5 10 15 At noon, she hies to a cool retreat, Where bowering elms over waters meet; She dimples the wave, where the green leaves dip; When her tremulous bosom would hide in vain, At eve, she hangs o'er the western sky LESSON XCIX.-EDUCATION OF FEMALES.-JOSEPH STORY. If Christianity may be said to have given a permanent elevation to woman, as an intellectual and moral being, it is as true, that the present age, above all others, has given play to her genius, and taught us to reverence its influ5 ence. It was the fashion of other times to treat the literary acquirements of the sex, as starched pedantry, or vain pretension; to stigmatize them as inconsistent with those domestic affections and virtues, which constitute the charm of society. We had abundant homilies read upon their 10 amiable weaknesses and sentimental delicacy, upon their timid gentleness and submissive dependence; as if to taste the fruit of knowledge were a deadly sin, and ignorance were the sole guardian of innocence. Their whole lives were "sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought;" and 15 concealment of intellectual power was often resorted to, to escape the dangerous imputation of masculine strength. In the higher walks of life, the satirist was not without color for the suggestion, that it was "A youth of folly, an old age of cards;" 20 and that, elsewhere, "most women had no character at all," beyond that of purity and devotion to their families. Admirable as are these qualities, it seemed an abuse of the gifts of Providence, to deny to mothers the power of instructing their children, to wives the privilege of sharing the intellectual pursuits of their husbands, to sisters and 5 daughters the delight of ministering knowledge in the fireside circle, to youth and beauty the charm of refined sense, to age and infirmity the consolation of studies which elevate the soul, and gladden the listless hours of despondency. 10 These things have, in a great measure, passed away. The prejudices, which dishonored the sex, have yielded to the influence of truth. By slow, but sure advances, education has extended itself through all ranks of female society. There is no longer any dread, lest the culture of 15 science should foster that masculine boldness, or restless independence, which alarms by its sallies, or wounds by its inconsistencies. We have seen that here, as everywhere else, knowledge is favorable to human virtue and human happiness; that the refinement of literature 20 adds lustre to the devotion of piety; that true learning, like true taste, is modest and unostentatious; that grace of manners receives a higher polish from the discipline of the schools; that cultivated genius sheds a cheering light over domestic duties, and its very sparkles, like 25 those of the diamond, attest at once its power and its purity. There is not a rank of female society, however high, which does not now pay homage to literature, or that would not blush, even at the suspicion of that ignorance, which, a 30 half century ago, was neither uncommon, nor discreditable. There is not a parent, whose pride may not glow at the thought, that his daughter's happiness is, in a great measure, within her own command, whether she keeps the cool, sequestered vale of life, or visits the busy walks of 35 fashion. A new path is thus opened for female exertion, to alleviate the pressure of misfortune, without any supposed sacrifice of dignity, or modesty. Man no longer aspires to an exclusive dominion in authorship. He has rivals, or 40 allies, in almost every department of knowledge; and they are to be found among those, whose elegance of manners, and blamelessness of life, command his respect, as much as their talents excite his admiration. LESSON C.-THE VOICES OF THE DEAD.-ORVILLE DEWEY. The world is filled with the voices of the dead. They speak, not from the public records of the great world only, but from the private history of our own experience. They speak to us, in a thousand remembrances, in a thousand 5 incidents, events, associations. They speak to us, not only from their silent graves, but from the throng of life. Though they are invisible, yet life is filled with their presence. They are with us, by the silent fireside, and in the seclu10 ded chamber: they are with us, in the paths of society, and in the crowded assembly of men. They speak to us, from the lonely way-side; and they speak to us, from the venerable walls that echo to the steps of a multitude, and to the voice of prayer. Go, where we will, the dead are with 15 us. We live, we converse, with those, who once lived and conversed with us. Their well remembered tone mingles with the whispering breezes, with the sound of the falling leaf, with the jubilee shout of the spring-time. The earth is filled with their shadowy train. 20 But there are more substantial expressions of the presence of the dead, with the living. The earth is filled with the labors, the works, of the dead. Almost all the literature in the world, the discoveries of science, the glories of art, the ever-during temples, the dwelling-places of 25 generations, the comforts and improvements of life, the languages, the maxims, the opinions, of the living, the very frame-work of society, the institutions of nations, the fabrics of empire,—all are the works of the dead: by these, they who are dead, yet speak. LESSON CI.-THE JEWISH REVELATION.-DR. NOYES. The peculiar religious character of the Psalms, which distinguishes them from the productions of other nations of antiquity, is well worthy of the attention of such as are disposed to doubt the reality of the Jewish revelation. 5 I do not refer to the prophetic character, which some of them are supposed to possess, but to the comparative purity and fervor of religious feeling, which they manifest; the sublimity and justness of the views of the Deity, and of his government of the world, which they present; and the clear perception of a spiritual good, infinitely to be preferred to any external possession, which is found in them. Let them be considered, as the expression and fruit of the principles of the Jewish religion, as they existed 5 in the minds of pious Israelites, and do they not bear delightful testimony to the reality of the successive revelations, alleged to have been made to the Hebrew nation, and of the peculiar relation which the Most High is said to have sustained towards them? 10 Let the unbeliever compare the productions of the Hebrew poets, with those of the most enlightened periods of Grecian literature. Let him explain, how it happened, that in the most celebrated cities of antiquity, which human reason had adorned with the most splendid trophies of art, 15 whose architecture it is now thought high praise to imitate well, whose sculpture almost gave life to marble, whose poetry has never been surpassed, and whose eloquence has never been equalled, a religion prevailed, so absurd and frivolous, as to be beneath the contempt of a child, at the 20 present day; while in an obscure corner of the world, in a nation in some respects imperfectly civilized, were breathed forth those strains of devotion, which now animate the hearts of millions, and are the vehicle of their feelings to the throne of God. Let him say, if there be not some 25 ground for the conclusion, that whilst the corner-stone of the heathen systems of religion, was unassisted human reason, that of the Jewish was an immediate revelation from the Father of lights. LESSON CII.-INCITEMENTS TO AMERICAN INTELLECT. G. S. HILLARD. The motives to intellectual action, press upon us with peculiar force, in our country, because the connection is here so immediate between character and happiness, and because there is nothing between us and ruin, but 6 intelligence which sees the right, and virtue which pur sues it. There are such elements of hope and fear, mingled in the great experiment which is here trying, the results are so momentous to humanity, that all the voices of the past 10 and the future, seem to blend in one sound of warning and entreaty, addressing itself, not only to the general, but to the individual ear. By the wrecks of shattered states, by the quenched lights of promise, that once shone upon man, by the long deferred hopes of humanity, by all that has 5 been done and suffered, in the cause of liberty, by the martyrs that died before the sight, by the exiles, whose hearts have been crushed in dumb despair, by the memory of our fathers and their blood in our veins,-it calls upon us, each and all, to be faithful to the trust which God has 10 committed to our hands. That fine natures should here feel their energies palsied by the cold touch of indifference, that they should turn to Westminster Abbey, or the Alps, or the Vatican, to quicken their flagging pulses, is, of all mental anomalies, 15 the most inexplicable. The danger would seem to be rather, that the spring of a sensitive mind may be broken by the weight of obligation that rests upon it, and that the stimulant, by its very excess, may become a narcotic. The poet must not plead his delicacy of organization, as 20 an excuse, for dwelling apart in trim gardens of leisure, and looking at the world only through the loop-holes of his retreat. Let him fling himself, with gallant heart, upon the stirring life, that heaves and foams around him. He must call home his imagination from those spots, on 25 which the light of other days has thrown its pensive charm, and be content to dwell among his own people. The future and the present must inspire him, and not the past. He must transfer, to his pictures, the glow of morning, and not the hues of sunset. He must not go to any 30 foreign Pharphar, or Abana, for the sweet influences which he may find in that familiar stream, on whose banks he has played as a child, and mused as a man. Let him dedicate his powers to the best interests of his country. Let him sow the seeds of beauty along that 35 dusty road, where humanity toils and sweats in the sun. Let him spur the baseness which ministers food to the passions which blot out, in man's soul, the image of God. Let not his hands add one seductive charm to the unzoned form of pleasure, nor twine the roses of his genius around 40 the reveller's wine-cup. Let him mingle with his verse those grave and high elements befitting him, around whom the air of freedom blows, and upon whom the light of heaven shines. Let him teach those stern virtues of selfcontrol and self-renunciation, of faith and patience, of |