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us. The protecting system has already, in the minds of many, removed the odium which formerly rested on this practice. It was but the last year that a distinguished senator rose up in his place here and held this language: "Your tariff policy compels respectable men to violate your law; you force them to disregard its injunctions, in order to elude its oppressions. It was his perfect conviction, that there was not a virtuous man throughout the union, who would now think it criminal to smuggle into the country every article consumed in it—and why? Because you force them to it in self-defense."-Sir, when these sentiments shall become prevalent, what think you will become of that system? How long will it last after the payment of duties shall come to be considered as a badge of servitude?

26 INFLUENCE OF GREAT ACTIONS DEPENDENT ON THEIR RESULTS.-Webster.

Great actions and striking occurrences, having excited a temporary admiration, often pass away and are forgotten, because they leave no lasting results, affecting the prosperity of communities. Such is frequently the fortune of the most brilliant military achievements. Of the ten thousand battles which have been fought; of all the fields fertilized with carnage; of the banners which have been bathed in blood; of the warriors who have hoped that they had risen from the field of conquest to a glory as bright and as durable as the stars, how few that continue long to interest mankind! The victory of yesterday is reversed by the defeat of to-day; the star of military glory, rising like a meteor, like a meteor has fallen; disgrace and disaster hang on the heels of conquest and renown; victor and vanquished presently pass away to oblivion, and the world holds on its course, with the loss, only, of so many lives, and so much treasure.

But if this is frequently, or generally, the fortune of military achievements, it is not always so. There are enterprises, military as well as civil, that sometimes check the current of events give a new turn to human affairs, and transmit their consequences through ages. We see their importance in their results, and call them great, because great things follow. There have been battles which have fixed the fate of nations. These come down to us in history with a solid and permanent influence, not created by a display of glittering armor, the rush of adverse battalions, the sinking and rising of pennons, the flight, the pursuit, and the

victory; but by their effect in advancing or retarding human knowledge, in overthrowing or establishing despotism, in extending or destroying human happiness. When the traveler pauses on the plains of Marathon, what are the emotions which strongly agitate his breast; what is that glorious recollection that thrills through his frame, and suffuses his eyes? Not, I imagine, that Grecian skill and Grecian valor were here most signally displayed; but that Greece herself was saved. It is because to this spot, and to the event which has rendered it immortal, he refers all the succeeding glories of the republic. It is because, if that day had gone otherwise, Greece had perished. It is because he perceives that her philosophers and orators, her poets and painters, her sculptors and architects, her government and free institutions, point backward to Marathon, and that their future existence seems to have been suspended on the contingency, whether the Persian or Grecian banner should wave victorious in the beams of that day's setting sun. And as his imagination kindles at the retrospect, he is transported back to the interesting moment: he counts the fearful odds of the contending hosts; his interest for the result overwhelms him; he trembles as if it was still uncertain, and seems to doubt whether he may consider Socrates and Plato, Demosthenes, Sophocles, and Phidias, as secure, yet, to himself and to the world.

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War is the law of violence. Peace the law of love. That law of violence prevailed without mitigation from the murder of Abel to the advent of the Prince of Peace.

We might have imagined, if history had not attested the reverse, that an experiment of four thousand years would have sufficed to prove, that the rational and valuable ends of society can never be attained, by constructing its institutions in conformity with the standard of war. But the sword and the torch had been eloquent in vain. A thousand battle-fields, white with the bones of brothers, were counted as idle advocates in the cause of justice and humanity. Ten thousand cities, abandoned to the cruelty and licentiousness of the soldiery: and burnt, or dismantled, or razed to the ground, pleaded in vain against the law of violence. The river, the lake, the sea, crimsoned with the blood of fellow-citizens, and neighbors, and strangers, had lifted up their voices in vain to denounce the

ascribed to the spirit of protestant christianity. It is from the influence of this spirit, that the sublime astronomy of La Place has not been, like that of Galileo, condemned as heretical. It. is to protestant christianity, that you owe the English Bible; a volume that has done more to correct and refine the taste, to elevate the imagination, to fill the mind with splendid and glowing images, than all the literature which the stream of time has brought down to the present age. I hope I am not laying an unhallowed hand upon the ark of God, if I presume to recommend the Bible to you as an object of literary enthusiasm. The Bible! Where in the compass of human literature, can the fancy be so elevated by sublime description, can the heart be so warmed by simple, unaffected tenderness! Men of genius! who delight in bold and magnificent speculation, in the Bible you have a new world of ideas opened to your range. Votaries of eloquence! in the Bible you will find the grandest thoughts clothed in a simple majesty, worthy of the subject and the Author. Servants of God! I need not tell you that the glories of immortality are revealed in language, which mortal lips had never before employed! But I forbear. The Bible is in your hands; and even now, while I am speaking its praise, "it is silently fulfilling its destined course;" it is raising many a heart to the throne of God

19.

THE TRUE SOURCES OF NATIONAL GREATNESS.-Harper.

When France shall at length be convinced that we are firmly resolved to call forth all our resources, and exert all our strength to resist her encroachments and aggressions, she will soon desist from them. She need not be told what these resources are; she well knows their greatness and extent; she well knows that this country, if driven into a war, could soon become invulnerable to her attacks, and could throw a most formidable and preponderating weight into the scale of her adversary. She will not, therefore, drive us to this extremity, but will desist as soon as she finds us determined. If our means of injury and of repelling her attacks were less than they are, still they might be rendered all-sufficient, by resolution and courage. It is in these that the strength of nations consists, and not in fleets, nor armies, nor population, nor money in the "unconquerable will -the courage never to submit or yield." These are the true sources of national greatness; and to use the words of a celebrated writer," where these means are not wanting, all others

will be found or created." It was by these means that Hoiland, in the days of her glory, triumphed over the mighty power of Spain. It was by these that in later times, and in the course of the present war, the Swiss, a people not half so numerous as we, and possessing few of our advantages, have honorably maintained their neutrality amid the shock of surrounding states, and against the haughty aggressions of France herself. It was this that made Rome the mistress of the world, and Athens the protectress of Greece. When was it that Rome attracted most strongly the admiration of mankind, and impressed the deepest sentiment of fear on the hearts of her enemies? It was when seventy thousand of her sons lay bleeding at Cannæ, and Hannibal, victorious over three Roman armies and twenty nations,. was thundering at her gates. It was then that the young and heroic Scipio, having sworn on his sword in the presence of the fathers of the country, not to despair of the republic, marched forth at the head of a people, firmly resolved to conquer or die ; and that resolution insured them the victory. When did Athens appear the greatest and the most formidable? It was when giving up their houses and possessions to the flames of the enemy, and having transferred their wives, their children, their aged parents, and the symbols of their religion, on board of their fleet, they resolved to consider themselves as the republic, and their ships as their country. It was then that they struck that terrible blow, under which the greatness of Persia sunk and expired.

20. GRATEFUL TRIBUTE TO THE HEROES OF THE REVOLU

TION.-Lathrop.

It is my pleasing duty, my fellow-citizens, to felicitate you on the establishment of our national sovereignty; and among the various subjects for congratulation and rejoicing, this is not the most unimportant, that heaven has spared so many veterans in the art of war; so many sages, who are versed in the best politics of peace; men, who are able to instruct and to govern, and whose faithful services, whose unremitted exertions to promote the public prosperity, entitle them to our firmest confidence and warmest gratitude. Uniting in the celebration of this anniversary, I am happy to behold many of the illustrious remnant of that band of patriots, who, despising danger and death, determined to be free, or gloriously perish in the cause. Their countenances beam inexpressible delight; our joys are increased

by their presence; our raptures are heightened by their par ticipation. The feelings, which inspired them in the "times which tried men's souls," are communicated to our bosoms. We catch the divine spirit which impelled them to bid defiance to the congregated host of despots. We swear to preserve the blessings they toiled to gain, which they obtained by the incessant labors of eight distressful years; to transmit to our posterity, our right undiminished, our honor untarnished, and our freedom unimpaired.

On the last page of fate's eventful volume, with the raptured ken/of prophecy, I behold Columbia's name recorded; her future honors and happiness inscribed. In the same important book, the approaching end of tyranny and the triumph of right and justice are written in indelible characters. The struggle will soon be over; the tottering thrones of despots will quickly fall, and bury their proud incumbents in their massy ruins.

"Then peace on earth shall hold her easy sway,
And man forget his brother man to slay.
To martial arts, shall milder arts succeed;
Who blesses most, shall gain tl immortal meed.
The eye of pity shall be pained no more,
With vict'ry's crimson banners stained with gore.
Thou glorious era come! Hail, blessed time!
When full orbed freedom shall unclouded shine;
When the chaste muses, cherished by her rays,
In olive groves shall tune their sweetest lays-
When bounteous Ceres shall direct her car,
O'er fields now blasted with the fires of war;
And angels view, with joy and wonder joined,
The golden age returned to bless mankind!""

21. NECESSITY OF A PURE NATIONAL MORALITY.-. -Beecher.

The crisis has come. By the people of this generation, by ourselves, probably, the amazing question is to be decided,— whether the inheritance of our fathers shall be preserved or thrown away; whether our Sabbaths shall be a delight or a loathing; whether the taverns, on that holy day, shall be crowded with drunkards, or the sanctuary of God with humble worshippers; whether riot and profaneness shall fill our streets, and poverty our dwellings, and convicts our gaols, and violence our land; or whether industry, and temperance, and righteousness, shall be the stability of our times: whether mild laws shall receive the cheerful submission of freemen, or the iron rod of a tyrant compel the trembling homage of slaves. Be not deceived.

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