recollected and felt by all interested, and which must render the separation proportionably afflieting. These considerations have added much to the difficulty your committee have experienced, and to the sacrifice of feeling they have been compelled to make, in recommending to the congregation an acquiescence in the measure proposed by their pastor. To withhold their consent to a separation, contrary to his wish, so deliberately and decidedly expressed, and when that wish is founded upon the reasons contained in his communication, might well be considered as rather the result of the feelings of affection, than the deliberate act of the judgment, and a due regard to the respect which they bear him. 'Your committee, therefore, recommend the adoption of the following resolutions, viz. "A communication, addressed to the members of this congregation, by the Rev. Doctor John M. Mason, their pastor, under date of the 22d day of September, 1821, requesting, for the reasons therein stated, the consent of the congregation to the demission of his charge, having been laid before them, at a regular meeting duly notified and convened, and the same having been maturely and fully considered :-" Resolved, That while this congregation desire to be deeply humbled, under the afflictive dispensation of Divine Providence, by which the health of their much loved and highly respected pastor has been so far impaired as to render it necessary, in his judgment, that he should retire from the pulpit, and remove into the interior of the country; they consider it their duty, painful as it is to their feelings, to acquiesce in his request; and they do accordingly, in pursuance of such request, hereby consent and agree, that he resign his charge into the hands of the Presbytery of New-York, at their next meeting; and that he be released from his pastoral relations to this congregation, from and after the first day of December next. 66 Resolved, That the chairman of this meeting be requested to furnish Doctor Mason with a copy, duly authenticated, of the preceding resolution; and, at the same time, tender him the warmest thanks of the congregation for his long-continued, able, and faithful ministrations among them; with the assurance, that so long as he shall live, and wheresoever the good providence of God may see fit to place him, their best sympathies and affections shall always accompany him, and their ardent prayers be offered, for his present and future happiness." Your committee cannot close their report, without adverting to a circumstance which is noticed in the communication referred to them, although they do not feel themselves authorized to submit any distinct proposition to the congregation, in relation to it. It is the fact, that the relinquishment of the charge of this congregation, by our beloved pastor, may draw after it consequences which will materially abridge his temporal comfort. Consequences, which, your committee are persuaded, the congregation would deplore; and, so far as Providence shall enable them, they will avert. All which is respectfully submitted, Our last communication, dated New-York, January 24th, conveys to us the pleasing intelligence, that the health of this excellent man has been greatly recruited since his removal to Carlisle, and he has been enabled to comply with the wishes of the Legislature of the State in which he has become a resident, to open their new Capitol, by an appropriate speech, with which, evincing as it does the full vigour of his masculine eloquence, we close our present article, "Gentlemen-The solemnities of this day contemplate no vulgar nor uninteresting event. It does not, indeed, make so such noise, nor is it encompassed with that splendour which is commonly called glory. We have here no triumphs of the military hero; there are no slaughtered thousands at our doors; there are no arts of peace beneath our victorious car, no widows with streaming eyes and broken hearts, mingle their lamentations with this day's exultation; no orphans swell the blood of the dead with the tears of the living, uplifting their helpless hands to heaven, imploring the infinite justice to avenge their wrongs. It is the triumph of peace, of the love of peace, of the children of peace; not a note of grief breaks on the joyous ear, not a single sigh disturbs this festive day. Yet there is something majestic beyond the pomps of martial grandeur; something which the imperfections of the soldier cannot tarnish; something which even political rivalships cannot imbitter, and which will cause the transactions of this day to be held in grateful remembrance when we are gathered unto our fathers. It is this--The representatives of a great, populous, and wealthy state, assembling in their new mansion, in the name of the God of heaven and of earth, to make provision for the happiness of the generation which lives, and of generations which shall live hereafter. "Fathers of the state! Legislators of Pennsylvania, allow me to mingle my congratulations with those of the ten thousands which will meet your ear! Citizens of Pennsylvania, let me join with you in your hearty acclaim of good will, and your fervent wish of all prosperity to the councils of the state, and let your voice, directed towards this hall of judgment, say, "Peace be within thy walls, and prosperity within thy palaces." Amen! Permit me, venerable hearers, to remind you of what you are yourselves perfectly aware, that the God, in whose name, and under whose eye, you meet, is the God of righteousness; and that to this God you must, all of you, one day, give in your account of your political stewardship. Nations, like individuals, are subject to his law. This is an authority paramount to all covenants, compacts, and constitutions among men, and therefore ought now, as it will ultimately, control all human operations, and rejudge all human judgments. The first great question with all earthly legislators should be, not what is popular, but what is right, making the point of popularity to be at all times subordinate to the point of integrity, having always a distinct reference to the presence and commandment of our infinite Judge. We are here upon ground where all is authority on one side, and all ought to be obedience on the other. The divine law admits of no compromise; and the legislation which does not proceed upon this principle, I must take leave to say, is substantially rotten; and, as it disregards the authority of God, can never subserve the happiness of men. Under the sanction of this great principle, allow me, sirs, to state that the legislature of this commonwealth cannot, without violating their own consciences, and the awfulness of their official oaths, degrade themselves into the legislature of a faction. The people of Pennsylvania are represented in this august assembly, and their rights and interests constitute the true subjects of legislative deliberation. Wo to the day, when there shall issue from these walls, not the voice of public weal, but the voice of mere party! when the real and known good of the community shall be merged in party ascendancy! when public righteousness, declared in the laws, shall be humbled to the purposes of private advancement! Far from us be such evil bodings. Let us rather look up to our political superiors, as to our "nursing fathers," from whom every thing that is great, magnanimous, and of universal interest, may justly be expected. "Here, on what topic shall I dwell? How improve, in the best manner, the opportunity which I owe to your indulgence? Shall I press upon your notice the importance of agriculture? as if every thing which belongs to the plough, to the dairy, to the hive, to the breed of cattle, of horses, of sheep, had not long since occupied the public mind, and called forth in your agricultural soeieties the fullest expression of the public sense and the public zeal? Shall I solicit your attention to domestic manufactures? as if this matter were not familiar to every family in the state? Shall I point out the importance of roads and bridges? as if your statute books were not full of salutary provisions on these important subjects? To what then shall I turn? Let me throw myself upon your indulgence, while I represent, that in Pennsylvania, in common with all the other states of the union, the public mind, by which I mean the mind of your youth, has not received its proportion of public regard. I say the mind of your youth, for in a short time they must furnish your statesmen, your judges, your generals. Pardon me, my re spected auditors, if the convictions of my judgment, the habits of my life, the functions with which I have been recently honoured, the very flattering attention by which you yourselves have been pleased to distinguish me this day, convert my inclination into an imperative duty. Lend me then your attention, accompanied with your wonted candour, while I expatiate for a minute or two on the edu-cation of your youth, as a subject of legislative patronage. Methinks, on this general point, there can be but one opinion. The use of reason is that which emphatically puts an immeasurable distance between man and the beasts. And the difference between instructed and uninstructed reason, is almost as great as between a man and his horse. Who can stand under a reproach of ignorance in those things which he is expected to know? What farmer, what mechanic, could endure the opprobrium of being unacquainted with the process of ploughing, or the use of his tools? Of all men living, I will be bold to say, that farmers ought to be the most friendly to a thorough education; their whole business rests upon this basis. Do they not train their horses, their oxen, their trees, their very soil, to the purposes which they are respectively to answer? And shall their youth, who come into the world more helpless, but yet. have powers infinitely greater than any of them, not have these powers evolved, and be qualified for usefulness according to the pre-eminence which God hath given them? Shall they conduct the legislative, the judicial, the military business of the country, without previous training? Will you commit your rights and property, your limbs and life, your religious and immortal interests, into the hands of men who are utterly unacquainted with law, with medicine, or with scriptural theology? This cannot be. We will not hear of so gross a libel upon the enlightened legislature of Pennsylvania. Now to what purpose can the bounty of this great and powerful state be so well applied, as to the instruction of her youth? From what will it yield to her so large a revenue of profit and of fame? Whatever she does judiciously in this matter is sure not to be lost; and let her keep in mind, that the concentration of her means is the best way to ensure happy results. Scattering the bounty of the state, is like scattering manure over the fields; your stock is wasted, and no good effects follow. I hail the period, when, under the fostering hand of the legislature, the pre-eminence of her citizens shall be so conspicuous, that it will be in other states and in other countries a sufficient passport to notice and honour to say of a young man, he is a Pennsylvanian! "Yet, to whom shall the community look for so auspicious a result, if not to those who occupy this splendid edifice? They are the guardians of the public purse, and the public have a right to expect from them a liberal expenditure, when their most precious interests are in question. Let me say without invidiousness, that the people of Pennsylvania have erected this noble structure; that the people's money has thus magnificently accommodated their representatives. I laud the bounty, and its application. Among all the sources of public expenditure, what could have been more proper, what more dignified, than that the people assembled here, in the persons of their representatives, should so largely participate in their own munificence? And I hope I do not misinterpret the general feeling, when I express my persuasion, that these representatives feel it to be their incumbent duty to render back to the people a suitable proportion of their own liberality in making abundant provision for the well-being of their youth. "Friends and fathers, allow me to close this short address, by a very brief retrospect of the past and anticipation of the future. Sixty years have not elapsed since the sound of the first axe was heard in the woods of Harrisburg. The wild beasts and wilder men occupied the banks of the Susquehanna. Since that time, with that mildness which has characterized the policy of the descendants of William Penn, and that industry which has marked all the generations of Pennsylvania, the forests have been subdued, the wild beasts driven away to haunts more congenial to their nature, and the wilder men have withdrawn to regions where they can hunt the deer and entrap the fish according to the mode practised by their ancestors. In the room of all these, there has started up, in the course of a few years, a town respectable for the number of its inhabitants, for its progressive industry, for the seat of legislation in this powerful state. What remains unaccomplished of all our temporal wishes? What more have we to say? What more can be said, but, go on and prosper! Carry the spirit of your improvement through, till the sound of the hammer, the whip of the waggoner, the busy hum of men, the voice of innumerable children issuing from their places of instruction, till lofty spires of worship, till richly endowed colleges of education, till all those arts which embellish man, shall gladden the banks of the Susquehanna and the Delaware, and exact from admiring strangers that cheerful and grateful tribute, This is the work of a Pennsylvania Legislature." POETRY. TO THE AUTHOR OF "DON JUAN," Thou compound of tenderness, passion, and vice, *We had intended to have continued the Death of Mungo Park in this Number, but the connecting leaf has unhappily been mislaid; by the appearance of our next, we hope, however, to have recovered or replaced it. |