網頁圖片
PDF
ePub 版

all connection with slavery, without saying a word against others; let the time come when, in all the mighty denominations of Christians, it can be announced that the evil has ceased with them-FOREVER; and let the voice from each denomination be lifted up in kind, but firm and solemn testimony against the system; with no "mealy" words; with no attempt at apology; with no wish to blink it; with no effort to throw the sacred shield of religion over so great an evil; and the work is done. There is no public sentiment in this land, there could be none created, that would resist the power of such testimony. There is no power OUT of the church that could sustain slavery an hour if it were not sustained IN it. Not a blow need be struck. Not an unkind word need be uttered. No man's motive need be impugned, no man's proper rights invaded. All that is needful is, for each Christian man, and for every Christian church, to stand up in the sacred majesty of such a solemn testimony, to free themselves from all connection with the evil, and utter a calm and deliberate voice to the world,—AND THE WORK WILL BE DONE.

WAR.

Who has ever told the evils, and the curses, and the crimes of war? Who can describe the horrors of the carnage of battle? Who can portray the fiendish passions which reign there? Who can tell the amount of the treasures wasted, and of the blood that has flowed, and of the tears that have been shed over the slain? Who can register the crimes which war has originated and sustained? If there is any thing in which earth, more than in any other, resembles hell, it is in its wars. And who, with the heart of a man-of a lover of human happiness-of a hater of carnage and crime can look but with pity, who can repress his contempt in looking on all the trappings of war-the tinsel-the nodding plumes-even the animating music-designed to cover over the reality of the contemplated murder of fathers, and husbands, and sons?

THE GENTLE CHARITIES OF LIFE.

A man's usefulness in the Christian life depends far more on the kindness of his daily temper, than on great and glorious deeds that shall attract the admiration of the world, and that shall send his name down to future times. It is the little rivulet that glides through the meadow, and that runs along day and night by the farm-house, that is useful, rather than the swollen flood, or the noisy cataract. Niagara excites our wonder, and fills the mind with amazement and awe. We feel that God is there; and it is well to go far to see

once at

.

least how solemn it is to realize that we are in the presence of the Great God, and to see what wonders his hand can do. But one Niagara is enough for a continent-or a world; while that same world needs thousands and tens of thousands of silvery fountains, and gently flowing rivulets, that shall water every farm, and every meadow, and every garden, and that shall flow on every day and every night with their gentle and quiet beauty. So with life. We admire the great deeds of Howard's benevolence, and wish that all men were like him. We revere the names of the illustrious martyrs. We honor the man who will throw himself in the "imminent deadly breach" and save his country,- and such men and such deeds we must have when the occasion calls for them. But all men are not to be useful in this way-any more than all waters are to rush by us in swelling and angry floods. We are to be useful in more limited spheres. We are to cultivate the gentle charities of life. We are by a consistent walk to benefit those around us-though we be in an humble vale, and though, like the gentle rivulet, we may attract little attention, and may soon cease to be remembered on earth. Kindness will always do good. It makes others happy-and that is doing good. It prompts us to seek to benefit others-and that is doing good. It makes others gentle and benignant-and that is doing good.

THE VALUE OF INDUSTRY.

Practical Sermons.

I have seen the value of industry; and as I owe to this, under God, whatever success I have obtained, it seems to me not improper to speak of it here, and to recommend the habit to those who are just entering on life.

I had nothing else to depend on but this. I had no capital when I began life; I had no powerful patronage to help me ; I had no natural endowments, as I believe that no man has, that could supply the place of industry; and it is not improper here to say that all that I have been able to do in this world has been the result of habits of industry which began early in life; which were commended to me by the example of a venerated father; and which have been, and are, an abiding source of enjoyment.

Dr. Doddridge, in reference to his own work, the "Paraphrase on the New Testament," said, that its being written at all was owing to the difference between rising at five and at seven o'clock in the morning. A remark similar to this will explain all that I have done. Whatever I have accomplished in the way of commentary on the Scriptures is to be traced to the fact of rising at four in the morning, and to the time thus secured which I

thought might properly be employed in a work not immediately connected with my pastoral labors.

In the recollection of the past portions of my life, I refer to these morning hours,-to the stillness and quiet of my room in this house of God when I have been permitted to "prevent the dawning of the morning" in the study of the Bible, while the inhabitants of this great city were slumbering round about me, and before the cares of the day and its direct responsibilities came upon me,-I refer, I say, to these scenes as among the happiest portions of my life; and I could not do a better thing in reference to my younger brethren in the ministry, than to commend this habit to them as one closely connected with their own personal piety, and their usefulness in the world.

Life at Three-Score.

ROBERT C. SANDS, 1799-1832.

ROBERT C. SANDS was born in the city of New York, May 11, 1799. He entered the Sophomore class in Columbia College in 1812, and was graduated, with a high reputation for scholarship, in 1815. He soon after began the study of law in the office of David B. Ogden, entering upon his new course of study with great ardor, and pursuing it with steady zeal. He had formed in college an intimate friendship with James Eastburn, afterwards a clergyman of the Protestant Episcopal Church; and in 1817 he commenced, in conjunction with his clerical friend, a romantic poem, founded on the history of Philip, the celebrated Sachem of the Pequods. But Mr. Eastburn's health began to fail early in 1819, and be died in December of that year, before the work was completed. It was therefore revised, arranged, and completed, with many additions, by Sands, who introduced it with a touching proem, in which the surviving poet mourned, in elevated and feeling strains, the accomplished friend of his youth. The poem was published, under the title of Yamoyden, at New York, in 1820, was received with high commendation, and gave Mr. Sands great literary reputation throughout the United States.

In 1820, Mr. Sands was admitted to the bar, and opened an office in the city of New York; but his ardent love of general literature gradually weaned him from his profession. In 1822 and 1823, he wrote many articles for the "Literary Review," a monthly periodical, and in 1824 the "Atlantic Magazine" was established and placed under his charge. He gave it up in six months; but when it became changed to the "New York Review," he was engaged as an editor, and assisted in conducting it till 1827. He had now become an author by profession, and looked to his pen for support, as he had before looked to it for fame or for amusement; and when an offer of a liberal salary was made him as an assistant editor of the New York Commercial Advertiser," he accepted it, and continued his connection with that journal until his death, which took place on the 17th of December, 1832; in the mean time editing and writing a

[ocr errors]

1

great number of miscellaneous works. A selection from his works was published in 1834, in two volumes, octavo, entitled Writings in Prose and Verse, with a Memoir,1

FROM THE PROEM TO YAMOYDEN.

Go forth, sad fragments of a broken strain,
The last that either bard shall e'er essay:
The hand can ne'er attempt the chords again
That first awoke them in a happier day:
Where sweeps the ocean-breeze its desert way,
His requiem murmurs o'er the moaning wave;
And he who feebly now prolongs the lay
Shall ne'er the minstrel's hallow'd honors crave;
His harp lies buried deep in that untimely grave!2

Friend of my youth! with thee began the love

Of sacred song; the wont, in golden dreams,
'Mid classic realms of splendors past to rove,

O'er haunted steep, and by immortal streams;
Where the blue wave, with sparkling bosom, gleams
Round shores, the mind's eternal heritage,

Forever lit by memory's twilight beams;

Where the proud dead, that live in storied page,
Beckon, with awful port, to glory's earlier age.

There would we linger oft, entranced, to hear,
O'er battle-fields, the epic thunders roll;
Or list, where tragic wail upon the ear

Through Argive palaces shrill echoing stole ;
There would we mark, uncurb'd by all control,
In central heaven, the Theban eagle's flight;
Or hold communion with the musing soul
Of sage or bard, who sought, 'mid pagan night,
In loved Athenian groves, for truth's eternal light.

[blocks in formation]

Friend of my youth! with thee began my song,
And o'er thy bier its latest accents die;
Misled in phantom-peopled realms too long-
Though not to me the muse averse deny,
Sometimes, perhaps, her visions to descry-
Such thriftless pastime should with youth be o'er;
And he who loved with thee his notes to try,

But for thy sake such idlesse would deplore

And swears to meditate the thankless muse no more.

1 "That American literature experienced a great loss in the early death of Sands, will be felt by the reader who makes acquaintance with his well-cultivated, prompt, exuberant genius, which promised, had life been spared, a distinguished career of genial mental activity and productiveness."-DUYCKINCK.

A series of interesting papers on the early and unpublished writings of this "true son of genius" may be found in the twenty-first and twenty-second volumes of the "Knickerbocker Magazine."

2 Mr. Eastburn died December, 1819, on a voyage to Santa Cruz, undertaken to regain his health.

ODE TO EVENING.

Hail sober evening! thee the harass'd brain
And aching heart with fond orisons greet;
The respite thou of toil; the balm of pain;
To thoughtful mind the hour for musing meet:
'Tis then the sage, from forth his lone retreat,
The rolling universe around espies;

'Tis then the bard may hold communion sweet
With lovely shapes, unkenn'd by grosser eyes,
And quick perception comes of finer mysteries.

The silent hour of bliss! when in the west

Her argent cresset lights the star of love:-
The spiritual hour! when creatures blest

Unseen return o'er former haunts to rove;
While sleep his shadowy mantle spreads above,

Sleep, brother of forgetfulness and death,

Round well-known couch with noiseless tread they rove,

In tones of heavenly music comfort breathe,

And tell what weal or bale shall chance the moon beneath.

Hour of devotion! like a distant sea,

The world's loud voices faintly murmuring die;
Responsive to the spheral harmony,

While grateful hymns are borne from earth on high.
Oh! who can gaze on yon unsullied sky,

And not grow purer from the heavenward view?
As those, the Virgin Mother's meek, full eye
Who met, if uninspired lore be true,

Felt a new birth within, and sin no longer knew.

Let others hail the oriflamme of morn,

O'er kindling hills unfurl'd with gorgeous dyes!
O, mild, blue Evening! still to thee I turn,

With holier thought, and with undazzled eyes;-
Where wealth and power with glare and splendor rise,

Let fools and slaves disgustful incense burn!

Still Memory's moonlight lustre let me prize:

The great, the good, whose course is o'er, discern,

And, from their glories past, time's mighty lessons learn!
From Yamoyden.”

MONODY ON SAMUEL PATCH.1

"By water shall he die, and take his end."-SHAKSPEARE.

Toll for Sam Patch!

Sam Patch, who jumps no more,

This or the world to come. Sam Patch is dead!

The vulgar pathway to the unknown shore

Of dark futurity, he would not tread.

amuel Patch was a boatman on the Erie Canal, in New York. He made himself notorious by leaping from the masts of ships, from the Falls of Niagara,

« 上一頁繼續 »