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an individual, or to indicate a landscape? He reads twenty books to write a sentence; he travels a hundred miles to make a line of description!

6. One paper I have read regarding Lord Macaulay says "he had no heart." Why, a man's books may not always speak the truth, but they speak his mind in spite of himself; and it seems to me this man's heart is beating through every page he penned. He is always in a storm of revolt and indignation against wrong, craft, tyranny. How he cheers heroic resistance; how he backs and applauds freedom struggling for its own; how he hates scoundrels, ever so victorious and successful; how he recognizes genius, though selfish villains possess it!

7. The critic who says Macaulay had no heart, might say that Johnson had none; and two men more generous, and more loving, and more hating, and more partial, and more noble, do not live in our history. Those who knew Lord Macaulay knew how adʼmirably tender, and generous, and affectionate he was. It was not his business to bring his family before the theater footlights, and call for bouquets from the gallery as he wept over them.

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8. If any young man of letters reads this little sermon,—and to him, indeed, it is addressed,-I would say to him, "Bear Scott's words in your mind, and 'be good, my dear.' Here are two literary men gone to their account, and, laus Deö,' as far as we know, that account is fair, and open, and clear. Here is no need of apologies for shortcomings, or explanations of vices which would have been virtues but for unavoidable et cetera.1

9. Here are two examples of men most differently gifted: each pursuing his calling; each speaking his truth as God både him; each honèst in life; just and irreproachable in his dealings; dear to his friends; honored by his country; beloved at his fireside. It has been the fortunate lot of both to give incalculable happiness and delight to the world, which thanks them in return with an immense kindliness, respect, affection. It may not be our chance, brother scribe, to be endowed with such merit, or rewarded with such fame. But the rewards of these men are rewards paid to our service. We may not win the baton'

1 Laus Dē' o, praise to God.
'Et cet' era, and the rest; &c.

4

Baton, (bå tông), a truncheon of staff; a marshal's staff

or épaulettes,' but Heaven give us strength to guard the honor of the flag!

THACKERAY.

WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY, an English novelist, essayist, and humor. ist, was born in Calcutta in 1811. His father, who descended from an old family of Yorkshire, was engaged in the civil service of the East India Company. He was sent to England in his seventh year, and placed at the Charterhouse School, London, from which he went to the university of Cambridge, but did not take his degree. He traveled and studied for several years in France, Italy, and Germany. He contributed to several leading magazines, and published works both in prose and verse, commencing before his thirtieth year; but his name was not generally known until he published "Vanity Fair," which was finished in 1848, when he was generally accounted, with Dickens and Bulwer, among the first British novelists. His "Pendennis," concluded in 1850, and "The Newcomes," in 1855, fully sustained his reputation. In the summer of 1851, he lectured in London before brilliant audiences on "The English Humorists of the 18th Century," the success of which induced him to prepare another series, “The Four Georges," which were first delivered in the principal cities of the United States in 1855-'6, and afterward in London and most of the large towns of England and Scotland. In January, 1860, appeared the first number of the "Cornhill Magazine," under his editorial charge, which soon reached a circulation of some one hundred thousand copies. He died December 24th, 1863.

TE

III.

79. THE PURITANS.

HE Puritans' were men whose minds had derived a peculiar character from the daily contemplation of superior beings and eternal interests. Not content with acknowledging, in general terms, an overruling Providence, they habituälly ascribed ĕvèry event to the will of the Great Being, for whose power nothing (nuth'ing) was too vast, for whose inspection nothing was too minūte. To know him, to serve him, to enjoy him, was with them the great end of existence.

2. They rejected with contempt the ceremonious homage which other sects substituted for the pure worship of the soul. Instead of catching occasional glimpses of the Deïty through an obscuring vail, they aspired to gaze full on the intolerable brightnèss, and to commune with him face to face. Hence originated their contempt for terrestrial distinctions. The difference between the greatest and meanest of mankind seemed to vanish, when compared with the boundless interval which separated the

1

Epaulettes, (èp′ å låt`).

'Pūri tans, persons, in the time of Queen Elizabeth and her immediate successors, so called in de

rision, because they professed to follow the pure word of God, and rejected the ceremonies and government of the Episcopal Church.

whole race from Him on whom their own eyes were constantly fixed. They recognized no title to superiority but his favor; and, confident of that favor, they despised all the accomplishments and all the dignities of the world.

3. If they were unacquainted with the works of philosophers and poëts, they were deeply read in the oracles of God; if their names were not found in the registers of heralds, they felt assured that they were recorded in the Book of Life; if their steps were not accompanied by a splendid train of menials, legions of ministering angels had charge over them. Their palaces were houses not made with hands: their diadems, crowns of glory which should never fade away!

4. On the rich and the eloquent, on nobles and priests, they looked down with contempt; for they esteemed themselves rich in a more precious treasure, and eloquent in a more sublime language-nobles by the right of an earlier creätion, and priests by the imposition of a mightier hand. The very meanèst of them was a being to whose fate a mysterious and terrible importance belonged-on whose slightest actions the spirits of light and darkness looked with anxious interest-who had been destined, before heaven and earth were created, to enjoy a felicity which should continue when heaven and earth should have passed away.

5. Events which short-sighted politicians ascribed to earthly causes, had been ordained on his account. For his sake, empires had risen, and flourished, and decayed; for his sake, the Almighty had proclaimed his will by the pen of the evangelist and the harp of the prophet. He had been rescued by no common deliverer from the grasp of no common foe; he had been ransomed by the sweat of no vulgar agony, by the blood of no earthly sacrifice. It was for him that the sun had been darkened, that the rocks had been rent, that the dead had arisen, that all nature had shuddered at the sufferings of her expiring God! MACAULAY.

THOMAS BABBINGTON MACAULAY, the most attractive, and one of the most learned and eloquent of the essayists and critics of the age, was educated at the University of Cambridge, England, where he took his degree in 1822, after having achieved the highest honors of the university. After leaving the university, he studied law at Lincoln's Inn, and was admitted to the bar in 1826. He has been distinguished in politics, as an orator in parliament, and as an able officer of the Supreme Council in Calcutta, India. He returned to England in 1838, and a few years later was elected Lord Rector of the University of Glasgow. He is very meritorious as a poet; but his poetical merit dwindles into insignificance in comparison with the unrivaled brilliancy of his prose. His "Essays

from the Edinburgh Review" have been published in three volumes. They have attained a greater popularity than any other contributions to the periodical works of the day. His last publication, the "History of England." is written in a style of great clearness, force, and eloquence, and is as popular among all classes as any history of the present century. He was raised to the peerage, as a tribute to his eminent literary merit, in 1857. He died December 28th, 1859.

I

IV.

80. THE PILGRIM'S VISION.

1.

SAW in the naked forest our scattered remnant cast

A screen of shivering branches between them and the blast;

The snow was falling round them, the dying fell as fast;
I looked to see them perish, when lo! the vision passed.

2.

Again mine eyes were opened-the feeble had waxed strong; The babes had grown to sturdy men, the remnant was a throng. By shadowed lake and winding stream, and all the shores along, The howling demons quaked to hear the Christian's godly song.

3.

They slept the village fathers-by river, lake, and shōre,
When far adown the steep of Time the vision rose once mōre :
I saw along the winter snow a spectral column pōur ;
And high above their broken ranks a tattered flag they bōre.

4.

Their Leader rode before them, of bearing calm and high,
The light of Heaven's own kindling throned in his awful eye :
These were a Nation's champions Her dread appeal to try;
"God for the right!" I faltered, And lo! the train passed by

5.

Once more; the strife was ended, the solemn issue tried ;
The Lord of Hosts, his mighty arm had helped our Israel's side:
Gray stone and grassy hillock, told where her martyrs died;
And peace was in the borders of victory's chosen bride

6.

A crash-as when some swollen cloud cracks o'er the tangled trees! With side to side, and spar to spar, whose smoking decks are these? I know Saint George's blood-red cross, thou Mistress of the Seas; But what is she, whose streaming bars roll out before the breeze.

7.

Ah! well her iron ribs are knit, whose thunders strive to quell The bellowing throats, the blazing lips that pealed the Armada's

knell !

The mist was cleared, a wreath of stars rose o'er the crimsoned

swell,

And wavering from its haughty peak, the cross of England fell!

8.

O, trembling Faith! though dark the morn, a heavenly torch is

thine;

While feebler races melt away, and paler orbs decline,

Still shall the fiery pillar's ray along thy pathway shine,

To light the chosen tribe that sought this Western Palestine!

9.

I see the living tide roll on, it crowns with flaming towers

The icy capes of Labrador, the Spaniard's "land of flowers;" It streams beyond the splintered ridge that parts the Northern showers

From eastern rock to sunset wave the Continent is ours! OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES.

V.

A

81. THE ROCK OF THE PILGRIMS.

ROCK in the wilderness welcomed our sires,

From bondage far over the dark rolling sea;
On that holy altar they kindled the fires,

Jehovah, which glow in our bosoms for Thee.
2. Thy blessings descended in sunshine and shower,
Or rose from the soil that was sown by Thy hand;
The mountain and valley rejoiced in Thy power,

And Heaven encircled and smiled on the land.
3. The Pilgrims of old an example have given
Of mild resignation, devotion, and love,

Which beams like a star in the blue vault of heaven,
A beacon-light hung in their mansion above.

4. In church and cathedral we kneel in our prayer¬.
Their temple and chapel were valley and hill:

But God is the same in the aisle or the air,

And He is the Rock that we lean upon still. MORRIS.

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