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It is a happy world. Hark! how the merry birds sing, and the young lambs-see! how they gambol on the hillside. Even the trees wave, and the brooks ripple in gladness. Yon eagle! Ah! how joyfully he soars up to the glorious heavens-the bird of liberty, the bird of America.

"His throne is on the mountain-top,

His fields the boundless air,
And hoary peaks, that proudly prop
The skies-his dwellings are.

He rises like a thing of light,

Amid the noontide blaze:

The midday sun is clear and bright—

It cannot dim his gaze."

It is happy. I see it and hear it all about me; nay, I feel it here in the glow, the eloquent glow of my own heart. He who made it must be happy.

It is a great world. Look off to the mighty ocean when the storm is upon it; to the huge mountain, when the thunder and the lightnings play over it; to the vast forest, the interminable waste; the sun, the moon, and the myriads of fair stars, countless as the sands upon the seashore. It is a great, a magnificent world, and He who made it,-Oh! He is the perfection of all loveliness, all goodness, all greatness, all gloriousness!

2. NATIONAL BANNER.-E. Everett.

All hail to our glorious ensign! courage to the heart and strength to the hand, to which, in all time, it shall be intrusted! May it ever wave in honor, in unsullied glory, and patriotic hope, on the dome of the capitol, în

the country's stronghold, on the entented plain, on the wave-rocked topmast. Wherever, on the earth's surface, the eye of the American shall behold it, may he have reason to bless it! On whatsoever spot it is planted, there may freedom have a foothold, humanity a brave champion, and religion an altar. Though stained with blood in a righteous cause, may it never, in any cause, be stained with shame. Alike, when its gorgeous folds shall wanton in lazy holiday triumphs on the summer breeze, and its tattered fragments be dimly seen through the clouds of war, may it be the joy and pride of the American heart. First raised in the cause of right and liberty, in that cause alone may it for ever spread out its streaming blazonry to the battle and the storm. Having been borne victoriously across the continent and on every sea, may virtue, and freedom, and peace for ever follow where it leads the way!

3. TURNING THE GRINDSTONE.

To illustrate the common cunning of men in turning their fellows to account, Dr. Franklin relates this amusing anecdote: "When I was a little boy, I remember one cold winter's morning I was accosted by a smiling man, with an axe on his shoulder; 'My pretty boy,' said he, has your father a grindstone?' 'Yes, Sir,' said I. 'You are a fine little fellow,' said he, 'will you let me grind my axe on it?' Pleased with his compliment of 'fine little fellow,' 'O yes, Sir,' I answered, 'it is down in the shop.' 'And will you, my man,' said he, patting me on the head, 'get a little hot water?' How could I refuse? I ran and soon brought a kettle

ful. 'How old are you, and what's your name?' continued he, without waiting for a reply; 'I am sure you are one of the finest fellows that ever I have seen; will you just turn a few minutes for me?' Tickled with the flattery, like a fool, I went to work, and bitterly did I rue the day. It was a new axe, and I toiled and tugged till I was almost tired to death. The school-bell rang, and I could not get away; my hands were blistered, and it was not half ground. At length, however, the axe was sharpened, and the man turned to me with 'Now, you little rascal, you've played the truant; scud for school, or you'll rue it.' Alas! thought I, it was hard enough to turn a grindstone this cold day, but now to be called a little rascal was too much. It sank deep into my mind, and often have I thought of it since. When I see a merchant over polite to his customers, begging them to take a little brandy, and throwing his goods on the counter, thinks I, that man has an axe to grind. When I see a man flattering the people, making great professions of attachment to liberty, who is in private life a tyrant, methinks, look out, good people, that fellow would set you turning grindstones. When I see a man hoisted into office by party spirit, without a single qualification to render him respectable or useful, alas! methinks, deluded people, you are doomed for a season to turn the grindstone for a booby."

4. LIVE FOR SOMETHING.-Dr. Chalmers. B. 1780, d. 1847.

Thousands of men breathe, move, and live, pass off the stage of life, and are heard of no more. Why? They did not partake of good in the world, and none

were blessed by them; none could point to them as the means of their redemption; not a line they wrote, not a word they spoke could be recalled, and so they perished; their light went out in darkness, and they were not remembered more than insects of yesterday. Will you thus live and die, O man immortal? Live for something! Do good, and leave behind you a monument of virtue that the storms of time can never destroy. Write your name by kindness, love and mercy on the hearts of thousands with whom you come in contact, year by year, and you will never be forgotten. No, your name, your deeds will be as legible on the hearts you leave behind, as the stars on the brow of the evening. Good deeds will shine as brightly on the earth as the stars of heaven.

5. THE GRAVE.-Washington Irving.

Oh, the grave! the grave! It buries every error; covers every defect; extinguishes every resentment. From its peaceful bosom spring none but fond regret and tender recollections. Who can look down upon the grave even of an enemy, and not feel a compunctious throb, that ever he should have warred with the poor handful of earth that lies mouldering before him? But the grave of those he loved, what a place for meditation ! Then it is we call up, in long review, the whole history of virtue and gentleness, and the thousand endearments lavished upon us, almost unheeded, in the daily intercourse of intimacy; then it is, we dwell upon the tenderness, the solemn and awful tenderness of the parting scene; the bed of death, with all the stifled grief; its noiseless attendants, its mute, watchful assiduities; the

last testimonies of expiring love; the feeble, fluttering, thrilling-Oh! how thrilling the pressure of the hand; the last, fond look of the glazed eye, turning upon us, even from the threshold of existence; the faint, faltering accents struggling in death to give one more assurance of affection! Aye, go to the grave of buried love and meditate! There settle the account with thy conscience, for every past endearment, unregarded, of that departed being, who never, never, never can return, to be soothed by contrition! If thou art a child, and hast ever added a sorrow to the soul, or a furrow to the silvered brow of an affectionate parent; if thou art a husband, and hast ever caused the fond bosom that ventured its whole happiness in thy arms, to doubt one moment of thy kindness or thy truth; if thou art a friend, and hast ever wronged in thought, or word, or deed, the spirit that generously confided in thee; if thou art a lover, and hast ever given one unmerited pang to the true heart that now lies cold and still beneath thy feet; then be sure that every unkind look, every ungracious word, every ungenteel action, will come thronging back upon thy memory, and knocking dolefully at thy soul; then be sure thou wilt be down, sorrowing and repentant on the grave, and utter the unheard groan, and pour the unavailing tear, more deep, more bitter, because unheard and unavailing.

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6. DANIEL WEBSTER'S CELEBRITY.

In 1835," says a Bostonian, "I was attending the circuit court in Portland, and boarded at the same hotel with Judge Story, and some of the bar. One day after

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