spread further and further, they have not outrun its protection or its benefits. It has been to us all a copious fountain of national, social, and personal happiness.

3. I have not allowed myself, sir, to look beyond the Union, to see what might lie hidden in the dark recess behind. I have not coolly weighed the chances of preserving liberty, when the bonds that unite us together shall be broken asunder. I have not accustomed myself to hang over the precipice of disunion, to see whether, with my short sight, I can fathom the abyss below; nor could I regard him as a safe counselor in the affairs of the government, whose thoughts should be mainly bent on considering, not how the Union might best be preserved, but how tolerable might be the condition of the people when it shall be broken up and destroyed.

4. While the Union lasts, we have high, exciting, gratifying prospects spread out before us, for us and our children. Beyond that, I seek not to penetrate the veil. God grant, that in my day, at least, that curtain may not rise. God grant, that on my vision never may be opened what lies behind. When my eyes shall be turned to behold, for the last time, the sun in heaven, may I not see him shining on the broken and dishonored fragments of a once glorious Union; on states dissevered, discordant, belligerent; our land rent with civil feuds, or drenched, it may be, in fraternal blood!

5. Let their last feeble and lingering glance rather behold the gorgeous ensign of the Republic, now known and honored throughout the earth, still full-high advanced, its arms and trophies streaming in their original luster, not a stripe erased or polluted, nor a single star obscured, bearing, for its motto, no such miserable interrogatory, as, "What is all this worth?” nor those other words of delusion and fally, "Liberty first, and Union afterward," but everywhere, spread all over it characters of living light, blazing on all its ample folds, as they

float over the sea, and over the land, and on every wind, and under the whole heavens, that other sentiment, dear to every true American heart, LIBERTY AND UNION, NOW AND FOR EVER, ONE AND INSEPARABLE.

LESSON LVI.

PROGRESS OF TIME. - ANON.

Why muse

Upon the past with sorrow! Though the year
Has gone to blend with the mysterious tide
Of old Eternity, and borne along,

Upon its heaving breast, a thousand wrecks
Of glory, and of beauty,

yet why mourn,
That such is destiny? Another year

Succeedeth to the past; in their bright round,
The seasons come, and go; the same blue arch,
That bath hung o'er us, will hang o'er us yet;
The same pure stars, that we have loved to watch,
Will blossom still at twilight's gentle hour,

Like lilies on the tomb of Day; and still,

Man will remain to dream, as he hath dreamed,
And mark the earth with passion. Love will spring
From the tomb of old affections; hope,
And joy, and great ambition, will rise up,
As they have risen, and their deeds will be
Brighter than those engraven on the scroll
Of parted centuries. Even now, the sea
Of coming years, beneath whose mighty waves,
Life's great events are heaving into birth,
Is tossing to and fro, as if the winds

Of heaven were prisoned in its soundless depths,
And struggling to be free.

Q

LESSON LVII.

BATTLE IN HEAVEN.- MILTON.

1. To whom, in brief, thus Abdiel stern replied:
Reign thou in hell, thy kingdom; let me serve,
In heaven, God ever blest, and his divine
Behests obey, worthiest to be obeyed;

Yet chains in hell, not realms, expect: meanwhile,
From me, (returned, as erst thou saidst, from flight)
This greeting on thy impious crest receive.

2 So saying, a noble stroke he lifted high,
Which hung not, but so swift with tempest fell
On the proud crest of Satan, that no sight,
Nor motion of swift thought, less could his shield,
Such ruin intercept. Ten paces huge

8.

He back recoiled; the tenth, on bended knee
His massy spear upstayed; as if on earth,
Winds under ground, or waters forcing way,
Sidelong had pushed a mountain from his seat,
Half-sunk with all his pines.

Now storming fury rose,
And clamor such as heard in heaven till now
Was never; arms on armor clashing, brayed
Horrible discord, and the maddening wheels
Of brazen chariots raged; dire was the noise
Of conflict; over head the dismal hiss
Of fiery darts in flaming volleys flew,
And flying, vaulted either host with fire.
So, under fiery cope together rushed
Both battles main, with ruinous assault
And inextinguishable rage. All heaven
Resounded; and had earth been then, all earth

4.

5.

Had to her center shook. What wonder? when
Millions of fierce encountering angels fought
On either side, the least of whom could wield
These elements, and arm him with the force
Of all their regions.

Long time in even scale,
The battle hung; till Satan, who that day
Prodigious power had shown, and met in arms
No equal, ranging through the dire attack
Of fighting seraphim confused, at length,

Saw where the sword of Michael smote, and felled
Squadrons at once; with huge two-handed sway,
Brandished aloft, the horrid edge came down
Wide wasting; such destruction to withstand
He hasted, and opposed the rocky orb
Of tenfold adamant, his ample shield
Of vast circumference. At his approach
The great archangel from his warlike toil
Surceased, and glad, as hoping here to end
Intestine war in heaven, th' arch-foe subdued.

Now waved their fiery swords, and in the air
Made horrid circles; two broad suns their shields
Blazed opposite, while Expectation stood
In horror; from each hand with speed retired,
Where erst was thickest fight, the angelic throng,
And left large fields, unsafe within the wind
Of such commotion; such as, to set forth
Great things by small, if, nature's concord broke,
Among the constellations war were sprung,
Two planets rushing from aspect malign
Of fiercest opposition, in mid-sky

Should combat, and their jarring spheres confound.

1. Gentlemen, if you still have any doubt as to the guilt or innocence of the defendant, give me leave to suggest to you what circumstances you ought to consider, in order to found your verdict. You should consider the character of the person accused; and in this task is easy. your I will venture to say there is not a man in this nation more known than the gentleman who is the subject of this prosecution; not only by the part he has taken in public concerns, and which he has taken in common with many, but still more so by that extraordinary sympathy for human affliction, which, I am sorry to think, he shares with so small a number.

2. There is not a day that you hear the cries of your starv ing manufacturers in your streets, that you do not, also, see the advocate of their sufferings; that you do not see his honest and manly figure, with uncovered head, soliciting for their relief, searching the frozen heart of charity for every string that can be touched by compassion, and urging the force of every argument and every motive, save that which his modesty suppresses, the authority of his own generous example.

3. Or, if you see him not there, you may trace his steps to the private abodes of disease, and famine, and despair, the messenger of Heaven, bringing with him food, and medicine, and consolation. Are these the materials of which you suppose anarchy and public rapine to be formed? Is this the man on whom to fasten the abominable charge of goading on a frantic populace to mutiny and bloodshed? Is this the man likely to apostatize from every principle that can bind him to the state, his birth, his property, his education, his character, and his children?