And, as his imagination kindles at the retrospect, he is transported back to the interesting moment; he counts the fearful odds of the contending hosts; his interest for the result overwhelms him; he trembles as if it were still uncertain, and seems to doubt whether he may consider Socrates and Plato, Demosthenes, Sophocles, and Phidias as secure, yet, to himself and to the world.

"If we conquer," said the Athenian commander, on the morning of that decisive day,-" If we conquer, we shall make Athens the greatest city of Greece." A prophecy how well fulfilled! "if God prosper us," might have been the more appropriate language of our fathers, when they landed upon this rock, if God prosper us, we shall here begin a work that shall last for ages; we shall plant here a new society, in the principles of the fullest liberty, and the purest religion; we shall subdue this wilderness which is before us; we shall fill this region of the great continent, which stretches almost from pole to pole, with civilization and Christianity; the temples of the true God shall rise where now ascends the smoke of idolatrous sacrifice; fields and gardens, the flowers of summer, and the waving and golden harvests of autumn, shall extend over a thousand hills, and stretch along a thousand valleys, never yet, since the creation, reclaimed to the use of civilized man.

We shall whiten this coast with the canvass of a prosperous commerce; we shall stud the long and winding shore with a hundred cities. That which we sow in weakness shall be raised in strength. From our sincere, but houseless worship, there shall spring splendid temples to record God's goodness; from the simplicity of our social union, there shall arise wise and politic constitutions of government, full of the liberty which we ourselves bring and breathe; from our zeal for learning, institutions shall spring, which shall scatter the light of knowledge throughout the land, and, in time, paying back what they have borrowed, shall contribute their part to the great aggregate of human knowledge; and our descendants, through all generations, shall look back to this spot, and this hour, with unabated affection and regard.”

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LESSON XLVI.

Obligations to the Pilgrims.-WHELPLEY.

LET us go back to the rock, where the Pilgrims first stood, and look abroad upon this wide and happy land, so full of their lineal or adopted sons, and repeat the question, to whom do we owe it, that "the wilderness has thus been turned into a fruitful field, and the desert has become as the garden of the Lord ?" To whom do we owe it, under an all-wise Providence, that this nation, so miraculously born, is now contributing with such effect to the welfare of the human family, by aiding the march of mental and moral improvement, and giving an example to the nations of what it is to be pious, intelligent, and free?

To whom do we owe it, that with us the great ends of the social compact are accomplished to a degree of perfection never before realized; that the union of public power and private liberty is here exhibited in a harmony so singular and perfect, as to allow the might of political combination to rest upon the basis of individual virtue, and to call into exercise, by the very freedom which such a union gives, all the powers that contribute to national prosperity?

To whom do we owe it, that the pure and powerful light of the gospel is now shed abroad over these countries, and is rapidly gaining upon the darkness of the western world; that the importance of religion to the temporal welfare of men, and to the permanence of wise institutions is here beginning to be felt in its just measure;—that the influence of a divine revelation is not here, as in almost every other section of christendom, wrested to purposes of worldly ambition ;-that the holy Bible is not sealed from the eyes of those for whom it was intended;-and the best charities and noblest powers of the soul degraded by the terrors of a dark and artful superstition?

To whom do we owe it, that in this favoured land the gospel of the grace of God has best displayed its power to bless humanity, by uniting the anticipations of a better world with the highest interests and pursuits of this ;—

by carrying its merciful influence into the very business and bosoms of men ;-by making the ignorant wise and the miserable happy;-by breaking the fetters of the slave, and teaching "the babe and the suckling" those simple and sublime truths, which give to life its dignity and virtue, and fill immortality with hope?

To whom do owe all this? Doubtless to the Plymouth Pilgrims!-Happily did one of those fearless exiles exclaim, in view of all that was past, and of the blessing, and honour, and glory that was yet to come, "God hath sifted three kingdoms, that he might gather the choice grain, and plant it in the wilderness !"

LESSON XLVII.

Song of the Pilgrims.-UPHAM.

THE breeze has swelled the whitening sail,
The blue waves curl beneath the gale,
And, bounding with the wave and wind,
We leave Old England's shores behind :-
Leave behind our native shore,
Homes, and all we loved before.

The deep may dash, the winds may blow,
The storm spread out its wings of wo,
Till sailors' eyes can see a shroud,
Hung in the folds of every cloud;
Still, as long as life shall last,

From that shore we'll speed us fast.

For we would rather never be,
Than dwell where mind cannot be free,
But bows beneath a despot's rod
Even where it seeks to worship God.
Blasts of heaven, onward sweep!
Bear us o'er the troubled deep!

O, see what wonders meet our eyes!
Another land, and other skies!

Columbian hills have met our view!
Adieu! Old England's shores, adieu!
Here, at length, our feet shall rest,
Hearts be free, and homes be blest.

As long as yonder firs shall spread
Their green arms o'er the mountain's head,-
As long as yonder cliffs shall stand,
Where join the ocean and the land,—
Shall those cliffs and mountains be
Proud retreats for liberty.

Now to the King of kings we'll raise
The pæan loud of sacred praise,

More loud than sounds the swelling breeze,
More loud than speak the rolling seas!
Happier lands have met our view!
England's shores, adieu! adieu!

LESSON XLVIII.

The Landing of the Pilgrim Fathers.--MRS. HEMANS.

THE breaking waves dash'd high
On a stern and rock-bound coast,
And the woods against a stormy sky,
Their giant branches toss'd;

And the heavy night, hung dark,

The hills and waters o'er,

When a band of Exiles moor'd their bark
On the wild New-England shore.

Not as the Conqueror comes,

They, the true-hearted, came;

Not with the roll of the stirring drums,-
And the trumpet that sings of Fame :-

Not as the Flying come,

In silence and in fear :

They shook the depths of the desert's gloom,
With their hymns of lofty cheer!

Amidst the storm they sang;

And the stars heard, and the sea;

And the sounding aisles of the dim woods rang

To the Anthem of the Free!

The ocean Eagle soar'd

From his nest by the white waves' foam, And the rocking pines of the forest roar'd :This was their welcome home!

There were men with hoary hair,
Amidst that Pilgrim band :-
Why had they come to wither there,
Away from their childhood's land?

There was woman's fearless eye,
Lit by her deep love's truth;
There was manhood's brow serenely high,
And the fiery heart of youth.

What sought they thus afar?
Bright jewels of the mine?

The wealth of seas? the spoils of war?
They sought for Faith's pure shrine !

Aye! call it holy ground,

The soil where first they trod !

They have left unstain'd what there they found,
Freedom to worship God!

LESSON XLIX.

The Safe Side of the Hedge.-TRENTON EMPORIUM.

You have often heard old people talk of "Keeping on the safe side of the Hedge." It is one of the old-fashioned maxims, long known and but little understood or practised in the world. Our good Schoolmaster used some