thest Thule is reached, there are no more retreats beyond the sea, no more discoveries, no more hopes. Here then a mighty work is to be fulfilled, or never, by the race of mortals. The man who looks with tenderness on the sufferings of good men in other times; the descendant of the pilgrims, who cherishes the memory of his fathers; the patriot, who feels an honest glow at the majesty of the system of which he is a member; the scholar, who beholds with rapture the long sealed book of unprejudiced truth expanded to all to read; these are they, by whom these auspices are to be accomplished. Yes, brethren, it is by the intellect of the country, that the mighty mass is to be inspired; that its parts are to communicate and sympathise, its bright progress to be adorned with becoming refinements, its strong sense uttered, its character reflected, its feelings interpreted to its own children, to other regions, and to after

ages.

THE STREAM OF LIFE.-Bishop Heber.

Life bears us on like the stream of a mighty river. Our boat at first glides down the narrow channel, through the playful murmurings of the little brook, and the windings of its grassy border. The trees shed their blossoms over our young heads; the flowers on the brink seem to offer themselves to our young hands; we are happy in hope, and we grasp eagerly at the beauties around us; but the stream hurries on, and still our hands are empty.

Our course in youth and manhood is along a wider and deeper flood, and amid objects more striking and magnificent. We are animated by the moving picture of enjoyment and industry which passes before us; we are excited by some shortlived success, or depressed and made miserable by some equally short-lived disappointment. But our energy and our dependence are both in vain. The stream bears us on, and our joys and our griefs are alike left behind us; we may be ship wrecked, but we cannot anchor; our voyage may be hastened, but it cannot be delayed; whether rough or smooth, the river hastens towards its home, till the roaring of the ocean is in our ears, and the tossing of the waves is beneath our keel; and the lands lessen from our eyes, and the floods are lifted up around us, and the earth loses sight of us, and we take our last leave of earth and of its inhabitants, and of our further voyage there is no witness but the Infinite and the Eternal.

And do we still take so much anxious thought for future. days, when the days which have gone by, have so strangely and uniformly deceived us? Can we still so set our hearts on the creatures of God, when we find by sad experience, that the Creator only is permanent? Or shall we not rather lay aside every weight and every sin which doth most easily beset us, and think of ourselves henceforth, as way-faring persons only, who have no abiding inheritance but in the hope of a better world, and to whom even that world would be worse than hopeless, if it were not for our Lord Jesus Christ, and the interest we have obtained in his mercies.

CLASSICAL LEARNING.-Ingersoll.

Classical learning aids every literary investigation, and ministers to every philosophical pursuit. It is a companion in the forum as well as the college; a friend and assistant in the tumult of political controversy, as well as "along the cool sequestered vale of life."-In many a field of scientific warfare, it is the titular goddess that accompanied Diomed through a thousand dangers. In the dark hour of scientific mystery, it is the sybil's branch; the donum fatalis virga-which leads its possessor through perils and difficulties to the light of day. The proper time for this invaluable acquisition is early youth. How otherwise should the young be so profitably employed? While the mind is yet immature for metaphysical refinements, or the sublime mysteries of philosophy, the acuteness of the understanding may be developed, and the habit of critical analysis and investigation be formed and fixed. Then acquirement must be made, or the opportunity is lost for ever. After enjoyments and after cares press too closely on the attention and occupy too large a portion of the time, to permit the introduction of studies which must precede the business period of life; if here and there a distinguished and gifted individual, by the mere force of native intellect, has been able to overcome the deficiencies of early finished education, the rare occurrence is to be admired, but not imitated or approved. Count the numbers, if it be possible, of those, who, by the aid of early instruction, have reached the highest destination which wealth and rank alone could neither deny nor bestow, and it will be apparent which is the exception and which the rule. The accomplished statesman, who directs the complicated machinery of the government of Great Britain, derives from his classical attainments

that polished rhetoric which has especially enabled him to rise above the fortuitous disadvantages of humble birth, and to display those substantial qualities, which otherwise he might have possessed in vain,

A preceding statesman, not less distinguished, through a long course of philosophy and fame, embellished his eloquence with the same classical beauties, which had been the pride and ambition of his boyhood, and his favourite study and recreation through every stage of life. The compliment paid by Paterculus to Cicero,"animo vidit, ingenio complexus est," would have been imperfect, if he had been unable emphatically to add, "eloquentia illuminavit." If the bustle of business, and the giddy round of pleasure, and the enjoyments of social intercourse, without the charm of elegant literature, can be accepted while they last as a substitute for the solace and delight of learning, there is a time which may happen to all men, when those occupations fail. It is the autumn of life, to which every one looks forward with desire or dread-the dreary or delightful interval between the active engagements of business, and the entrance into a better world. The verdant vale of years, where the lengthening shadows are contemplated without repining at the departure of well spent time or the gloomy desert, where no plant of earlier days is found to yield its fruitfulness and shade. Then, recollection may become an empty void; and the mind, instead of turning inward for enjoyment to its own resources, and drawing upon the stores which youth had accumulated, may unhappily find itself lost in discontent and peevishness.-In this interesting interval, business becomes irksome; and the growing inactivity, without even the infirmities of age, will impose restraints upon an intercourse with society. It is filled up by mingling the elegant indulgence of classic reading and recollection with a fervent piety-the one, a lamp to light the feet on earth; the other, a star that illuminates the path to immortality.

THE LAUNCH OF A SHIP OF THE LINE.-Campbell.

That Pope was neither so insensible to the beauties of nature, nor so indistinct in describing them, as to forfeit the character of a genuine poet, is what I mean to urge, without exaggerating his picturesqueness. But before speaking of that quality in his writings, I would beg leave to observe, in the first place, that the faculty by which a poet luminously describes

objects of art, is essentially the same faculty which enables him to be a faithful describer of simple nature; in the second place, that nature and art are to a greater degree relative terms in poetical description, than is generally recollected; and thirdly, that artificial objects and manners are of so much importance in fiction, as to make the exquisite description of them no less characteristic of genius, than the description of simple physical appearances. The poet is "creation's heir." He deepens our social interest in existence. It is surely by the liveliness of the interest which he excites in existence, and not by the class of subjects which he chooses, that we most fairly appreciate the genius or the life which is in him. It is no irreverence to the external charms of nature to say, that they are not more important to a poet's study than the manners and affections of his species. Nature is the poet's goddess; but by nature no one rightly understands her mére inanimate face-however charming it may be-or the simple landscape painting of trees, clouds, precipices, and flowers. Why then try Pope, or any other poet, exclusively by his powers of describing inanimate phenomena? Nature, in the wide and proper sense of the word, means life in all its circumstances-nature moral as well as external. As the subject of inspired fiction, nature includes artificial forms and manners.-Richardson is no less a painter of nature than Homer. Homer himself is a minute describer of works of art; and Milton is full of imagery derived from it, -Satan's spear is compared to the pine, that makes "the mast of some great admiral," and his shield is like the moon artificially seen through the glass of the Tuscan artist."The spirit-stirring drum, the ear-piercing fife, the royal banner, and all the quality, pride, pomp, and circumstance of glorious war," are all artificial images. When Shakespear groups into one view the most sublime objects of the universe, he fixes first on "the cloud clapt towers, the gorgeous palaces, the solemn temples."

....

Those who have ever witnessed the spectacle of the launching of a ship of the line, will perhaps forgive me for adding this to the examples of sublime objects in artificial life. Of that spectacle, I can never forget the impression, and of having witnessed it reflected from the faces of ten thousand spectators.They seem yet before me--I sympathise with their deep and silent expectation, and with their final burst of enthusiasm. It was not a vulgar joy, but an affecting solemnity. When the vast bulwark sprang from her cradle, the calm water, on which she swung majestically round, gave the imagination a contrast of the stormy element on which she was soon to ride. All the days of battle, and the nights of danger, which she had to en

counter; all the ends of the earth, which she had to visit, and all that she had to do and to suffer for her country, rose in awful presentiment before the mind; and when the heart gave her a benediction, it was like one pronounced on a living being.”

Extracts from an Address of DE WITT CLINTON, before the Phi Beta Kappa Society, July, 1823.

The honour and glory of a nation consist in the illustrious achievements of its sons in the cabinet and the field-in the science and learning which compose the knowledge of manin the arts and inventions which administer to his accommodation, and in the virtues which exalt his character. Scarcely two centuries have elapsed since the settlement of these United States, and in that period we have seen a WASHINGTON, a HENRY, a FRANKLIN, a RITTENHOUSE, and a FULTON-the most splendid names in war, in eloquence, in philosophy, in astronomy, and in mechanics, which the world has ever witnessed. The congress of patriots who proclaimed our independence in the face of an admiring world, and in the view of approving heaven, have descended, with three exceptions, to the grave; and in this illustrious band were comprised more virtue and wisdom, and patriotism and energy, than in any association of ancient or modern times.

When we consider the small areas in which the insignia of human greatness have been displayed, we will find equal cause for astonishment and exultation. Attica was not more extensive than some of our counties, and the whole of Greece did not exceed this state in dimensions. Rome, for a long period, did not cover as great an extent and the Swiss Cantons, the United Netherlands, and England, when compared with the illustrious men and the illustrious deeds of which they can boast, are of a very limited space. The United States contain more than a twentieth part of the land of this globe, and not 600,000 square miles less than the whole of Europe. The Deity has placed us on a mighty continent: the plastic hand of nature has operated on a stupendous scale: our rivers and lakesour cataracts and mountains-our soil and climate-bear the impress of greatness, of fertility, of salubrity. In this spacious theatre, replete with the sublime and the beautiful, let us act a correspondent part. This state, which now has a population of a million and a half, is capable of supporting ten millions of souls, and before this century closes, this maximum will be at