LOVE thyself last; cherish thou hearts that hate thee; Still in thy right hand carry gentle peace, To silence envious tongues. Be just, and fear not; Thy God's and Truth's; then, if thou fallest, O Cromwell! Shakespeare. ALL the rich treasures of the past are appropriated by Christianity-the moral culture of the Hebrew, the poetry and philosophy of Greece, the jurisprudence of Rome. All these, in so far as they are pure and good, are absorbed by Christianity, and ennobled and baptized by the Christian spirit. In Christian Europe, poetry, philosophy, science, flourish as they never flourished in any preceding age; and they lay their richest tribute at the feet of Christ, the Divine king of the world. Prof. Cocker. WHAT! rest, ease here, in the ministry, or in Christian work? There is no rest here. Now is the time for battle, for work! Heaven will be our rest. Now is the time for steady, prayerful, unflinching work. Moody. XVI. WATCH-FIRES. CONTINUED. THE proposed religious amendment to the Constitution of the United States is unnecessary, impracticable and undesirable. Christian law is the corner-stone of the govern ment. In its recognition of the Sabbath and its requirement of an oath, God and the supremacy of Christ are indirectly and inferentially recognized and honored by the Constitution as it is; so that Christianity in its various connections permeates the entire structure of the government, and is its underlying and informing spirit. Chaplains are appointed, fasts and thanksgivings are recommended, and one of the most beautiful features of the government is the quiet, unostentatious working through it of Christian ideas. F. A. Noble, D.D. BURN and destroy the idols of party you have worshiped; banish politics from the municipality and county, limiting it to questions affecting principles in the State and Nation; place competency and integrity at every part of the public service; adorn your courts with judges worthiest to wield the attributes of God; elect representatives that will reflect the majority of a free people; send to the senate statesmen whom history will immortalize and nations make their models. Americans! the countless generations who will dwell within the confines of this continent from now to eternity confide their liberties to you. Uphold them, I implore you, with a patriotism that will never tire; guard them with a vigilance that will never sleep. Daniel Dougherty. I AM struck with the fact that Bismarck, the great statesman of Germany, probably the foremost man in Europe today, stated as an unquestioned principle, that the support, the defense and the propagation of the Christian Gospel is the central object of the German Government. Our fathers, though recognizing, in common with Germany and other Christian nations of the earth, the supreme importance of religion among men, deliberately turned to the great nation they were about to establish, and said: "You shall never make any law about religion;" and turning to the States, they said, virtually, to them: "You shall never make any law establishing any form of religion." In other words, here was a right, an interest, too precious to be trusted either to the Nation or to the States. Our fathers said: "This highest of all human interests we will reserve to the people themselves. We will not delegate our power over it to any organized government, State or National We will not allow any Legislature to make any law concerning it." James A. Garfield. My countrymen! this anniversary has gone by forever, and my task is done. While I have spoken the hour has passed from us; the hand has moved upon the dial, and the old century is dead! The American Union hath endured an hundred years! Here, on the threshold of the future, the voice of Humanity shall not plead to us in vain. There shall be darkness in the days to come, danger for our courage, temptation for our virtue, doubt for our faith, suffering for our fortitude, a thousand shall fall before us and tens of thousands at our right hand. The years shall pass beneath, and century follow century in quick succession. The generations of men shall come and go; the greatness of yesterday shall be forgotten to-day, and the glories of this noon shall vanish before to-morrow's sun; but America shall not perish, but endure while the spirit of our fathers animates their sons. Henry Armitt Brown. THAT motionless shaft will be the most powerful of speakers. Its speech will be of civil and religious liberty. It will speak of patriotism and of courage. It will speak of the moral improvement and elevation of mankind. Decrepit age will lean against its base, and ingenuous youth gather round it, while they speak to each other of the glorious events with which it is connected, and exclaim, "Thank God! I also am an American!" Daniel Webster. It may be not unreasonably said that the preservation of IT the States and the maintenance of their governments are as much within the design and care of the Constitution as the preservation of the Union and the maintenance of the National government. The Constitution in all its provisions looks to an indestructible Union, composed of indestructible States. Chief Justice Chase. The years My countrymen! the moments are quickly passing, and we stand like some traveler upon a lofty crag that separates two boundless seas. The century that is closing is complete. "The past," said your great statesman, "is secure." It is finished and beyond our reach. The hand of detraction cannot dim its glories, nor the tears of repentance wipe away its stains. Its good and evil, its joy and sorrow, its truth and falsehood, its honor and its shame, we cannot touch. Sigh for them, blush for them, weep for them, if we will, we cannot change them now. The old century is dying and they are to be buried with him; his history is finished and they will stand upon its roll forever. The century that is opening is all our own. that are before us are a virgin page. We can inscribe them as we will. The future of our country rests upon us. happiness of posterity depends on us. The fate of humanity may be in our hands. That pleading voice, choked with the sobs of ages, which has so often spoken to deaf ears, is lifted up to us. It asks us to be brave, benevolent, consistent, true to the teachings of our history, proving “divine descent by worth divine." It asks us to be virtuous, building up public virtue upon private worth; seeking that righteousness which exalteth nations. It asks us to be patriotic, loving our country before all other things; making her happiness our happiness, her honors ours, her fame our own. It asks us in the name of Charity, in the name of Freedom, in the name of God! The Henry Armitt Brown. WHEREVER party spirit shall strain the ancient guarantees of freedom, or bigotry and ignorance shall lay their fatal hands upon education, or the arrogance of caste shall strike at equal rights, or corruption shall poison the very springs of national life—there, minute-men of liberty! are your Lexington Green and Concord Bridge, and as you love your country and your kind, and would have your children rise up and call you blessed, spare not the enemy! Over the hills, out of the earth, down from the clouds, pour in resistless might. Fire from every rock and tree, from door and window, from hearthstone and chamber, hang upon his flank and rear from noon to sunset, and so, through a land blazing with holy indignation, hurl the hordes of ignorance and corruption and injustice, back, back, in utter defeat and ruin. George William Curtis. SHE takes but to give again, As the sea returns the rivers in rain, Is planted England's oaken-hearted mood, As e'er went worldward from the island wall. To one strong race all races here unite; Bayard Taylor. |