bler classes, possess; this eminent person is presented to our observation clothed in attributes as modest, as unpretending, as little calculated to strike or to astonish, as if he had passed unknown through some secluded region of private life. But he had a judgment sure and sound; a steadiness of mind which never suffered any passion, or even any feeling to ruffle its calm; a strength of understanding which worked rather than forced its way through all obstacles—removing or avoiding rather than overleaping

hem.

If profound sagacity, unshaken steadiness of purpose, the entire subjugation of all the passions which carry havoc through ordinary minds, and oftentimes lay waste the fairest prospects of greatness-nay, the discipline of those feelings which are wont to lull or to seduce genius, and to mar and to cloud over the aspect of virtue herself— joined with, or rather leading to the most absolute self-denial, the most habitual and exclusive devotion to principle -if these things can constitute a great character, without either quickness of apprehension, or resources of information, or inventive powers, or any brilliant quality that might dazzle the vulgar-then surely Washington was the greatest man that ever lived in this world uninspired by Divine wisdom, and unsustained by supernatural virtue.

His courage, whether in battle or in council, was as perfect as might be expected from this pure and steady temper of soul. A perfect just man, with a thoroughly firm resolution never to be misled by others, any more than to be by others overawed; never to be seduced or betrayed, or hurried away by his own weaknesses or self-delusions, any more than by other men's arts; nor ever to be disheartened by the most complicated difficulties, any more than to be spoilt on the giddy heights of fortune-such was this great man-great, pre-eminently great, whether we regard him sustaining alone the whole weight of campaigns all but desperate, or gloriously terminating a just warfare by his resources and his courage-presiding over the jarring elements of his political council, alike deaf to the storms of all extremes or directing the formation of a new government for a great people, the first time that so vast an experiment had ever been tried by man-or finally retiring from the supreme power to which his virtue had

raised him over the nation he had created, and whose destinies he had guided as long as his aid was required—retiring with the veneration of all parties, of all nations, of all mankind, in order that the rights of men might be conserved, and that his example never might be appealed to by vulgar tyrants.

This is the consummate glory of Washington; a triumphant warrior where the most sanguine had a right to despair; a successful ruler in all the difficulties of a course wholly untried; but a warrior, whose sword only left its sheath when the first law of our nature commanded it to be drawn; and a ruler who, having tasted of supreme power, gently and unostentatiously desired that the cup might pass from him, nor would suffer more to wet his lips than the most solemn and sacred duty to his country and his God required!

To his latest breath did this great patriot maintain the noble character of a captain the patron of peace, and a statesman the friend of justice. Dying, he bequeathed to his heirs the sword which he had worn in the war for liberty, and charged them "Never to take it from the scabbard but in self-defence, or in defence of their country and her freedom ;" and commanded them, that "when it should thus be drawn, they should never sheath it nor ever give it up, but prefer falling with it in their hands to the relinquishment thereof"-words, the majesty and simple eloquence of which are not surpassed in the oratory of Athens and Rome.

It will be the duty of the historian and the sage in all ages to let no occasion pass of commemorating this illustrious man; and, until time shall be no more, will a test of the progress which our race has made in wisdom and in virtue be derived from the veneration paid to the immortal name of WASHINGTON!

LESSON XIV.

Washington's Monument.-ANONYMOUS.
Few columns rose when Rome was free,
To mark her patriots' last repose;

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When she outlived her liberty,

The Emp'rors' mausoleums rose; And Trajan's shaft was reared at last, When freedom from the Tiber pass'd. "Better than Trajan," lowly lies,

By broad Potomac's silent shore, Hallowing the green declivities With glory now and evermore. Art to his fame no aid hath lentHis country is his monument.

LESSON XV.

Corn Fields.-MARY HOWITT.

In the young merry time of spring,
When clover 'gins to burst,
When blue-bells nod within the wood,
And sweet May whitens first;
When merle and mavis sing their fill,
Green is the young corn on the hill.
But when the merry spring is past,
And summer groweth bold,
And in the garden and the field
A thousand flowers unfold,
Before a green leaf yet is sere,
The young corn shoots into the ear.

But, then, as day and night succeed,
And summer weareth on,
And in the flowery garden beds
The red rose groweth wan,
And hollyhock and sunflower tall
O'ertop the mossy garden-wall:-

When on the breath of autumn breeze,
From pastures dry and brown,
Goes floating, like an idle thought,
The fair, white thistle-down:
O, then, what joy to walk at will,
Upon that golden harvest-hill!

What joy in dreamy ease to lie

Amid a field new-shorn:

And see all round, on sun-lit slopes,
The piled-up shocks of corn,
And send the fancy wandering o'er
All pleasant harvest-fields of yore!
I feel the day; I see the field;
The quivering of the leaves;
And good old Jacob and his house
Binding the yellow sheaves;
And, at this very hour, I seem
To be with Joseph in his dream.
I see the fields of Bethlehem,
And reapers many a one,
Bending unto their sickles' stroke,
And Boaz looking on ;
And Ruth, the Moabitess fair,
Among the gleaners, stooping there.

Again I see a little child,

His mother's sole delight; God's living gift of love unto

The kind, good Shunamite;
To mortal pangs I see him yield,
And the lad bear him from the field.

The sun-bathed quiet of the hills,
The fields of Galilee,

That, eighteen hundred years ago,
Were full of corn, I see;

And the dear Saviour take his way
'Mid ripe ears on the Sabbath-day.

O golden fields of bending corn,
How beautiful they seem!

The reaper-folk, the piled-up sheaves,
To me are like a dream:

The sunshine and the very air

Seem of old time, and take me there!

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LESSON XVI.

Abou Ben Adhem.-LEIGH HUNT.

ABOU Ben Adhem (may his tribe increase!)
Awoke one night from a deep dream of peace,
And saw within the moonlight of his room,
Making it rich and like a lily in bloom,
An angel writing in a book of gold.
Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold,
And, to the presence in the room, he said,

"What writest thou?" The vision raised its head,
And, with a look, made of all sweet accord,

Answered, “The names of those who love the Lord!"
"And is mine one?" asked Abou-"Nay, not so,"
Replied the angel. Abou spake more low,
But cheerily still; and said "I pray thee, then,
Write me as one that loves his fellow-men."
The angel wrote and vanished. The next night
It came again, with a great wakening light,

And showed the names whom love of God had blest;
And lo! Ben Adhem's name led all the rest!

LESSON XVII.

Eloquence and Logic. From an Eulogy on H. S. Legaré, of South Carolina.-W. C. PREston.

OUR popular institutions demand a talent for speaking, and create a taste for it. Liberty and eloquence are united in all ages. Where the sovereign power is found in the public mind and the public heart, eloquence is the obvious approach to it. Power and honour, and all that can attract ardent and aspiring natures, attend it. The noblest instinct is to propagate the spirit, "to make our mind the mind of other men," and wield the sceptre in the realms of passion. Smitten with the love, he devoted himself to the culture of eloquence, from his boyhood. He was by nature endowed