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And if he carefully register his own convictions, and add them to the collections already formed, of various, converging proofs, he assuredly will have accomplished the noblest end for which man may live and acquire learning-his own improvement and the benefit of his kind. For as an old and wise poet has written, after a wiser saint:

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"The chief use then in man of that he knowes,

Is his paines-taking for the good of all,
Not fleshly weeping for our own made woes,
Not laughing from a melancholy gall,

Not hating from a soul that overflowes

With bitterness breathed out from inward thrall;

But sweetly rather to ease, loose, or binde,
As need requires, this frail, fallen human kinde."

THE DRINKING USAGES OF SOCIETY.-BISHOP POTTER.

THE question, then, is not, What may have been proper in other days or other lands, in the time of Pliny or of Paul, but What is proper now and in our own land. The Apostle points us to a case in which to eat meat might cause one's brother to offend; and his own magnanimous resolution, under such circumstances, he thus avows: "If meat make my brother to offend, I will eat no meat while the world stands." Thus, what may at one time be but a lawful and innocent liberty, becomes at another a positive sin. The true question, then-the only practical question for the Christian patriot and philanthropist, is this: "Intemperance abounds! Ought not my personal influence, whether by example or by precept, to be directed to its suppression? Can it be suppressed while our present drinking usages continue? In a country where distilled liquors are so cheap and so abundant, and where the practice of adulterating every species of fermented liquor abounds-in such a country, can any practical and important distinction be made between different kinds of intoxicating liquors? If abstinence is to be practised at all as a prudential or a charitable act, can it have

much practical value unless it be abstinence from all that can intoxicate?" These questions are submitted, without fear, to the most deliberate and searching scrutiny.

THE FUTURE GLORY OF AMERICA.-RAMSAY.

WHEN I anticipate in imagination the future glory of my country, and the illustrious figure it will soon make on the theatre of the world, my heart distends with generous pride for being an American. What a substratum for empire! compared with which, the foundation of the Macedonian, the Roman, and the British sink into insignificance. Some of our large states have territory superior to the island of Great Britain, whilst the whole together are little inferior to Europe itself. Our independence will people this extent of country with freemen, and will stimulate the innumerable inhabitants thereof, by every motive, to perfect the acts of government, and to extend human happiness.

Having for

I congratulate you on our glorious prospects three long years weathered the storms of adversity, we are at length arrived in view of the calm haven of peace and security. We have laid the foundations of a new empire, which promises to enlarge itself to vast dimensions, and to give happiness to a great continent. It is now our turn to figure on the face of the earth, and in the annals of the world. The arts and sciences are planted among us, and, fostered by the auspicious influence of equal governments, are growing up to maturity, while truth and freedom flourish by their sides. Liberty, both civil and religious, in her noontide blaze, shines forth with unclouded lustre on all ranks and denominations of men.

Ever since the flood, true religion, literature, arts, empire, and riches have taken a slow and gradual course from east to west, and are now about fixing their long and favorite abode in this new western world. Our sun of political happiness is already risen, and hath lifted its head over the mountains,

illuminating our hemisphere with liberty, light, and polished life. Our independence will redeem one quarter of the globe from tyranny and oppression, and consecrate it to the chosen seat of truth, justice, freedom, learning, and religion. We are laying the foundation of happiness for countless millions. Generations yet unborn will bless us for the blood-bought inheritance we are about to bequeath them. Oh! happy times! Oh! glorious days! Oh! kind, indulgent, bountiful Providence, that we live in this highly-favored period, and have the honor of helping forward these great events, and of suffering in a cause of such infinite importance!

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EULOGY UPON JOHN C. CALHOUN.-WEBSTER.

SIR, the eloquence of Mr. Calhoun, or the manner of his exhibition of his sentiments in public bodies, was part of his intellectual character. It grew out of the qualities of his mind. It was plain, strong, terse, condensed, concise; sometimes impassioned, still always severe. Rejecting ornament, not often seeking far for illustration, his power consisted in the plainness of his propositions, in the closeness of his logic, and in the earnestness and energy of his manner. These are the qualities, as I think, which have enabled him through such a long course years to speak often, and yet always command attention. His demeanor as a senator is known to us all-is appreciated, venerated by us all. No man was more respectful to others; no man carried himself with greater decorum; no man with superior dignity. I think there is not one of us but felt, when he last addressed us from his seat in the Senate,-his form still erect, with a voice by no means indicating such a degree of physical weakness as did in fact possess him, with clear tones, and an impressive, and, I may say, imposing manner,—who did not feel that he might imagine that he saw before us a senator of Rome, when Rome survived.

Mr. President, he had the basis, the indispensable basis, of

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all high character, and that was, unspotted integrity, unimpeached honor and character. If he had aspirations, they were high, and honorable, and noble. There was nothing grovelling or low, or meanly selfish, that came near the head or the heart of Mr. Calhoun. Firm in his purpose, perfectly patriotic and honest, as I am sure he was, in the principles that he espoused, and in the measures that he defended, aside from that large regard for that species of distinction that conducted him to eminent stations for the benefit of the republic, I do not believe he had a selfish motive or selfish feeling.

However, sir, he may have differed from others of us in his political opinions, or his political principles, those principles and those opinions will now descend to posterity under the sanction of a great name. He has lived long enough, he has done enough, and he has done it so well, so successfully, so honorably, as to connect himself for all time with the records of his country. He is now an historical character. Those of us who have known him here will find that he has left upon our minds and our hearts a strong and lasting impression of his person, his character, and his public performances, which, while we live, will never be obliterated. We shall hereafter, I am sure, indulge in it as a grateful recollection that we have lived in his age, that we have been his contemporaries, that we have seen him, and heard him, and known him. We shall delight to speak of him to those who are rising up to fill our places. And when the time shall come when we ourselves shall go, one after another, in succession, to our graves, we shall carry with us a deep sense of his genius and character, his honor and integrity, his amiable deportment in private life, and the purity of his exalted patriotism.

CAPITAL PUNISHMENT.-EDW. LIVINGSTON.

HISTORY presents to us the magic glass on which, by looking at past, we may discern future events. It is folly not to read; it is perversity not to follow its lessons. If the hemlock had

not been brewed for felons in Athens, would the fatal cup have been drained by Socrates? If the people had not been familiarized to scenes of judicial homicide, would France or England. have been disgraced by the useless murder of Louis or of Charles? If the punishment of death had not been sanctioned by the ordinary laws of those kingdoms, would the one have been deluged with the blood of innocence, of worth, of patriotism, and of science, in her revolution? Would the best and noblest lives of the other have been lost on the scaffold in her civil broils? Would her lovely and calumniated queen, the virtuous Malesherbes, the learned Condorcet-would religion, personified in the pious ministers of the altar, courage and honor, in the host of high-minded nobles, and science, in its worthy representative, Lavoisier-would the daily hecatomb of loyalty and worth-would all have been immolated by the stroke of the guillotine; or Russell and Sidney, and the long succession of victims of party and tyranny by the axe? The fires of Smithfield would not have blazed, nor, after the lapse of ages, should we yet shudder at the name of St. Bartholomew, if the ordinary ecclesiastical law had not usurped the attributes of divine vengeance, and by the sacrilegious and absurd doctrine, that offences against the Deity were to be punished with death, given a pretext to these atrocities. Nor, in the awful and mysterious scene on Mount Calvary, would that agony have been inflicted, if by the daily sight of the cross, as an instrument of justice, the Jews had not been prepared to make it one of their sacrilegious rage. But there is no end of the examples which crowd upon the memory, to show the length to which the exercise of this power, by the law, has carried the dreadful abuse of it, under the semblance of justice. Every nation has wept over the graves of patriots, heroes, and martyrs, sacrificed by its own fury. Every age has had its annals of blood.

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