that height in the air, and the few men that can do it would better discuss Egyptian mechanics."

Take canals. The Suez Canal absorbs half its receipts in cleaning out the sand which fills it continually, and it is not yet known whether it is a pecuniary success. The ancients built a canal at right angles to ours; because they knew it would not fill up if built in that direction, and they knew such an one as ours would. There were magnificent canals in the land of the Jews, with perfectly arranged gates and sluices. We have only just begun to understand ventilation properly for our houses; yet late experiments at the Pyramids in Egypt show that those Egyptian tombs were ventilated in the most perfect and scientific manner.

Again, cement is modern, for the ancients dressed and joined their stones so closely, that in buildings thousands of years old the thin blade of a penknife cannot be forced between them. The railroad dates back to Egypt. Arago has claimed that they had a knowledge of steam. A painting has been discovered of a ship full of machinery, and a French engineer said that the arrangement of this machinery could only be accounted for by supposing the motive power to have been steam. Bramah acknowledges that he took the idea of his celebrated lock from an ancient Egyptian pattern. De Tocqueville says there was no social question that was not discussed to rags in Egypt.

"Well," say you, "Franklin invented the lightningrod." I have no doubt he did; but years before his invention, and before muskets were invented, the old soldiers on guard on the towers used Franklin's invention to keep guard with; and if a spark passed between them and the spear-head, they ran and bore the warning of the state and condition of affairs. After that you will admit that Benjamin Franklin was not the

only one that knew of the presence of electricity, and the advantages derived from its use. Solomon's Temple, you will find, was situated on an exposed point of the hill; the temple was so lofty that it was often in peril, and was guarded by a system exactly like that of Benjamin Franklin.

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Well, I may tell you a little of ancient manufactures. The Duchess of Burgundy took a necklace from the neck of a mummy, and wore it to a ball given at the Tuileries; and everybody said they thought it was the newest thing there. A Hindoo princess came into court; and her father, seeing her, said, "Go home, you are not decently covered, go home;" and she said, Father, I have seven suits on;" but the suits were of muslin, so thin that the king could see through them. A Roman poet says, "The girl was in the poetic dress of the country." I fancy the French would be rather astonished at this. Four hundred and fifty years ago the first spinning-machine was introduced into Europe. I have evidence to show that it made its appearance two thousand years before.

Well, I tell you this fact to show that perhaps we do not invent just everything. Why did I think to grope in the ashes for this? Because all Egypt knew the secret, which was not the knowledge of the professor, the king, and the priest. Their knowledge won an historic privilege which separated them from and brought down the masses; and this chain was broken when Cambyses came down from Persia, and by his genius and intellect opened the gates of knowledge, thundering across Egypt, drawing out civilization from royalty and priesthood.

Such was the system which was established in Egypt. of old. It was four thousand years before humanity took that subject to a proper consideration; and when

this consideration was made, civilization changed her character. Learning no longer hid in a convent, or slumbered in the palace. No; she came out, joining hands with the people, ministering unto them and dealing with them.

We have not an astrology in the stars, serving only the kings and priests: we have an astrology serving all those around us. We have not a chemistry hidden in underground cells, striving for wealth, striving to change everything into gold. No; we have a chemistry laboring with the farmer, and digging gold out of the earth with the miner. Ah, this is the nineteenth century; and of the hundreds of things we know, I can show you ninety-nine of them which have been anticipated! It is the liberty of intellect, and a diffusion of knowledge, that has caused this anticipation.

When Gibbon finished his History of Rome, he said, "The hand will never go back upon the dial of time, when everything was hidden in fear in the dark ages." He made that boast as he stood at night in the ruins of the Corsani Palace, looking out upon the places where the monks were chanting. That vision disappeared, and there arose in its stead the Temple of Jupiter. Could he look back upon the past, he would see nations that went up in their strength, and down to graves with fire in one hand, and iron in the other hand, before Rome was peopled, which, in their strength, were crushed in subduing civilization. But it is a very different principle that governs this land; it is one which should govern every land; it is one which this nation needs to practise this day. It is the human property; it is the divine will that any man has the right to know anything which he knows will be serviceable to himself and to his fellowman, and that will make art immortal if God means that it shall last.

DANIEL O'CONNELL.

On the one hundredth anniversary of the birth of Daniel O'Connell, August 6, 1875, a celebration was held in Music Hall, Boston. Mr. Phillips was the orator of the occasion. No subject could have been more congenial, for no statesman of his own day had more deeply impressed Mr. Phillips than O'Connell, and the name of the Irish agitator was often on the American agitator's lips. The oration was often repeated, and takes rank with the orator's masterpieces.

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HUNDRED years ago to-day Daniel O'Connell was born. The Irish race, wherever scattered over the globe, assembles to-night to pay fitting tribute to his memory, one of the most eloquent men, one of the most devoted patriots, and the most successful statesman which that race has given to history. We of other races may well join you in that tribute, since the cause of constitutional government owes more to O'Connell than to any other political leader of the last two centuries. The English-speaking race, to find his equal among its statesmen, must pass by Chatham and Walpole, and go back to Oliver Cromwell, or the able men who held up the throne of Queen Elizabeth. If to put the civil and social elements of your day into successful action, and plant the seeds of continued strength and progress for coming times, if this is to be a statesman, then most emphatically was O'Connell one. To exert this control, and secure this progress, while and because ample means lie ready for use under your hand, does not rob Walpole and Colbert, Chatham and Riche

lieu, of their title to be considered statesmen. To do it, as Martin Luther did, when one must ingeniously discover or invent his tools, and while the mightiest forces that influence human affairs are arrayed against him, that is what ranks O'Connell with the few masterly statesmen the English-speaking race has ever had. When Napoleon's soldiers bore the negro chief Toussaint L'Ouverture into exile, he said, pointing back to San Domingo, "You think you have rooted up the tree of liberty, but I am only a branch. I have planted the tree itself so deep that ages will never root it up." And whatever may be said of the social or industrial condition of Hayti during the last seventy years, its nationality has never been successfully assailed.

O'Connell is the only Irishman who can say as much. of Ireland. From the peace of Utrecht, 1713, till the fall of Napoleon, Great Britain was the leading State in Europe; while Ireland, a comparatively insignificant island, lay at its feet. She weighed next to nothing in the scale of British politics. The Continent pitied, and England despised her. O'Connell found her a mass of quarrelling races and sects, divided, dispirited, brokenhearted, and servile. He made her a nation whose first word broke in pieces the iron obstinacy of Wellington, tossed Peel from the cabinet, and gave the government to the Whigs; whose colossal figure, like the helmet in Walpole's romance, has filled the political sky ever since; whose generous aid thrown into the scale of the three great British reforms, the ballot, the corn-laws, and slavery, secured their success; a nation whose continual discontent has dragged Great Britain down to be a second-rate power on the chess-board of Europe. I know other causes have helped in producing this result, but the nationality which O'Connell created has been the main cause of this change in England's importance.