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He died among strangers; in a foreign land, without a kindred hand to close his eyes, yet he did not die unwept. With all his faults, and errors, and passions, and caprices, he had the gift of attaching his humble dependants warmly to him. One of them, a poor Greek, accompanied his remains to England, and followed them to the grave. I am told that, during the ceremony, he stood holding on by a pew in an agony of grief, and, when all was over, seemed as if he would have gone down into the tomb with the body of his master. A nature that could inspire such attachments must have been generous and beneficent. From "Newstead Abbey."

ADDRESS OF NICIAS TO HIS TROOPS.

THUCYDIDES.

ATHENIANS, I must remind you that you left behind you no more such ships in your docks, nor so fine a body of heavy-armed troops; and that, if anything else befall you but victory, your enemies here will immediately sail thither, and those of our countrymen who are left behind there will be unable to defend themselves against both their opponents on the spot and those who will join them; and thus, at the same time, you who are here will be at the mercy of the Syracusans (and you know with what feelings you came against them), and those who are there at home at that of the Lacedæmonians. Being brought then to this one struggle for both parties, fight bravely now, if you ever did; and reflect, both individually and collectively, that those of you who will now be on board your ships represent both the army and the navy of the Athenians, all that is left of your country, and the great name of Athens: in behalf of which, whatever be the point in which one man excels another, either in science or courage, on no other occasion could he better display it, so as both to benefit himself and to contribute to the preservation of all.

From "The Peloponnesian War."

COMMON THINGS IMPORTANT.

ROBERT C. WINTHROP

SCHOLARS must condescend to deal with common thoughts, with common words, with common topics;-or rather, they must learn to consider nothing as common or unclean which may contribute to the welfare of man, the safety of the republic, or the glory of God. It is theirs, by their efforts in the pulpit or at the bar, in the lecture-room, or the legislative hall, at the meetings of select societies, or at the grander gatherings of popular masses, in the columns of daily papers,

in the pages of periodical reviews or magazines, or through the scattered leaves of the occasional tract or pamphlet, to keep a strong, steady current of sound, rational, enlightened sentiment always in circulation through the community. Let them remember that false doctrines will not wait to be corrected by ponderous folios or cumbrous quartos. The thin pamphlet, the meagre tract, the occasional address, the weekly sermon, the daily leader, these are the great instruments of shaping and moulding the destinies of our country. In them, the scholarship of the country must manifest itself. In them, the patriotism of the country must exhibit itself. In them, the morality and religion of the country must assert itself. The word in season," that word of which Solomon understood the beauty and the value, when he likened it to apples of gold in pictures of silver, -it is that which is to arrest error, rebuke falsehood, confirm faith, kindle patriotism, commend morality and religion, purify public opinion, and preserve the State.

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From "Address before the Alumni of Harvard," 1852.

THE PHYSICIAN'S DUTY AND RESPONSIBILITY.

DR. J. W. FRANCIS.

Who that has kept vigils at the couch of genius, and marked the wayward flickerings of its sacred fire, made yet more ethereal by disease, or seen beauty grow almost supernatural in the embrace of pain, has not felt his mission to be holy as well as responsible? And when a voice that has thrilled millions is hushed, or a mind upon which rest the cares of a nation is prostrated, who has not realized how intimately the healing art is knit into the vast and complex web of human society? Let not that be thought a light office which summons us to minister, as apostles of science, to the greatest exigencies of life; to cheer the soul under the acute sufferings of maternity, and alleviate the decay of nature; to watch over the glimmering dawn and the fading twilight of existence; to stand beside the mother, whose sobs are hushed that the departure of her first-born may be undisturbed; and be oracles at the bedside of the revered minister of holy truth, the halo of whose piety softens, on his brow, the lines of mortal agony. What a mastery of self, what requisites, mental and corporeal, are demanded in him who is the observer of scenes like these, whose sympathies are awakened to services such as are befitting the mighty crisis, and whose talents are efficiently enlisted for the triumphant accomplishment of his devout trust! The advent of such an ambassador, when his calling is duly understood, must awaken the heart to its profoundest depths, and cannot be inoperative upon minds of intellectual and moral culture.

From "Discourse before the New York Academy of Medicine."

THE SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTE.

JOEL R. POINSETT.

A LIBERAL and enlightened Englishman, foreseeing the benefits which would result to science throughout the world, by its successful cultivation in the vast and extensive field offered by these states and territories, with enlarged views and praiseworthy philanthropy, has bequeathed a fund to be employed for the sacred purposes of increasing and diffusing knowledge among men. This bequest will enable the government to afford all necessary protection to the promotion of science and the useful arts, without the exercise of any doubtful power, by the application of the annual interest of this fund to the establishment of an observatory, the erection of suitable buildings to contain the collections, and for lecture-rooms, the purchase of books and instruments, and the salaries of professors and curators. Specimens of natural history are rapidly accumulating. The exploring expedition has already sent home a large collection, which remains packed away in boxes in a room belonging to the Philadelphia Museum, generously loaned by the company for that purpose; and we may anticipate from the ability and well-known zeal of the naturalists who accompanied it by order of government, that the squadron itself, shortly expected, will return richly freighted with objects of natural history.

From "A Discourse at Washington," 1840.

THE FIRST PREDICTED ECLIPSE.

O. M. MITCHEL.

To predict an eclipse of the sun, the astronomer must sweep forward, from new moon to new moon, until he finds some new moon which should occur, while the moon was in the act of crossing from one side to the other of the sun's track. This certainly was possible. He knew the exact period from new moon to new moon, and from one crossing of the ecliptic to another. With eager eye he seizes the moon's place in the heavens, and her age, and rapidly computes where she will be at her next change. He finds the new moon occurring far from the sun's track; he runs round another revolution; the place of the new moon falls closer to the sun's path, and the next yet closer, until, reaching forward with piercing intellectual vigor, he at last finds a new moon which occurs precisely at the computed time of her passage across the sun's track. Here he makes his stand, and on the day of the occurrence of that new moon, he announces to the startled inhabitants of the world that the sun shall expire in dark eclipse. Bold prediction!—Mysterious prophet! with what scorn must the unthinking` world have received this solemn declaration! How slowly do the moons

roll away, and with what intense anxiety does the stern philosopher await the coming of that day which should crown him with victory, or dash him to the ground in ruin and disgrace! Time to him moves on leaden wings; day after day, and at last hour after hour, roll heavily away. The last night is gone-the moon has disappeared from his eagle gaze in her approach to the sun, and the dawn of the eventful day breaks in beauty on a slumbering world.

This daring man, stern in his faith, climbs alone to his rocky home, and greets the sun as he rises and mounts the heavens, scattering brightness and glory in his path. Beneath him is spread out the populous city, already teeming with life and activity. The busy morning hum rises on the still air, and reaches the watching place of the solitary astronomer. The thousands below him, unconscious of his intense anxiety, buoyant with life, joyously pursue their rounds of business, their cycles of amusement. The sun slowly climbs the heavens, round and bright and full-orbed. The lone tenant of the mountain-top almost begins to waver in the sternness of his faith, as the morning hours roll away. But the time of his triumph, long delayed, at length begins to dawn; a pale and sickly hue creeps over the face of nature. The sun has reached his highest point, but his splendor is dimmed, his light is feeble. At last it comes!-Blackness is eating away his round dise, onward with slow but steady pace the dark veil moves, blacker than a thousand nights,-the gloom deepens,-the ghastly hue of death covers the universe,-the last ray is gone, and horror reigns. A wail of terror fills the murky air,-the clangor of brazen trumpets resounds,— an agony of despair dashes the stricken millions to the ground, while that lone man, erect on his rocky summit, with arms outstretched to heaven, pours forth the grateful gushings of his heart to God who had crowned his efforts with triumphant victory. Search the records of our race, and point me, if you can, to a scene more grand, more beautiful. It is to me the proudest victory that genius ever won. It was the conquering of nature, of ignorance, of superstition, of terror, all at a single blow, and that blow struck by a single arm. And now do you demand the name of this wonderful man? Alas! what a lesson of the instability of earthly fame are we taught in this simple recital. He who had raised himself immeasurably above his race,-who must have been regarded by his fellows as little less than a god, who had inscribed his fame on the very heavens, and had written it in the sun, with a "pen of iron, and the point of a diamond," even this one has perished from the earth-name, age, country, are all swept into oblivion, but his proud achievement stands. The monument reared to his honor stands, and although the touch of time has effaced the lettering of his name, it is powerless, and cannot destroy the fruits of his victory.

From "Planetary and Stellar Worlds."

KEPLER'S DISCOVERY OF THE THIRD LAW.

O. M. MITCHEL

GUIDED by some kind angel or spirit whose sympathy had been touched by the unwearied zeal of the mortal, Kepler returned to his former computations, and, with a heaving breast and throbbing heart, he detects the numerical error in his work, and commences anew. The square of Jupiter's period is to the square of Saturn's period as the cube of Jupiter's distance is to some fourth term, which Kepler hoped and prayed might prove to be the cube of Saturn's distance. With trembling hand, he sweeps through the maze of figures; the fourth term is obtained; he compares it with the cube of Saturn's distance. They are the same!-He could scarcely believe his own senses. He feared some demon mocked him. He ran over the work again and again he tried the proportion, the square of Jupiter's period to the square of Mars' period as the cube of Jupiter's distance to a fourth term, which he found to be the cube of the distance of Mars-till finally full conviction burst upon his mind: he had won the goal, the struggle of seventeen long years was ended, God was vindicated, and the philosopher, in the wild excitement of his glorious triumph, exclaims:

"Nothing holds me. I will indulge my sacred fury! If you forgive me, I rejoice; if you are angry, I can bear it. The die is cast. The book is written, to be read either now, or by posterity, I care not which. It may well wait a century for a reader, since God has waited six thousand years for an observer!"

More than two hundred years have rolled away since Kepler announced his great discoveries. Science has marched forward with swift and resistless energy. The secrets of the universe have been yielded up under the inquisitorial investigations of god-like intellect. The domain of the mind has been extended wider and wider. One planet after another has been added to our system; even the profound abyss which separates us from the fixed stars has been passed, and thousands of rolling suns have been descried swiftly flying or majestically sweeping through the thronged regions of space. But the laws of Kepler bind them all:-satellite and primary-planet and sun-sun and system, all with one accord proclaim, in silent majesty, the triumph of the hero philosopher.

From "Planetary and Stellar Worlds."

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