whether using the instrument of words, the pencil, or the chisel—the hand of poet, of painter, or of sculptor. We ought to remember, then, that when we let imaginative studies drop out of our habits of reading, we neglect a whole region of truth and reality which the highest prose authority acknowledges itself unequal to. The propensity to partial prose reading is attended with further loss, inasmuch as it not only separates us from much of the highest truth human nature can hold communion with, but it makes one lose the finest and deepest-reaching discipline our spiritual being is capable of. Two thousand years ago, the great philosopher of criticism gave his wellknown theory of tragic poetry, that it purifies our feelings through terror and pity. But in the large compass of its power, poetry employs also other and kindlier agencies of good. It deals with us in the spirit of the most sagacious morality: it does not single out this or that faculty, and tutor the one till it grows weary or stubborn, or stupid under the narrow teaching and the dull iteration, but it addresses good sense (which true poetry is never heedless of), the intellect, the affections, and what has been well called "the great central power of imagination, which brings all the other faculties into harmonious action." Instead of ministering to the mind diseased or the mind enfeebled one drug, or hard, unvaried food, it carries poor suffering humanity to the seaside, or up to the mountain-tops, for the larger contemplation which leads to infinity, and for the health and strength and life of sublimer and purer thoughts and feelings. Were it possible to fathom the mystery which dwells in the serious eyes of infancy, we should learn, I believe, that nature leads the young spirit on to its sense of truth through wonderment and faith; and we do know how the imagination of childhood puts forth its powers into the region of the marvellous, the distant, the shadowy, and the infinite, Robinson Crusoe's lonely island, the Arabian wonders, fairy fictions, fables without the "morals," which are skipped with better wisdom than they were put there, or travels in far-off lands. These things wear away as the work of life comes on, and, unhappily, the loving, faithful, imaginative spirit wears away too. The imagination is suffered to grow torpid, instead of being cultivated into a wiser activity, and our souls become materialized and sophisticated. There is enough in life to make us practical, but what we more need is to study how to be wisely visionary, to carry the freshness and feelings of childhood (and this has been said to be a characteristic of genius) into the mature reason. Frederick William Thomas. BORN in Providence, R. I., 1808. DIED in Washington, D. C., 1866. SONG. IS said that absence conquers love! I've tried, alas! its power to prove, I plunge into the busy crowd, But when I ask my heart the sound, And when some other name I learn, Still will my heart to thee return In vain! I never can forget, And would not be forgot; E'en as the wounded bird will seek Its favorite bower to die, So, lady! I would hear thee speak, 'Tis said that absence conquers love! I've tried, alas! its power to prove, But thou art not forgot. Seargent Smith Prentiss. BORN in Portland, Me., 1808. DIED at Longwood, near Natchez, Miss., 1850. THE SONS OF NEW ENGLAND. [Address before the New England Society of New Orleans, 22 December, 1845.] THE HE spirit of the Pilgrims survives, not only in the knowledge and piety of their sons, but, most of all, in their indefatigable enterprise and indomitable perseverance. They have wrestled with nature till they have prevailed against her, and compelled her reluctantly to reverse her own laws. The sterile soil has become productive under their sagacious culture, and the barren rock, astonished, finds itself covered with luxuriant and unaccustomed verdure. Upon the banks of every river they build temples to industry, and stop the squanderings of the spendthrift waters. They bind the naiads of the brawling stream. They drive the dryads from their accustomed haunts, and force them to desert each favorite grove; for upon river, creek, and bay they are busy transforming the crude forest into stanch and gallant vessels. From every inlet or indenture along the rocky shore swim forth these ocean birds-born in the wild wood, fledged upon the wave. Behold how they spread their white pinions to the favoring breeze, and wing their flight to every quarter of the globe-the carrier-pigeons of the world! It is upon the unstable element the sons of New England have achieved their greatest triumphs. Their adventurous prows vex the waters of every sea. Bold and restless as the old northern Vikings, they go forth to seek their fortunes in the mighty deep. The ocean is their pasture, and over its wide prairies they follow the monstrous herds that feed upon its azure fields. As the hunter casts his lasso upon the wild horse, so they throw their lines upon the tumbling whale. They "draw out Leviathan with a hook." They "fill his skin with barbed irons," and in spite of his terrible strength they "part him among the merchants." To them there are no pillars of Hercules. They seek with avidity new regions, and fear not to be "the first that ever burst" into unknown seas. Had they been the companions of Columbus, the great mariner would not have been urged to return, though he had sailed westward to his dying day. Jefferson Davis. BORN in Christian Co., Ky., 1808. ON LEAVING THE SENATE. [Speech in the U. S. Senate, 21 January, 1861.—The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government. 1881.] I RISE, Mr. President, for the purpose of announcing to the Senate that I have satisfactory evidence that the State of Mississippi, by a solemn ordinance of her people, in convention assembled, has declared her separation from the United States. Under these circumstances, of course, my functions are terminated here. It has seemed to me proper, however, that I should appear in the Senate to announce that fact to my associates, and I will say but very little more. The occasion does not invite me to go into argument; and my physical condition would not permit me to do so, if it were otherwise; and yet it seems to become me to say something on the part of the State I here represent on an occasion so solemn as this. It is known to Senators who have served with me here that I have for many years advocated, as an essential attribute of State sovereignty, the right of a State to secede from the Union. Therefore, if I had not believed there was justifiable cause, if I had thought that Mississippi was acting without sufficient provocation, or without an existing necessity, I should still, under my theory of the government, because of my allegiance to the State of which I am a citizen, have been bound by her action. I, however, may be permitted to say that I do think she has justifiable cause, and I approve of her act. I conferred with her people before that act was taken, counselled them then that, if the state of things which they apprehended should exist when their Convention met, they should take the action which they have now adopted. I hope none who hear me will confound this expression of mine with the advocacy of the right of a State to remain in the Union, and to disregard its constitutional obligations by the nullification of the law. Such is not my theory. Nullification and secession, so often confounded, are, indeed, antagonistic principles. Nullification is a remedy which it is sought to apply within the Union, and against the agent of the States. It is only to be justified when the agent has violated his constitutional obligations, and a State, assuming to judge for itself, denies the right of the agent thus to act, and appeals to the other States of the Union for a decision; but, when the States themselves and when the people of the States have so acted as to convince us that they will not regard our con stitutional rights, then, and then for the first time, arises the doctrine of secession in its practical application. Secession belongs to a different class of remedies. It is to be justified upon the basis that the States are sovereign. There was a time when none denied it. I hope the time may come again when a better comprehension of the theory of our Government, and the inalienable rights of the people of the States, will prevent any one from denying that each State is a sovereign, and thus may reclaim the grants which it has made to any agent whomsoever. I, therefore, say I concur in the action of the people of Mississippi, believing it to be necessary and proper, and should have been bound by their action if my belief had been otherwise; and this brings me to the important point which I wish, on this last occasion, to present to the Senate. It is by this confounding of nullification and secession that the name of a great man whose ashes now mingle with his mother earth has been evoked to justify coercion against a seceded State. The phrase, "to execute the laws," was an expression which General Jackson applied to the case of a State refusing to obey the laws while yet a member of the Union. That is not the case which is now presented. The laws are to be executed over the United States, and upon the people of the United States. They have no relation to any foreign country. It is a perversion of terms-at least, it is a great misapprehension of the case-which cites that expression for application to a State which has withdrawn from the Union. You may make war on a foreign State. If it be the purpose of gentlemen, they may make war against a State which has withdrawn from the Union; but there are no laws of the United States to be executed within the limits of a seceded State. A State, finding herself in the condition in which Mississippi has judged she is—in which her safety requires that she should provide for the maintenance of her rights out of the Union-surrenders all the benefits (and they are known to be many), deprives herself of the advantages (and they are known to be great), severs all the ties of affection (and they are close and enduring), which have bound her to the Union; and thus divesting herself of every benefit-taking upon herself every burden-she claims to be exempt from any power to execute the laws of the United States within her limits. It has been a conviction of pressing necessity-it has been a belief that we are to be deprived in the Union of the rights which our fathers bequeathed to us-which has brought Mississippi to her present decision. She has heard proclaimed the theory that all men are created free and equal, and this made the basis of an attack upon her social institutions; and the sacred Declaration of Independence has been invoked to maintain the position of the equality of the races. That Declaration of Inde |