the whole corporation of captains, from Walter the Penniless to Napoleon Bonaparte, compared with those movable types of Faust? Truly it is a mortifying thing for your conqueror to reflect how perishable is the metal with which he hammers with such violence; how the kind earth will soon shroud up his bloody footprints; and all that he achieved and skillfully piled together will be but like his own canvas city of a camp,- this evening, loud with life, to-morrow all struck and vanished, "a few pits and heaps of straw."

For here, as always, it continues true, that the deepest force is the stillest; that, as in the fable, the mild shining of the sun shall silently accomplish what the fierce blustering of the tempest in vain essayed. Above all, it is ever to be kept in mind, that not by material but by moral power are men and their actions to be governed. How noiseless is thought! No rolling of drums, no tramp of squadrons, no tumult of innumerable baggage-wagons, attend its movements.

In what obscure and sequestered places may the head be meditating, which is one day to be crowned with more than imperial authority! For kings and emperors will be among its ministering servants; it will rule not over but in all heads, and with these solitary combinations of ideas, and with magic formulas, bend the world to its will. The time may come when Napoleon himself will be better known for his laws than his battles, and the victory of Waterloo may prove less momentous than the opening of the first Mechanics' Institute.

THE POETRY OF THE BIBLE

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THE POETRY OF THE BIBLE

GEORGE GILFILLAN

George Gilfillan (1813-1878) was a clergyman of the United Presbyterian Church of Scotland. The following extract is taken from his most successful book, "Bards of the Bible," first published in 1851.

That so much of Scripture should be written in the language of poetry has excited some surprise and created some inquiry; and yet in nothing do we perceive more clearly than in this, the genuineness, power, and divinity of the oracles of our faith. As the language of poetry is that into which all earnest natures are insensibly betrayed, so it is the only speech which has in it the power of permanent impression. The language of the imagination is the native language of man. It is the language of his excited intellect, of his aroused passions, of his devotion, of all the higher moods and temperaments of his mind. It was meet, therefore, that it should be the language of his revelation from God.

The language of poetry is thus the language of the inspired volume. The Bible is a mass of beautiful figures; its words and its thoughts are alike poetical; it has gathered around its central truths all natural beauty and interest; it is a Temple with one altar and one God, but illuminated by a thousand varied lights, and studded with a thousand ornaments. It has substantially but one declaration to make, but it utters that in the voices of the creation. It has pressed into its

service the animals of the forest, the flowers of the field, the stars of heaven, all the elements of nature. The lion spurning the sands of the desert, the wild roe leaping over the mountains, the lamb led in silence to the slaughter, the goat speeding to the wilderness; the rose blossoming in Sharon, the lily drooping in the valley, the apple-tree bowing under its fruit; the great rock shadowing a weary land, the river gladdening the dry place; the moon and the morning star; Carmel by the sea, and Tabor among the mountains; the dew from the womb of the morning, the rain upon the mown grass, the rainbow encompassing the landscape; the light, God's shadow; the thunder, His voice; the wind and the earthquake, His footsteps: — all such varied objects are made, as if naturally so designed from their creation, to represent Him to whom the Book and all its emblems point. Thus the quick spirit of the Book has ransacked creation to lay its treasures on Jehovah's altar, united the innumerable rays of a far-streaming glory on the little hill of Calvary, and woven a garland for the bleeding brow of Immanuel, the flowers of which have been culled from the gardens of a universe.

BUNKER HILL MONUMENT

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BUNKER HILL MONUMENT

DANIEL WEBSTER

Taken from an address delivered at the laying of the cornerstone of Bunker Hill Monument at Charlestown, Mass., June 17, 1825. This address is commonly known as Webster's "First Bunker Hill Oration."

Let it not be supposed that our object is to perpetuate national hostility, or even to cherish a mere military spirit. It is higher, purer, nobler. We consecrate our work to the spirit of national independence, and we wish that the light of peace may rest upon it forever. We rear a memorial of our conviction of that unmeasured benefit which has been conferred on our own land, and of the happy influences which have been produced, by the same events, on the general interests of mankind. We come, as Americans, to mark a spot which must forever be dear to us and our posterity. We wish that whosoever, in all coming time, shall turn his eye hither, may behold that the place is not undistinguished where the first great battle of the Revolution was fought. We wish that this structure may proclaim the magnitude and importance of that event to every class and every age. We wish that infancy may learn the purpose of its erection from maternal lips, and that weary and withered age may behold it and be solaced by the recollections which it suggests. We wish that labor may look up here, and be proud, in the midst of its toil. We wish that, in those days of disaster, which, as they come on all

nations, must be expected to come on us also, desponding patriotism may turn its eyes hitherward, and be assured that the foundations of our national power still stand strong. We wish that this column, rising toward heaven among the pointed spires of so many temples dedicated to God, may contribute also to produce, in all minds, a pious feeling of dependence and gratitude. We wish, finally, that the last object on the sight of him who leaves his native shore, and the first to gladden his who revisits it, may be something which shall remind him of the liberty and the glory of his country. Let it rise, till it meet the sun in its coming; let the earliest light of the morning gild it, and parting day linger and play on its summit.

NORTHERN LABORERS

CHARLES NAYLOR

Taken from a speech delivered in the national House of Representatives. Mr. Naylor was Congressman from Philadelphia from 1837 to 1841.

The gentleman has misconceived the spirit and tendency of Northern institutions. He is ignorant of Northern character. He has forgotten the history of his country. Preach insurrection to the Northern laborers! Preach insurrection to me! Who are the Northern laborers? The history of your country is their history. The renown of your country is their renown. The brightness of their doings is emblazoned on its every page. Blot from your annals the deeds and