II. THE SHIP OF STATE. LONGFELLOW. Thou, too, sail on, O Ship of State! III. THE TRUE HERO. HORACE BUSHNELL. The true hero is the great, wise man of duty,-he whose soul is armed by truth and supported by the smile of God,he who meets life's perils with a cautious but tranquil spirit, gathers strength by facing its storms, and dies, if he is called to die, as a Christian victor at the post of duty. And, if we must have heroes, and wars wherein to make them, there is none so brilliant as a war with wrong,-no hero so fit to to be sung as he who hath gained the bloodless victory of truth and mercy. IV. HEART ESSENTIAL TO GENIUS. We are not always equal to our fate, W. G. SIMMS. Nor true to our conditions. Doubt and fear With expectation, sinks beneath the time. The masters have their weakness. "I would climb," V. EDUCATION. ADDISON. I consider a human soul without education, like marble in the quarry, which shows none of its inherent beauties until the skill of the polisher fetches out the colors, makes the surface shine, and discovers every ornamental cloud, spot, and vein that runs through the body of it. Education, after the same manner, when it works upon a noble mind, draws out every latent virtue and perfection, which, without such helps, are never able to make their appearance. VI. THE VANITY OF WEALTH. DR. JOHNSON. No more thus brooding o'er yon heap, Can gold remove the mortal hour'? VII. CONSOLATION OF THE GOSPEL. A. ALEXANDER. OH, PRECIOUS GOSPEL! Will any merciless hand endeavor to tear away from our hearts, this last, this sweetest consolation'? Would you darken the only avenue through which one ray of hope can enter'? Would you tear from the aged and infirm poor the only prop on which their souls can repose in peace'? Would you deprive the dying of their only source of consolation'? Would you rob the world of its richest treasure'? Would you let loose the flood-gates of every vice, and bring back upon the earth the horrors of superstition, or the atrocities of atheism'? Then endeavor to subvert the gospel'; throw around you the firebrands of infidelity'; laugh at religion, and make a mockery of futurity'; but be assured that for all these things, God will bring you into judgment`. VIII. THE LIGHT OF HOPE. O. W. B. PEABODY. 1. Oh, who that has gazed, in the stillness of even, Has seen not afar, in the bosom of heaven, And mourned that the path to a region so fair Should be shrouded with sadness and fears;— 2. And who that has gazed, has not longed for an hour, And Hope, like the rainbow, unfold, through the shower And, oh! if that rainbow of promise may shine To brighten the vale of the tomb. IX. PAMPERING THE BODY AND STARVING THE SOUL. EDWARD EVERETT. 1. What! feed a child's body, and let his soul hunger'? pamper his limbs, and starve his faculties'? Plant the earth, cover a thousand hills with your droves of cattle, pursue the fish to their hiding-places in the sea, and spread out your wheat-fields across the plain, in order to supply the wants of that body which will soon be as cold and as senseless as the poorest clod, and let the pure spiritual essence within you, with all its glorious capacities for improvement, languish and pine'? 2. What build factories, turn in rivers upon the waterwheels, unchain the imprisoned spirits of steam, to weave a garment for the body, and let the soul remain unadorned and naked'? What! send out your vessels to the furthest ocean, and make battle with the monsters of the deep, in order to obtain the means of lighting up your dwellings and workshops, and prolonging the hours of labor for the meat that perisheth, and permit that vital spark, which God has kindled, which He has intrusted to our care, to be fanned into a bright and heavenly flame,—-permit it, I say, to languish and go out'? 3. What considerate man can enter a school, and not reflect, with awe, that it is a seminary where immortal minds are training for eternity'? What parent but is, at times, weighed down with the thought, that there must be laid the foundations of a building which will stand, when not merely temple and palace, but the perpetual hills and adamantine rocks on which they rest, have melted away!—that a light may there be kindled which will shine, not merely when every artificial beam is extinguished, but when the affrighted sun has fled away from the heavens'? 1. "We all do fade as a leaf." Change is the essence of life. แ Passing away," is written on all things; and passing away is passing on from strength to strength, from glory to |