mind of the savage has never been disciplined by study; and it, therefore, in the comparison, appears like the rough bison of the forest, distinguished only for strength and ferocity. 5. I am not now to discuss the question, whether the souls of men are naturally equal. You may have a good mind, a sound judgment, or a vivid imagination, or a wide reach of thought and of views; but, believe me, you probably are not a genius, and can never become distinguished without severe application. Hence all that you ever have, must be the result of labor; hard, untiring labor. 6. You have friends to cheer you on; you have books and teachers to aid you, and multitudes of helps. But, after all, discipline and educating your mind must be your own work. No one can do this but yourself. And nothing in this world is of any w th, which has not labor and toil as its price. 7. The Zephyrs of summer can but seldom breathe around you. " foresee, distinctly, that you will have to double Cape Horn in the winter season, and to grapple with the gigantic spirit of the storm, which guards the cape; and I foresee as distinctly, that it will depend entirely on your own skill and energy, whether you survive the fearful encounter, and live to make a port in the mild latitudes of the Pacific." 8. Set it down as a fact, to which there are no exceptions, that we must labor for all that we have, and that nothing is worth possessing, or offering to others, which costs us nothing, The first and great object of education is, to discipline the mind. Make it the first object to be able to fix and hold your attention upon your studies. He who can do this, has mastered many and great difficulties; and he who cannot do it, will in vain look for success in any department of study. 9. Patience is a virtue kindred to attention; and without it the mind cannot be said to be disciplined. Patient labor and investigation are not only essential to success in study, but are an unfailing guaranty to success. 10. The student should learn to think and act for himself. True originality consists in doing things well, and doing them in your own way. A mind half educated is generally imita ting others. "No man was ever great by imitation." Let it be remembered that we cannot copy greatness or goodness by any effort. We must acquire it by our own patience and diligence. 11. Another object of study is, to form the judgment, sc that the mind can not only investigate, but weigh and balance opinions and theories. Without this, you will never be able to decide what to read or what to throw aside; what author to distrust, or what opinions to receive. Some of the most laborious men, and diligent readers, pass through life without accomplishing anything desirable, for the want of what may be called a well-balanced judgment. 12. The great instrument of affecting the world is the mind; and no instrument is so decidedly and continually improved by exercise and use, as the mind. Many seem to feel as if it were not safe to put forth all their powers at one effort. You must reserve your strength for great occasions, just as you would use your horse, moderately and carefully on common occasions, but give him the spur on occasions of great emergency. This might be well, were the mind, in any respect, like the bones and muscles of the horse. 13. You may call upon your mind to-day for its highest efforts, and stretch it to the utmost in your power, and you have done yourself a kindness. The mind will be all the better for it. To-morrow you may do it again; and each time it will answer more readily to your calls. 14. But remember that real discipline of mind does not so much consist in now and then making a great effort, as in having the mind so trained that it will make constant efforts. The perfection of a disciplined mind is, not to be able, on some great contingency, to rouse up its faculties, and draw out a giant strength, but to have it always ready to produce a given, and an equal quantity of results in a given and equal time LESSON XXVII. ODE ON EDUCATION. MONTGOMERY. 1. THE lion, o'er his wild domains, 7 Reigns through the deep with quenchless rage 2. Of all that live, and move, and breathe, Man only rises o'er his birth; He looks above, around, beneath, At once the heir of heaven and earth; These are the lowest powers of man. 3. From strength to strength he travels on, Is but Eternity begun. 4. What guides him in his high pursuit, And while celestial ages roll, The joys of knowledge shall increase. 5. Hail to the glorious plan, that spread New spirit breathed into the clod, LESSON XXVIII. 28 EXALTED CHARACTER OF POETRY." CHANNING. [The reader may note the inflections for emphatic succession of particulars, in the following piece.* See Rule 10, p. 34.] 1. POETRY seems to us the divinest of all arts; for it is the breathing or expression of that principle or sentiment, which is deepest and sublimest in human nature; we mean, of that thirst or aspiration, to which no mind is wholly a stranger, for something purer and lovelier, something more powerful, lofty and thrilling, than ordinary and real life affords. 2. In an intellectual nature, framed for progress and for higher modes of being, there must be creative energies, power of original and ever-growing thought; and poetry is the form in which these energies are chiefly manifested. 3. It is the glorious prerogative of this art, that it "makes all things new," for the gratification of a divine instinct. It indeed finds its elements in what it actually sees and experiences in the worlds of matter and mind; but it combines and blends these into new forms, according to new affinities, and * It is believed to be important in securing a correct application of the principles of reading, for the learner to mark lightly, with a pencil, such words, pauses, inflections, &c., as are illustrative of the rules to which reference is made in the subsequent les sons. The most ancient poetry which has come down to us, is that of the Hebrews. breaks down, if we may so say, the distinctions and bounds of nature. 4. It imparts to material objects, life, and sentiment, and emotion, and invests the mind with the powers and splendors of the outward creation; describes the surrounding universe in the colors which the passions throw over it, and depicts the mind in those modes of repose or agitation, of tenderuess or sublime emotion, which manifest its thirst for a more powerful and joyful existence. 5. We, accordingly, believe that poetry, far from injuring society, is one of the great instruments of its refinement and exaltation. It lifts the mind above ordinary life, gives it a respite from depressing cares, and awakens the consciousness of its affinity with what is pure and noble. 6. In its legitimate and highest efforts, it has the same tendency and aim with Christianity; that is, to spiritualize our nature. True, poetry has been made the instrument of vice, the pander of bad passions; but when genius thus stoops, it dims its fires, and parts with much of its power; and, even when poetry is enslaved to licentiousness and misanthropy, she cannot wholly forget her true vocation. 7. Strains of pure feeling, touches of tenderness, images of innocent happiness, sympathies with what is good in our nature, bursts of scorn or indignation at the hollowness of the world, passages true to our moral nature, often escape in an immoral work, and show how hard it is for a gifted spirit to divorce itself wholly from what is good. Poetry has a natu ral alliance with our best affections. It delights in the beauty and sublimity of outward nature and of the soul. 8. It indeed portrays, with terrible energy, the excesses of the passions, but they are passions which show a mighty. nature, which are full of power, which command awe, and excite a deep though shuddering sympathy. Its great tendency and purpose is, to carry the mind beyond and above the beaten, dusty, weary walks of ordinary life; to lift it into a purer element, and to breathe into it more profound and generous emotion. |