man accomplishment may be resolvable into the degree of intellectual endowment and the energy with which it is directed. A small body driven by a great force will produce a result equal to, or even greater than, that of a much larger body moved by a considerably less force. So it is with minds. Hence we often see men of comparatively small capacity, by greater energy alone, leave, and justly leave, their superiors in natural gifts far behind them in the race for honors, distinction, and preferment.

This is, perhaps, the most striking characteristic of those great minds and intellects which never fail to impress their names, their views, ideas, and opinions, indelibly upon the history of the times in which they live. To this class belong Columbus, Luther, Cromwell, Watt, Fulton, Franklin, and Washington. It was to the same class that General Jackson belonged. He had not only a clear conception of his purpose, but a will and energy to execute it. And it is in the same class, or amongst the first order of men, that Henry Clay will be assigned a place; that great man whose recent loss the nation still mourns. Mr. Clay's success, and those civic achievements which will render his name as lasting as the history of his country, were the result of nothing so much as that element of character which I have denominated energy. Thrown upon life at an early age, without any means or resources save his natural powers and abilities, and without the advantages of anything above a common-school education, he had nothing to rely upon but himself, and nothing upon which to place a hope but his own exertions. But, fired with a high and noble ambition, he resolved, as young as he was, and cheerless as were his prospects, to meet and surmount every embarrassment and obstacle by which he was surrounded. His aims and objects were high, and worthy the greatest efforts; they were not to secure the laurels won upon the battle-field, but those wreaths which adorn the brow of the wise, the firm, the sagacious and far-seeing statesman. The honor and glory of his life was,

"Th' applause of list'ning senates to command,
The threats of pain and ruin to despise,

To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land,
And read his history in a nation's eyes."

This great end he most successfully accomplished. In his life and character you have a most striking example of what energy and indomitable perseverance can do, even when opposed by the most adverse circumstances.

BEECHER.

1813

HENRY WARD BEECHER, the most distinguished preacher of his day, not only in America, but in the world, was born at Litchfield, Connecticut, in 1813. He is the son of Rev. Dr. Lyman Beecher, himself a clergyman of positive character and commanding abilities, and is one of a large family of brothers and sisters, each of whom has won distinction in literature or the pulpit. Henry Ward graduated at Amherst College in 1834, and in 1837 was settled as pastor of a Presbyterian church at Lawrenceburgh, Indiana. Two years later he removed to Indianapolis, whence the first glimmer of his great genius surprised and fascinated the public. After eight years' service at this post, he accepted a call to the pastorate of Plymouth Church, Brooklyn, which is still the theater of his labors. His rank as a pulpit orator has already been indicated in the first lines of this paragraph. In that character he has won his fame, and in it he will go down in history with Massillon and Bossuet, and the great preachers of the English Church. His connection with literature is almost exclusively via the pulpit; what he speaks to attentive thousands in his church reappears in his many books, lacking, it is true, the magnetic and intensifying charm of his personal presence, yet instinct and eloquent with the lofty thoughts and the noble catholicity which are fundamental constituents of his nature. The limitations which restrict this notice forbid any adequate analysis of the sources of his power; but it may be suggested that Mr. Beecher's success as a moral teacher is largely due to the practical and sympathetic qualities of his mind. He knows how to put himself in direct rapport with his hearers or readers, knows their needs, their modes of thinking; puts himself in their place, in fact, and manipulates an audience of thousands as easily and effectively as he would conduct his part of a colloquy. A briefer definition of his exceptional intellectual equipment would be, - a marvelous knowledge of human nature, touching which he would almost seem to have received a special illumination. In his sermons and addresses every one recognizes a personal application, so many-sided and many-eyed is Mr. Beecher's mind; he speaks not merely to those in his presence, but to all humanity. His first book, Lectures to Young Men, was published in 1850, and has passed through nearly a score of editions. The Star Papers, First and Second Series, two volumes made up of his contributions to a New York weekly paper, and Life Thoughts, a collection of extracts from his extemporaneous sermons, have had great popularity. Within a year has been issued his Yale Lectures on Preaching, a series of vigorous and suggestive discourses delivered before the students of the Yale Divinity School. Mr. Beecher's most ambitious literary work is The Life of Jesus, the Christ, which is still unfinished, only one volume having been published. One of the most noteworthy advantages possessed by Mr. Beecher is his power of adapting his style to his subject. Our extracts illustrate this, and an examination of other specimens of his composition would disclose a still wider range of his versatility. His homiletic style is simple, yet singularly vigorous, compact in form, yet euphonious and flowing; his rhetoric is marked by frequent illustrations drawn from universal knowledge or experience, and by occasional passages of dramatic fervor and picturesque beauty. But in all his writings all considerations are held strictly subordinate to strength and substance.

THE MONTHS.

Snow is on the

1. JANUARY! Darkness and light reign alike. ground. Cold is in the air. The winter is blossoming in frostflowers. Why is the ground hidden? Why is the earth white? So hath God wiped out the past, so hath he spread the earth like an unwritten page for a new year! Old sounds are silent in the forest and in the air. Insects are dead, birds are gone, leaves have perished, and

all the foundations of soil remain. Upon this lies, white and tranquil, the emblem of newness and purity, the virgin robes of the yet unstained year.

2. FEBRUARY! The day gains upon the night. The strife of heat and cold is scarce begun. The winds that come from the desolate north wander through forests of frost-cracking boughs, and shout in the air the weird cries of the northern bergs and ice-resounding oceans. Yet, as the month wears on, the silent work begins, though storms rage. The earth is hidden yet, but not dead. The sun is drawing near. The storms cry out. But the Sun is not heard in all the heavens. Yet he whispers words of deliverance into the ears of every sleeping seed and root that lies beneath the snow. The day opens; but the night shuts the earth with its frost-lock. They strive together; but the darkness and the cold are growing weaker. On some nights they forget to work.

3. MARCH! The conflict is more turbulent; but the victory is gained. The world awakes. There come voices from long-hidden birds. The smell of the soil is in the air. The sullen ice, retreating from open field and all sunny places, has slunk to the north of every fence and rock. The knolls and banks that face the east or south sigh for release, and begin to lift up a thousand tiny palms. 4. APRIL! The singing month. Many voices of many birds call for resurrection over the graves of flowers, and they come forth. Go see what they have lost. What have ice and snow and storm done unto them? How did they fall into the earth stripped and bare?— how do they come forth opening and glorified? Is it, then, so fearful a thing to lie in the grave? In its wild career, shaking and scourged of storms through its orbit, the earth has scattered away no treasures. The Hand that governs in April governed in January. You have not lost what God has only hidden. You lose nothing in struggle, in trial, in bitter distress. If called to shed thy joys as trees their leaves, if the affections be driven back into the heart as the life of flowers to their roots, yet be patient. Thou shalt lift up thy leaf-covered boughs again. Thou shalt shoot forth from thy roots new flowers. Be patient. Wait. When it is February, April is not far off. Secretly the plants love each other.

5. MAY! O flower-month! perfect the harvests of flowers; be not niggardly. Search out the cold and resentful nooks that refused the sun, casting back its rays from disdainful ice, and plant flowers

even there. There is goodness in the worst. There is warmth in the coldness. The silent, hopeful, unbreathing sun, that will not fret or despond, but carries a placid brow through the unwrinkled heavens, at length conquers the very rocks; and lichens grow, and inconspicuously blossom. What shall not Time do that carries in its

bosom Love?

6. JUNE! Rest! This is the year's bower. Sit down within it. Wipe from thy brow the toil. The elements are thy servants. The dews bring thee jewels. The winds bring perfume. The Earth shows thee all her treasure. The forests sing to thee. The air is all sweetness, as if all the angels of God had gone through it, bearing spices homeward. The storms are but as flocks of mighty birds that spread their wings, and sing in the high heaven. Speak to God now, and say, O Father! where art thou? and out of every flower and tree, and silver pool, and twined thicket, a voice will come, "God is

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in me." The earth cries to the heavens, "God is here!" and the heavens cry to the earth, "God is here! The sea claims him. The land hath him. His footsteps are upon the deep. He sitteth upon the circle of the earth. O sunny joys of the sunny month, yet soft and temperate, how soon will the eager months that come burning from the equator scorch you!

7. JULY! Rouse up! The temperate heats that filled the air are raging forward to glow and overfill the earth with hotness. Must it be thus in everything, that June shall rush toward August? Or is it not that there are deep and unreached places for whose sake the probing sun pierces down its glowing hands? There is a deeper work than June can perform. The Earth shall drink of the heat before she knows her nature or her strength. Then shall she bring forth to the uttermost the treasures of her bosom; for there are things hidden far down, and the deep things of life are not known till the fire reveals them.

8. AUGUST! Reign, thou fire-month! What canst thou do? Neither shalt thou destroy the earth, whom frosts and ice could not destroy. The vines droop, the trees stagger, the broad-palmed leaves give thee their moisture, and hang down; but every night the dew pities them. Yet there are flowers that look thee in the eye, fierce Sun, all day long, and wink not. joyful insects. If our unselfish

This is the rejoicing month for eye would behold it, it is the most populous and the happiest month. The herds plash in the sedge; fish

seek the deeper pools; forest fowl lead out their young; the air is resonant of insect orchestras, each one carrying his part in Nature's grand harmony. August, thou art the ripeness of the year! Thou art the glowing center of the circle !

9. SEPTEMBER! There are thoughts in thy heart of death. Thou art doing a secret work, and heaping up treasures for another year. The unborn infant-buds which thou art tending are more than all the living leaves. Thy robes are luxuriant, but worn with softened pride. More dear, less beautiful, than June, thou art the heart's month. Not till the heats of summer are gone, while all its growths remain, do we know the fullness of life. Thy hands are stretched out, and clasp the glowing palm of August and the fruit-smelling hand of October. Thou dividest them asunder, and art thyself molded of them both.

10. OCTOBER! Orchard of the year, bend thy boughs to the earth, redolent of glowing fruit! Ripened seeds shake in their pods. Apples drop in the stillest hours. Leaves begin to let go when no wind is out, and swing in long waverings to the earth, which they touch without sound, and lie looking up, till winds rake them, and heap them in fence-corners. When the gales come through the trees, the yellow leaves trail like sparks at night behind the flying engine. The woods are thinner, so that we can see the heavens plainer as we lie dreaming on the yet warm moss by the singing spring. The days are calm. The nights are tranquil. The Year's work is done. She walks in gorgeous apparel, looking upon her long labor; and her serene eye saith, "It is good."

11. NOVEMBER! Patient watcher, thou art asking to lay down thy tasks. Life to thee now is only a task accomplished. In the night-time thou liest down, and the messengers of winter deck thee with hoar-frosts for thy burial. The morning looks upon thy jewels, and they perish while it gazes. Wilt thou not come, O

December?

12. DECEMBER! Silently the month advances. There is nothing to destroy, but much to bury. Bury then, thou snow, that slumberously fallest through the still air, the hedge-rows of leaves! Muffle thy cold wool about the feet of shivering trees! Bury all that the year hath known! and let thy brilliant stars, that never shine as they do in thy frostiest nights, behold the work! But know, O month of destruction! that in thy constellation is set that Star, whose rising is