labored in its hope. They sought to incorporate its principleswith the elements of their society, and to diffuse its influence through all their institutions, civil, political, and literary. Let us cherish these sentiments, and extend their influence still more widely; in the full conviction that that is the happiest society which partakes in the highest degree of the mild and peaceable spirit of Christianity.

The hours of this day are rapidly flying, and this occasion will soon be passed. Neither we nor our children can expect to behold its return. They are in the distant regions of futurity, they exist only in the all-creating power of God, who shall stand here, a hundred years hence, to trace, through us their descent from the Pilgrims, and to survey, as we have now surveyed, the progress of their country during the lapse of a century. We would anticipate their concurrence with us in our sentiments of deep regard for our common ancestors. We would anticipate and partake the pleasure with which they will then recount the steps of New England's advăncement. On the morning of that day, although it will not disturb us in our repose, the voice of acclamation and gratitude, commencing on the rock of Plymouth, shall be transmitted through millions of the sons of the Pilgrims, till it lose itself in the murmurs of the Pacific seas.

We would leave, for the consideration of those who shall then occupy our places, some proof that we hold the blessings transmitted from our fathers in just estimation; some proof of our attachment to the cause of good government, and of civil and religious liberty; some proof of a sincere and ardent desire to promote everything which may enlarge the understandings and improve the hearts of men. And when, from the long distance of a hundred years, they shall look back upon us, they shall know, at least, that we possessed affections, which, running backward, and warming with gratitude for what our ancestors have done for our happiness, run forward

a.so to our posterity, and meet them with cordial salutation, ere yet they have arrived on the shore of being.

Advance, then, ye future generations! We would hail you, as you rise in your long succession, to fill the places which we now fill, and to taste the blessings of existence where we are passing, and soon shall have passed, our human duration.

We bid you welcome to this pleasant land of the fathers. We bid you welcome to the healthful skies, and the verdant fields of New England. We greet your accession to the great inheritance which we have enjoyed. We welcome you to the blessings of good government, and religious liberty. We welcome you to the treasures of science and the delights of learning. We welcome you to the transcendent sweets of domestic life, to the happiness of kindred, and parents, and children. We welcome you to the immeasurable blessings of rational existence, the immortal hope of Christianity, and the light of everlasting Truth!

LESSON XLIII.

The Land of Dreams. -W. C. BRYANT.
A MIGHTY realm is the Land of Dreams,
With steeps that hang in the twilight sky,
And weltering oceans and trailing streams
That gleam where the dusky valleys lie.
But over its shadowy border flow

Sweet rays from the world of endless morn,
And the nearer mountains catch the glow,
And flowers in the nearer fields are born.

The souls of the happy dead repair,

From their bowers of light, to that bordering land,

And walk in the fainter glory there,

With the souls of the living, hand in hand.

One calm sweet smile in that shadowy sphere,

From eyes that open on earth no more

One warning word from a voice once dear

How they rise in the memory o'er and o'er!
Far off from those hills that shine with day,
And fields that bloom in the heavenly gales,
The Land of Dreams goes stretching away
To dimmer mountains and darker vales.
There lie the chambers of guilty delight,
There walk the spectres of guilty fear,
And soft, low voices that float through the night
Are whispering sin in the helpless ear.
Dear maid, in thy girlhood's opening flower,
Scarce weaned from the love of childish play!
The tears on whose cheeks are but the shower
That freshens the early blooms of May!
Thine eyes are closed, and over thy brow
Pass thoughtful shadows and joyous gleams,
And I know, by the moving lips, that now
Thy spirit strays in the Land of Dreams.
Light-hearted maiden, O, heed thy feet!
O keep where that beam of Paradise falls;
And only wander where thou may'st meet
The blesséd ones from its shining walls.
So shalt thou come from the Land of Dreams,
With love and peace to this world of strife;
And the light that over that border streams
Shall lie on the path of thy daily life.

LESSON XLIV.

Nature and Poetry favorable to Virtue. - Humility recommended in judging of the Ways of Providence. — BEATTIE.

O NATURE, how in every charm supreme!

Whose votaries feast on raptures ever new 1

O for the voice and fire of seraphim,

To sing thy glories with devotion due'

Blest be the day I scaped the wrangling crew
From Pyrrho's maze and Epicurus' sty;

And held high converse with the godlike few,
Who, to the enraptured heart, and ear, and eye,
Teach beauty, virtue, truth, and love, and melody.
Then hail, ye mighty masters of the lay,

Nature's true sons, the friends of man and truth;
Whose song, sublimely sweet, serenely gay,
Amused my childhood, and informed my youth.
O let your spirits still my bosom soothe,

Inspire my dreams and my wild wanderings guide:
Your voice each rugged path of life can smooth;
For well I know, wherever ye reside,

There harmony, and peace, and innocence abide.

Ah me! neglected on the lonesome plain,
As yet poor Edwin never knew your lore,
Save when, against the winter's drenching rain,
And driving snow, the cottage shut the door;
Then, as instructed by tradition hoar,
Her legend when the beldame 'gan impart,
Or chant the old heroic ditty o'er,

Wonder and joy ran thrilling to his heart:
Much he the tale admired, but more the tuneful art.

Various and strange was the long-winded tale;
And halls, and knights, and feats of arms displayed;

Or

merry swains who quaff the nut-brown ale,

And sing, enamored of the nut-brown maid:

The moonlight revel of the fairy glade;

Or hags that suckle an infernal brood,
And ply in caves the unutterable trade,*

Allusion to Shakspeare.

"Macbeth.-How now, ye secret, black, and midnight hags, What is 't ye do?

Witches. A deed without a name."

MACBETH. [ACT IV. Scene I.

'Midst fiends and spectres, quench the moon in blood, Yell in the midnight storm, or ride the infuriate flood.

But when to horror his amazement rose,

A gentler strain the beldame would rehearse,
A tale of rural life, a tale of woes,

The orphan-babes, and guardian uncle fierce.
O cruel! will no pang of pity pierce

That heart, by lust of lucre seared to stone?

For sure, if aught of virtue last, or verse,
To latest times shall tender souls bemoan

Those hopeless orphan babes, by thy fell arts undone.

Behold, with berries smeared, with brambles torn,*
The babes now famished, lay them down to die:
Amidst the howl of darksome woods forlorn,

Folded in one another's arms they lie;

Nor friend nor stranger hears their dying cry; "For from the town the man returns no more."

But thou, who Heaven's just vengeance dar'st defy, This deed, with fruitless tears, shalt soon deplore, When Death lays waste thy house, and flames consume thy

store.

A stifled smile of stern, vindictive joy
Brightened one moment Edwin's starting tear;
"But why should gold man's feeble mind decoy,
And innocence thus die by doom severe ?
O Edwin! while thy heart is yet sincere,
The assaults of discontent and doubt repel :
Dark, even at noontide, is our mortal sphere;
But, let us hope; to doubt is to rebel;
Let us exult in hope, that all shall yet be well

See the fine old ballad, called The Children in the Wood.