I

And earth puts on its rudest frown;
But colder, ruder was the hand,

That drove them from their own fair land,
Their own fair land--refinement's chosen seat,
Art's trophied dwelling, learning's green retreat;
By valour guarded, and by victory crowned,
For all, but gentle charity, renowned.

With streaming eye, yet steadfast heart,
Even from that land they dared to part,

And burst each tender tie;
Haunts, where their sunny youth was passed,
Homes, where they fondly hoped at last

In peaceful age to die;
Friends, kindred, comfort, all they spurned

Their fathers' hallowed graves;
And to a world of darkness turned,

Beyond a world of waves.
2 When Israel's race from bondage fled,

Signs from on high the wanderers led;
But here-Heaven hung no symbol here,
Their steps to guide, their souls to cheer;
They saw, through sorrow's lengthening night,
Nought but the fagot's guilty light;
The cloud they gazed at was the smoke,
That round their murdered brethren broke.
Nor power above, nor power below,
Sustained them in their hour of wo;

A fearful path they trod,

And dared a fearful doom;
To build an altar to their God,

And find a quiet tomb.
3 Yet, strong in weakness, there they stand,

On yonder ice-bound rock,
Stern and resolved, that faithful band,

To meet fate's rudest shock.
Though anguish rends the father's breast,
For them, his dearest and his best,

With him the waste who trod-
Though tears that freeze, the mother sheds
Upon her children's houseless heads

The Christian turns to God!

4 In grateful adoration now,

Upon the barren sands they bow.
What tongue of joy e’er woke such prayer,
As bursts in desolation there?
What arm of strength e’er wrought such power,

As waits to crown that feeble hour?
There into life an infant empire springs!

There falls the iron from the soul;
There liberty's young accents roll,

Up to the King of kings!
To fair creation's farthest bound,
That thrilling summons yet shall sound;

The dreaming nations shall awake,
And to their centre earth's old kingdoms shake

Pontiff and prince, your sway

Must crumble from that day;
Before the loftier throne of Heaven,

The hand is raised, the pledge is given-
One monarch to obey, one creed to own,
That monarch, God, that creed, His word alone.
5 Spread out earth's holiest records here,

Of days and deeds to reverence dear;
A zeal like this what pious legends tell?

On kingdoms built

In blood and guilt,
The worshippers of vulgar triumph dwell-

But what exploit with theirs shall page,

Who rose to bless their kind;
Who left their nation and their age,

Man's spirit to unbind?

Who boundless seas passed o'er,
And boldly met, in every path,
Famine and frost and heathen wrath,

To dedicate a shore,
Where piety's meek train might breathe their vow
And seek their Maker with an unshamed brow;
Where liberty's glad racę might proudly come,
And set up there an everlasting home?

19

EXERCISE 77.

Duty of Literary men to their Country.—GRIMKE.

We cannot honor our country with too deep a reverence; we cannot love her with an affection, too pure and fervent; we cannot serve her with an energy of

purpose or a faithfulness of zeal, too steadfast and ar5 dent. And what is our country? It is not the East, with

her hills and her valleys, with her countless sails, and the rocky ramparts of her shores. It is not the North, with her thousand villages, and her harvest-home, with her

frontiers of the lake and the ocean. It is not the 10 West, with her forest-sea and her inland-isles, with her

luxuriant' expanses, clothed in the verdant corn, with her beautiful Ohio, and her majestic Missouri. Nor is it yet the South, opulent in the mimic snow of the cot

ton, in the rich plantations of the rustling cane, and 15 in the golden robes of the rice-field. What are these

but the sister families of one greater, better, holier family, our COUNTRY? I come not here to speak the dialect, or to give the counsels of the patriot-states

But I come, a patriot-scholar, to vindicate the 20 rights, and to plead for the interests of American Lite

rature. And be assured, that we cannot, as patriotscholars, think too highly of that country, or sacrifice too much for her. And let us never forget, let us

rather remember with a religious awe, that the union 25 of these States is indispensable to our Literature, as

it is to our national independence and civil liberties, to our prosperity, happiness, and improvement. If, indeed, we desire to behold a Literature like that, which

has sculptured, with such energy of expression, which 30 has painted so faithfully and vividly, the crimes, the

vices, the follies of ancient and modern Europe: if we desire that our land should furnish for the orator and the novelist, for the painter and the poet, age

after age, the wild and romantic scenery of war; the 35 glittering march of armies, and the revelry of the

camp; the shrieks and blasphemies, and all the horrors of the battle field; the desolation of the harvest, and the

man.

burning cottage; the storm, the sack, and the ruin of 40 cities: If we desire to unchain the furious passions of

jealousy and selfishness, of hatred, revenge and ambition, those lions, that now sleep harmless in their den: If we desire, that the lake, the river, the ocean, should blush

with the blood of brothers; that the winds should waft 45 from the land to the sea, from the sea to the land, the

roar and the smoke of battle; that the very mountaintops should become altars for the sacrifice of brothers; if we desire that these, and such as these—the elements

to an incredible extent, of the Literature of the old 50 world—should be the elements of our Literature, then,

but then only, let us hurl from its pedestal the majestic statue of our union, and scatter its fragments over all our land. But, if we covet for our country the noblest,

purest, loveliest Literature, the world has ever seen, such 55 a Literature as shall honor God, and bless Mankind; a

Literature, whose smiles might play upon an Angel's face, whose tears “would not stain an Angel's cheek;" then let us cling to the union of these States, with a pat

riot's love, with a scholar's enthusiasm, with a chris60 tian's hope. In her heavenly character, as a holocaust

self-sacrificed to God; at the height of her glory, as the ornament of a free, educated, peaceful, christian people, American Literature will find that THE INTELLECTUAL

SPIRIT IS HER VERY TREE OF LIFE, AND THAT UNION, 65 HER GARDEN OF PARADISE.

EXERCISE 78. Eulogy on Adams and Jefferson.-Wirt. Such was the state of things under which the Congress of 1776 assembled, when Adams and Jefferson again met. It was, as you know, in this Congress, that

the question of American Independence came, for the 5 first time, to be discussed; and never, certainly, has a

more momentous question been discussed in any age or in any country; for, it was fraught, not only with the destinies of this wide extended continent, but as the

event has shown, and is still showing, with the destinies 10 of man all over the world,

Amid this appalling array that surrounded them, the first to enter the breach, sword in hand, was John Adams—the vision of his youth at his heart, and his coun

try in every nerve. On the sixth of May, he offered, in 15 committee of the whole, the significant resolution, that

the colonies should form governments independent of the crown. This was the harbinger of more important measures, and seems to have been put forward to feel

the pulse of the House. The resolution, after a severa 20 struggle, was adopted on the 15th of May following.

On the 7th of June, by previous concert, Richard Henry Lee moved the great resolution of Independence, and was seconded by John Adams; and “then came

the tug of war.” The debate upon it was continued 25 from the 7th to the 10th, when the further consideration

of it was postponed to the 1st of July, and at the same time a committee of five was appointed to prepare, provisionally, a draught of a Declaration of Independence.

At the head of this important committee, which was then 30 appointed by a vote of the House, although he was proba

bly the youngest member, and one of the youngest men in the House, for he had served only part of the former session, and was but thirty-two years of age, stands the

name of Thomas Jefferson-Mr. Adams stands next. 35 And these two gentlemen, having been deputed a sub

committee to prepare the draught, that draught, at Mr. Adams's earnest importunity, was prepared by his more youthful friend. Of this transaction Mr. Adams is him

self the historian, and the authorship of the Declaration, 40 though once disputed, is thus placed forever beyond the reach of question.

The final debate on the resolution was postponed as we have seen, for nearly a month. In the meantime,

all who are conversant with the course of action of all 45 deliberative bodies, know how much is done by conver

sation among the members. It is not often, indeed, that proselytes are made on great questions by public debate. On such questions, opinions are far more frequently

formed in private, and so formed, that debate is seldom 50 known to change them. Hence the value of the out-of

door talent of chamber consultation, where objections, candidly stated, are candidly, calmly, and mildly discussed; where neither pride, nor shame, nor anger take