WHAT IS A MINORITY?

JOHN B. GOUGH

NOTE TO THE PUPIL.-John B. Gough was born in Kent, England, in 1817. He came to America in 1829, and while learning the trade of bookbinder in New York formed intemperate habits, and sunk to the lowest depths of poverty and wretchedness. About 1840 he was induced to sign the pledge. He became greatly interested in temperance reform, and soon distinguished himself as the most eloquent advocate of the cause. He was the most popular lecturer of

his time. He spoke nearly one hundred times on temperance in Exeter Hall, London. He died in 1886.

WHAT is a minority? The chosen heroes of this

earth have been in the minority. There is not a social, political, or religious privilege that you enjoy to-day that was not bought for you by the blood and tears and patient sufferings of the minority. It is the minority that have vindicated humanity in every struggle. It is the minority that have come out as iconoclasts to beat down the Dagons their fathers have worshiped, -the old abuses of society. It is the minority that have stood in the van of every moral conflict, and achieved all that is noble in the history of the world. You will find that each generation has been always busy in gathering up the scattered ashes of the martyred heroes of the past, to deposit them in the golden urn of a nation's history.

Look at Scotland, where they are erecting monuments -to whom? to the Covenanters. Ah, they were in a minority! Read their history, if you can, without the blood tingling in the tips of your fingers! Look at that girl, of whose innocent stratagem the legend has come down to us, and see how persecution sharpens the intel

lect as well as gives power to faith! She was going to the conventicle. She knew the penalty of that deed was death. She met a company of troopers. "My girl, where are you going?" She could not tell them a lie; she must tell the truth. It was death to go to that conventicle. To tell that she was going there was to reveal its place to these soldiers, and the lives of her friends were in her hands. "Let me go!" she said. "I am going to my father's house. My elder brother is dead and he has left a will, and I am in it; and it is to be read to-day." "Go, my girl," said he; "and I hope you will have something handsome." These were the minority that, through blood and tears and scourgings, -dyeing the waters with their blood, and staining the heather with their gore,— fought the glorious battle of religious freedom.

Minority if a man stand up for the right, though the right be on the scaffold, while the wrong sits in the seat of government; if he stand for the right, though he eat, with the right and truth, a wretched crust; if he walk with obloquy and scorn in the by-lanes and streets, while falsehood and wrong ruffle it in silken attire, let him remember that wherever the right and truth are, there are always "troops of beautiful, tall angels gathering round him, and God himself stands within the dim future, and keeps watch over his own. If a man stands for the right and the truth, though every man's finger be pointed at him, though every woman's lips be curled at him in scorn, he stands in a majority; for God and good angels are with him, and greater are they that are for him than all they that be against him!

THE WANTS OF MAN

JOHN QUINCY ADAMS

NOTE TO THE PUPIL. — John Quincy Adams was born at Quincy, Mass., in 1767. He early went to Europe with his father and attended school at Paris, Amsterdam, and Leyden. At the age of fourteen he went to St. Petersburg as private secretary and interpreter to Francis Dana, who had just been appointed Minister to Russia. This was the beginning of a public career that lasted, with few interruptions, fifty-four years. Minister to Netherlands, Russia, Prussia, and England, Commissioner to form the treaty of Ghent, State Senator, United States Senator, Secretary of State, President, and then for many years member of Congress, his was a career unequaled in this country, yet he was unpopular and died a disappointed man. He kept an elaborate diary, delivered addresses, published essays, and wrote some poetry.

With four choice cooks from France, beside,

To dress my dinner well.

What next I want, at princely cost,
Is elegant attire ;

Black sable furs for winter's frost,
And silks for summer's fire,

And Cashmere shawls, and Brussels lace

My bosom's front to deck,

And diamond rings my hands to grace, And rubies for my neck.

I want (who does not want?) a wife,
Affectionate and fair;

To solace all the woes of life,
And all its joys to share;
Of temper sweet, of yielding will,
Of firm yet placid mind;

With all my faults to love me still,
With sentiment refined.

And as Time's car incessant runs,
And Fortune fills my store,
I want of daughters and of sons
From eight to half a score.
I want (alas! can mortal dare
Such bliss on earth to crave ?)
That all the girls be chaste and fair,
The boys all wise and brave.

1 want a warm and faithful friend
To cheer the adverse hour;
Who ne'er to flattery will descend,
Nor bend the knee to power:

A friend to chide me when I'm wrong, My inmost soul to see ;

And that my friendship prove as strong For him, as his for me.

I want the seals of power and place,
The ensigns of command;
Charged by the people's unbought grace
To rule my native land.

Nor crown nor scepter would I ask
But from my country's will,
By day, by night, to ply the task,
Her cup of bliss to fill.

I want the voice of honest praise
To follow me behind,

And to be thought in future days
The friend of human kind,
That after ages as they rise,
Exulting may proclaim,

In choral union to the skies,

Their blessings on my name.

These are the Wants of mortal man,-
I cannot want them long,
For life itself is but a span,

And earthly bliss, a song.
My last great want, absorbing all,

Is, when beneath the sod,
And summoned to my final call,

The Mercy of my God.