVERETT.

LESSON CLIX.

THE VOICE OF SPRING.

1. I COME, I come! ye have called me long;
I come o'er the mountains, with light and song;
Ye may trace my step o'er the wakening earth,
By the winds which tell of the violet's birth,
By the primrose stars in the shadowy grass,
By the green leaves, opening as I pass.

2. I have breathed on the south, and the chestnut flowers
By thousands have burst from the forest bowers,

And the ancient graves and the fallen fanes,
Are vailed with wreaths on Italia's plains;
But it is not for me, in my hour of bloom,
To speak of the ruin or the tomb.

3. I have looked o'er the hills of the stormy north,
And the larch has hung all his tassels forth;
The fisher is out on the sunny sea,

And the reindeer bounds o'er the pastures free,
And the pine has a fringe of softer green,

And the moss looks bright where no foot hath been.

4. I have sent through the wood-paths a glowing sigh,
And called out each voice of the deep blue sky;
From the night-bird's lay, in the starry time,
In the groves of the soft Hesperian clime,
To the swan's wild note, by the Iceland lakes,
When the dark fir-branch into + verdure breaks.

5. From the streams and founts I have loosed the chain,
They are sweeping on to the silvery main,
They are flashing down from the mountain brows,
They are flinging spray o'er the forest boughs,
They are bursting fresh from their sparry caves,
And the earth resounds with the joy of waves.

6. Come forth, O ye children of gladness, come!
Where the violets lie, may be now your home.
Ye of the rose-lip, and dew-bright eye,
And the bounding footstep, to meet me, fly!
With the lyre, and the wreath, and the joyous lay,
Come forth to the sunshine; I may not stay.

7. Away from the dwellings of care-worn men!
The waters are sparkling in grove and glen;
Away from the chamber and silent hearth!
The young leaves are dancing in breezy mirth;
Their light stems thrill to the wild-wood strains,
And youth is abroad in my green domains.

8. But ye! ye are changed since ye met me last!
There is something bright from your features passed !
There is that come over your brow and eye,

Which speaks of the world, where the flowers must die!
Ye smile! but your smile hath a dimness set;
Oh! what have ye looked on, since last we met?

9. Ye are changed, ye are changed! and I see not here
All whom I saw in the vanished year:

There were graceful heads, with their ringlets bright,
Which tossed in the breeze, with a play of light,
There were eyes, in whose glistening laughter lay
No faint remembrance of dull decay.

10. There were steps that flew o'er the cowslip's head,
As if for a banquet all earth were spread;

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There were voices that rung through the sapphire-sky
And had not a sound of mortality!

Are they gone? Is their mirth from the mountains passed?
Ye have looked on death, since ye met me last!

11. I know whence the shadow comes o'er you now,
Ye have strewn the dust on the sunny brow!
Ye have given the lovely to earth's embrace,
She hath taken the fairest of beauty's race;
With their laughing eyes, and their +festal crown,
They have gone from among you, in silence, down!

12. They are gone from among you, the young and fair;
Ye have lost the gleam of their shining hair!
But I know of a land, where there falls no blight,
I shall find them there, with their eyes of light!
Where Death, 'mid the bloom of the morn may dwell,
I tarry no longer; farewell, farewell!