will" shoulder his crutch and tell how fields were won," and tell you of its priceless value. And yet we are shamelessly struggling in his sight, like mercenary children, for the patrimony, around the death-bed of a common parent, by whose industry and exertion it was accumulated, before the heart of him who gave them existence had ceased to pulsate. Amid all these conflicts, it has been my policy to give peace and stability to the Union, to silence agitation, to restore fraternal relations to an estranged brotherhood, and to lend my feeble aid in enabling our common country to march onward to the glorious fruition which awaits her. I have opposed, and will hereafter oppose, the monster disunion, in any and every form, and howsoever disguised, or in whatsoever condition, —— whether in the germ, or the stately upas, with its widespread branches; whether it comes from the North or the South, or the East or the West; and whether it consists in denying the South her just rights, or in her demanding that to which she is not entitled. The Union of these States, in the true spirit of the constitution, is a sentiment of my life. It was the dream of my early years; it has been the pride and joy of manhood; and, if it shall please Heaven to spare me to age, I pray that its abiding beauty may beguile my vacant and solitary hours. I do not expect a sudden disruption of the political bonds which unite the states of this confederacy; but I greatly fear a growing spirit of jealousy and discontent and sectional hate, which must, if permitted to extend itself, finally destroy the beauty and harmony of the fabric, if it does not raze it to its foundation. It cannot be maintained by force, and majorities in a confederacy should be admonished to use their power justly. Let no one suppose that those who have been joined together will remain so, despite the commission of mutual wrongs, because they have once enjoyed each other's confidence and affection, and propriety requires them to remain united. A chafed spirit, whether of a community or an individual, may be goaded beyond endurance; and the history of the world has proved that the season of desperation which succeeds is awfully reckless of consequences. But woe be to him by whom the offence of disunion comes! He will be held accursed when the

bloody mandates of Herod and Nero shall be forgiven; and be regarded as a greater monster in this world than he who, to signalize his brutal ferocity, reared a monument of thousands of human skulls; and, in the next,

"The common damned will shun his society,

And look upon themselves as fiends less foul."

THE INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. — J. A. Dix.

THE influence of Christianity upon the political condition of mankind, though silent and almost imperceptible, has doubtless been one of the most powerful instruments of its amelioration. The principles and the practical rules of conduct which it prescribes; the doctrine of the natural equality of men, of a common origin, a common responsibility, and a common fate; the lessons of humility, gentleness and forbearance, which it teaches, are as much at war with political as they are with all moral injustice, oppression, and wrong. During century after century, excepting for brief intervals, the world too often saw the beauty of the system marred by the fiercest intolerance and the grossest depravation. It has been made the confederate of monarchs in carrying out schemes of oppression and fraud. Under its banner armed multitudes have been banded together, and led on by martial prelates to wars of desolation and revenge. Perpetrators of the blackest crimes have purchased from its chief ministers a mercenary immunity from punishment.

But nearly two thousand years have passed away, and no trace is left of the millions who, under the influence of bad passions, have dishonored its holy precepts; or of the far smaller number who, in seasons of general depravation, have drunk its current of living water on the solitary mountain or in the hollow rock. Its simple maxims, outliving them all, are silently working out a greater revolution than any which the world has seen; and long as the period may seem since its doctrines were first announced, it is almost imperceptible when regarded as one of the divisions of that

time which is of endless duration. To use the language of an eloquent and philosophical writer, "The movements of Providence are not restricted to narrow bounds; it is not anxious to deduce to-day the consequences of the premises it laid down yesterday. It may defer this for ages, till the fulness of time shall come. Its logic will not be less conclusive for reasoning slowly. Providence moves through time as the gods of Homer through space; it makes a step, and years have rolled away. How long a time, how many circumstances, intervened before the regeneration of the moral powers of man by Christianity exercised its great, its legitimate function upon his social condition! Yet who can doubt or mistake its power?"

THE EXAMPLE OF OUR FOREFATHERS.-J. Sparks.

THE instructive lesson of history, teaching by example, can nowhere be studied with more profit, or with a better promise, than in the Revolutionary period of America; and especially by us, who sit under the tree our fathers have planted, enjoy its shade, and are nourished by its fruits. But little is our merit or gain, that we applaud their deeds, unless we emulate their virtues. Love of country was in them an absorbing principle, an undivided feeling; not of a fragment, a section, but of the whole country. Union was the arch on which they raised the strong tower of a nation's independence. Let the arm be palsied that would loosen one stone in the basis of this fair structure, or mar its beauty; the tongue mute, that would dishonor their names, by calculating the value of that which they deemed without price!

They have left us an example already inscribed in the world's memory; an example portentous to the aims of tyranny in every land; an example that will console in all ages the drooping aspirations of oppressed humanity. They have left us a written charter as a legacy, and as a guide to our course. But every day convinces us that a written charter may become powerless. Ignorance may misinterpret it; ambition may assail and faction destroy its vital parts; and aspiring knavery may at last sing its requiem on the

tomb of departed liberty. It is the spirit which lives: in this are our safety and our hope, - the spirit of our fathers; and while this dwells deeply in our remembrance, and its flame is cherished, ever burning, ever pure, on the altar of our hearts, while it incites us to think as they have thought, and do as they have done, the honor and the praise will be ours, to have preserved unimpaired the rich inheritance which they so nobly achieved.

PUBLIC FAITH.-F. Ames.

To expatiate on the value of public faith may pass with some men for declamation ; to such men I have nothing to say. To others I will urge, Can any circumstance mark upon a people more turpitude and debasement? Can anything tend more to make men think themselves mean, or degrade to a lower point their estimation of virtue, and their standard of action?

It would not merely demoralize mankind; it tends to break all the ligaments of society, to dissolve that mysterious charm which attracts individuals to the nation, and to inspire in its stead a repulsive sense of shame and disgust.

What is patriotism? Is it a narrow affection for the spot where a man was born? Are the very clods where we tread entitled to this ardent preference because they are greener? No, sir; this is not the character of the virtue, and it soars higher for its object. It is an extended self-love, mingling with all the enjoyments of life, and twisting itself with the minutest filaments of the heart. It is thus we obey the laws of society, because they are the laws of virtue. In their authority we see, not the array of force and terror, but the venerable image of our country's honor. Every good citizen makes that honor his own, and cherishes it not only as precious, but as sacred. He is willing to risk his life in its defence, and is conscious that he gains protection while he gives it. For what rights of a citizen will be deemed inviolable when a state renounces the principles that constitute their security? Or, if his life should not be invaded, what would its enjoyments be in a country odious in the eyes of strangers, and dishonored in his own?

Could he look with affection and veneration to such a country as his parent? The sense of having one would die within him; he would blush for his patriotism, if he retained any; and justly, for it would be a vice. He would be a banished man in his native land.

I see no exception to the respect that is paid among nations to the law of good faith. If there are cases in this enlightened period when it is violated, there are none when it is decried. It is the philosophy of politics, the religion of governments. It is observed by barbarians, a whiff of tobacco-smoke, or a string of beads, gives not merely binding force, but sanctity, to treaties. Even in Algiers, a truce may be bought for money, but, when ratified, even Algiers is too wise, or too just, to disown and annul its obligation. Thus, we see, neither the ignorance of savages, nor the principles of an association for piracy and rapine, permit a nation to despise its engagements. If, sir, there could be a resurrection from the foot of the gallows, if the victims of justice could live again, collect together and form a society, — they would, however loath, soon find themselves obliged to make justice that justice under which they fell — the fundamental law of their state. They would perceive it was their interest to make others respect, and they would therefore soon pay some respect themselves to the obligations of good faith.

It is painful, I hope it is superfluous, to make even the supposition that America should furnish the occasion of this opprobrium. No! let me not even imagine that a republican government, sprung, as our own is, from a people enlightened and uncorrupted, a government whose origin is right, and whose daily discipline is duty, can, upon solemn debate, make its option to be faithless, can dare to act what despots dare not avow, what our own example evinces, the states of Barbary are unsuspected of. No! rather let me make the supposition that Great Britain refuses to execute the treaty after we have done everything to carry it into effect. Is there any language of reproach pungent enough to express your commentary on the fact? What would you say, or, rather, what would you not say? Would you