LESSON CLIII. 1 PAR' THE NON, a celebrated temple of Minerva at Athens, in Greece. 2 COL OS SE UM. See note, page 333. AL HAM' BRA, a palace of the Moorish kings at Granada, affording an unusually fine exhibition of Saracenic architecture. 'MOOR, a native of the countries now called Morocco, Tunis, Algiers, and Tripoli, on the northern coast of Africa. 'PY THAG' O RAS, a Greek philosopher, born about 570 years B.C. He taught the doctrine of metempsychosis, or transmigration of souls through different orders of animal existence. 6 Ho' MER. See note, page 106. ANTIQUITY OF EGYPT. MRS. E. OAKES SMITH. HERE were giants in the land in those days. "THERE Thus, in the very language of Scripture, one is led to exclaim, when contemplating Egypt, the mother of civilization, the cradle of the arts, the one kingdom standing alone among the ancient things of earth, the ancient among all that is old. While its origin is lost amid a dark and obscure mythology, Egypt has lived in the magnificence of its own ruins to witness kingdoms and dynasties rise, flourish, and disappear under the unfailing progress of time; and nations, once the glory and terror of the earth, fade away, till their memory is to be sought in the remains of their genius, their works of taste, or the splendor of their ruins. 2. Egypt remains, shorn of her beams, it is true, yet does she live with a name as enduring as the materials of which her stupendous and giant-like monuments are constructed. Carry the mind back to the time when the *Genesis, 6th chap., 4th verse. Tiber, with its vines and olives, glided in solitary beauty between its verdant banks, and the seven hills, crowned with vegetation to their very summits, resounded only to the melody of the wild bird or the tread of the ferocious beast, ere Romulus had laid the foundations even of the "Eternal City," and what was Egypt then? 3. She had become ruinous with age: her surplus population had, centuries before, carried the arts to other lands, and peopled kingdoms that were the glory of the earth. Greece, retaining the elements of Egyptian greatness, had remodeled every thing with a lighter and more exuberant taste; the superb grandeur of the original country had yielded to the elegant fancy of a refined and chastened judgment; and arts and literature, freed from the thralldom of a gloomy priesthood, started at once to life, like the fabled goddess, armed and full-grown. 4. Surely there were giants in the land in those days," we involuntarily exclaim when beholding the stupendous works of human labor that date their origin to a period anterior to any certain records. The mountain of solid granite has been excavated into an idolatrous temple, and the chisel of the artist has wrought upon its surface immense figures of men, who, thousands and thousands of years ago, figured upon the arena of life, and performed the exploits there recorded. 5. There are the mementoes of their greatness, though their names have long since passed away, and are forgotten. Yet there stand those colossal men, the champions of ancient Egypt, living in imperishable granite, looking from the sepulcher of centuries upon the generations that stare in wonderment upon them, not one of whom can lift the vail which time has thrown over their name and deeds. The history of the whole world, so far as it is now known to man, might have been written as it transpired, upon the surface of the Pyramids, and yet the shadows of unknown times would rest upon their summits. 6. We must go back to a period long prior to any certain chronology, if we would even attempt to form a conception of the refinement and resources of this wonderful people. We must violate the gloomy sanctuary of the mausoleum and catacomb, be able to interpret the hieroglyphics of their decaying temples, and, wandering amid their time-honored Pyramids, be gifted with a mental vision that penetrates the dim twilight of ages, if we would solve the mystery of the early Egyptians. 1 2 7. Egypt, amid the nations of the earth, reminds us, if we may "compare great things with small," of the old oak that has braved the storms and the changes of a thousand years, and beheld sapling after sapling rise in its shadow, grow to maturity and decay, while its own form became but the more venerable with the moss of ages. The Parthenon, the Colosseum, and the Palace of the Alhambra,3 have each been the pride and glory of their respective nations, and are now venerable in ruins; but neither the elegant Greek, the stern Roman, nor the haughty Moor, could, more than ourselves, penetrate the obscurity that vails the builders of these vast edifices, which vie in durability with the "everlasting hills." 8. It was here that Herodotus, Pythagoras," Homer, and all the wise and gifted of Greece, sat at the feet of an Egyptian priesthood, and imbibed those lessons of wisdom and knowledge which they were to convey to their own soil, where, touched by a livelier fancy and more elegant taste, they were to produce works that remain to this day, the wonder and admiration of the world. LESSON CLIV. CHOICE EXTRACTS. I. BUGLE SONG. TENNYSON. 1. THE 1. THE splendor falls on castle walls, And snowy summits old in story; The long light shakes across the lakes, And the wild cataract leaps in glory. Blow, bugle, blow! set the wild echoes flying; 2. O hark! O hear! how thin and clear, And thinner, clearer, farther going! O sweet and far, from cliff and scar, The horns of Elf-land faintly blowing! Blow! let us hear the purple glens replying: Blow, bugle; answer, echoes,—dying, dying, dying! 3. O love! they die in yon rich sky; They faint on hill, or field, or river! Our echoes roll from soul to soul, And grow forever and forever. Blow, bugle, blow! set the wild echoes flying; And answer, echoes, answer, - dying, dying, dying! II. THE AGE OF PROGRESS. CHARLES SUMNER. 1. THE age of manity has come. chivalry has gone. An age of huThe horse, whose importance, more In than human, gave the name to that early period of gallantry and war, now yields his foremost place to man. serving him, in promoting his elevation, in contributing to his welfare, in doing him good, there are fields of bloodless triumph, nobler far than any in which the bravest knight ever conquered. Here are spaces of labor, wide as the world, lofty as heaven. 2. Let me say, then, in the benison once bestowed upon the youthful knight, - Scholars, jurists, artists, philanthropists, heroes of a Christian age, companions of a celestial knighthood, "Go forth. Be brave, loyal, and successful!" And may it be our office to light a fresh beacon-fire sacred to truth! Let the flame spread from hill to hill, from island to island, from continent to continent, till the long lineage of fires shall illumine all the nations of the earth, animating them to the holy contests of KNOWLEDGE, JusTICE, BEAUTY, Love. III. CLEAR THE WAY. 1. THERE's a fount about to stream, Into gray: Men of thought, and men of action, |