5. The Sun rejoicing round the earth, announced
Daily the wisdom, power, and love of God.
The Moon awoke, and from her maiden face,
Shedding her cloudy locks, looked meekly forth,
And with her virgin stars walked in the heavens,
Walked nightly there, conversing as she walked,
Of purity, and holiness, and God.

6. In dreams and visions, Sleep instructed much..
Day uttered speech to day, and night to night
Taught knowledge: silence had a tongue: the grave,
The darkness, and the lonely waste, had each
A tongue that ever said-"Man! think of God!
Think of thyself! think of eternity!"

Fear God, the thunders said; fear God, the waves;
Fear God, the lightning of the storm replied;
Fear God, deep loudly answered back to deep."

LESSON XXXIX.

EXPLANATORY NOTES.-1. HERALDRY is the art or practice of recording genealogies, and blazoning or displaying arms.

2. CHAUCER was the first great English author. He died in the year 1400. He is distinctly known as the "Father of English poetry."

3. POPE was one of the first poets of the eighteenth century.

4. The PANTHEON was a magnificent temple at Rome. dedicated to all the gods. It was built 30 years before Christ, by Agrippa, in the reign of Augustus. It was converted into a Christian temple in the year 609, and it still remains in almost a perfect state of preservation. It contains one immense circular hall, crowned with a lofty dome, and lighted from above. 5. UTOPIAN is a word derived from Utopia, a name signifying no place or an imaginary place. Hence, Utopian means fanciful.

AMERICAN HISTORY.

GULIAN C. VERPLANCK.

[From a Discourse before the New York Historical Society.]

1. THE study of the history of most other nations, fills the mind with sentiments, not unlike those which the American traveler feels, on entering the venerable and lofty cathedral of some proud old city of Europe. Its solemn grandeur, its vastness, its obscurity, strike awe to his heart. From the richly

painted windows, filled with sacred emblems and strange antique forms, a dim religious light falls around. A thousand recollections of romance, poetry, and legendary story, come thronging in upon him. He is surrounded by the tombs of the mighty dead, rich with the labors of ancient art, and emblazoned with the pomp of heraldry.'

2. What names does he read upon them? Those of princes and nobles who are now remembered only for their vices; and of sovereigns, at whose death no tears were shed, and whose memories lived not an hour in the affection of their people. There, too, he sees other names, long familiar to him for their guilty or ambiguous fame. There rest the blood-stained soldier of fortune, the orator who was ever the ready apologist of tyranny,—great scholars who were the pensioned flatterers of power,—and poets who profaned the high gift of genius, to pamper the vices of a corrupted court.

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3. Our own history, on the contrary, like that poetical temple of fame, reared by the imagination of CHAUCER,' and decorated by the taste of POPE, is almost exclusively dedicated to the memory of the truly great. Or rather, like the Pantheon of Rome, it stands in calm and severe beauty amid the ruins of ancient magnificence, and "the toys of modern state." Within, no idle ornament encumbers its simplicity. The pure light of heaven enters from above, and sheds an equal and serene radiance around. As the eye wanders about its extent, it beholds the unadorned monuments of brave and good men who have bled or toiled for their country, or it rests on votive tablets inscribed with the names of the best benefactors of mankind.

4. "Patriots are here, in Freedom's battle slain;

Priests, whose long lives were closed without a stain;
Bards worthy him who breathed the poet's mind;

Founders of arts that dignify mankind;

And lovers of our race, whose labors gave

Their names a memory that defies the grave."

5. If Europe has hitherto been willfully blind to the value of our example and the exploits of our sagacity, courage, inven

tion, and freedom, the blame must rest with her, and not with America. Is it nothing for the universal good of mankind to have carried into successful operation a system of self-government, uniting personal liberty, freedom of opinion, and equality of rights, with national power and dignity, such as had before existed only in the Utopian dreams of Philosophers? Is it nothing in moral science, to have anticipated in sober reality, numerous plans of reform in civil and criminal jurisprudence, which are, but now, received as plausible theories by the politicians and economists of Europe?

6. Is it nothing to have been able to call forth on every emergency, either in war or peace, a body of talents always equal to the difficulty? Is it nothing to have, in less than a half century, exceedingly improved the sciences of political economy, of law, and of medicine, with all their auxiliary branches; to have enriched human knowledge by the accumulation of a great mass of useful facts and observations, and to have augmented the power and the comforts of civilized man, by miracles of mechanical invention? Is it nothing to have given the world examples of disinterested patriotism, of political wisdom, of public virtue,-of learning, eloquence, and valor, never exerted, save for some praiseworthy end?

7. LAND OF LIBERTY! thy children have no cause to blush for thee. What though the arts have reared few monuments among us, and scarce a trace of the Muse's footstep is found in the paths of our forests, or along the banks of our rivers; yet our soil has been consecrated by the blood of heroes, and by great and holy deeds of peace. Its wide extent has become one vast temple and hallowed asylum, sanctified by the prayers and blessings of the persecuted of every sect, and the wretched of all nations.

8. LAND OF REFUGE! LAND OF BENEDICTIONS! Those prayers still arise, and they still are heard: "May peace be within thy walls, and plenteousness within thy palaces!" "May there be no decay, nor leading into captivity, and no complaining in thy streets!” May truth flourish out of the earth, and righteousness look down from heaven!"

LESSON XL.

AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE.

A. B. STREET.

1. HAI to the planting of Liberty's tree!
Hail to the charter declaring us free!
Millions of voices are chanting its praises,

Millions of worshipers bend at its shrine,
Wherever the sun of America blazes,

Wherever the stars of our bright banner shine.
2. Sing to the heroes who breasted the flood
That, swelling, rolled o'er them—a deluge of blood.
Fearless they clung to the ark of the nation,

And dashed on mid lightning, and thunder, and blast,
Till Peace, like the dove, brought her branch of salvation,
And Liberty's mount was their refuge at last.

3. Bright is the beautiful land of our birth,

The home of the homeless all over the earth.
Oh! let us ever with fondest devotion,

The freedom our fathers bequeathed us, watch o'er,
Till the Angel shall stand on the earth and the ocean,
And shout mid earth's ruins, that Time is no more.

LESSON XLI.

CONTEMPLATION OF THE STARRY HEAVENS.

THOMAS DICK.

1. THE starry heavens present, even to the untutored observer, a sublime and elevating spectacle. He beholds an immense concave hemisphere, surrounding the earth in every region, and resting, as it were, upon the circle of the horizon. Wherever he roams abroad, on the surface of the land or of the ocean, this celestial vault still appears encompassing the world; and after traveling thousands of miles, it seems to make no nearer an approach than when the journey commenced.

2. From every quarter of this mighty arch, numerous lights are displayed, moving onward in solemn silence, and calculated

to inspire admiration and awe. Even the rudest savages have been struck with admiration at the view of the nocturnal heavens, and have regarded the celestial luminaries either as the residences of their gods, or the arbiters of their future destinies. But to minds enlightened with the discoveries of science and revelation, the firmament presents a scene incomparably more magnificent and august.

3. Its concave rises toward immensity, and stretches, on every hand, to regions immeasurable by finite intelligence; it opens to the view a glimpse of orbs of inconceivable magnitude and grandeur, and arranged in multitudes which no man can number, which have diffused their radiance on the earth during hundreds of generations; it opens a vista which carries our views into the regions of INFINITY, and exhibits a sensible display of the immensity of space, and of the boundless operations of OMNIPOTENCE.

4. It demonstrates the existence of an eternal and incomprehensible Divinity, who presides, in all the grandeur of His attributes, over an unlimited empire; it overwhelms the contemplative mind with a display of the riches of His wisdom and the glories of His OMNIPOTENCE; it directs our prospects to the regions of other worlds, where myriads of intelligences, of various orders, experience the effects of divine love and beneficence.

5. Amidst the silence and the solitude of the midnight scene, it inspires the soul with a solemn awe, and with reverential emotions; it excites admiration, astonishment, and wonder in every reflecting mind, and has a tendency to enkindle the fire of devotion, and to raise the affections to that ineffable Being who presides in high authority over all its movements.

6. While contemplating, with the eye of intelligence, this immeasurable expanse, it teaches us the littleness of man, and of all that earthly pomp and splendor, of which he is so proud; it shows us that this world, with all its furniture and decora tions, is but an almost invisible speck on the great map of the universe; and that our thoughts and affections ought to soar above all its sinful pursuits and its transitory enjoyments.