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SARCASM.

God be thanked, man's pride is greater than his ignorance, and what he wants in knowledge he supplies by sufficiency. When he has looked about him as far as he can, he concludes there is no more to be seen. When he is at the end of his line, he is at the bottom of the ocean. When he has shot his best, he is sure none ever did or ever can shoot better or beyond it. His own reason he holds to be the certain measure of truth, and his own knowledge of what is possible in nature.-Sir W. Temple.

BOLDNESS.

I am a Roman citizen-my name Mutius. My purpose was to kill an enemy. Nor am I less prepared to undergo the punishment than I was to perpetrate the deed. To do and to suffer bravely is a Roman's part. Neither am I the only person thus affected towards you; there is a long list of competitors for the same honour. If, therefore, you choose to confront the danger of selling your life every hour at hazard, prepare yourself—you will have the foe in the very porch of your palace. This is the kind of war that the Roman youth declare against you. You have nothing to fear in the field; the combat is against you alone, and every individual is your antagonist.-Livy.

ENERGETIC REMONSTRANCE.

You cannot, my lords, you cannot conquer America! What is your present situation there? We do not know the worst, but we know that in three campaigns we have done and suffered much. You may swell every expence, accumulate every assistance, and extend your traffic to the shambles of every German despot. Your attempts will be for ever vain and impotent-doubly so, indeed, from this mercenary aid on which you rely; for it irritates, to an incurable resentment, the minds of your adversaries to overrun them with the mercenary sons of rapine and plunder, devoting them and their possessions to the rapacity of hireling cruelty. If I were an American, as I am an Englishman, while a foreign troop was landed in my country, I never would lay down my arms. Never, never, never!-Earl of Chatham.

DECLAMATION.

These abominable principles, and this most abominable avowal of them, demand the most decisive indignation. I call upon that right-reverend, and this most learned bench, to vindicate the

religion of their God—to defend and support the justice of their country. I call upon the bishops to interpose the unsullied sanctity of their lawn; upon the judges, to interpose the purity of their ermine to save us from the pollution. I call upon the honour of your lordships to reverence the dignity of your ancestors, and to maintain your own. I call upon the spirit and humanity of my country to vindicate the national character.-Earl of Chatham.

NARRATIVE.

"

An old man and a little boy were driving an ass to the next market to sell. "What a fool is this fellow" said a man upon the road," to be trudging it on foot, with his son, that his ass may go light." The old man hearing this set his boy upon the ass and went whistling by the side of him. "Why," Sirrah, cries a second man to the boy, "is it fit for you to be riding while your poor old father is walking on foot?" The father, upon this rebuke, took down his son from the ass and mounted himself. "Do you see," said a third, "how the lazy old knave rides along upon his beast, while his poor little boy is almost crippled with walking?" The old man no sooner heard this than he took up his son behind him. "Pray, honest friend," said a fourth, "is that ass your own." "Yes," replied the man. "One would not have thought so," said the other, "by your loading him so unmercifully; you and your son are better able to carry the poor beast than he you." Anything to please," said the owner; and, alighting with his son, they tied the legs of the ass together, and by the help of a pole, endeavoured to carry him upon their shoulders over the bridge that led to the town. This was so entertaining a sight that the people ran in crowds to laugh at it; till the ass, conceiving a dislike to the over complaisance of his master, burst asunder the cords that tied him, slipped from the pole, and tumbled into the river. The poor old man made the best of his way home, ashamed and vexed, that by endeavouring to please everybody he had pleased nobody, and lost his ass into the bargain.

EXERCISES ON FORCE.

SUBDUED FORCE.

There is no breeze upon the fern,
No ripple on the lake;

Upon the eyre nods the erne,

The deer hath sought the brake.
The small birds will not sing aloud,
The springing trout lies still,

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So darkly glooms yon thunder cloud
That swathes, as with a purple shroud,
Benledi's distant hill.

There breathed no winds their crest to shake
Or wave their flags abroad;
Scarce the frail aspen seemed to quake
That shadowed o'er their road.
No cymbal clashed, no clarion rang,
Still were the pipe and drum :
Save heavy tread and armour clang,
Their sullen march was dumb.

RAISED FORCE.

THE LANDING OF THE PILGRIM FATHERS.*

The breaking waves dashed high

On a stern and rock-bound coast,
And the woods against a stormy sky
Their giant branches tossed.

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 drum,
And the trumpet that sings of fame.

Not as the flying come,

In silence and in fear;

They shook the depths of the desert gloom,
With their hymns of lofty cheer.

Amidst the storm they sung;

And the stars heard,-and the sea;

And the sounding isles of the dim wood rang,
To the anthem of the free.

*The Puritans, who had been driven by the intolerance of the times into Holland, resolved on seeking an asylum for themselves and their children on the shores of America. They landed in New England, December 22, 1620.

The ocean eagle soared

From his nest by the white waves' foam,
And the rocking pines of the forest roared :—
This was their welcome home.

And this was holy ground,

The soil where first they trod.

They have left unstained what there they found,—
FREEDOM TO WORSHIP GOD!

EXERCISES ON TONE.

MONOTONE.

Of man's first disobediencé, and the fruit

Of that forbidden tree whose mortal taste
Brought death into the world, and all our woe,
With loss of Eden; till one greater man

Restore us, and regain the blissful seat,

Sing, heavenly muse, that, on the secret top

Of Oreb or of Sinai, didst inspire

That shepherd who first taught the chosen seed,

In the beginning how the heavens and earth

Rose out of chàos,

Monotone, at the commencement of poetic descriptions, adds greatly to the dignity and grandeur of the objects described.

LOW AND SOLEMN.

THE BURIAL OF SIR JOHN MOORE.

Not a drum was heard, nor a funeral note,
As his corse to the ramparts we hurried;
Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot
O'er the grave where our hero was buried.

We buried him darkly at dead of night,
The sods with our bayonets turning,
By the struggling moon-beam's misty light,
And the lantern dimly burning.

No useless coffin confined his breast,

Nor in sheet, nor in shroud we bound him;
But he lay like a warrior taking his rest,
With his martial cloak around him.

Few and short were the prayers we said,
And we spoke not a word of sorrow;
And we stedfastly gazed on the face of the dead,
And bitterly thought of the morrow.

HIGH AND CHEERFUL.

But thou, oh Hope, with eyes so fair,
What was thy delighted measure?
Still it whispered promised pleasure,
And bade the lovely scenes at distance hail;
Still would her touch the strains prolong,-
And from the rocks, the woods, the vale,

She called on echo still through all her song;
And, above the sweetest theme she chose,

A soft responsive voice was heard at every close.

And Hope, enchanted, smiled, and waved her golden hair.

EXERCISES ON TIME.

SLOW.

The curfew tolls the knell of parting day;
The lowing herds wind slowly o'er the lea;
The ploughman homeward wends his weary way,
And leaves the world to darkness and to me.

Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight;
And all the air a solemn stillness holds,
Save where the beetle wheels his drony flight,
And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds.

Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade, Where heaves the turf in many a mould'ring heap, Each in his narrow cell for ever laid,

The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.

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